(urth) Babbie

John Watkins john.watkins04 at gmail.com
Thu Mar 19 08:11:47 PDT 2009


On Thu, Mar 19, 2009 at 10:43 AM, David Stockhoff <dstockhoff at verizon.net>wrote:

> I forget the name of the character, but I recall that the farthest-down
> "deity" is pretty clearly identified with the farthest-up.


The Most Low God does claim to be the Most High God.  But he's lying--the
text is fairly clear (given that it's Wolfe) on the point.


> His/her dealings with Abel thus parallel Abaia's undines' dealings with
> Severian. There are wars and rebellions, but they resemble Vodalus'
> rebellion against the State but which did not necessarily oppose the
> Autarch. If these creatures' offers are temptations, they are also tests.
>
> In other words, it's far more complex than simple oppositional dualism.
> Falling into error doesn't doom one's soul and make one a social outcast,
> as the Devil giggles and snorts with glee, as in the Victorian or Protestant
> German imagination. So perhaps Wolfean characters do in fact treat with the
> devil all the time, but he is surely an aspect of the divine and thus not
> really the devil. Or something like that.
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Thu, 19 Mar 2009 09:54:30 -0400
> From: John Watkins <john.watkins04 at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: (urth) Babbie
> To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net>
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> On Thu, Mar 19, 2009 at 7:43 AM, David Stockhoff <dstockhoff at verizon.net
> >wrote:
>
>
> >
>> > Thus, even the dead ends are not really "dead" just as the gods and
>> their
>> > myths are not really "false," and since the "traps and snares" I
>> referred to
>> > (Milton) are always set by the Devil, who apparently has no presence in
>> > Wolfe (or if he does he works for the Increate), they don't exist. It's
>> an
>> > interesting contrast with Protestantism---and Satan-obsessed
>> Catholicism?
>> >
>> > I think the Devil does exist in Wolfe's work.  He's portrayed pretty
>>
>>
> directly in Wizard Knight, for example, and I'm not sure we're supposed to
> think that there's anything redeemable about the Squid God and his ilk.
>
> That said, I do think that Wolfe flirts with the Origenism we see in George
> MacDonald and, to a lesser extent, C.S. Lewis.
>
>
>
>
> >
>> > ------------------------------
>>
>
>
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