<html><body><div style="color:#000; background-color:#fff; font-family:times new roman, new york, times, serif;font-size:12pt"><div><span>there is that "thing" sleeping in the mine with the ape men, that Severian says he might "now" know what it is - related to tectonic movement? What is down there? Does a throwaway detail like that resonate with something else in the text?</span></div><div><br></div> <div style="font-family: times new roman, new york, times, serif; font-size: 12pt;"> <div style="font-family: times new roman, new york, times, serif; font-size: 12pt;"> <div dir="ltr"> <div class="hr" style="margin: 5px 0px; padding: 0px; border: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); height: 0px; line-height: 0; font-size: 0px;" contenteditable="false" readonly="true"></div> <font face="Arial" size="2"> <b><span style="font-weight: bold;">From:</span></b> David Stockhoff <dstockhoff@verizon.net><br> <b><span style="font-weight:
bold;">To:</span></b> Jerry Friedman <jerry_friedman@yahoo.com>; The Urth Mailing List <urth@lists.urth.net> <br> <b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sent:</span></b> Sunday, September 8, 2013 5:41 AM<br> <b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Subject:</span></b> Re: (urth) "been teaching literature for over 35 years"<br> </font> </div> <div class="y_msg_container"><br><div id="yiv2231766193">
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<div class="yiv2231766193moz-cite-prefix">On 9/8/2013 12:25 AM, Jerry Friedman
wrote:<br>
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<blockquote type="cite">
<pre>Well, he might justifiably ask, if Wolfe intended plate tectonics to exist on Urth, how it makes the book better for Severian to tell us that it stopped. To improve the dying-earth atmosphere?</pre>
</blockquote>
<br>
<br>
I'm intrigued by Jeff's idea:<br>
<br>
<pre>The slowing of geology processes and the refrigeration of the earth in
somewhat of a historical time scale was once the current scientific
thought in the 19th century (Bellamy mentions it in LOOKING BACKWARD), so
the idea has a reason to be present and for the estimated time necessary
to be reckoned past, however mistakenly by the characters.
</pre>
We've seen plenty of evidence that Wolfe gleaned gems from the
historical trash heap of incorrect comprehensions of the physical
universe in writing BNS. In fact, one could take it a step further
and say that his universe is entirely created from such pulpy
cliches---<br>
<br>
by which I mean to make a direct literary connection, because the
pulp SF Wolfe admires, from Cthulhu to, I don't know, maybe Flash
Gordon and beyond, consists almost entirely of disproven scientific
assumptions. Look at how the surface environment of Venus has been
(mis)conceived throughout the history of SF.<br>
<br>
---knowing full well that they do not fit well together. Two other
well-known cases of this are Severian's comments about geological
strata and the various genetic theories of 5HC, which Lee has
identified as BNS's thematic precursor. Would this not, in Wolfe's
thinking, parallel all the valid but imperfect understandings of the
<b>nonphysical </b>universe? It's all the same, on other
words---the science we believe today will be the superstition of
tomorrow.<br>
<br>
So yes, it makes the book better. <br>
<br>
Also, "death" is perhaps a relative term on a geologic time scale.
In our time, small volcanic islands are created before our eyes. In
Severian's, this may no longer occur, but the plates could
experience settling for quite some time after the primary tectonic
activity has either ceased or simply decreased enough that most
people assume Urth is dead, because all the volcanoes are. Thus the
earthquakes in Typhon's time.<br>
<br>
</div>
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