Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site duke.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!mcnc!duke!crm From: crm@duke.UUCP (Charlie Martin) Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers Subject: Re: Samual Delany's Dahlgren Message-ID: <6085@duke.UUCP> Date: Sat, 10-Aug-85 12:00:26 EDT Article-I.D.: duke.6085 Posted: Sat Aug 10 12:00:26 1985 Date-Received: Mon, 12-Aug-85 23:19:33 EDT References: <124@nte-scg.UUCP> <16107@watmath.UUCP> Reply-To: crm@duke.UUCP (Charlie Martin) Distribution: net Organization: Duke University Lines: 35 Summary: In article <16107@watmath.UUCP> jagardner@watmath.UUCP (Jim Gardner) writes: ... abbreviated here ... > >Almost all of Delany's books have a protagonist or major character >with disfigured hands. Off the top of my head, this is true of Dhalgren, >Triton, the first two Neveryon books (and possibly the third, I haven't >read it yet), and Stars in My Pockets Like Grains of Sand. I greatly >suspect the same thing is true of Nova. Absolutely. Prince Red not only has no (right I think) hand, but is actually neurologically damaged in a way that makes a conventional transplant impossible, so that he requires a prosthesis; this is almost unknown in Prince's universe. (I've always wondered how Prince controlled his prosthesis, as I suspect from the book's description that Prince would not only not be able to control the hand directly (the associated part of his brain is missing) but that he would actually have trouble conceiving of the idea of using a right hand, just as my dyslexia makes it difficult for me to even understand that other people can't read mirror writing. But that's another think entirely.) > >Don't ask me why. Either Delany dislikes his hands, he knows someone >with disfigured hands, or it's some literary >allusion I don't understand. Here's my frivolous literary theory of the week (I'm trying to restrict myself until I a) finish the damn' novel or b) finish my damn' thesis): A deformity of the hands could symbolize powerlessness -- an inability to "handle" the world or some part of it. That fits with Nova, at least. -- Charlie Martin (...mcnc!duke!crm)