Date: Sun, 03 Feb 2002 11:42:18 -0700
From: maa32 
Subject: (urth) For Joe: more nasty puns

Hey Joe.  If you wanted another Fruedian association in Wolfe, then the name 
of the narrator Horn offers a few.  I'm sure we've discussed the Shakespearian 
connotation of horns and cuckholdry, and the Horn as male genitals from 
"Hornbus, you whore" of Nightside the long sun (which, I believe, if you will 
forgive my crudity, invokes fellatio).  Here is one more that might be just 
coincidental: Horn falls in that big pit on the island.  If you buy my theory 
that this recreates the vanished people by hybridizing man and tree, then Horn 
acts as an impregnating phallus "lost in the big woods".  Unlike naming the 
taverns "the cock" and "the bush", I am not willing to say that this Horn in a 
pit is intentional on Wolfe's part.  I just recall being traumatized by the 
description of Jolenta's private parts as an unhatched chick or something in 
The Claw of the Conciliator in the fifth grade or so.  That's a pretty scary 
description to a young boy. And then there is that whole iron dingus scene in 
the Claw that always catches me by surprise.
Please forgive the crudity of this post.
Marc Aramini



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