posted
...relatively minor I guess, but it's a continuity goof that bugs me.
In Memory of Earth, Issib says that he'd been with an "auntie" and described the disappointing experience to Nafai. But in "Call of Earth" when Nafai's talking to Hushidh about Issib, he says his brother's a virgin.
So does that mean "aunties" don't count then, or what?
Posts: 7 | Registered: Aug 2007
| IP: Logged |
posted
That bothered me too. I mentally retconned it so that Issib's experience with the "auntie" didn't actually go "all the way". Issib's description of the "auntie" experience is vague enough that I can read it that way for the sake of continuity, although it does require a little stretching.
Posts: 120 | Registered: Jun 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Another possibility is that the experience of being with an 'Auntie' doesn't really count towards a person having had intercourse the same as it would with a peer or spouse. In the Basilica society, anyway.
Posts: 4 | Registered: Sep 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
I just think it was one of those errors that happens if you're not going to spend a ton of time obsessing over the continuity of every book.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Whether or not aunties count, Issib and Hushidh's wedding night in The Ships of Earth made it clear (in my opinion) that that was physically Issib's actual first time.
I think pooka's right, such errors are inevitable. And it's good that Mr. Card doesn't spend all his time searching for little details that don't match between books. Otherwise he'd never finish his sequels.
Still, when I find something like that as a reader, it tends to throw me out of the story until I come up with an explanation that works. Usually I can with a little imagination.
Posts: 120 | Registered: Jun 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:I just think it was one of those errors that happens if you're not going to spend a ton of time obsessing over the continuity of every book.
That's the thing. It really seemed to me that OSC really did spend a ton of time obsessing over the continuity of every book. As far as I can tell all the other details are consistent. It's one of the reasons why I liked the series so much, there are a lot of small details that catch your attention and don't make sense until you read the whole series to the end. Things that can be screwed up unless you make sure the details match.
Also, being a member of the Star Wars vs. Star Trek community and a big anime fan, retcons don't count, especially mental ones Posts: 7 | Registered: Aug 2007
| IP: Logged |
posted
I thought Homecoming contained some of OSC's best writing. However, the series contained many continuity and editorial errors (some relevant to the plot, and some just annoying).
I documented them all in this thread three years ago.
posted
There are several, um, errors in homecomming, but you can self justify most of them.
Here I self justified by assuming that Issib was lying. I mean, seriously, who wouldn't want to show their snotty little brother his place when discussing such a sensetive subject? Issib could EASILY have made up his response to Nafai.
Posts: 1321 | Registered: Jun 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
Am I crazy or does Kokor talk about having an auntie at the beginning of Call of Earth? Does that mean something different or...uh...
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by pooka: Am I crazy or does Kokor talk about having an auntie at the beginning of Call of Earth? Does that mean something different or...uh...
Hmmm, I don't recall seeing that, maybe I'll look at it again
Posts: 7 | Registered: Aug 2007
| IP: Logged |
posted
Argh. Three years later and this problem keeps popping up. There was no mistake. Nafai said that Issib was "as much a virgin as I am". He said that on his wedding night, after fumblingly trying to have sex with Luet. He was relating Issib's small amount of experience with his auntie to his own newly-married experience.
edit:
quote: Whether or not aunties count, Issib and Hushidh's wedding night in The Ships of Earth made it clear (in my opinion) that that was physically Issib's actual first time.
And, no, I don't think so. I just read the series again and Mr. Card takes a couple of different opportunities to show that Issib's major concern is not that no woman will ever have sex with him, but that no woman will ever LOVE him, and let him father her children. He is nervous about his time with Hushidh because he's never made love, not because he's never at any sexual experience at all.
Posts: 6367 | Registered: Aug 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Oh, that makes a lot of sense. I just read that today.
Re: Kokor
Aunt and Neice is the relationship of a student to a teacher in Basilica, I now realize. Kokor used the word "auntie" and it confused me, but shortly thereafter Rasa is referred to as being an aunt. It was just an unfortunate collision of context and character, I'm afraid. If I'd never read the series before, that interpretation would not have occured to me, but it had been long enough since I'd read it that the correct meaning didn't spring to mind.
Posts: 11017 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Ha, yeah. The term auntie kinda creeped me out in that usage, considering how easily the word aunt gets tossed around in the series.
Posts: 6367 | Registered: Aug 2003
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
