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You are right: there have to be two wives, and the mother of Rian is probably not the one who went with Reis to Woldercan. Norma is still an excellent candidate for the first wif…
12 Dec 2008, 13:15
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Son of Witz wrote: My biggest problem with Lexicon Urthus is that he throws out some wild L.U. does give a reference on this one under "History of Urth" in the timeline. It's Uot…
11 Dec 2008, 23:20
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The mausolem is indeed a mystery. One thing we know for sure is that it is Severian's. "I have disturbed my own tomb, and I go to lie in it." It contains three closed coffins and t…
11 Dec 2008, 21:29
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It must be after he became Autarch (1 S.R.) and before leaving for Briah (10 S.R.). The most likely scenario is that he was captured while leading a battle against the Ascians. Jus…
11 Dec 2008, 19:33
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Consider Sev in his role of Apu-Punchau. He was an aquastor, but he was able to be killed by his people. He self-resurrected only when the light of the New Sun reached him. All of …
11 Dec 2008, 19:20
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The voices make me think of spirits bound in service to a wizard. If there's a specific literary reference, it may be to *The Tempest*: 1) The voice like the wind is like Ariel, th…
11 Dec 2008, 17:16
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John Watkins wrote: This seems dead-on to me, except that I can't quite square the black beans with Apheta's claim that the Hieropeople were behind the black hole in the sun (or, …
10 Dec 2008, 22:54
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Abaia can't be all that ancient. In SotL, Typhon wakes up and tells Severian that he detects the monsters for the first time. They are new to Typhon, though he must have possesse…
09 Dec 2008, 21:17
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It seems a bit contradictory to the concept of "the will of God" that God would allow timelines in which every possible thing happens. It would follow from what you said before t…
08 Dec 2008, 12:16
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Hold on -- the date of the celebration of Christmas was chosen to co-opt the Roman holiday of Saturnalia. Almost everyone agrees that could not be the real birthday of Jesus -- s…
06 Dec 2008, 13:23
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I think you're right. At the time Chris took his vows he probably had no idea he would ever get back to the time when his wife was alive. It was only one day when he looked in th…
06 Dec 2008, 05:06
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Here are more "Burtisms" -- anachronistic and heavily British-slangy. He's almost as over-the-top as King Kanoa in "An Evil Guest" (by the way, I also think Kanoa is faking his spe…
04 Dec 2008, 22:51
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Now that we have cleared Chris of the murder of Valentin and the other time-crimes of Burt and Lesage, it's time to re-evaluate his morality. Wolfe invites us to do this: "I am not…
04 Dec 2008, 16:18
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The first trip of Chris to the past resulted in the early invention of the jib sail. Perhaps the changes brought about by Chris and his descendants pushed technology along faster…
04 Dec 2008, 12:25
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Near the part about temptation we were talking about, Fr. Chris said he could take the monorail to New Jersey (p. 226). The name of the monastery is given: Our Lady of Bethlehem …
04 Dec 2008, 12:19
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That's not quite feasible, because the world of Fr. Cris has city-to-city monorails, human genetic engineering, and the communists out of power in Cuba. But for the sake of argumen…
03 Dec 2008, 16:53
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I don't read the temptation paragraphs that way. "What if my father decided not to go to Cuba to run the casino? What if he did not enroll me in the monastery school because of som…
03 Dec 2008, 16:22
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The more I check out Burt, the more bogus he looks. Here's more... Burt's story of being a midshipman on half-pay (p. 55) is a lie. Midshipmen were in training to be officers, but…
02 Dec 2008, 22:42
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I just found another reference that helps clinch the case for Captain Burt's "Dago" anachronism, and ties him directly to Lesage. Asuka calls Chris a "rital" and he says "I suppos…
02 Dec 2008, 20:27
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1. Captain Burt is marked as a time traveler by his anachronistic use of the racial slur "Dago" (p. 39). According to the Online Etymology Dictionary <http://www.etymonline.c…
02 Dec 2008, 17:38
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Thank you for the date corrections. There's still enough of a gap between 1680 and 1725 that Wolfe may have intended a clue, but it's not as clear as I first thought. ...his belie…
01 Dec 2008, 21:28
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01 Dec 2008, 20:47
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Oops -- sorry about multiple sends of the same message. My mailer was malfunctioning and it looked like nothing was getting through, so I tried multiple times.…
01 Dec 2008, 16:47
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I recently posted a theory here that Chris/Ignacio murdered Valentin and helped Lesage set up Captain Burt for betrayal. I now think the truth is more complicated than that. Chris …
01 Dec 2008, 16:43
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I previously posted a theory that Chris/Ignacio had killed Valentin and set Captain Burt up for betrayal by Lesage. I now think that idea was mistaken. Chris says confessions that…
01 Dec 2008, 16:24
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I previously posted a theory that Chris/Ignacio had killed Valentin and set Captain Burt up for betrayal by Lesage. I now think that idea was mistaken. Chris says confessions that…
