r/genewolfe

All the talk and discussion of 'malfoid' fanfic from Harry Potter doing rounds on twitter has made me think Gene Wolfe would have definitely created a character similar to that if he had written HP. Although Wolfe never wrote any romance novel , the romantic elements he incorporated were very tasteful and IMO quite underrated because they were very brief. He had a penchant for creating those 'female characters who want to kill you but secretly are in love with you'. Agia is a very good example of that and Severian in the end even mentions how much he loved her which at the time came as a surprise to me and makes total sense now. Drakaina and Novia are also great characters although they don't quite fit the trope I am describing. In short , I think GW doing a enemy to lovers romance novel would have been dope.

Just a heads up on Humble you can get 38 of Wolfe's books (EPUB) for a $20 minimum, and support Alzheimers research at the same time. Seems like a win for everyone.

Hello all, I just finished the Book of the New Sun (still have to read Urth though) this morning and I wanted to let everyone on here know. I feel I have been truly initiated at this point. Gene Wolfe is by a good margin the best SF writer I have ever read. The first line of Shadow is so well put together it makes me shiver (that and many others).

Although I feel that I missed so many details that must be remedied by a reread (or many), that is another part of the beauty of the series. It's a series that builds upon itself bit by bit, sentence by sentence, almost fragmentary, but whose whole creates an amazing work of art. It is the only series that I have wanted to reread immediately after finishing it.

My favorite part was maybe the alzabo fight in Sword. It is wonderfully surreal yet viscerally frightening.

But it is hard to put into words how I feel right now, like my mind has been opened to ways of thinking I didn't know were possible. I feel somber yet gleeful. I wonder how others felt when they finished the series, for the first or second or third time.

I will study this series and all the rest of his works for years to come, I imagine. I already finished The Fifth Head before, so I'll keep going with Urth.

Anyway, I just wanted to tell someone about it, since no one else I know in person has ever read his work before.

Hi! I’m currently reading Soldier of Arete and am enjoying it a lot! My question, is there a chapter 4? My edition goes straight from chapter 3 into chapter 5 but there’s no missing pages or anything?
Just curious if this is a gross oversight or a literary technique of Wolfe’s to confuse the readers more? Thanks!