message 0179

• Russian Influences (Chernevog/Yvgenie and Union/Alliance Universe)

>Date: Tue, 15 Jun 93 07:02:50 -0500
>From: bjgaed@ccmail.monsanto.com
>Subject: cherryhlist followup

>> H'llo!

>>

>> In my (hopefully futile) attempts to clean the local book shops of all

>> works written by C.J. Cherryh (those I not already possess) I picked

>> up _Chernevog_ and _Yvgenie_.  Obviously the plots of these two take

>> place in ancient Russia/Ukraina.  Regarding the russian references

>> from Cherryh's Union related novels I wonder, if she has special

>> relations to the slavic part of (our ;) world.  Does someone have an

>> explanation to this?

>

I'm not sure that there's a direct connection between the Russian

novels ("Rusalka", "Chernevog", "Yvgenie") and the Russian influences

in the Union/Alliance novels -- other than Cherryh's general interest

in the region.  Instead, I suspect that she realized that there was

almost no fantasy based on Russian history or Russian fairy tales, and

decided to use them as the basis for a few novels.





nancy ott      



Cherryh's general interest in the region?  What about everyone's general 

interest in the region on a river near Kiev?



(Do we warn about spoilers in this mailing list?  If so, then consider yourself 

warned.)



When I read _Chernevog_ I was struck by the geographical location.  It could 

hardly be coincidence that the "dead" forest caused by the influence of 

Chernevog corresponds to the contaminated zone surrounding present-day 

Chernobyl.  I know very little about slavic languages and was not able to detect 

any specific wordplay.  The "Chern-" part of the names probably refers to the 

color "black", but I could not figure out what the roots of the two names were.



A comment on the mixed dangers and benefits of technology?  An extended allegory 

about nuclear power where technology=magic?  Technology gives rise to some good 

and some bad just as magic begets both wizardry and sorcery?



Bruce Gaede