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<p style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%" align="center"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3">CALAMITY
WARPS</font></font></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"> “Calamity
Warps” first appeared in </font></font><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><i>Realms
of Fantasy</i></font></font><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3">
in 2003 and is collected in </font></font><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><i>Starwater
Strains.</i></font></font></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="font-style:normal">SUMMARY</span></font></font></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="font-style:normal"> The
story begins, “Calamity Jane is our dog, and she warps through
space. I suppose I should say space-time, though that implies a level
of expertise I haven't actually got.” The neighbor, Bob Smith,
agrees that she is a very fast dog. </span></font></font>
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<p style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="font-style:normal"> After
the death of his previous dog, a cairn terrier, the narrator's wife
wants a new one, to which the narrator reluctantly agrees if she gets
it herself. Calamity Jane is procured through Save-A-Pet for the
price of shots. Her breed is indeterminate, but “if you dropped her
in a pack of coyotes the coyotes would roll out the welcome mat, and
brag afterward about their new member.” She has wolf like ears and
at times resembles a Belgian shepherd, and responds to the narrator
with tolerant hostility.</span></font></font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="font-style:normal"> He
comments that at first he though her warping was just extreme speed,
and that she simply appears “without ever having gotten there”.
Deer will not eat the rosebushes when Calamity is near. He also
describes her chase of a rabbit, which at first frustrates her with
its superior agility and sharp turns. Eventually, Calamity catches
the rabbit by simply running through a turn without actually turning
and losing momentum, as if she had continued running in a straight
line and poked a hole through space. The narrator praises the dog
against his better judgment, and in an aside asks, “What would you
have done? Would you want a dog like Calamity mad at you?”</span></font></font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="font-style:normal"> He
relates that the people at Save-A-Pet had named her Calamity Jane,
supposedly because of her tendency to get in things she shouldn't be
in, but the narrator suspects that she brings even greater calamity.
After this, he tries to chain her, but she warps out of it easily,
then she begins bringing strange things home, such as a Japanese ID
and money, an odd polished bone stick with bark-like skin, and a
wounded pink furry invertebrate like nothing else the narrator had
ever seen. </span></font></font>
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<p style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="font-style:normal"> Soon
she even brings a giant four armed shadow and a weapon that seems </span></font></font><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="font-style:normal">at
times </span></font></font><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="font-style:normal">like
a sword, an axe, a bat with a nail in it, and even a machine gun.
When he shows his neighbor, she responds that it is terrible, but is
also somehow beautiful. The narrator loses his own shadow, and the
four armed, helmed one clings to him. He attempts to avoid notice,
but when the lights go out at work one day, people scream at the
shadow</span></font></font><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="font-style:normal">'</span></font></font><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="font-style:normal">s
stark appearance. When he holds the sword, he notes that the shadow
holds it in three hands and it feels “about like a broom handle”
to him, though it is 37 pounds. </span></font></font>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="font-style:normal"> He
concludes by saying, “Now it's started talking to me at night. Is
that what they call runes? It whispers late at night when I'm in bed,
and that's why I'm telling you this now.”</span></font></font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="font-style:normal"> </span></font></font></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="font-style:normal">COMMENTARY</span></font></font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="font-style:normal"> Wolfe's
love of dogs extends to his earliest childhood, and he has regularly
had at least one dog throughout the majority of his adult life.
While his own name has definitely led him to experiment with both
lupine and canine symbols, this affection for them occasionally
overcomes the need for misdirection and subtlety and creates a
tribute almost free of irony (which is something, alas, many of his
human characters almost personify). Of this story, Gene has said:</span></font></font></p>
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<p style="margin-left:0.5in;margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%"><font color="#000000"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="letter-spacing:normal"><span style="font-style:normal"><span style="font-weight:normal">When
I sent “Calamity Warps” to Kathe Koja, she said it seemed very
autobiographical. Which in a way it was. Calamity Jane was really
Rosemary's dog, and I never liked her as much as I should have. She
was a better dog than I deserved; let's leave it like that. And fast!
Why, when she was young -- well, you wouldn't believe me. For the
first three or four years she was determined to learn Human and used
to practice her language lessons when she and I were alone in the
house and I wasn't looking. Calamity could give you the creeps.</span></span></span></font></font></font></p>
<p style="margin-left:0.5in;margin-bottom:0in;font-style:normal;font-weight:normal;line-height:100%">
<br>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%"><font color="#000000"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="letter-spacing:normal"><span style="font-style:normal"><span style="font-weight:normal">Given
that, despite Gene's affection for dogs, he is capable of preferring
some to others definitely shows us that his overall lack of affection
for Calamity Jane and her general weirdness had an impact on him and
his tone for this story. (Calamity Jane was obviously named after the
famous American frontierswoman active in the wild west in the late
19</span></span></span></font></font></font><font color="#000000"><sup><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="letter-spacing:normal"><span style="font-style:normal"><span style="font-weight:normal">th</span></span></span></font></font></sup></font><font color="#000000"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="letter-spacing:normal"><span style="font-style:normal"><span style="font-weight:normal">
century, but her name here is more important for its association with
“calamity”). This particular dog does not receive the same
treatment as the noble Triskele, who becomes a symbol of selfless
devotion in </span></span></span></font></font></font><font color="#000000"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="letter-spacing:normal"><i><span style="font-weight:normal">The
Book of the New Sun.</span></i></span></font></font></font></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom:0in;line-height:100%"><font color="#000000"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="letter-spacing:normal"><span style="font-style:normal"><span style="font-weight:normal"> More
importantly for this story, it seems that there are definite Viking
and Norse significations to the four armed shadow and the mysterious
weapon which seems an ax, a sword, and a bat with a nail in it which
is described as both “terrible” and “beautiful”. The shadow,
with its horns, as well as the runes, all resonate with Norse culture
and myth. While the four armed shadow certainly echoes Burroughs
Barsoom books and the warlike, four armed Martian cultures that John
Carter finds there in his own astral jaunts through space, I think
Calamity Jane is actually a harbinger of the final battle so </span></span></span></font></font></font><font color="#000000"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="letter-spacing:normal"><span style="font-style:normal"><span style="font-weight:normal">central</span></span></span></font></font></font><font color="#000000"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span style="letter-spacing:normal"><span style="font-style:normal"><span style="font-weight:normal">
to Norse myth. The Cerberus-like hound Garmr in the Poetic Eddas
escapes his bonds to precipitate Ragnarok and the end of time (just
as Calamity escapes her chains easily) and humanity is thus
described: </span></span></span></font></font></font>
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<dl><dd style="margin-left:0.5in"><font face="Times New Roman, serif"><span style="font-style:normal"><span style="font-weight:normal">Brothers
will fight </span></span></font>
</dd><dd>
and kill each other,
</dd><dd>
sisters' children
</dd><dd>
will defile kinship.
