(urth) Gummed-Up Works or Got Lives?

[David Stockhoff]

On 12/18/2011 3:04 PM, Gerry Quinn wrote:
> *From:* David Stockhoff <mailto:dstockhoff at verizon.net>
> On 12/18/2011 10:51 AM, Gerry Quinn wrote:
>
> > > Severian was certainly not responsible for Dorcas’s death, so placing
> > > him as the witch (or wicked fairy, in the canonical version of
> > > Sleeping Beauty) is absurd.
>
> > Christ, Gerry. He raised her from the dead. No one said he was wicked.
> Then trying to make a correspondence between him and the witch in the 
> story (either story) is ridiculous.

Ah, I see. You did not know witches come in both black and white.
>
> > > If you want to change every aspect of the story, and even what story
> > > it is, what is the point of your argument? When you say “there is no
> > > 1:1" relationship”, then, given the sort of relationships you are
> > > apparently willing to propose, you are tacitly admitting that 
> there is
> > > no relationship at all. Because admitting the sort of relationships
> > > you are proposing now would imply that every book should be discussed
> > > as if it reconstituted the Library of Babel.
>
> > Please be specific, or no one will know what you mean.
> It is you who are failing to be specific. You don’t even know what 
> fairy tale you’re talking about.

I was never talking about "a" fairy tale. Nor was Wolfe. Why are you?
>
> > > There is a vague resonance with Sleeping Beauty when a beautiful 
> woman
> > > is resurrected. Just as there is a vague resemblance between Dr. 
> Talos
> > > and a stuffed fox. Discussing the stuff that you are suggesting is
> > > meaningful – for example the “enchantment” you claimed Dorcas is 
> under
> > > – is the equivalent of discussing the horsehair Talos is stuffed 
> with,
> > > and what colour horse it came from.
>
> > Have you ever considered introducing the concept of figurative language
> > to your programming? You are a marvel of AI engineering, but your
> > insistence on tackling literature that your analytical routines can't
> > handle betrays you. Or are you just trying to become human, like 
> Data on
> > Star Trek?
> There’s a difference between figurative language and un-thought-out 
> nonsense. I’m sorry if it discomfits you that I can distinguish 
> between them.

Literature must all look like nonsense to you, no matter how well 
"thought out." No, it saddens me that you are unable to understand the 
books you spend so much time trying to reduce to codes and formulas. But 
it saddens me more that you are bent on preventing others from having a 
conversation unbound by those codes and formulas.

I'm going to let you have the last word here, because clearly your 
programming insists on it. I was a fool to hope you might have any 
higher goal than that. From now on, all your posts will be deleted from 
my mailbox before I see them.