(urth) Gummed-Up Works or Got Lives?
Gerry Quinn
gerry at bindweed.com
Sat Dec 17 15:54:56 PST 2011
From: David Stockhoff
On 12/16/2011 9:02 AM, Gerry Quinn wrote:
> > However, it has no obvious magical or even “magical” powers; the only
> > time we might ascribe such things to it is when Baldander’s energy
> > mace is shattered (as is the sword) in striking it. The only
> > fairy-tale-like element, really, is the sword being there for use at
> > the right time; and it’s hard to think of any story involving
> > adventure that such things don’t happen. We might wonder whether
> > previous Severians got smashed by Baldander’s mace.
> > It’s a hero’s sword more than a magic sword, IMO.
> No question. It runs against the cliche, but carries it through
> nevertheless. Just as Elric's sword marks, determines, and hurts and
> even betrays him, so does Severian's.
It doesn’t betray him – it is destroyed saving him. But that’s by the by.
> > > And what do you mean, "Dorcas was under no enchantment"? Did you read
> > > the book?
> > Yes. To what enchantment do you refer?
> That which kept her preserved and asleep for some 20 years. (You can
> argue that this did not happen, and I agree. But then there are two
> narratives here, aren't there? And one of them is informed by various
> tales about preserving sleep underground, and women in lakes.)
That’s a circular argument. “Dorcas is like Sleeping Beauty. Therefore she was under an enchantment, rather than dead. Therefore she is like Sleeping Beauty.”
> > > If you don't know fairies live underground, then you know nothing of
> > > the topic upon which you so boldly discourse.
> > I know some fairies live underground, as do some men, and some other
> > creatures. Are you saying that all fairies live underground? Pardon me
> > if I ask for a reference.
> Again? Try the Mabinogion.
You already admitted in another post that fairies can live almost anywhere, depending on the particular complex of legends.
> > Let us
> > suppose every story to be a thread in a large multi-dimensional space
> > of story elements. A couple of points on the thread of Dorcas’s story
> > lie relatively close to a couple of points on the Sleeping Beauty
> > thread, where ‘relatively close’ includes ‘dead’ as being close to
> > ‘under an enchanted sleep’. As I’ve pointed out, we could find many
> > similarly close threads in all kinds of works; I just mentioned an
> > example at random.
> You're comparing Buffy to Wolfe? Is there a question?
Why shouldn’t I? Both Buffy and BotNS are large works that play with elements of many fantasy genres; in that at least they are very alike. They are similar in that you can find episodes that are weakly like Sleeping Beauty, but not strongly so – I don’t recall any strong SB reference in Buffy either, though I could have forgotten or missed one. The point is that any such work will have threads passing near to points in a very large volume of story space, and therefore the fact that a thread passes near a point is not in itself of much significance.
> > We could even find more examples in BotNS! Does Valeria not also have
> > some correspondences to Sleeping Beauty? And what about Typhon? Shall
> > I waffle on about how in the Typhon scene Wolfe mashes up Sleeping
> > Beauty and Beauty and the Beast, with Severian taking the part of the
> > Prince in the former and Beauty in the latter?
> Now you're getting it! Yes, Valeria is a princess in a tower. Typhon is
> a king sleeping under a mountain. But these don't quite work, do they?
No more than Dorcas quite works.
> Hmm. Hmm. Maybe they aren't supposed to, quite. But given how little we
> know of Valeria, it's a sound pattern if not a solid data point.
> Whatever could it mean?
For me, three Sleeping Beauties, none of which quite work, means the Sleeping Beauty detector is oversensitive and yielding false positives.
> If you have serious thoughts about Wolfe and Disney, lay them out
> here---don't save them for your therapist.
When I think of Sleeping Beauty, I think of the fairy tale, probably versions I read in childhood. I’m not even sure I’ve seen the film (I do remember Snow White).
- Gerry Quinn
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