(urth) GUT's and so on

[Jeff Wilson]

On 9/6/2010 2:50 AM, Lee Berman wrote:
>
>> Jeff Wilson- The "Country of Friends" is almost certainly a reference to Texas,
>> named after the the indigenous word for "friends". Texas is quadruply appropriate
>> as the boyhood home state of Gene Wolfe.
>
> I like this explanation pretty well. Also, the state motto of Texas is "Friendship",
> based on the Caddo word.
>
> Philadelphia seems a longer shot- its name most commonly translated as "brotherly
> love" but as the center of the "Quaker" religion the preferred name of which is "The
> Religious Society of Friends".
>
> Moreover, Texas is more like a "Land" while Philly is more like an urban jungle. 		 	   		

Texas is referred to as "the land of friends" in another Wolfe story of 
the period, "Feather Tigers", which also features alien inheritors and 
vanished races and colonialism.

-- 
Jeff Wilson - jwilson at io.com
Computational Intelligence Laboratory - Texas A&M Texarkana
< http://www.tamut.edu/CIL >