(urth) Like a good Neighbor

[David Stockhoff]

On 11/21/2011 2:53 PM, Gerry Quinn wrote:
> *From:* David Stockhoff <mailto:dstockhoff at verizon.net>
> **
> On 11/21/2011 2:04 PM, Gerry Quinn wrote:
> > > Actually I’m using it to shoot down a theory in which Horn did die.
> > > But it does work fine with my theory of what happened in the pit 
> which
> > > I posted earlier. It’s not very dependent on when the long-nosed man
> > > appeared.
>
> > Correct. It doesn't appear to depend on anything. As far as I can
> > tell---you haven't actually posted it.
> I posted it today in a reply to James. I think I had it in a couple of 
> posts. Here it is again anyway:
> Horn fell in and was badly concussed. [As with Auk before him, this 
> was the prelude to a mystical evolution, but that’s not germane to the 
> episode, it’s just a trope that Wolfe recycles.] The Neighbours did 
> their best to help him but they live in another dimension and can’t 
> move anything physical or bring him water.

I'm not sure how you know this but I agree. Typical Faerie behavior.
> What they did was touch his forehead with a mental amplifier that 
> temporarily gave him the ability to astrally travel and get help. 
> Unfortunately he went to Nettle who could not help him and indeed 
> became frightened, thinking I suppose that he was a ghost or inhumu.

Possibly. I said much the same thing (you called it "inane sarcasm") and 
suggested that it was a test of sorts, whether of Horn or of his "recovery."
> The only other human or quasi-human entity on the island at that time 
> was Seawrack (Krait may have been hanging around already, but even if 
> the Neighbours knew that, they wouldn’t have expected him to help).

Why do you think the Neighbors do not know the inhumi?
> It is possible that they didn’t recognise Seawrack as human. It’s also 
> possible that they tried to communicate with her but she fled. We know 
> she is terrified of Neighbour constructions at least – it’s probable 
> that she is even more terrified of Neighbours.

Why would either Krait or Seawrack have anything to do with it? Why 
wouldn't she have told Horn if they appeared to her?

What is their motivation in helping Horn if they are not willing to 
appear to his friends like Lassie barking that Tommy is down the well? 
Are they moral people at all, even to the extent of helping themselves?
> It was this abandonment of Horn due to her fear that she is 
> rationalising. Of course the simple scenario that she is ignorant of 
> human life and ordinary death – everyone she has met has quickly died 
> and stayed dead – is also perfectly possible.

Easily disproved, but to you, possible.
> It was his experience with the mental amplifier that initiated Horn’s 
> subsequent development of extraordinary psychic powers. We already see 
> that he has changed when he is going with Krait to find Seawrack – he 
> sees the world with “a sharpness of detail born of a consciousness of 
> detail”. He’s changed – but nothing about the change is the sort of 
> thing we might particularly expect to associate with a Neighbour 
> psyche – affinity with trees, consciousness of other dimensions, 
> feeling he’s missing limbs, whatever.

And your evidence for this expectation of "whatever" is where? Give page 
numbers.

Where did he get his trailblazing ability from---is that not to be 
expected from association with "a Neighbour psyche"? What do you think 
that "sharpness" is?
> He doesn’t develop superpowers just like that, it requires other 
> events and experiences – his experiences on Green, his death, his 
> experiments on inhumi which he is *contemplating carrying out in the 
> future* during his time as Rajan of Gaon.
> Anyway, that’s my working theory for the moment. I think it fits the 
> facts and involves the swallowing of fewer camels than scenarios in 
> which Horn died in the pit.

Thanks, but you failed to outline in detail how the timing of events in 
the pit helps your case, just as you have failed to detail why it hurts 
ours.

It seems to me that what you do is find the easiest path to the lowest 
place and amaze yourself at how easy it is to defend it. You are Wolfe's 
ideal foolish reader---you fall for every single one of his plausible 
surface explanations, which are ALWAYS provided. It's as though he makes 
a place where one can stand and see nothing going on in all directions; 
you seek that place and on finding it feel you have done real work 
getting there.

Remarkably, all one really needs to do to achieve this state is to 
never, ever have read another book of literature. Literature has only 
camels to offer anyway.