(urth) The mystery of the image of an astronaut cleaned byRudesind
James Wynn
crushtv at gmail.com
Wed Jul 7 21:46:06 PDT 2010
For the record, I don't give a hoot about Rudesind and only a little
bit about Fechin. Whatever Inire is, is fine with me. But what I don't
like is cheap shots. And that is what this post is about for me.
> say, Rudesind is Inire. And I'm asking 'and now what?'. And I'm not
getting an answer.
Actually, I have answered you. I've explained that the question cannot
be answered. I've made a request of you: Replaced "Rudesind is Inire"
with "Doras is Severian's grandmother" and answer the same question. The
answer is the same in both instances. You've dodged this challenge
repeatedly.
>"It couldn't work because..." is all but
>impossible - especially when all contrary evidence can be just
ignored, as
>in this Rudesind/Inire case - and "Here's something else that fits that
>pattern...." is essentially gratis.
It's not ignored. When someone proffers a theory, he feels obliged to
ride it until it breaks down. It's just how it works. And just because
someone posits an explanation that is shown to be problematic does not
mean there is nothing there. Putting it out there and taking the beating
over it is part of the game. But sitting on your backside and drawling
"I don't see it" is about as offensive a response as I've seen. And I
see it every time someone pieces together an argument.
>Patterns come by the dozens. In books as rich in detail as Wolfe's you
can
>get patterns out of anything. It's futile. You think you're clever
because
>you've found a pattern, when in fact the hard thing is not to find them.
This POV is lazy. And it's not even true. Not even close to true. Wolfe
does not say the same thing over and over or reference the same physical
trait over and over for no point. You more of his stories and you'll see
that's true.
Nor is it true that solid patterns are hard not find. Wolfe's problem is
in the other direction. He doesn't leave nearly ENOUGH clues. His work
often tends to appear to be randomly lackadaisical until you read it a
second time or talk to someone about it. And then you find out it was a
different story from the one you thought you were reading.
And *no one* who enjoys reading Wolfe thinks reading him verrry
carefully and then taking a conclusive leap is futile. Well, it's rare
anyway. I don't care what anyone says. Pick the most textually rigorous
person on this list. If he's been here long that person has proffered
wild, even bizarre, explanations at times based on the thinnest of
evidence. You'll do it too, Antonio. Textual rigor is important. Priding
yourself on it is arrogant and lacking in any self-awareness.
>In short, I don't think everything in a book should serve some
>purpose within that book. But reader speculation must, because
>with all the stuff that Wolfe left lying there to toy with, if you don't
>set some standard, then you can go on indefinitely at random.
There is no objective standard. This standard itself is purely
subjective. But that's not the problem with it in practice. The problem
with this standard you've laid down is that it is simultaneously
"know-nothing" and presumptive. It's presumptive, in practice, because
it declares that everything in the story of significance is already
known. Which is ridiculous. It was only a few years ago that someone
pretty convincingly argued that the tunnels Severian walks through to
reach Valeria move through Time. It's know-nothing because it declares
anything one doesn't know already must not be important since, after
all, we've got along alright without it until now.
When you agree with someone's theory, it seems to have all kinds of
"speculative significance". When you don't or (more often) when the
explanation is above your head, it seems pointless.
It's not as though I've never seen this standard before. It's an easy
trump card someone pulls out whenever laying out a detailed rebuttal
seems too hard, but not saying anything at all seems harder.
u+16b9
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