From: m.driussi@genie.com
Subject: (whorl) The Usual Can Of Worms
Date: Sun, 15 Jun 97 17:38:00 GMT


[Posted from WHORL, the mailing list for Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun]

Reply:  Item #7331328 from WHORL@LISTS.BEST.COM@INTERNET#

alga,

Thanks for that interview with Hartwell!  Yikes, it is interview city
for Gene Wolfe--on Friday he was slated to be interviewed by a
newspaper reporter.

Re: the answer train.  Now I get to abandon all that speculation on
goddesses of Love & War ("Lovin' War"?  Puns on "Whore Goddess/War
Goddess"?  Cupid's bow and arrow--eh--much deadlier in the hands of
his mother . . . ) by a sort of clean fiat: after all, "Love is as
love does."

But yeah, ambiguity: if Q is all for planetfall (another Infocom
title!), then what has he been doing to promote exodus for the last
thirty years?  Even if we grant as true the theory that the planetfall
gods lost in the big war, even then Q seems to be acting to preserve
status quo, albeit a kinder and gentler (no human sacrifice) version.

The Pike's ghost is less ambiguous--it removes machines, putting the
ball back in your court of physical fakery (Quetzal, or another
vampire, for example).  Or another miracle.  (Pike's ghost arrives
after Mucor as sorta succubus and the flying bat . . . which leads
to . . . )

Pike as father of Blood.  He was a candidate, sure.  But as a
solution he offers unique problems.  Succubi and incubi come to mind.
No, that's overly complicated (even though it might fit the pattern
of "Patera scratches talisman; Patera is visited by vampire
temptress"--like Kypris, there's more to battling devils than just
the fisticuffs, don'cha know).  Easier to assume that Pike knowingly
had sinful whoopie (no visions for you, padre . . . unless . . . say,
you don't suppose that like Silk, Pike got enlightened right after
whoopie?) with a woman whom he may or may not have known was Maytera
Rose.  (That is, if he =did= know, then he subsequently never knew that
she was pregnant.)

We'll try at least one more train load.  In a week or so.  I have to
go back and see who just missed the last train . . . I'll post a list
of passengers and parcels in a while.

=mantis=