Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2002 18:11:40 -0700
From: Michael Andre-Driussi 
Subject: (urth) alga's experiences with 5HC

Alga wrote:
>In my own case, I fell for 5H because of its perversity and cruelty. I think
>(I really don't recall) that I first read only the first novella, which I
>found (and find) dazzling, a model of what science fiction could do if it
>grew up.(Does that mean I consider perversity and cruelty to be grown up?)

Well iirc you don't like (Harold Bloom's favorite) A VOYAGE TO ARCTURUS
enough to re-read it because it is too much in the perversity and cruelty
dept.  So maybe the 5HC novella marks the practical limit for your tastes?
Terminus est, as it were.

>I don't
>think it was till after I was hooked by the New Sun that I read the second
>and third novellas, which take some patience, but when I did and put them
>together in my mind--well, it's quite an achievement.

This is the bit that still surprises me!  Because you were so enthused
about "Tracking Song," I find it hard to remember that you don't like "`A
Story' by John V. Marsch."  I always expect that this would be your
=favorite= of the three novellas in 5HC, because, in my mind, at least, I
tend to think: "A Story" is like "Tracking Song" and "The Tale of the Boy
Called Frog."

You don't have to explain or anything, alga!  I'm just saying that it
surprises me, which in turn shows my shaky grasp on things.

I can see differences between "A Story" and "Tracking Song" and "Boy Called
Frog," and among them, or maybe among the differences I can't see, must
loom a .  . . well, a world of difference in your eyes.

=mantis=


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