(urth) PF review
thalassocrat at nym.hush.com
thalassocrat at nym.hush.com
Sat Dec 1 04:26:21 PST 2007
On Sat, 01 Dec 2007 09:22:18 +1100 paul witcover <gdeonn at yahoo.com>
wrote:
>
> All excellent questions, many of which I continue to puzzle
>over! I've been a little disappointed by the critical reception
>of this novel so far -- the majority view seems to be that it's a
>light-hearted romp, just pure fun, without any of the weightier
>issues normally present in his work. It's baffling to me that the
>book could be so significantly misapprehended.
In fact, isn't it quite clear that Chris is a monster? He sins,
wilfully and in complete knowledge of what he is doing. Even when
he is given a chance to undo his sinful acts, he rejects it, and
instead uses the opportunity to try to ensure he will sin in the
same way, again. His confession is worse than worthless.
Look: the whole story is supposed to be a kind of confession. No
matter how you look at it, there is at least one thing for which he
definitely needs the premium-level forgiveness package: the killing
of Michet. Assume that everything else can be marked down to
circumstances, battle, bad luck, youth, whatever. He killed Michet
when Michet was offering him reconciliation, while he was
effectively unarmed, and solely to preserve his respect as captain.
The Michet killing triggers the whole "confession".
He comes back from the past. He can, perhaps, undo Michet. Whether
or not he can actually alter the future/past, he has an obvious
moral obligation to try to do so. But he wilfully chooses not to
try. He does not go to visit himself in Jersey. He obviously plans
to act exactly as Ignacio did during his "own" youth, and do
everything to ensure that "Chris1" follows exactly the same
trajectory as "he" did, so he can take over Novia when "Chris1"
goes back to the future.
He is going to ensure that his youthful self sins in exactly the
same way, so his older self can benefit. He preys not only on
others, but also on his own youth.
I think Chris is perhaps the most unambiguously evil character
Wolfe has presented in a novel. I find it breathtaking.
"Sometimes I have had to slip." Maybe, sometimes, but when he came
back to the future he had a miraculous chance to try to undo the
slips - and he rejected it.
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