(urth) Babbiehorn?: Was: a sincere question mostly for roy

[David Stockhoff]

On 11/17/2011 8:33 PM, James Wynn wrote:
> I really don't see a need for the callotte-donning to buttress my 
> case. But it is a fact that the way "Pike's ghost" was wearing the 
> callotte, then disapperates, and the callotte following to the floor, 
> made me me immediately doubt we were looking a "real" gothic-style 
> ghost. I'm not the only one based on the conversations at the time. 
> The whole question "If this is the Rajan, then explain why he wore 
> Pike's callotte!" reminds me of this question and answer:
>
>     List: What was Typhon's goal in sending the Whorl in the first place?
>
>     Wolfe's answer: I'm sure Typhon would have had any number of
>     reasons for sending out the Whorl.
>

This is an important observation about the way Wolfe sees his 
characters. They don't helplessly repeat ancient myths or go from 
choreographed plot point to plot point like marionettes. They experience 
constraints but have motives and make choices. And they do random 
impulsive or habitual things just as humans do. (Free Live Free is full 
of habitual behaviors like this.)

In this case, the Rajan may simply have been happy to be home again, and 
saw the hat and wondered what he might look like in it after so much 
time and change.
>
>
> Basically, I don't understand how "Pike's ghost" wearing Pike's 
> callotte undermines the understanding that he is the Rajan in 
> Time-travel.
>
> Personally, I don't see myself as the anti-Gerry. When critiquing the 
> theories of others, Gerry presents himself as one seeking to stamp out 
> any suggestion of literary-style allusions in Wolfe's works. I, 
> alternately DO NOT seek to denounce naturalized behavior in the books 
> in order to insist that every cup, twitch, or sigh has a Deeper 
> Meaning. I believe, that the allusions serve the story as a signal to 
> what is going on. I also think the story often riffs on references to 
> myth, literature, and SF pulp. It goes both ways. I'm open to 
> allusions when I detect them, but I don't sit down a read every scene 
> with the thought "Let's find the secret meaning here".
>
> When I see a parallel to some outside source in a story I wonder 
> whether Wolfe intended it. If I see that Wolfe continues to track the 
> source, I draw the conclusion that he probably did. And so, if I come 
> to a point where there is some gap in the text that leaves me 
> wondering, I consult the pattern to see if it might possibly provide 
> illumination. I don't expect that it must. I hope that it might.

I think the Sun Cycle has a semirigid template deep in its 
background---its bones. Or think of it as a "rack" the author sets up in 
his workshop. Some elements are rigid and simple because they are 
primary: Pas dies and is reborn. Silk becomes an astral being of sorts. 
Details are filled in. The Aristaeus myth below is a secondary structure 
to get from point A to B to C that requires that he has a son who dies, 
etc., as is the Osiris myth. Astral time travel and mind-integration 
become devices to achieve these things. Characters become real and take 
care of the rest---what you correctly call "naturalized" behavior. The 
puppet becomes a person who believes he has free will and therefore 
does, but all the while fulfills a plan (primary, not secondary).

I think Silk = Typhon is one such simple starting point that the reason 
we find it hard to see is that it has been written over by all the 
subsequent development. But rather than being a Deep Meaning, I think 
these templates are the least important parts of the story, if only 
because they are universal. Silk's identity is important to Wolfe but 
not to the reader, so he leaves it covered by all his secondary and 
tertiary construction.
>
> Antonio, let me give you an example of the way I read Wolfe and you 
> can see if it is useful to you as well. When I read The Book of the 
> Long Sun the second time. The names of the three sybs: Rose, Mint, and 
> Marble combined with the Sun St. Manteion led me to the story of 
> Aristaeus, the prophet of Apollo. It just so happened that my 
> reference on this was Robert Graves' "The Greek Myths". As I read on I 
> realized "Hey, this part of the LS story is sort of like the next part 
> in the Aristeaus story the way Graves tells it. If Wolfe is tracking 
> this story, I should see such-and-such next." And I did. The story 
> kept riffing on the life of Aristeaus. And then I also discovered that 
> according to Herodotus (the major source for the first two Latro 
> volumes) Aristeaus appeared in Italy after his death and claimed that 
> he had been Apollo's raven-- hmm...there's some Silk in there. And I 
> learned that Pindar (also a major character in the Latro story) had 
> written a major work on the life of Aristaeus so it now I was pretty 
> certain that Wolfe was quite familiar with Aristaeus. Finally, I was 
> consistently troubled that whenever Incus played a part in the 
> elements of Long Sun version of Aristaeus's life, he played a female 
> (and I also noted that he played the role of Hesphaetus's "mechanical 
> woman"). So that was how I decided Incus was female and learned the 
> identity of the mysterious Maytera Corn. And I expected next that Silk 
> would have a son, who would be turned into a deer and killed by his 
> own hounds. Boy was I disappointed. I didn't try to MAKE it fit, 
> though. I just said, "Wolfe isn't carrying it that far." Then 
> eventually I realized that the greenbuck Horn encountered resurrected 
> his body and taken his mission...until his own men turned on him in 
> Green and killed him. And afterwards I realized that this tracked to 
> the story of the son of Aristaeus and I was glad. Anyway, that's how I 
> do it.

In short, you read. A lot.

Where is Maytera Corn mentioned? I just searched all four books of LS 
for "corn" and don't see it.