(urth) Wolfe being clear on 5HoC

[Tony Ellis]

bsharp wrote:
>But I can respect anyone who prefers the sanctity of the words
>and the sacred bond that forms between reader and author when
>someone reads a story. 

I think you're reading too much into what I've said. I don't believe in
'the sanctity of the words', or any sacred bond between reader and
author.

You seem to be talking primarily about understanding Wolfe's fiction in
the artistic sense - what the stories *mean*, and in that respect I have
no problem with looking outside the stories themselves. My favourite
long poem in the world is Basil Bunting's autobiographical Briggflatts,
and I know that reading about the poet's life gave me an invaluable
insight into it.

But, Wolfe isn't just writing works of art. He's also writing stories
with lots of mysteries and puzzles in them, which we are intended to
solve, and a lot of our time on the list is spent trying to do so. And
in this case I do believe that our solutions to these puzzles should
come from the story itself. Not because the words are in some way
sanctified, but simply because that's where Wolfe has put the clues.