
Ends of the Urth - CrocodileStreet
https://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/public/neil-gaiman-gene-wolfe-folio-society/
======
glangdale
Wolfe is terrific, and terrifically underrated. Some of his efforts I find
unreadable ("The Knight", "The Wizard Knight") and some banal, but when he's
good, he's _really good_. "There Are Doors" is my personal favourite - low
key, complex and affecting. The Book of the New Sun is probably the most
famous (and deservedly so) and it also bears rereading.

Just as pleasing is the fact that the Book of the New Sun is a rather cryptic
callout to Jack Vance's Dying Earth, which shows great taste.

~~~
dmitriid
Just read "the Book of the New Sun" in its entirety and I can't understand the
appeal people find in it.

The author really enjoys telling stories, and is very bad at telling _a_
story. The world is glorious, and he does nothing with it. The protagonist is
a nymphomaniac borderline[1] rapist who goes on long monologues about women as
nothing more than objects (and many more monologues that are rarely
insightful). The protagonist never changes, the story jumps from a chance
encounter to a deus ex machina and back through random events of no
consequence.

But, as with literature, its very subjective, so ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

[1] Yeah, not even borderline. "Oh, look at this beautiful woman sleeping. I
couldn't help but start sex with her".

~~~
autarch
"The protagonist is a nymphomaniac borderline[1] rapist ..."

Yes, Severian is not a particularly good person, but does that make this a bad
series of books? I don't think Wolfe is trying to present him as good, which
would be hard to swallow. This is written entirely from Severian's viewpoint,
not Wolfe's.

In the sequel-ish series, the Long Sun books, the protagonist _is_ a very good
person, and he's a marked contrast to Severian.

~~~
dmitriid
> I don't think Wolfe is trying to present him as good, which would be hard to
> swallow. This is written entirely from Severian's viewpoint, not Wolfe's.

And yet we’re made to swallow the fact that he’s an exceptionally good person,
an amazing leader whome people follow with no afterthought, and the Chosen One
who brings the era of the New Sun.

~~~
Mediterraneo10
> And yet we’re made to swallow the fact that he’s an exceptionally good
> person

Are we? Wolfe has stated in interviews that Severian is not supposed to be
seen as a good person, but rather a deeply flawed one.

> an amazing leader whome people follow with no afterthought

Severian only starts to draw a following once he becomes autarch, and then
people aren’t following him as much as the office (or the effects of the
office). Elsewhere, it is Severian who tags along with various people he
meets.

> the Chosen One who brings the era of the New Sun.

Did you go on to read _The Urth of the New Sun_? I won’t spoil it here for
others, but that book does reveal that Severian’s “chosenness” and “saving of
the planet” isn’t ultimately all it was cracked up to be.

As for lack of character growth, it is strange that you list Dorcas an
example, because IMHO her gradual development over books 1–3 (with the coda in
book 4) is a poignant aspect of the work.

And incidentally, novels where a protagonist tours a world full of odd
characters, and the author does not particularly develop these characters or
even the protagonist, is a well-established literary genre that goes back many
centuries (the picaresque).

~~~
dmitriid
> Are we? Wolfe has stated in interviews that

Doesn't matter what he said in interviews. The third book is full to the brim
with with thin hints or outright "we knew you were special, so we were
searching for you high and low".

> Severian only starts to draw a following once he becomes autarch

Re-read the entire attack on Baldanders' castle. "The people naturally follow
me" and all that.

> Did you go on to read The Urth of the New Sun?

I didn't and after the Book of the New Sun I frankly don't want to touch
anything by Wolfe :)

> a well-established literary genre that goes back many centuries (the
> picaresque).

"picaresque: relating to an episodic style of fiction dealing with the
adventures of a rough and dishonest but appealing hero."

The main problem is that Severian is anything but appealing.

------
olvy0
I've always thought Gene Wolfe and David Lynch are similar in tone, so to
speak, although obviously they work in different mediums and have different
interests. Their similarity, IMO, is in the way they obscure the basic
narrative behind a veil of misdirections and symbolism, while using plain
language and everyday locations that they twist just so, to create a kind of
surrealism. This surrealism is painstakingly constructed from pieces of modern
culture (Lynch) or SF classics (Wolfe), mixed with autobiographical pieces. I
personally enjoy reading Wolfe and viewing Lynch for the first time the same
way I enjoy looking at a Dali or Magritte painting, just having my brain
tickled with the wealth of strange details that were obviously well thought
and put together with a purpose, although this purpose alludes me on first
viewing/reading and might perhaps continue to allude me in the future.

Caveat: this is just a very general feeling I have. I haven't read all of
Wolfe's books, nor have I seen all of Lynch's movies (although I have
read/watched most of their oeuvre). I'm also not from the US, and English is
not my first language, so I might be missing a lot of nuances.

------
alphadevx
SPOILER ALERT. I'm reading the first volume of The Book of The New Sun right
now for the first time, so was surprised that Neil introduced a spoiler in the
first paragraph of the linked article so I had to stop reading it...

~~~
egypturnash
It’s a spoiler for a completely different and unrelated novel. All he really
says about New Sun is that despite his claims to remember everything, Severian
is an unreliable narrator, that it may be useful to look up the older stories
connected with the names of characters (especially if they share names with
Catholic saints) and that "things returning to life" is a recurring theme in
the book, which is worth paying attention to.

He also says that Wolfe told him who Severian's mother is, but leaves that
undisclosed.

~~~
alphadevx
I did not stick around to read it all, the first hint of a spoiler sent me
back here to warn others. Neil knows the material really well, he wrote the
introduction to the recent limited edition of The Book of the New Sun for the
Folio Society for example, so I should have trusted him not to blow it.

~~~
egypturnash
This article _is_ that introduction.

~~~
alphadevx
Ah good, then I have already read it as I own that edition from the Folio
Society :-)

