Torin Scharer - American Author Project on Gene Wolfe

The following passage was an example from the first chapter of the sensory detail that Gene Wolfe includes in his writing. My past experience with reading literature from Gene Wolfe had lead me to believe that the most remarkable thing about his writing is the heavy weight of his descriptions, and reliance on small details for important hints in the plot.

"It is my nature, my joy and my curse, to forget nothing. Every rattling chain
and whistling wind, every sight, smell, and taste, remains changeless in my
mind, and though I know it is not so with everyone, I cannot imagine what it can
mean to be otherwise, as if one had slept when in fact an experience is merely
remote. Those few steps we took upon the whited path rise before me now: It was
cold and growing colder; we had no light, and fog had begun to roll in from
Gyoll in earnest. A few birds had come to roost in the pines and cypresses, and
flapped uneasily from tree to tree. I remember the feel of my own hands as I
rubbed my arms, and the lantern bobbing among the steles some distance off, and
how the fog brought out the smell of the river water in my shirt, and the
pungency of the new-turned earth. I had almost died that day, choking in the
netted roots; the night was to mark the beginning of my manhood." (Wolfe p.4)