Wind And Lorenzen

Question And Answer.

OK. I am rounding up no less than three remaining references to the wind. Maybe some such references do just describe the weather and nothing else?

"A few wounded aliens crawled out of sight, a few dead lay emptily where they had fallen. There was a sharp reek of smoke in the chill windless air." (CHAPTER XVI, p. 132)

A pause in hostilities is marked by a pause in the wind.

"A low little wind sighed through the grove and rustled the leaves." (CHAPTER XVII, p. 136)

The pause in hostilities continues while men must think about what to do next. Appropriately, the wind now sighs rather than roaring, raging etc.

"'I think I see,' murmured Lorenzen. The wind wove around his voice, and a moonbeam flitted across his eyes." (p. 141)

He sees, helped by a moonbeam. The wind supports his articulation of what he sees... OK. That is it with the wind in this novel (I think).

We have to think about what Lorenzen and Avery say and not necessarily just agree with either of them.

Lorenzen:

"'I claim that with all our failures and all our sins, we've still done damn well for an animal that was running around in the jungle only two hundred lifetimes ago.'" (p. 145)

I agree with that but what follows from it? I think that it means that we have changed our condition and can change it again, indeed are changing it now. Lorenzen goes on to say:

"'I like man how he is...'" (ibid.)

How man is: he is changing his environment and himself in the process. Does Lorenzen want to take a snapshot and hold us indefinitely just where we are now?

This sentence concludes:

"'...not man as a bunch of theorists thinks he ought to be.'" (ibid.)

We need some theoretical understanding! We need to consider how we think we ought to be, not just affirm how we are! Of course Avery's "bunch of theorists" is doing it wrong, manipulating instead of advising.

Avery wants to use:

"'...the hidden interplay of economics and religion and technology - to evolve the culture we want.'" (CHAPTER XVI, p. 140)

Nothing should be hidden. Everyone should understand economics, religion and technology.

Avery wants restraint, dignity, contentment and thought as opposed to blindness, greed and ruthless animality. That sounds like an irreconcilable antithesis. Restraint and contentment could be mere passivity. We need the energy that was expressed through greed although shared technological wealth should certainly make greed as such redundant.

If an author sets up an irreconcilable antithesis, then indeed it remains irreconcilable.