In The Master Pilot's Bar I wrote,
Syl has gone from hosting his own Wolfe board to maintaining a small but very loyal following at his sub-forum at Kevin's Watch, unfortunately that forum has, recently been reduced to a thread. I'm about to blare this forum under the Hangar's internet profile. I will keep this forum going as long as the Hangar exists. If there isn't a way to appreciate Gene Wolfe's work on the net then we are all sadly bereft.
Like David Zindell in the "Neverness" books Wolfe has a way of creating not only a brand new world(s) but creating a new language to describe all his little intracacies...especially in his Urth books. His descriptions and symbology are not only subtle, but mindblowing, in the end. We have some incredible Sci-Fi and fantasy authors in Quicktime and Wolfe is the ultimate compliment to this very thought-provoking category. Anyone brilliant enough to delve deep into Zindell, Brin, Martin, Donaldson, Simmons, etc...will feel throughly rounded once they discover Wolfe.
Zindell is not only a disciple of Frank Herbert, but, obviously, Gene Wolfe as well as illustrated in this excerpt of Orson Scott Card's review of Neverness, as posted on Hatrack.com:
Quote:There are obvious echoes of Gene Wolfe in Neverness. Zindell has picked up some of Wolfe's stylistic quirks -- lists of arcane and archaic words, for instance ("eschatologists, cetics, akashica, horologes . . . scryers, holists, historians, remembrancers, ecologists, programmers, neologicians, and cantors" -- all of which are used in the story; Zindell does not list in vain.) It is daring to invite comparison with Wolfe, and sometimes a bit embarrassing. For instance, when Zindell lists all the different kinds of bars in one district of the city of Neverness, he ends the list by saying, "Somewhere -- and why not? -- there is a bar for those wishing to talk about what is occurring in all the other bars." Such anticlimax -- such an obvious punchline. Wolfe would surely have done a double-twist, like "A bar for those who believe there are no bars, and another for those who believe there are bars, but do not believe anyone has ever seen one."
*****
Before, you are wise; after, you are wise. In between you are otherwise.
Fravashi saying (from the formularies of Osho the Fool) <i>Edited by: danlo60 at: 5/26/06 12:30 pm
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