[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: orion-list guilty corpses



   >The results
   >suggest that the scroll is a curious mixture of realism and fantasy.

The military students are, of course, correct. The War Between the Sons
of Light (White Hats) and the Sons of Dark (Black Hats) is set in the
_future_; hence, fiction on *its* face. In terms and milieu appropriate
to its intended audience, "The War Scroll" story is a good example of
future fantasy; Science Fiction & Fantasy 2nd BCE style. A pity so much
is missing; it is a rattling good story that stands up well in comparison
with a story on a similar theme: the 1930's SF&F pop hit, _The War Between
the Newts_, by Karel Capek.

In any good fiction, real events are incorporated to grant versimilitude;
these "real" parts are necessary both to tie in the known to the unknown
and to help the reader suspend disbelief... which is quite necessary if
one wants to bring in such obviously fictional elements as "demons" and
"angels" fighting alongsides the Bad Guys (Black Hats) and the Good Guys
(White Hats). These "real" portions are why period fiction is such a gold
mine of information for historians.

Look how carefully the author followed Deut 23: 9-14. This tells us, for
instance, that this section of Deut was well enough known among the
intended audience to require the author to follow it exactly or risk
reality crashing in. There is no need to cavill at the oddities in those
military descriptions with their mixture of real and fantastic elements --
both current and ancient; we can expect contradictions in a piece of fiction.
The info it gives us about what was known from the past and what was known
from current events about military procedures is enormous.

Further, while we know that fabulous stories abounded within the Greco-Roman
world, the "War Scroll" gives us one piece of priceless information about pop
lit at the time: future fiction & fantasy was a known and acknowledged genre.

Other information it gives us is what new ideas and theories were popular
during the period. New theories are always turning up in popular lit.; if
a theory becomes the current "fad," stories using characters from them, or
characters with the same characteristics and ideas, pop up like mushrooms
on rotting wood. For an appropriate comparison, read some 19th-century
"Socialist" pop. lit. with its "pure" White Hat "downtrodden" heroes fight-
ing their "evil" Black Hat "establishment" foes.

There is a ton of scarce and unusual social and historical info in that
document. So much work has been done on the "War Scroll," that it should
take very little extra time to put all this work to use in winkling out
the "real" historical and social info.

Oh, yes, the name of the "Wicked Priest"? That is right easy to answer:
His name is Darth Vader.

Cheerio,

Rochelle

Former 1st Lieutenant in the CAP, the US Air Force Auxiliary search and
rescue group <G>
--
Dr. Rochelle I. Altman, co-coordinator IOUDAIOS-L  risa@hol.gr

For private reply, e-mail to "Rochelle I.Altman" <risa@isis.hol.gr>
----------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe from Orion, e-mail to majordomo@mscc.huji.ac.il with the
message: "unsubscribe Orion." Archives are on the Orion Web site
and at http://www.mail-archive.com/orion%40panda.mscc.huji.ac.il/. For
more information on the Orion Center, visit our web site,
http://orion.mscc.huji.ac.il.