> Inspired by the few 'healed' broo illuminatants, its
>perfectly possible that someone will then go on to try to breed out
>the innate nastiness of broo and produce a civilised strain - and
>like Nick, I think its inevitably going to go terribly wrong, mostly
>because I think that is the best direction for dramatic use of this
>idea.
I agree totally. It could be fun, though, to have a small community of healed Broo that are making strides toward redemption of their race through the most exceptional self-sacrifice, piety, and discipline in the Light of the Red Moon. Naturally, it has been moved to Tarsh or somewhere in the wild because, honestly Flavius, would you want one living next door? Then the murders start with half-eaten abused bodies found in oddly prominant places. Is it the Old Broo stirring in these apparantly pious mendicants, or is some ogre assassin (or a depraved and surprisingly clever Uroxi?) trying to discredit the experiment? Only the bold and perceptive Lunar Tribune can uncover the shocking truth before it's too late, and her superiors have made it clear that a couple of high ranking Seven Mothers priestesses want to see the experiment succeed. What's a loyal but tired and cynical Lunar to do?
Keith N says:
>I disagree with some of these points. I think the Mostali do have a written
>language, even if it is only used for blueprints, technical drawings and
>assembly instructions. I would not describe them as having limited data -
I'd
>say the anal retentive in every dwarf would make them hoard huge banks of
>entirely useless data. Recording the measurements of every clack they
possess
>and other such timewasting. Call it extremely limited information out of
>extremely unlimited data and it is more mostali (IMO). Dragonewts do not
>write at all, although they make themselves different colours and decorate
>themselves with stuff - does that count.
I don't have a good "gut" sense of the Mostali. I can immagine them having printed manuals that date back to dirt, endlessly recopied. They should also have that good fundamentalist attitude toward print: "if it agrees with us, it is redundant; if it contradicts us, it is detestible; either way, it should be burned." On the other hand, I can also see Mostali using an apprentice system that trains the worker orally on every facet of, say, glass blowing. Since innovation is bad, there is no need for one glass blower to ever communicate with another. Similarly, while they have "hobbies," they don't share that information (no fanzines or mailing lists for the plucky young Dwarf, alas). So I don't feel the Mostali need to be literate, although I don't feel that they don't need to be, either. Your idea is certainly as convincing as my reasoning.
It just occurred to me that Aldrayami could have vegetive information technology -- fruits and other edibles that contain specific messages, skills, etc. "You are old enough to be an archer; it is time to eat from the Archery Tree." Plants grown from dead Aldrayami could carry some of that Aldrayami's memories, allowing access to the "tribe's" history. "We are fighting the Uz, let us eat the Uzkilling Berries...." Who knows what would happen to humans who ate this fruit? (Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil?). On the other hand, this is not really literacy, so it's outside of the scope of my essay.
>A more general point is that I feel that Glorantha *should* be less literate
>than it sometimes appears but that is partly because our perception of it is
>often through 'discovered' or 'translated' documents. Scrolls were also a
>regular feature of treasure in RQ2, and the whole of Pavis sometimes seems
>obsessed with 'charts' frex.
Well, I don't know about that. Many of the documents I recall are from Lunar sources, and the Lunars are probably one of the most literate cultures in Glorantha. Others have been from sources that are more likely to have some literacy (an Issarion trader or a Lhankor Mhy sage). I agree, though, that literacy rates should be fairly low, and that many "literate" people should have fairly weak reading skills (a merchant who can read accounts, puzzling out figures and names, for example. (which brings up another point: does anyone in Glorantha have double-entry bookkeeping? I'd say not, so accounting practices are probably not very sophisticated.)) Anyway, thanks!
Peter Larsen
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