Bruce N H
Active Member
Hi all,
In a couple of the early classes we discussed when (in-universe) Mannie wrote this memoir relative to the revolution. The final chapters gave us some evidence and Corey didn't circle back to that in the last class, so I just wanted to gather the facts in one place.
1. In the very first line of the book we get that there is an independent Lunar government, so we know early on this was written after the successful revolution.
2. Also early on we get evidence that at the time of the story travel to Hong Kong Luna was hard - that the tubes weren't built there yet. Mannie had been there once on a mail rocket. The clear implication was that at some point between the events of the story and the writing of the memoir the extra 1000 km of tube had been dug, and now people go back and forth routinely.
3. When Mannie first describes his marriage to Wyoh he says he "opted at fourteen". Later down on earth when a reporter guesses Mannie is twenty-two he says he's "been married longer than that". So at a minimum Mannie is thirty-seven at this point.
4. In describing the story of the battle in chapter 22, Mannie says "I don't know how much to tell. Can't tell all, but stuff in history books is so wrong!" So the action is long enough ago to the readers of Mannie's memoir that it is the stuff of history books, but recent enough that maybe some things should still be secret. Speculation, but maybe some of the players in the war still have a role in the government, even though we're told that Mannie and Wyoh no longer "amounted to something in government".
5. We are also told in the last chapter that the Tibet catapult took seventeen years to build. The way this is being told to his readers, though, suggests that the completion of the catapult is at least a few years past. It's not like he said "And, great news, we now have a Tibet catapult!"
6. We get other societal changes that imply the passage of time - e.g. now there is much more travel back and forth, kids even go to earth for school.
7. Finally, the last line tells us that Mannie is "not even a hundred yet". We might guess he's near to 100, though, because he didn't says something like he wasn't even eighty yet.
Okay, putting that all together. Mannie could have written his memoir at the earliest 18 years after the war (based on the Tibet catapult). At the latest this is written 62 years after the war (based on Mannie's youngest possible age at the point of the war being 37 and his oldest possible age now being 99). So maybe it would be fair to say that Mannie wrote his memoir about 40 years after the war, give or take a decade? That's certainly long enough ago for the war, and even the completion of the Tibet catapult, to be a thing of history and for Mannie and Wyoh to be retired from government, and also for lots of societal change and infrastructure development, but also recent enough that someone like Finn to still be in the government.
Anyway, that's my suggestion. Thoughts?
Bruce
In a couple of the early classes we discussed when (in-universe) Mannie wrote this memoir relative to the revolution. The final chapters gave us some evidence and Corey didn't circle back to that in the last class, so I just wanted to gather the facts in one place.
1. In the very first line of the book we get that there is an independent Lunar government, so we know early on this was written after the successful revolution.
2. Also early on we get evidence that at the time of the story travel to Hong Kong Luna was hard - that the tubes weren't built there yet. Mannie had been there once on a mail rocket. The clear implication was that at some point between the events of the story and the writing of the memoir the extra 1000 km of tube had been dug, and now people go back and forth routinely.
3. When Mannie first describes his marriage to Wyoh he says he "opted at fourteen". Later down on earth when a reporter guesses Mannie is twenty-two he says he's "been married longer than that". So at a minimum Mannie is thirty-seven at this point.
4. In describing the story of the battle in chapter 22, Mannie says "I don't know how much to tell. Can't tell all, but stuff in history books is so wrong!" So the action is long enough ago to the readers of Mannie's memoir that it is the stuff of history books, but recent enough that maybe some things should still be secret. Speculation, but maybe some of the players in the war still have a role in the government, even though we're told that Mannie and Wyoh no longer "amounted to something in government".
5. We are also told in the last chapter that the Tibet catapult took seventeen years to build. The way this is being told to his readers, though, suggests that the completion of the catapult is at least a few years past. It's not like he said "And, great news, we now have a Tibet catapult!"
6. We get other societal changes that imply the passage of time - e.g. now there is much more travel back and forth, kids even go to earth for school.
7. Finally, the last line tells us that Mannie is "not even a hundred yet". We might guess he's near to 100, though, because he didn't says something like he wasn't even eighty yet.
Okay, putting that all together. Mannie could have written his memoir at the earliest 18 years after the war (based on the Tibet catapult). At the latest this is written 62 years after the war (based on Mannie's youngest possible age at the point of the war being 37 and his oldest possible age now being 99). So maybe it would be fair to say that Mannie wrote his memoir about 40 years after the war, give or take a decade? That's certainly long enough ago for the war, and even the completion of the Tibet catapult, to be a thing of history and for Mannie and Wyoh to be retired from government, and also for lots of societal change and infrastructure development, but also recent enough that someone like Finn to still be in the government.
Anyway, that's my suggestion. Thoughts?
Bruce
