Utterly Arbitrary Jottings on Gene Wolfe's Book of Days
“How the Whip Came Back”
This seems transparently misogynist.
Might link Gershenfeld’s When Things Think to the robot.
Last image of the husband in chains is clearly meant to be symbolic–should also pay closer attention to what kind of memory alteration the protag. has had.
UN again.
Soviet domination–penology.
Note “Lincoln’s Birthday”
“Of Relays and Roses”
32 our economy has come to depend on people getting married more than once
Mark XX: Mark 10-11 and 10-12 tell of Jesus forbidding divorce Is there a hint of the subversion of the natural order by Marcia choosing him as a husband here?
“Paul’s Treehouse”
clearly set against the background of urban riots
scotch set in his stomach like a pool of mercury
48 Russell had been an engineer at one time; Morris had never been quite sure of the reason he no longer was
Another murderous gang that effete Americans aren’t prepared for via an overreliance on technology.
It seemed as if Paul’s retreat into the treehouse might mirror the protest groups’ dissociation from society, but that’s not what the ending reveals.
“St. Brandon” (from Peace)
Fairly incomprehensible.
“Beautyland”
Exposition of the libertarian position on enivornmental regulation and original sin.
“Car Sinister”
Might be thought of in relation to American blues tradition of comparing women to automobiles. Last line is somewhat mysterious.
“The Blue Mouse”
UN again. File under deprivation of free will through social engineering, deleterious effects of.
“How I Lost the Second World War and Helped Turn Back the German Invasion”
Am teaching this one. Will report back later.
“The Adopted Father”
96 hundred million people drew unemployment benefits 98 abnormally perfunctory Martian terraforming plan 98-99 implanted memories, also in “How the Whip Came Back”
The ending requires more comment.
“Forlesen”
I think Alice Turner on the Urth list once noted that Wolfe had his Borges mode and his Kafka mode. This story is clearly in the latter.
It’s also quite funny and not as mysterious as it might appear. Forlesen is not in a computer, as some enthusiasts have suggested, but he’s in the ontological equivalent–the goal of the rationalized society in which he lives. The final comment about the aliens attempting to recreate civilization as it might have been confirms this and is not meant literally.
The idea about a brain tumor also appears in the Book of the Long Sun.
The final answers seem to match the list of roles, as contributors to the Urth list have noted. The man says “yes” to priest, theologian, actor, National Hero, and aged loremaster. He also says “maybe” to novelist. I doubt I’m the first to point out that this might very well be how Wolfe sees himself (he served in the Korean War).
“An Article about Hunting”
This, were it not for the type of humor, probably wouldn’t out of place in an NRA pamphlet.
“The Changeling”
The voice of the beginning itself changes from what follows. Brainwashing is clearly in the background of this story. One way to think of it might be that the narrator has in fact come back from China after defecting but that the subsequent confusion about his identity and memory comes from his reeducation. The violence he committed against the frog and his competitive instincts could be manifestations of an individualist vs. collectivist propaganda. (I’m aware this point may be unclear; I’m thinking about it.) He can only now live in the west as a ghost, a vestige, a figure outside of time and place. The Peter Pan legend has supplied the details of his psychotic ideation.
“Many Mansions”
Perhaps is set in the same general world of The Fifth Head of Cerberus. Could it be an ancestor of David Foster Wallace’s Brief Interviews with Hideous Men? Probably not, though I wonder when the unprinted questions conceit first appears.
“Against the Lafayette Escadrille”
The LE was a group of volunteer American pilots who fought with the French against the Germans before the U.S. entered WWI. Well, I didn’t know.
The “flammable dope” was a varnish applied to the cloth surface of airplane parts (OED).
No actual dresses were used for the “Silk Dress Balloons,” though they were made of silk.
Nostalgia. Craft as reclamation of lost time. Aura. Authenticity.
“The War Beneath the Tree”
There are clear similarities to the feminine world depicted in There Are Doors with the robots designed to provide company for lonely children, etc. The substitution of technology for interpersonal relationships as a way of meeting the world and its attendant perils is the main idea here.
“La Befana”
I’ve written about this in the Island of Dr. Death and Other Stories and Other Stories entry.
“Melting”
I didn’t know about tulpas, a clearly fascinating concept.
We have a bit of the hypocrite lecteur at the end there. Reminds me in form of “Car Crash While Hitchhiking.”