(urth) short story 7: The Green Wall Said

[David Stockhoff]

On 4/4/2012 8:23 AM, David Stockhoff wrote:
> On 4/3/2012 6:59 PM, Gerry Quinn wrote:
>> *From:* Marc Aramini <mailto:marcaramini at yahoo.com>
>> > The Green Wall Said
>> >
>> This is probably Wolfe’s first somewhat cryptic story in which it is 
>> very
>> >
>> difficult to draw
>> an accurate conclusion, and it is my favorite of
>> >
>> “Young Wolfe”. It was published in
>> Michael Moorcock’s New Worlds
>> >
>> in 1967. It may be a biological survey done on a
>> human sample group
>> >
>> by aliens, as I see little evidence that is a behavioral or 
>> spriritual one.
>> It *is* pretty cryptic. My thoughts on this one:
>> First, I think they are in a flying saucer, presumably in a holding 
>> cell in half of the dome those things have on top. The shape fits, as 
>> does the room tilting five degrees then straightening – presumably a 
>> course correction. Also, the helicopter pilot apparently remembers 
>> seeing it after a while; he might be fabulating but it is plausible 
>> that someone piloting an aircraft might have noticed a flying saucer 
>> whereas someone beamed up from the ground wouldn’t.
>> The aliens are an ancient race. They are sane and rational, and their 
>> laws are just. Their EQ is obviously a bit lacking, though. 
>> Apparently their “springs of being” are failing, and they cannot fix 
>> it without learning to sacrifice for the kind as humans do.
>> I think they are near-immortal, but – whether because of slow 
>> physical degeneration, new challenges they cannot deal with, or 
>> whatever – their time is coming to an end. But individuals of this 
>> species refuse to allow themselves to die and be replaced by 
>> offspring. They want to understand how humans do it. They cannot 
>> understand the tools humans use, which are love/caring for others, 
>> and religion. They have targeted humans who display these (with the 
>> exception of the prisoner, but even he has got religion recently).
>> The accountant is poor (threadbare suit) but desperate to support his 
>> six children. The soldier flies an air ambulance. The nun works in an 
>> orphanage and the doctor runs a mission. As I say, the prisoner is an 
>> anomaly – but then again he is being cared for, so maybe that’s it.
>> This could be a foreshadowing of some of the spiritual themes in 
>> Wolfe, as well as the concept of renewal requiring death, applied 
>> most pungently in the case of Urth/Ushas.
>> One last observation: might the last ‘DO YOU DO IT’ be addressed to 
>> the reader?
>
> Without having read that story yet, just commenting on this comment: 
> this is as clear an "aliens as Fairies" story as one could imagine. 
> AND ... they appear to be robots as well. Functionally speaking, that 
> is: they are immortal, logical, unemotional, dying only from wear and 
> tear, functionally capable of producing offspring but practically 
> incapable.
>
> Not /terribly /different from Tolkien's high elves, who are emotional 
> but in control, undying but capable of being killed, just, and who 
> reproduce rarely. As Fairies, they need humans for something they lack 
> and that only sentient mortality can provide.

Just read the story, and of course Gerry's summary is almost verbatim.

Assuming everything the wall says is literally true, the aliens are 
exactly as I described: presumably biological, but FUNCTIONALLY as close 
to robots as they could be. And yet at the same time they are 
also---again, FUNCTIONALLY---as close to classic 
fairies-in-need-of-mortals as they could be. Plain as day.

Naturally, there isn't a "fairy vibe," whatever that means, because as 
is usual with Wolfe, when he makes his themes this obvious---hidden in 
plain sight---he does not exactly put up a sign.