(urth) AEG - borrowings

Jordon Flato jordonflato at gmail.com
Wed Apr 15 09:14:06 PDT 2009


The Invisibles is great.

On Wed, Apr 15, 2009 at 12:00 AM, Allan Anderson <rubel at goosemoon.org>wrote:

> I was going to postpone commenting on this for a couple of days while I
> finish the book, but I can't help myself.
>
> So far, I'm thinking that any and all "borrowings" fit nicely into An Evil
> Guest's nature as a sort of tribute piece, a stylistic pastiche. Maybe no
> one thinks anyone would care about a implicit literary reference. I'm
> delighted to hear about these connections you've discovered! When I read
> "Gideon Chase", I thought of the character "Gideon Stargrave" (aka King Mob)
> from the comic book series The Invisibles. He's another horror/sf writer who
> becomes more than that profession might seem. But it's very possible that
> Grant Morrison referred to Mo's novel in his own choice of names: what makes
> The Invisibles relevant, I think, is the books' conscious blending of genre,
> reality, and fiction. It's an unique story, but also very much a borrowed
> patchwork shirt. And pulpy stories of the type AEG seems to want a family
> relationship with, well, they have always dipped a range of  sources. So
> it's completely appropriate, to my mind.
>
> But here's my question: at the cast party, someone tells Cassie she looks
> like she's seen a banshee. Aren't Banshees often seen washing bloody
> clothing, as a death omen? Is that the mountain's laundress?
>
> Okay, I'll shut up and get back to reading.
>
>
> On Apr 12, 2009, at 12:02 PM, Stephen Hoy wrote:
>
>  Fernando Gouvea recently noted a curious coincidence between Wolfe's
>> 'Peace'
>> (1975) and Bartis's 'Tranquility' (2001), each work sharing a central
>> character named Weer. Gouvea also noted certain stylistic similarities,
>> enough to make us wonder about the extent of the parallels. Let's take a
>> look at a couple of similar items in AEG, and see if we can detect the
>> existence of an invisible line between literary theft and literary
>> allusion.
>>
>> While reading An Evil Guest, I noticed that the character Gideon Chase
>> shares a name with a central character in Timothy Mo's historical novel,
>> 'An
>> Insular Possession' (1987). This might be a curious coincidence. It also
>> might be intentional. It's impossible to know with any certainty without
>> asking the author (and perhaps not even then).
>>
>> Suppose that it's not a coincidence. Suppose Wolfe read 'An Insular
>> Possession' some years ago, and suppose that when he invented the
>> character
>> of the wizard, he chose the name Gideon Chase as a reflection of some
>> aspect
>> of this character, intentionally reinforcing the idea of Chase as a figure
>> bridging the gap between the two cultures colliding in AEG. Is there
>> anything wrong with that?
>> Let's take another case: the trembling mountain and the laundress. As Marc
>> Aramini pointed out in October, Wolfe reviewed a work with a similar
>> motif,
>> Cory Doctorow's 'Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town' (2005). After
>> reading both works, it's hard to believe that Wolfe was not
>> self-consciously
>> referring to Doctorow's mountain & washing machine, and, further, that
>> Wolfe
>> fully realized Doctorow or any reader of 'Someone Comes to Town, Someone
>> Leaves Town' would recognize the motif in AEG. Is there anything wrong
>> with
>> that?
>>
>> To each of the above, I'd venture a guess that there's nothing wrong with
>> either act, but I have very different reasons for each guess.
>>
>> In the case of the name Gideon Chase, it's not clear that Wolfe borrowed
>> from Mo. Assuming there is a conscious borrowing, there are very few
>> similarities between the two characters. Personally, I doubt that readers
>> familiar with both works would suspect Wolfe chose the name as a conscious
>> reflection of Mo's character, but the possibility exists.
>>
>> In the case of the mountain and laundress, it's possible Doctorow and
>> Wolfe
>> each borrowed from a common source, perhaps some work transcribing
>> Algonquin
>> legends. It's also possible Wolfe asked Doctorow's permission to use the
>> idea--although one might expect to see a word or two about it in AEG or
>> perhaps even in an interview about AEG.
>>
>> But assume Wolfe borrowed these two things without explicit advance
>> permission, somehow slipping them past the legal team at his publisher.
>> But
>> is this any different from Wolfe's explicit use of a Baskin-Robbins in an
>> early chapter? Does anyone imagine that either Mo or Doctorow would object
>> to Wolfe's particular use as they appear in AEG?
>>
>>
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