01 Dec 2008, 16:23
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I suppose you're referring to Moore's "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen," though I think he's doing something like he did in "Watchmen" -- a deconstruction of the world of heroi…
29 Nov 2008, 13:05
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The discovery of the body of Valentin and his dog Francine in the cave on Hispaniola (p. 204-205) leaves the reader with a mystery. Who killed Valentin? 1. Suicide is suggest…
27 Nov 2008, 14:20
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Wolfe may have drawn some ideas from Tertullian, but he surely wouldn't consider him to be the last word on Christian morality. A couple of centuries later St. Augustine wrote on…
22 Nov 2008, 18:19
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There is Christianity in Wolfe's future world. Cassie encounters it through Margaret (especially in her song "Walk in the Reign") and in her role as Mariah Brownlea. Her star-pow…
20 Nov 2008, 12:51
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Son of Witz wrote: It's not my theory, it's Borski's, from Solar Labyrinth, and the text seems to support it. He's talking about before his unmanning. The text says she was born i…
19 Nov 2008, 11:38
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I now think that Norma Peiper was the wife who accompanied Reis to Woldercan (p. 301). There's no need to postulate a second wife, because the timing can be made to work with one…
15 Nov 2008, 22:14
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There is direct evidence that Norma is Bill's ex -- she comes right out and says it: "I used to be married to the volcano god. Did you know?" (p. 176). Cassie misunderstands and a…
13 Nov 2008, 16:02
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It's interesting to try to connect the love triangles in Cassie's plays with her real life. In "The Red Spot," Brad Kingsley (Bruce Sandoz) is married to Jane Simmons (Alexis Caba…
12 Nov 2008, 19:03
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Indeed. Things didn't work out quite as well as the Vironese hoped in the case of Silk, however: 1) People expected miracles and the favor of the gods when Silk himself had lost…
05 Nov 2008, 11:57
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Given that Wolfe is a Christian I doubt very much that he would write a work consistent with such a nihilistic Lovecraftian premise. But other writers, such as August Derleth (al…
03 Nov 2008, 20:55
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I haven't read that and it looks like it will be hard to find around here. The only online summary I found was here: http://www.mulle-kybernetik.com/RAL/MT/shortstories.html: Off…
31 Oct 2008, 16:03
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AEG is packed with Christian symbolism. There's a lot of the Book of Romans in here. Notice the two bracelets Cassie receives from Reis. The gold one is heavy, barbaric, and dea…
30 Oct 2008, 12:22
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Gid cannot be too powerful. A time-traveler with the ability to freely change the past would not allow himself to be shot and lose a leg, for example. I don't think he can consciou…
28 Oct 2008, 15:07
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If the birth announcement message was treated like Cassie's ethermail (sent in order to avoid time complications) then it's possible that there was no child at all and that Gid i…
28 Oct 2008, 12:01
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I'd like to expand on this theory, which I think may be a key to the book. When Cassie asks to drive Gid's hopper, she says "I want to be -- I want to matter. I want to be somebody…
27 Oct 2008, 16:21
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I think Gid still loved her even after the loss of her mojo, but she might not love him, at least not enough to turn from her grief over Bill. The Pygmalion reference on p. 81 su…
27 Oct 2008, 12:06
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That's plausible, but Silk does run into a genuine Long-Sun blackout in the next section of their narrative, so Matthew's narrative compression idea may be right. It could also b…
27 Oct 2008, 11:22
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Margaret Briggs seems like a nice, innocent character on the surface -- but I suspect that she is more than she seems. She seems to be a werewolf, and she may also be a spy for m…
25 Oct 2008, 17:29
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Margaret is probably a werewolf and a spy (I'll post all my reasons in another entry) but I doubt she has extensive magical powers. She does know enough about hotel security that…
25 Oct 2008, 17:27
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I suppose most of these things could have natural explanations if we really pushed it. The apartment building could have a bizarre numbering scheme such that apartment 301 is on …
25 Oct 2008, 12:06
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Something very strange was going on with Cassie's apartment in this story. There are too many inconsistencies for the explanation to be typos or mistakes. I believe the answer is t…
24 Oct 2008, 15:38
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I think you've nailed it with this reference. I took a quick look at the online html version of this book: http://craphound.com/someone/Cory_Doctorow_-_Someone_Comes_to_Town_Someon…
20 Oct 2008, 17:39
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Great observation about the time zone. Of course Cassie wouldn't start to get up early when she is pampered royalty -- she'd sleep later, if anything. Possible explanations: 1) …
20 Oct 2008, 00:09
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You may be onto something about Margaret Briggs. 1) She is described as a small gray woman (p. 54) with a colorless face (p.57). 2) She doesn't think to get a straw to preserve C…
18 Oct 2008, 22:10
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