What do you think?
Rate this book
A Chapter Guide to Gene Wolfe's Latro Novels
A chapter-by-chapter guide to Gene Wolfe's Latro novels: "Soldier of the Mist," "Soldier of Arete," and "Soldier of Sidon."
- GenresNonfiction
202 pages, Paperback
Published October 1, 2020
8 people are currently reading
357 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 of 1 review
September 6, 2021
A collection of commentary and anecdotes whose aim is to explore the mysteries of Wolfe’s Soldier series of books. Drawing primarily upon Herodotus (one of Wolfe’s main sources) along with other ancient and modern works Andre-Driussi walks the reader through each chapter of Soldier of the Mist, Soldier of Arete, and Soldier of Sidon.
Andre-Driussi presents commentary on each chapter of the books which is broken down into a short précis of the action and may also include specific notes on relevant myths, onomastics, and geography that come out in the chapter. Occasionally Andre-Driussi will provide a very short commentary on items or mysteries he thinks of particular note and also makes a point of pointing out any uses of the word “wolf” in the text. These chapter breakdowns are usually quite sparse, and I was surprised by the brevity of most entries in the book - indeed the almost cursory nature of some of them. It’s really in the appendices that appear at the end of each main section that we get some additional info and commentary, though even there I could have wished for more. I think I was hoping for something more akin to the old urth list where strange theories and esoteric pondering were heaped upon Wolfe’s work and while Andre-Driussi does put forward a few ideas they are relatively few and far between. Ultimately, I think that I felt that much that was presented here was obvious (perhaps a strange thing to say for a work about Gene Wolfe) and the rest wasn’t as intriguing or novel as I perhaps hoped it would be.
There were certainly still a fair number of nuggets that help to shed some light on Wolfe’s foray into Ancient Greece and I think it would still be a helpful companion for those coming to the series on a first read, especially if you are not well-versed in ancient mythology or history. Perhaps the most useful elements of the commentary are the extracts provided from Herodotus, Wolfe’s primary ‘source’ for the first two volumes of the Soldier series, as they give insight into Wolfe’s method and purpose as we see the ways in which he follows his source and, perhaps more importantly, those where he differs.
Andre-Driussi presents commentary on each chapter of the books which is broken down into a short précis of the action and may also include specific notes on relevant myths, onomastics, and geography that come out in the chapter. Occasionally Andre-Driussi will provide a very short commentary on items or mysteries he thinks of particular note and also makes a point of pointing out any uses of the word “wolf” in the text. These chapter breakdowns are usually quite sparse, and I was surprised by the brevity of most entries in the book - indeed the almost cursory nature of some of them. It’s really in the appendices that appear at the end of each main section that we get some additional info and commentary, though even there I could have wished for more. I think I was hoping for something more akin to the old urth list where strange theories and esoteric pondering were heaped upon Wolfe’s work and while Andre-Driussi does put forward a few ideas they are relatively few and far between. Ultimately, I think that I felt that much that was presented here was obvious (perhaps a strange thing to say for a work about Gene Wolfe) and the rest wasn’t as intriguing or novel as I perhaps hoped it would be.
There were certainly still a fair number of nuggets that help to shed some light on Wolfe’s foray into Ancient Greece and I think it would still be a helpful companion for those coming to the series on a first read, especially if you are not well-versed in ancient mythology or history. Perhaps the most useful elements of the commentary are the extracts provided from Herodotus, Wolfe’s primary ‘source’ for the first two volumes of the Soldier series, as they give insight into Wolfe’s method and purpose as we see the ways in which he follows his source and, perhaps more importantly, those where he differs.
Displaying 1 of 1 review