Re: Could there be a Gnarly Man in current times?

On 5/7/24 5:46 PM, Christian Weisgerber wrote:

On 2024-05-07, Tony Nance <tnusenet17@gmail.com> wrote:
 

This story was written in 1939 and is set in 1956. It’s about an
immortal Neanderthal - basically he stopped aging around the age of 33.
He most definitely looks the part,

 So with modern clothing and grooming he'll blend right in.
I'm sorry, were you under the impression--as a writer in 1939 might
have been--that a Neanderthal would noticeably stand out?
 

Huh? Oh, I see - yeah, that's surely a reasonable inference, and it's my fault I left it ambiguous. I had the full context of the story in my head when I wrote the post - although it's the inspiration from the story, "Neanderthal" is almost a red herring here.  My wondering is more about modern technology and its effects on money, identity, etc; and, if someone is very physically distinctive, I think cameras could make things a little difficult too.

and he’s intelligent, articulate,
knowledgable, knows dozens of languages, etc etc etc,

 That we don't know.  The language ability of Neanderthals has
attracted plenty of attention, but the anatomical details mostly
hinge on soft tissue that doesn't fossilize, never mind that we
don't know their cognitive abilities.  I guess the recent trend is
to _assume_ by default that they were very much like H. sapiens,
but we don't know.
 

And this made me wonder:
Given his obvious physical differences,

 Bzzt.  _If_ he can articulate and cognitively handle H. sapiens
languages, he'll pass.
 

He was already "passing" in de Camp's story (look at the list of jobs in the original post), though de Camp did mention that the protagonist had some rare and unusual physical traits.

and with modern technology and
communication being what it is, are there ways he could he stay a member
of modern society and also avoid attention?

 Maintaining fake identities is becoming ever more difficult, I
think.
 

Me too.
Tony

ObFiction:
 * One of the early _Anita Blake_ novels has a vampire so old that
   he pre-dates Homo sapiens.
 * I was amused by that _CSI_ episode where the team was baffled
   by a dead body found in the desert.  No head, hands or feet, and
   skinned.  Eww.  Something just felt off, so Grissom called in an
   old flame^W^Wexpert anthropologist, who pointed out that they
   were looking at a gorilla.