(urth) Swanwick and others

[Craig Brewer]

I unintentionally answered my own question. Well, in a sense: I just finished Caitlin Kiernan's _The Drowning Girl_, and (although I have no idea if it was intentionally influenced by Wolfe), it certainly seems to fit. There are two narratives being given us at once from the pov of a single admittedly "insane" narrator. And both can't possibly be true (or "factual," as she says), although both are, she insists, true. So "unrealiable" narrator, explicit plots that obviously aren't the "real" story, werewolves and ghosts that might not be, etc.



________________________________
 From: dunnaaa . <bahamut0 at gmail.com>
To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net> 
Sent: Friday, June 20, 2014 7:01 PM
Subject: Re: (urth) Swanwick and others
 


The world-building is very similar - we are aware that there is a lot going on out there, but we are only teased brief details which let us attempt to construct the larger picture.
I definitely got a BotNS vibe off of Anathem - mostly for this reason. I think the difference lies in the explanations that we are given by the authors - for instance, I would have been perfectly happy reading the first half of Anathem and then leaving it be, with all my questions unanswered, but the possibilities I could create still out there. Whereas with Wolfe, I am much happier with the world and the answers that he provides. 
So I guess I'm saying that Wolfe is the better writer, but I can definitely get that Anathem evokes some of the feelings that I got when reading BotNS. 
Cheers,
Sean
On Jun 17, 2014 10:05 PM, "Andrew Mason" <andrew.mason53 at googlemail.com> wrote:


>
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>Michael Thayer wrote: 
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>>I am a big fan of Anathem, but I just don't see the New Sun
>>parallels/connection -- what specifically do you see as the similarities?
>> I'm intrigued.
>>
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>Set on an Earth-like planet in the far 'future' (though not as far, nor as blatantly Earth-like)
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>Lots of unusual words (in Wolfe real words: in Stephenson made-up ones, though not too mysterious if you know Latin; but the effect is similar). 
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>The hero begins in an enclosed community and then goes on a journey. 
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>And, most importantly, the idea of alternative worlds and a choice between them. 
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>Well, it may not add up to much, but Stephenson was rather absurdly accused of plagiarism (with the mistaken claim that the planet is called Orth), so clearly others besides me have noticed a similarity. 
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>As I mentioned a little while ago, Paul Witcover's _The Emperor of All Things_ seems to acknowledge a debt to Wolfe, though perhaps a negative one, as the character Wolfe is a villain; (but then, Umberto Eco made Borges a villain, and I don't think that was meant in a wholly hostile way). 
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>--
>>
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