(urth) traveling north

[brunians at brunians.org]

In the centuries before the Ottomans took Byzantium, they were behaving as
they later behaved in reference to Vienna.

People were concerned.

.


> The Ottomans laid siege to Vienna three times over centuries, each time
> failing to capture the city. They did however take Constantinople and
> never gave it up. Note that Nessus is based on Byzantium, so the enemy
> would have to be Turks anyway.
>
> But additionally Turks therefore are the Saracens of the Renaissance and
> represent the eternal Orientalist European "Invader from the East," but
> with an implacable and bureaucratic flavor rather than a wild, animal-like
> flavor (like the Mongols on their ponies). Take that to the nth degree and
> you might get something like the Ascians.
>
> Nessus and the Commonwealth have a very obvious Middle-earth-like
> mentality regarding the geography of Urth. (See the classic New Yorker
> cover about the view of the world from Manhattan for a modern version.)
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 2
> Date: Sun, 06 Jun 2010 01:57:23 +0100
> From: Jane Delawney <jane_delawney at sky.com>
> To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net>
> Subject: Re: (urth) traveling north
> Message-ID: <4C0AF273.7070303 at sky.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
>
> First of all many many apologies if I have started a hare and then not
> been around to follow it up. it is a classic troll tactic and I am not a
> troll (although stating you are not is also a classic tactic of course,
> right now I know I can't win). Instead color me guilty of not thinking
> (ie. that I was on 3 12 hour shifts immediately following my last post)
> before posting. Will try very hard not to do this again.
>
> Second: many many thanks to all those who have responded. I see that my
> 15 years out of the fandom have resulted in some serious lacunae in my
> knowledge; I had not previously been aware of Gene Wolfe's statements on
> the issue of north/south on Urth and also of the identity of the Ascians.
>
> [As an aside though - I wonder very much now why Wolfe initially
> identifies the Ascians as his 'equivalent of the Turks'. Turks of what
> era? I'm guessing ancient, warlike, sweeping across the plains Turks,
> not the inhabitants of the modern land of Turkey who are not well known
> for Ascian-like behavior.
>
> The real  puzzle for me in this identification however is their evident
> totalitarian mentality, how this relates to the Turks of any era I am
> not sure.]
>
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