On Paths Unknown discussion

Discussion thread for the KIY part 4, The Yellow Sign.

Ha! I think what he is doing with each story, is revealing just a little more of the "world" of the KIY, and also of the play itself, of course.

I loved The Yellow Sign. It's creepy in just the right ways - not revealing too much, not explaining too much. There's a sense of uncontrollable venom running beneath the surface and the protagonist is powerless against it.

Thread for part 5 here, btw: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Is it OK to discuss the full quartet and connections here as well, Traveller? (I will wait to do so until I see more people 'clocking in'.)

ETA: never mind; I see you posted while I was pondering my tabs.

@ Kenneth: I actually found that with most of the stories- but yes, that sense of powerlessness against their fate.... it was especially horrible that he knew about the book and didn't want to read it, but...

Oh, sorry, Amy, that was actually for the next story, so let me post that separate thread for the first 4 stories now: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

I'll have to pick up the other KIY stories, since I have not yet read them.

Kenneth wrote: "I'll have to pick up the other KIY stories, since I have not yet read them."

We can leave it here if you guys like; but I am interested enough in Chambers now that I'd like to read the other stories at some point in time. It doesn't have to be now.

....so, if any of you have over-arching thoughts about the first 4 stories and the conceit they create (The play, the 'reality?' of the Yellow King, and also, how other works based on it relates back) , we can do that for now - here: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

This was my favorite of the four KIY stories - although I wish someone would explain Tessie's slang about "mashing." Is that the same as crushing on someone, or does it mean kissing or sleeping with them?

Right now I just have one comment to make about this story. I think that, like "In the Court of the Dragon," it has a strong religious theme. (view spoiler)[In this case, Jack and Tessie's story parallels Adam and Eve's story. It's all about loss of innocence and how that loss of innocence leads to corruption and death. In fact, when Jack realizes Tessie can't pose nude for him anymore, he says, "Alas! Alas! We had eaten of the tree of knowledge, and Eden and native innocence were dreams of the past—I mean for her." That "I mean for her" bit is hugely ironic. He thinks he's a man of the world, but he's still a believing Catholic, and reading TKIY tears away his mask and makes him realize he knew nothing about real life and real corruption.

In this story, TKIY parallels the apple in the Adam and Eve story. It's the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil. Tessie is tempted and eats/reads it first, and then Jack follows suit because he can't bear to leave her to suffer alone. The result is that now they're both corrupted and subject to death. And isn't it interesting that when the watchmen reaches Jack's locked door, the bolts "rotted"?

ETA: I've just realized Jack died *before* the priest gave him his last rites. In Catholic belief, doesn't that mean Jack dies unblessed or goes to hell or something? I know it's a bad way to go, anyway. (hide spoiler)]

Ah, I see you've spoiler tagged your comment, thanks A., very considerate.
Hello btw, and welcome to the group! :)

Let me explain how we deal with spoilers: to avoid having to spoiler tag EVERYTHING, we rather have lots of threads, and I usually link from one thread to the next one, so the only reason I asked you to use tags in the thread of the mask, was the part of your post that relates to the other stories - since people might not have read story 3 or 4 yet when they enter the thread for story 2.

That's why I made an overarching thread where people can go and discuss all 4 stories together - only, you are the only one who bothered to pull all the threads together, ha.

We definitely were still meaning to, but as you might have noticed, we tend to read lots of books at a time, and so we can get distracted.

...but I'm very glad you've given us some motivation to finish this off properly. :)

Regarding your comments on this story: yes, agreed on the Adam and Eve. Once again Chambers trips us up with ambiguity; I can't help wondering if the watchman (view spoiler)[ killed Jack, or if Jack killed the watchman, and this ties up with a similar thing regarding story 1, The Repairer of Reputations : where I couldn't figure out if Hildred killed the cat and/or Mr. Wilde, or if the cat *really* killed Mr. Wilde, and even if the cat existed at all... (hide spoiler)]

I thought I'd probably put too much inside the spoiler tags, but I figured that was better than putting too little. ;-)

Let me make sure I understand what you're saying, since I'm writing this early in the morning and I'm a little groggy. I think you're saying that if I'm writing a comment about, say, Chapter 3, and I'm writing it on the Chapter 3 page, I don't need to use spoiler tags; but if I write about Chapter 3 on the Chapter 1 page, I do need spoiler tags. Is that right?

And yeah, I knew discussing four stories in one post was problematic. I just couldn't figure out how to get my point across without explaining it that way. I don't know what sort of admin powers you have, but if you ever need to delete or move anything I've written, I understand completely. I'm been an admin before, myself.

As for Chapter 1, (view spoiler)[it hadn't occurred to me to that Hildred might have killed Wilde until I read the comments on that page. My assumption was that Vance had killed him. I don't think the cat killed him anyway; I don't think a cat could realistically cut someone's throat that deeply. (hide spoiler)] But I didn't comment on that page because I didn't have anything to add to the discussion...except maybe this. ;-)

A. wrote: "I thought I'd probably put too much inside the spoiler tags, but I figured that was better than putting too little. ;-)

Let me make sure I understand what you're saying, since I'm writing this ea..."

Yep, that's more or less how we do it, otherwise it becomes rather onerous. You can use your own discretion as to when to use the tags, and like you say, rather safe than sorry, because some ppl can become quite grumpy when they feel they've been 'spoiled'. ;)

About your Capter 1 comment - but, we know that (view spoiler)[ Hildred is insane, because he had read TKIY, plus, it was dark and he -thought- he was attacking the cat, whom he -thought- had attacked Wilde. (hide spoiler)]

Yeah, I see what you're getting at about Chapter 1. It just didn't occur to me while I was reading it.