Against the Day: Chums and reality in Light Across the Ranges.

[Mark Kohut]

The Chums are fictional, we know from the beginning. Made of authorial air, like
their 'patriotic' airship (at the Fair). Author is omniscient and defines their stories, their
'work'. 

Chums interact with the 'real world' on their assignments, and by taking some humans 
aboard. As we can see and as we said during the online read, they are do-gooders, Bodhisatva-types.
Full of innocence and ideals. Their adventure stories are essentially Romances, in the sense of irreal elements
and 'happy' endings; [happy endings are why we call it Fiction---O. Wilde] 

Romance had surfaced as adventure stories in the time period of early AtD; heroes 
and themes of honor and loyalty predominated, it is written.  Conrad wrote a novel called Romance. 

The world they interact with and much of what they see is the dark side of Romance--anti-Romance. Reality. Simple
presentation of the stockyards is a summary of The Jungle, so to speak, yet also raised to a major
metaphor about the West: Weber's rationalization that narrows and kills, the slaughterhouse(s)
 that were the 20th Century and that still go on. Etc. 
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