That line is amazing. And that PIE language is fascinating. Thanks for introducing me to that. It highlights, for me, that Hoban's language isn't too extreme, it's probably not even close to as extreme enough. 2400 years from now? What was English like 2400 years in the past? It wasn't even Proto-English yet at…

I think you're right. They are each other. The spiral of the journey around Inland, the spiral of Riddley's journey to the center of his intellect, to clarity. Et cetera!

Is there another online book club we can all join or start to tackle some of these classics? I am really wanting to read ULYSSES now.

I wouldn't say that Riddley created books (plural), but we know he created one, RIDDLEY WALKER. He writes about writing it, about when he wrote it, he takes a break from it before the last chapter. Then he goes on tour, with a band of perhaps like-minded people, and like gunpowder, the idea of the book will get out.

Um, I'm not sure if the word "obviously" belongs anywhere in that comment….

Good stuff, everyone—but is Riddley really the Cain figure? Isn't Lisserner the one who really betrays Goodparley?

"Arga warga," first and foremost.

Like A LOT of truly great works, "the structure and style of the book is related to its themes." I'm going to remember that phrase.

Unfortunately, it's not. It's not an exact quote, but it's close, and it went on for more than half an hour. I was stunned, but didn't know how to say, "That's fine, except I think your entire worldview is bullshit" without her perhaps being offended. I made some subtle digs when she suggested homeopathic remedies…

I am going to read ULYSSES, because what you (pico79) and Zach and Keith describes sounds just awesome to me. Besides, I think RIDDLEY WALKER has made me more adept at the sort of deciphering-minded thinking that's needed for books like these, or even for certain human interactions.

My to-read pile is most of my home library. But thanks for that excellent comment Rowan, if indeed it can even be called a "comment." It's more of a publishable essay, really, if you just tack some footnotes onto it.

I love Donna's comment
about the reader's experience of deciphering RIDDLEY WALKER being a meta-version of Goodparley and Riddley's experience of reading the Eusa captions.

J.Lo's hip-hop phase
Kirsten Buick, author of the recent biography of Edmonia Lewis, gives a really cool lecture on J.Lo co-opting the race of whomever J.Lo dates—whiteness with Ben Affleck, Puerto Rican/latina with Marc Anthony, blackness with Puffy Combs—and then translating that into her personal style and into…

Not being "directly cast out to be eaten by wild dogs," "shared identity," "a useful role to play"—those are good enough answers for me.

So if Goodparley is Abel, who's Cain? Lissener? I suppose. Yes. Definitely. And does that make Granser Adam? And the 7 men from Horny Boy, Eve? (Not sure about that one.) And was the Garden all the time before the Bad Time; the worldwide nuclear war the flaming sword that cuts them off from it; and everything…

Comments like this make me want to sit down and re-read the whole book.

THIS.

I was intrigued by that, and I'm willing to accept that in the world of this story there are some sorts of psychic abilities or genetic or cultural memories, but the skeptic in me (and the lover of hard science fiction) still looked for a more realistic explanation and ultimately settled on the radar blip and the…

Cool observation, Swibble. That kind of blew my mind. I want to write a book like this, but how would a person even go about such a task? How did Hoban pull this off? He must have gone over his pages so many times, constantly revising, and adding to it, reading it whole times through just to check that one aspect…

Well, yes, except that parents will maybe be more savage and determined in protecting their children. It's hard to say. Let's hope we never find out.