(urth) Father Inire Theory cont.

[Gerry Quinn]

From: "Lee Berman" <severiansola at hotmail.com>

> As a man of faith, I think Gene Wolfe rewards those moments of gestalt, 
> holistic insight in his books
> and punishes those who rely on logical detective work and conscious 
> assemblages of evidence. LIke the
> optical illusion, one is rewarded with a stunning revelation and doubled 
> vision, while the other is
> punished with a singular, simplistic vision only of a young, pretty woman.

Certainly those who fail to see these holistic patterns are punished; they 
will miss certain insights.  But those fail  to apply logic and weigh 
evidence are punished equally - they are doomed to wander endlessly in a 
maze of random associations that exist more in their heads than in the 
works.  Perhaps it is not such a punishment; they may prefer such an 
existence.  But if they set themselves up as guides, they should not be 
surprised if those who attempt to follow them become restless after a time, 
begin to question where they are going, point out that they seem to have 
passed this place before but going in the opposite direction, etc.

In short, one needs to apply both modes of thought to make progress.  Both 
sides of the brain, as some would say.

You mischaracterise me as relying only on logic, because my criticisms of 
the interpretational schemes put forward recently by you and James have been 
logically based.  This, it seems to me, is not because my thought processes 
are skewed towards logic, but because yours and James, at least in the way 
they have been applied here, pay insufficient heed to it.

Does Gene Wolfe include puzzles in his stories, clues to which may be found 
in a variety of forms, sometimes subtle, for example barely mentioned events 
or allusions?  Certainly.

Is therefore every train of association launched from something that might 
or might not be such a clue an equally valid interpretation?  I do not think 
so.

To understand a Wolfe novel (insofar as that may be possible) we must employ 
both intuition and reason.  To abandon one of the two is to walk on one leg.

> And that's just for a simple drawing. Wolfe's work is much harder to 
> translate. IMHO the thing
> to remember is that the best Wolfe insights are not the product of 
> arguments. They are VISIONS. The evidence is consciously collected to 
> support the vision later, but it is the vision which comes first.

Fine - but isn't it equally important to examine the evidence that 
supposedly supports the vision, and even consider evidence that contradicts 
it?

> Part of the process involves Wolfe's demand for a leap of faith. The first 
> leap to take is accepting that
> pretty much every one of his stories will contain a complete paradigm 
> shift which is even more masked and
> disguised than the one in 5HoC. Another is that Gene wolfe is just smarter 
> than anyone in his audience, at
> least in the realm of puzzle making/solving. So, when I see signs that 
> someone else has gotten a gestalt
> vision that completely shifts perception of a Wolfe story I pay attention. 
> They might be a delusional,
> misled, misinformed psychotic inventing things from their own head. But 
> they might onto something. I am not
> the smartest WOlfe fan but I can admit that. I don't want to be stubborn 
> and petty and vain and risk being
> left out, missing the reward/old crone my smarter compatriots are willing 
> to share with me.

I pay attention too.  I even attempt to determine whether the vision is 
sound or not.  That, in fact, is exactly what you're criticising me for, 
though you attempt to dress it up otherwise!

- Gerry Quinn