(urth) South America

[Lee Berman]

>Jerry Friedman: The Commonwealth is clearly in the southern hemisphere, 
>and there are far more suggestions of South America than of Africa or 
>Australasia, but I don't think we're supposed to connect it with the 
>real present-day South America, still less connect the mountains with 
>the Andes or Nessus with Buenos Aires.

Interesting! The debate does carry on after all. I would agree with the
assessment that there are far more S. America references than to any other
geographic location on earth. This includes extant and fossil animals and 
human cultural references.
 
So I guess the question becomes: if Wolfe didn't intend us to associate the 
Commonwealth with South America why did he use such an overwhelming volume of 
South American references?