Given how many times you've talked about Gene Wolfe's love of puns, this omission stunned me: In your discussion of Peace chapter 3 you had a protracted discussion about Julius Smart and oranges, but never once mentioned the "Orange Julius".
top of page
Lovecraftian Fiction
Literary Podcasts
CLAYTEMPLE MEDIA
bottom of page
SPOILER ALERT (of the interpretive kind?)
Digging further into this: Orange Julius was even associated with the devil in the 1970s: https://www.sjpl.org/blog/looking-back-devilish-good-drink-remembering-orange-julius
I'll just leave it at this: there are satanic interpretations of Peace out there
Haha I was just coming here to say this too. Wolfe must have intended this, as the Orange Julius is even an alchemical transformation of the orange into a drink originally associated with tonics and which was popular at state fairs! So much fits with the setting of Chapter 3. From Wikipedia: "In 1929, Bill Hamlin, Julius Freed's real estate broker, developed a mixture that made the acidic orange juice less bothersome to his stomach. Freed's stand began serving the drink, which had a frothier, creamier texture. The sales at the stand increased substantially after the introduction of the new drink, going up to $100 a day. During the 1950s and 1960s, Orange Julius was sold at a variety of outlets, including state and county fairs and freestanding Orange Julius stands. The original stand also provided medicinal tonics and Bible tracts."