Quote:Smith is depicting a world, like some of the lands in Dunsany, that ends at a distant horizon with a definite rim leading into the abyss of space; hence the fragments of asteroids and other space detritus mentioned in the first paragraph.
Problem is, at least one other definite 'Zothique' story also has a 'edge' to the world, or at least a character who believes such.
From 'Necromancy in Naat':
Quote:'This I had apprehended when the storm bore us westward: for we have fallen into the grip of that terrible ocean-stream which mariners call the Black River. Evermore the stream surges and swiftens toward the place of the sun's outermost setting, till it pours at last from the world's rim. Between us now and that final verge there is no land saving the evil land of Naat, which is called also the Isle of Necromancers. I know not which were the worse fate, to be wrecked on that infamous isle or hurled into space with the waters falling from earth's edge.