Stencil's mother

[Grant White]

This is a bit late,
But circles are kinda my field at the moment, mostly they make me dizzy, 
but seem to pop up very frequently as both thematic and structural 
devices in the post modern quiver of tricks.

THe best circular structures come from the ancient myths and most 
religions rely on a circular voyage of some description. Raglan and 
Campbell discuss the Ur Myth in this context, and the Ur myth, as all 
good circle chasing mythsters know, is the hero blueprint. Slothrop fits 
it nicely, and given the recent discussion of Stencil's pedigree he 
starts to fit it pretty well (point one of the Ur myth checklist is a 
mysterious birth).

It has been too long between V's, I'll admit, but I remember it as being 
fairly cyclical in structure (please feel free to dump on me for 
inaccuracies) And Stencil's voyage is circular because ultimately he 
wants to come back and find himself through finding V. And packing down 
with the devil usually helps.

Grant.

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On Thu, 28 Dec 1995, Tim Ware wrote:

> 
> It's somewhat tricky ascertaining whether or not V. is H. Stencil's 
> mother. His father Sidney cops to being seduced by V. Wren in 1899. Sen 
> in 1899. Younger Stencil was born in 1901. Long gestation. My own opinion 
> is that, reading the story of V. as a parody of the Virgin myth, perhaps 
> we're talking some sort of immaculate conception here. 
> 
> If V. is a parody/inversion of the Virgin Mary, with God "in a wideawake hat 
> [fighting] skirmishes with an aboriginal Satan out at the antipodes of the 
> firmament, in the name and for the safekeeping of any Victoria" (p.73), 
> and not forgetting those five crucified British soldiers, one could 
> suppose that V. was Herbert's mother and, following this analogy, 
> that he had been "conceived without sin" (as the Miraculous Medal says). 
> Thus Sidney's thought: "His father, ha." (p.489)  Herbert seems to dismiss 
> the notion that he is some sort of "self-appointed" prophet (p.53). Of 
> course, he also _seems_ to dismiss the idea that V. is his mother ("The 
> question is ridiculous" p.54).
> 
> Now what about that circle Sidney considers completing, a circle which 
> includes V., Fausto Sr. and himself? (p.489) Hmmmm.
> 
> Any ideas?
> 
> Tim W  
> 
> 
> 
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ timware at crl.com
> If you are dealt a lemon ... play lemonade - CD-ROM DOS
> 
> 
> 
>