Customer Reviews

Lexicon Urthus, Second Edition

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Gene Wolfe elevates the sensations of wonder, mystery, and discovery that we associate with science fiction into the realms of aesthetic and religious awe. He reaches back in time to take hold of the the thread of myth, traces this thread through the weave of history and literature, draws it forward into the unimaginable future, and then he ties the two ends together in an infinite loop.

I am profoundly grateful for Lexicon Urthus, a book that is clearly a product of extraordinary time and effort on the part of its author. Lexicon Urthus is a key to the labyrinth that is The Book of the New Sun. It is full of maps, diagrams, and timelines, as well as definitions of the words you won't find in your dictionary, and information about the linguistic, mythical, historical, and/or literary origins and meanings of the names of people and places in the book.

The trouble with much that has been written about Wolfe's works, especially about the New Sun novels, is that it is full of speculation, specious reasoning, and overinterpretation. In contrast, all of the information in Lexicon Urthus is based upon Wolfe's text and upon extrapolation and research; nothing is made up. Lexicon Urthus is an invaluable resource for delving deeper into Wolfe's masterpiece.

As a proud owner of the first edition of this work (now out of print), I want to make clear that this is a much-expanded second edition (440 pages vs. the original 304) and all the richer for it.

Having read Wolfe's Urth Cycle (as Driussi himself names it) several times, I read this book much like an encyclopedia, with one reference pinging me off to the next and so on. With a full list of characters (named and unnamed), etymological explanations for many terms in the text, as well as longer articles detailing some of the intricacies and going some way to provide answers to the puzzles hidden in the books, it is an invaluable work of reference for the Wolfe enthusiast.

It will also prove of great use to newcomers to Wolfe's books, as the unfamiliar words can be off-putting to some. Rest assured none are truly made up and have their roots in Latin, Greek and many other sources.

My only (very, very minor) quibble with it is the discovery of the odd typo (Chateline, for Chatelaine, for instance), but even the man himself (Wolfe) has been known to make the occasional mistake. On the other hand, as this is a Print On Demand title, perhaps the author will make these minor corrections, rendering my copy even more valuable!

The first edition of this book sold out before I could get a copy (before I even heard of its existence), but I was lucky enough to borrow a copy from a friend to accompany my first re-read of "New Sun." It added hugely to my enjoyment and my understanding, and it was with great reluctance I returned it to the owner. I am immensely pleased to see this new edition, and look forward to another pass through "New Sun" with its accompaniment.

Extremely useful for keeping track of the all of the concepts in Urth. But be warned, if you are in the middle of reading the novels and use it as a reference, it could give things away. So be careful and try not to read every entry when you flip through it.

I'm thrilled to see the second edition of the Lexicon Urthus available in Kindle format. I only wish that the 4(+1) books in the New Sun saga were likewise available (sigh).

I downloaded a sample of the Lexicon yesterday evening--mostly to verify the formatting. Each entry is a pearl of information. Some of the information made me gasp. Before I knew it, I had purchased the Lexicon and (at 2:00AM) completed reading the work cover to cover. Oh, I cannot wait to dive back into the Book of the New Sun with this searchable tool close at hand. I might even attempt to wrap my brain around Urth of the New Sun one more time.

great fun for word lovers, too, and an excellent introduction to the depth of wolfe's work.

LEXICON URTHUS is a dictionary prepared by Michael Andre-Driussi of the unusual words and names used by Gene Wolfe in his four-volume masterpiece The Book of the New Sun (and its coda THE URTH OF THE NEW SUN). Originally published in 1994, it swiftly went out of print and used copies went for high prices. The publication of its second edition is to be heralded.

Those who have read Wolfe's work know that he usually allows many of his archaic terms to be defined for the reader through context, but those wishing to know more about these words weird and wonderful can turn to this resource. The book doesn't limit itself merely to terminology, however, but also contains the names of characters and places. Many characters in the Book of the New Sun are named after obscure saints of early Christianity or the Middle Ages or mythological figures, and Andre-Driussi shows why they have the names they do. For example, "Nilammon", the man mentioned in passing by the caretaker who shows Severian a picture of the moon ("Now there's trees enough on it to hide Nilammon") is named after a 4th century Egyptian saint who hid in his cell to escape a mob that wanted to proclaim him bishop.

Yet, Andre-Driussi sometimes goes astray. In the entry on Valeria, for example, he mentions several female saints, but doesn't mention who, I would say, is the most likely namesake of the character: Claudius' wife Valeria Messalina. The name of "Kim Lee Soong", the ancestor of the prisoners in the antechamber, is said to be Chinese, but clearly it is Korean. And occasionally Andre-Driussi makes pronouncements that are simply beyond reason, such as that Hethor is the same as Soong. The work is also clearly an amateur production, although Sirius Fiction has typeset and bound it quite nicely.

Educated readers will already recognise many of these etymologies, and LEXICON URTHUS is no substitute for the Oxford English Dictionary and a good saints dictionary. Still, the book is worth reading for any passionate fan of The Book of the New Sun.