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<DIV style="font-color: black"><B>From:</B> <A title=severiansola@hotmail.com
href="mailto:severiansola@hotmail.com">Lee Berman</A> </DIV></DIV></DIV></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT>>larry miller:
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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT><FONT
style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT>It was always my understanding
that there were many alien <BR><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">>
</FONT>>beings on Urth and part of Severians unreliability as narrator was
his <BR><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT>>inability to
distinguish them from other beings.<BR> <BR><FONT
style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT>Yes, but I think the question is
whether these aliens are entirely a product<BR><FONT
style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT>of evolution on other planets or
whether they are humans who left Urth in<BR><FONT
style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT>earlier waves, mutated, evolved
and are now returned.</DIV>
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<DIV>You suggested earlier that Wolfe indicated this somewhere in _Urth_.
Have you a link to this? </DIV>
<DIV><BR><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT>>Marc Aramini: I
think the Vanished People and the inhumi are man and their <BR><FONT
style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT><FONT>>modifications of
themselves. Tree genetic template + mankind = vanished people, <BR><FONT
style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT>>etc. The tree
integration is simply a modification of man and the lower animals.<BR><FONT
style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT>>But that's just me I
guess.<BR><BR><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT>I think the
model makes sense. The thing is, if this story is going to retain a<BR><FONT
style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT>semblance of Judeo-Christian
relevance, I think a human occupied universe makes<BR><FONT
style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT>some sense. Nobody really wants a
green blob or crystalline structure Jesus <BR><FONT
style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: #f5f5f5">> </FONT>(well at least not Gene Wolfe, I
guess).</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT size=+0>I don’t see why not. Wolfe’s aliens are often humanoid,
but by no means always, and in many of his stories (certainly including the Urth
cycle) he indicates that robots and androids as pretty much equivalent to
people, and often morally superior. Even if all the aliens in the
stories evolved from humans (and I personally think it’s pretty clear that they
did not) the robots and androids obviously cannot have. A robot Jesus is
not part of the Solar Cycle, obviously, but the concept would sit better with it
than with most SF novels, crystalline structure or no.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=+0></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=+0>- Gerry Quinn</FONT></DIV>
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