</dd><dd>
It is harsh in the world,
</dd><dd>
whoredom rife
</dd><dd>
—an axe age, a sword age
</dd><dd>
—shields are riven—
</dd><dd>
a wind age, a wolf age—
</dd><dd>
before the world goes headlong.
</dd><dd>
No man will have
</dd><dd>
mercy on another (Dronke 19).</dd><dd><br></dd><dd>There are runes carved on Odin's spear, Gungnir, but the spear does
not resemble the weapon Wolfe describes, though Odin usually has a
horned helm. Other famous swords in Norse myth include Sigmund's
Gram, but the weapon in Wolfe's story seems to be more like an
amalgamation of destructiveness rather than any specific weapon. Its
terrible beauty and the way that it feels light to him and has even
begun to whisper to the narrator at night indicates that he is being
changed by it, and Calamity has succeeded in setting in motion a
great and terrible force.</dd><dd><br>
</dd><dd>The idea of a bound dog is reiterated several times in Norse myth,
most notably in the Fenris Wolf, a child of Loki. He was bound by
the duplicity of the gods, who offered him Tyr's hand as a gesture
of their good faith until he could be bound in Gleipner. A sword
was also used to prop open his mouth, to aid in binding him until
Ragnarok could begin – and it is this wolf which shall at last
slay Odin when the final battles are fought. While the Norse gods
are not normally portrayed with four arms, there is a lack of
humanity in many of the jotnar, or giants, who hold a similar place
in Norse myths to the Titans in Greek myth, being formed of primeval
matter and at war with the younger gods or Aesir. The jotnar are
monstrous at times, and the fire jotnar will also have a role in
Ragnarok.
</dd><dd><br>
</dd><dd>Once again, Wolfe's blending of science fiction, biographical
information, and myth creates a story that also shows another aspect
of his world view that is really not commented upon in light of its
absence from his larger series. The pink fluffy invertebrate
grounds the later mythic shadow in an ostensibly science fictional
tale, but the majority of the resonance strays from realistic
mimesis and comes closer to fantasy. Underneath the veneer of
ordinary appearances, there is a sinister shadow of mythic import.
While this doesn't make Wolfe's universe that of paranoid dread and
sublime fear (as one might describe Lovecraft's horror), it also
serves to highlight the dualism for which Wolfe is famous. Ordinary
people doing ordinary things cast a shadow tempered by myth and
spirituality, and there is a looming significance to this. Every
day, in the mind and in the heart, something of a high stakes battle
between poorly understood forces comes into play, some good, some
evil, and some a complicated, hidden impulse – in this case, to
destruction and armageddon.
</dd><dd>
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</dd><dd>
UNANSWERED QUESTIONS:</dd><dd>
<br>
</dd><dd>
Are there any particular gods or science fiction characters that
the shadow most resembles? While there are superficial similarities
to Burroughs Barsoom books in the use of astral warping and four
armed schematics, the runes and the whispering weapon (which seems
somehow to be all weapons and is very light for our narrator)
creates an effect of impending calamity and battle in a particularly
Norse vein.</dd><dd>
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</dd><dd>
CONNECTION WITH OTHER WORKS</dd><dd>
<br>
</dd><dd>
The ordinary hiding a shadowy underbelly of mythic stature is
nothing new in Wolfe, and is especially prominent in “real world”
stories which eventually violate the laws of reality such as
“Houston, 1943”, the Arimaspian tales, or “A Fish Story.”
The heavy influence of Norse myth is quite clear in <i>The Wizard
Knight,</i> and the use of dogs is especially prevalent in Wolfe's
fiction, such as “Rattler” or “The Dog of the Drops.”</dd><dd>
<br>
</dd><dd>
RESOURCES<br><br>
</dd><dd style="margin-left:0.5in;text-align:left">
<font color="#00000a"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span lang="en-US">Dronke,
Ursula. </span></font></font><font color="#00000a"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span lang="en-US"><i>The
Poetic Edda Volume II: Mythological Poems</i></span></font></font><font color="#00000a"><font style="font-size:12pt" size="3"><span lang="en-US">.
Oxford: Clarendon/Oxford University, 1997.</span></font></font></dd></dl>
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