From: "Alice K. Turner" <aturner3@nyc.rr.com>
Subject: Re: Digest whorl.v012.n175
Date: Tue, 25 Dec 2001 20:20:08 -0500

Marc wrote:

> Please forgive me if this post repeats older material and rips off
anyone's
> ideas.  The computer I am working on now is so painfully slow that to
review
> the archives would take a million years.  As I was re-reading the Book of
the
> Short Sun, it struck me that the individual events that make up the text
> involve female spys working to subvert peace and order.  In the first
book,
> I'm sure we've discussed how Evensong (Chota) was probably a spy for Han,
> since she was upset when called the Man of Han's woman, and then tried to
find
> all about the inhuma when the narrator escaped with her (after she got a
"boat
> for a single spy").  Fava and Mora where spies, and in Return to the Whorl
the
> dream the narrator has in Chapter 4 involves Spider, the spy catcher,
saying
> that it's all dirt, and has Fava and Mora pointing down at Hyacinth,
obviously
> implicated as a spy at this point due to her lesbian relationship on the
> Triviguante Ship in Exodus from the Long Sun.  These females form a long
line
> of spies that permeate the text.  I think the most important distinction
to
> make is whether or not Seawrack is a spy for the Mother.  In On Blue's
Waters,
> Horn posits the "main riddle" that the Mother may desire Seawrack to
mingle
> with mankind to be a better lure, a more effective bait, or something
equally
> sinister.
> If all these spy subplots point to Seawrack as a spy (and the name
Evensong
> sailing in a boat with the narrator tends to evoke images of Seawrack),
then
> perhaps Silk's departure at the end of the Book of the Short Sun is a real
> sacrifice: he bites the bullet, takes the spy with him to remove her from
the
> Mother's employment permanently, thus destroying the Mother's eyes in the
> world and blinding her, as he reversed the blindness of Pig and Maytera
> Marble.  (Vision is a big part of the Book, too.) Silk steals the siren
and
> saves the world from the evil machinations of Mother, a victory for men
> everywhere and a fine answer to "fair young girls live to deceive you, sad
> experience teaches me."
> Once again, I have no idea how much of this has been discussed before
since I
> didn't read the books until the discussion had gone in a very different
> direction and have been grossly negligent in reviewing the archives.

No, this has not been discussed, and even if it had, please don't apologize.
We are glad to welcome you. I'm interested in this subject because of my own
elaborate (and only somewhat joky) spy deconstruction involving Dr. Crane as
the kingpin of an enormous set-up in BotLS. Please give us more of your
take--it seems quite plausible, and I like the use of the song.

Alice