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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
style="FONT-STYLE: normal; DISPLAY: inline; FONT-FAMILY: 'Calibri'; COLOR: #000000; FONT-SIZE: small; FONT-WEIGHT: normal; TEXT-DECORATION: none"><BR> <BR>>
If only he could avoid the thinking which corrals his thinking into using terms
like<BR>> "instead" and "the key" as though there is one and only one way to
understand the text<BR>> and our goal is to determine which one is "best" and
discard the rest.<BR>> <BR>> I don't quite get it. You don't have to
be a literature professor to understand the concept<BR>> of multi-layered
analysis. Science requires a similar mode of thinking. Does a physicist rant
<BR>> that he lives on earth not some stinking solar system or galaxy and
that he is composed of head, <BR>> arms and legs not atoms? </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">No,
because those things are not contradictory. He does argue that if two
hypotheses are contradictory, at least one must be wrong.</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">Of
course this rule, whose application to the universe is the foundation of
science, does not necessarily have to apply in literature. And since an
author does not have the powers of the Increate, even a humble creation such as
a book is likely to be imperfect. Furthermore, a science fiction book
usually contains elements different from reality, and it may be that this very
fact is sufficient to ensure that logical contradictions must exist somewhere;
that is, it may be that no possible universe exists in which there are both
stable stars and faster than li</DIV>
<DIV
style="FONT-STYLE: normal; DISPLAY: inline; FONT-FAMILY: 'Calibri'; COLOR: #000000; FONT-SIZE: small; FONT-WEIGHT: normal; TEXT-DECORATION: none">ght
travel, for example.</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">However,
Wolfe is not a shoddy or careless author. He wants his SF to work as
science fiction, even though that is not his priority. That is why, in my
opinion, one of the strongest arguments against Marc’s theory of animals turning
into plants or vice versa is the simple absence of (say) a farmer on Blue
hinting that such things are the norm for at least some of the native organisms
of Green and Blue. </DIV>
<DIV
style="FONT-STYLE: normal; DISPLAY: inline; FONT-FAMILY: 'Calibri'; COLOR: #000000; FONT-SIZE: small; FONT-WEIGHT: normal; TEXT-DECORATION: none">I
am quite certain that if Wolfe had intended such an interpretation to be
possible, he would have included such a passage.</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">Multiple
layers must be compatible. There’s no problem when they are of different
kinds. But certain interpretations carry implications that conflict with
other theories. Green can’t literally be Urth without the intervention of
extraordinary astronomical changes whose existence is nowhere indicated,
combined with a massive conspiracy by everyone from Typhon down to the
Crew. And the Neighbours. And there’s no logical reason why Typhon
should have sent the Whorl to a future Urth – when it was launched he had no
reason to believe a black hole would be injected into the Sun – or at least he
believed that he could control events following its injection. If someone
is seriously proposing that Green is literally Urth, they need to provide some
answers to questions like these and many others.</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">The
proposal that Father Inire appears in multiple guises (apart from the jungle
shaman) throughout the books is less radical than Marc’s, but still has
considerable implications. For a start, it supposes that he is a
shapeshifter. There are *no shapeshifters at all* in BotNS, at least of
the type conventional in SF and implied for Inire in this theory. Tzadkiel
is seen and the sea monsters are referenced, but no indication of their ability
to split off parts of themselves is mentioned - and even if it were it involves
small parts split off from a larger entity, and there’s no indication of this
with Father Inire. </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">But
shapeshifting is the least of the problems. Maybe Inire can somehow
duplicate himself with mirrors and is very good at disguise. Or you could
go with my Botanic Gardens theory. The big problem is the same as with
Marc’s - it turns half the storyline into a giant conspiracy against the
reader. All these characters that are supposedly Inire – they can’t be
themselves any more. Their storylines are obliterated. Every tale
they tell of their lives is simply a lie told by Inire. No conclusions can
be drawn from what they say (because even if we guess they are Inire, nothing
they say seems to tell us anything relevant). And to what effect?
Why would Wolfe destroy his book and his characters for such a reason? Is
the idea of Father Inire as secret manipulator grand enough to build a great
book on? Does Wolfe at least provide solutions for the questions raised,
given that he is writing a detective story disguised as SF? I think the
answer is no to both.</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">A
radical hypothesis that is based on flimsy (and often highly selected, and at
times nonexistent) evidence and that contradicts multiple story elements in an
obvious way isn’t a good theory, in my opinion. Not about a book I’d want
to read, anyway.</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">I
believe there are good interpretations to be found that, while they may not be
perfect, don’t have gaping holes in them.</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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