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<DIV style="font-color: black"><B>From:</B> <A title=dstockhoff@verizon.net
href="mailto:dstockhoff@verizon.net">David Stockhoff</A> </DIV></DIV></DIV>
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On 10/27/2011 8:37 AM, Gerry Quinn wrote:<BR>> > *From:* Lee Berman
<mailto:severiansola@hotmail.com><BR>> > **<BR>> > > I
think it is a goosechase to think there is more than one ship which<BR>> >
> becomes lost in the folds of time. The text hints there is only one
and<BR>> > > I take the hint.<BR>> > Where is this ‘hint’? The
text TELLS us quite clearly that there were <BR>> > many:<BR>> > "He
came to sell his clothes, and they were the kind worn on the old <BR>> >
ships that sailed beyond the world's rim long ago, and they weren't <BR>>
> costumes or forgeries or even tomb-tender old garments that had lain
<BR>> > for centuries in the dark, but clothes not far from new. He said
his <BR>> > ships—all those ships—became lost in the blackness between the
suns, <BR>> > where the years do not turn. Lost so that even Time cannot
find them."<BR>> > There’s also Jonas’s crashed ship. Unless you think
that Tzadkiel is <BR>> > going to crash on Urth some time in his future
and Urth’s past. <BR>> > Because he expects to find a port, and it is gone
(that’s why they <BR>> > crashed).<BR>> > There’s only one Ship. But
there are lots of ships.<BR><BR>> Yes. But it also says "all those ships"
became lost. So it's ambiguous. <BR>> Are there STILL any ships other than
The Ship?</DIV></DIV>
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style="FONT-STYLE: normal; DISPLAY: inline; FONT-FAMILY: 'Calibri'; COLOR: #000000; FONT-SIZE: small; FONT-WEIGHT: normal; TEXT-DECORATION: none">Probably
lots of the old lost ships are still lost and turn up occasionally, like the
Fortunate Cloud and perhaps the Quasar (we don’t know how Hethor returned to
Urth).</DIV></DIV>
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style="FONT-STYLE: normal; DISPLAY: inline; FONT-FAMILY: 'Calibri'; COLOR: #000000; FONT-SIZE: small; FONT-WEIGHT: normal; TEXT-DECORATION: none">Other
ships exist too: the Whorl currently orbits a distant star, which is itself
inhabited by spacefaring aliens. The ships that got away from Typhon’s
empire no doubt escaped to advanced planets where interstellar travel remains
commonplace. </DIV></DIV>
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<DIV
style="FONT-STYLE: normal; DISPLAY: inline; FONT-FAMILY: 'Calibri'; COLOR: #000000; FONT-SIZE: small; FONT-WEIGHT: normal; TEXT-DECORATION: none">Finally,
on the subject of multiple ships, Wolfe’s appendix to CotA goes into some
detail, and always uses the plural. Among other things he notes that: “the
star-traveling ships appear to be propelled by light pressure on immense sails
of metal foil”.</DIV></DIV>
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<DIV
style="FONT-STYLE: normal; DISPLAY: inline; FONT-FAMILY: 'Calibri'; COLOR: #000000; FONT-SIZE: small; FONT-WEIGHT: normal; TEXT-DECORATION: none">He
also indicates that the ships are commanded by the Hierodules but sometimes
crewed by human beings, and that Jonas and Hethor appear to have been crewmen on
such ships. [However, it seems improbable that the Fortunate Cloud was so
commanded; it seems to me to have been the product of an Asian culture much
closer to our own times than the setting of BotNS.]</DIV></DIV>
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<DIV
style="FONT-STYLE: normal; DISPLAY: inline; FONT-FAMILY: 'Calibri'; COLOR: #000000; FONT-SIZE: small; FONT-WEIGHT: normal; TEXT-DECORATION: none">-
Gerry Quinn</DIV></DIV>
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