(urth) Tracking Song and The Call of the Wild

[Roy C. Lackey]

Again, contradictory thoughts, but I can't seem to help it.

Matthew Groves quoted and wrote:
>> Since Cutthroat is clearly not native to the planet and came to be there
>by way of the beings on the Sleigh, is he the same type of being as they or
>is he not?
>
>I think he is not. I think Cutthroat is a man like us.

Then our views of this story are further apart than I thought. We agree that
Cutthroat is not the same type of being as those who are responsible for the
Sleigh, but I think there has to be a dog in his family tree, just as there
is a lion in Ketin's and a wolf in Longknife's.

> Remember Master
>Malrubius's analogy somewhere in TbotNS (I think before they leave Nessus)
>about Man's relationship to the Increate being of the same nature as
>Triskele's relationship to Severian? I think this is how we are to
>understand TS. In terms of CotW, Cutthroat's relationship to the Great
>Sleigh is analogous to Buck's relationship to John Thornton. I think there
>may be other Sleigh dogs like Cutthroat, but I think there are also
Mushers,
>or at least a Musher. The Sleigh dogs are men; the Mushers are, in some
>sense, divine.

Why divine? Where is the evidence?

Terms like "man" and "men" are used loosely in TS and, depending on who is
using them, mean different things. Each of the beastmen tribes seems to
refer to members of its own species as men, but members of different types
of tribes are fair game (pun intended), because it is less clear whether
they regard the other types of beastmen as also being "men" on a
more-or-less equal moral footing or not.

Longknife flat-out stated that Cutthroat was *not* a man, and all but stated
explicitly that Nashhwonk and all the other talking species were "animals".
His use of the word "man", in context, clearly extends only to members of
the wolfmen. Their *tribal* law mandates that the tribe not kill and eat its
own kind, but that law is superceded by the law of survival, which requires
that, if food becomes scarce enough, Crookedleg will be killed and eaten
because he is the weakest member and cannot prevent it. That was the threat
Cutthroat faced if he stayed with the wolfmen; he was not a man of their
species and could therefore be killed and eaten even before Crookedleg, if
circumstances demanded it.

Of course, there is always something else to muddy the water. One of the
other wolfmen told Cutthroat there were "Many men and women, all dressed
like you." on the Sleigh. Obviously, he is not using "men" in the same sense
as Longknife.

Nashhwonk left human footprints, and Cutthroat spoke of him as a man.
Cutthroat said to him, "I don't hunt people. I thought we were after an
animal." Cutthroat was ashamed of having hunted him, and he saw the body
dismembered. If there was any telltale mark of a beast about Nashhwonk, I
find no mention of it. Even his great size relative to the wolfmen seems to
be in the same proportion as a human to a wolf.

More mud. Nashhwonk said he was called Mankiller. He said the legs of his
chair (how many animals use chairs?) were bound with sinews cut from a man's
leg. He makes it absolutely clear that he does not regard the wolfmen as the
same kind of being that provided the sinews. So which species provided the
sinews if it wasn't his own?

Eggseeker said, "We knew you were from the Great Sleigh by your dress and
your face -- like all of them, you look much like the Wiggikki, but we see
you are not cruel, as they are." Note the "all of them". Everyone from the
Sleigh that Eggseeker's people saw looked like Cutthroat, and Cutthroat
looked much like the wolfmen, only less savage. Nice doggie. No "Mushers" in
sight moralizing or showing video of the planet's idyllic future.

Still, who is the "you" Cutthroat addresses in the recorder/transmitter, and
why will that entity not communicate with him?

I am tempted to suggest that the cutoff in communication (intended to last
for, say, fourteen days) was punishment for some minor infraction (say, the
equivalent of a dog peeing in the house), only the punishment had unintended
consequences. ["If you're going to act like a dog, see how you like being
treated like a dog." Later: "Oh, you poor thing! Let's see if I can make it
all better."] This is essentially a religious argument, from the perspective
of those who hold that being cut off from God is its own Hell. But this
suggestion fits Matthew G.'s position rather than mine, so forget it. <g>

I just don't see any evidence in TS that any great crime was committed by
Cutthroat that got him expelled from the Sleigh. I don't see any evidence of
divinity associated with the Sleigh, unless it is that winged man at the end
of the story. And I'm not even sure the winged man has anything to do with
the Sleigh. The winged man is definitely not the "you" addressed by
Cutthroat; indeed, Cutthroat seems never to have seen such a creature
before.

Returning to the CotW angle; by the time Buck encountered John Thornton he
had already turned his back on men. Only his fear of what men had done and
could do to him again kept him in his place. Buck would have died but for
Thornton's interference and ministrations. Even back in sunny California,
though Buck had never been abused, neither had he been treated with any
particular regard. It's only natural that he came to "love" Thornton, the
only man who ever treated him so well. But in Buck's experience, Thornton
was a fluke, and even he was killed by other men.

The irony of the situation is that, had Buck never come to "love" a man, he
would never have become a man killer. Was Cutthroat ever in an analogous
situation with someone on the Great Sleigh, the "you" he remembered at the
end? Or is that carrying the analogy too far?

Or is it indeed just a "lost dog" story, as someone once suggested? There
was no crime, no punishment. Crewman Cutthroat became separated by some
mischance from the Sleigh and, like a real dog or small child, lacked the
intellectual capacity to fully understand his situation. The psychological
trauma of being what he can understand only as abandoned caused his amnesia.
He started chasing the Sleigh, like a silly dog, got distracted by other
animals and had adventures, got hurt and laid himself down to die. The
Sleigh, having completed its mission and having heard reports of him, comes
hurrying to find him, but is probably too late. And the winged man turns out
to be just a carrion eater, or else an angel come to collect his human soul,
depending on one's religious preference.

Why did the "you" on the other end of the transmitter -- if there was anyone
there at all -- not speak to him? I don't know (and I may not be the first
to say this; can't remember), but it may have something to do with Man
having lost the ability to speak and understand the language of the animals.
The various tribes of animals all spoke the same language, but the person on
the other end of the transmitter, if he were a true man, might not have
understood Cutthroat's plight until it was translated for him by another
crewman. The true man (or men) may have stayed out of sight in the "big hut"
on the Sleigh.

But that's reaching.

-Roy