Posted from 2 addresses as James Jordan, James B. Jordan
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I don't have time to catch up on all this thread, but FWIW: 1. The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil is associated with rule. "Knowledge of Good and Evil" is a synonym for w…
08 Aug 2006, 21:43
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A point or two. 1. Wolfe is his ancient interview with me makes it clear that Severian's God is the Christian God, and that he is a "Christian figure," a person seeking by grace…
30 Jan 2006, 17:53
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Is Odin symbolism is already at work in the Severian books? There is Ragnarok, so I guess Wolfe was already employing a bit of Norse imagery. The chapter does not seem to be trad…
10 Sep 2003, 14:42
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It's post-Velikhovskian hyper-Velikhovskian stuff. Astral catastrophism. All kinds of material explicable on other grounds is put together to argue that the planets were moving a…
07 Sep 2003, 20:27
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I'm not Roy, but my understanding of what is being suggested is that consciousness, not memories, would be downloaded. This is also the problem with reincarnation/metempsychosis.…
07 Sep 2003, 20:02
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I'm not anticlone, but my own guess when I read the books, which I'll offer for rebuttal, is that Silk is a son of Typhon. In Mainframe, Goodpas, Silk, and Kypris form a model of…
06 Sep 2003, 22:31
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There is Biblical background for this also, with Cain and Abel, and even more, the twins Esau and Jacob. Behind these pairs are Lucifer and the Angel of Yahweh, who wrestle for t…
06 Sep 2003, 14:31
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At 02:51 PM 9/5/2003, you wrote: And Silk, the virtual saint, thought so highly of the With the rest of this post I agree, in the main. But I think Silk left because "mission ac…
06 Sep 2003, 01:31
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IIRC, Wolfe has said that Typhon had no knowledge of the inhumi, so any kind of literal or clone/paternity relationship between him and Quetzal seems to be out. Symbolically you …
05 Sep 2003, 01:20
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Granted. And there are all those clones.... Nutria…
05 Sep 2003, 01:14
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Well, Silk is tall, and more importantly, I guess, he is, we assume, a clone of the builder of the LS Whorl, and he goes off with the Whorl. What begins with Pas ends and continu…
05 Sep 2003, 01:13
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This is important to bear in mind, because we readers have a tendency to see identity where there is only archetype in operation. If someone looks and acts a bit like Apollo he m…
05 Sep 2003, 00:33
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Haven't lookt back at it, but remember thinking of tomatolike apple (identified in folklore only, of course) of the Garden of Eden, esp. since this happens early in the narrative…
21 Aug 2003, 19:37
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If Whorl was intended to make a sleau circuit and return to a post-Flood Urth/Ushas, that would provide an explanation for its slow speed in a culture that had FTL capability, no…
19 Aug 2003, 16:16
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At 04:03 AM 8/16/2003, Don replied to: I think this might even be "two points in favor of parallelism." Sure Tzadkiel's ship is the only one of its kind, though archetyp…
16 Aug 2003, 14:53
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I don't think your Whorl = OneShip hypothesis can stand close inspection, as Crush has pointed out. Thematically, however, there may be something Wolfe intended. The One Ship is …
13 Aug 2003, 15:42
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Josh, alga and mantis are two resident experts, and there are others. If all of you folks want another round on Crowley, that's fine with me. I just don't have much to c…
30 Jul 2003, 16:53
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Josh, Thou hast queried: Yes, I did. Then, thou hast responded to severall things I wrote. Let me say that I was giving my PERSONAL reaction to LB. An…
29 Jul 2003, 16:08
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I just read this. Damn. Here's an elderly gentleman being treated this way by novices, regardless of their age. Gene apologizes to his host. Gentleman a…
29 Jul 2003, 01:51
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If'n you wanna search the Archives, you'll find a looooong discussion of LB a few years back. Since alga brought me up, I'll confess to starting the whole thing. …
29 Jul 2003, 01:33
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Yes, this is like interpreting a particular part of the Bible that is kind of relevant to the Severian narrative: the gospels. One can find scores of "contradictions" in the four…
15 Jul 2003, 00:09
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BUT, Trollope wrote for serialized publication. The first part of a given book or series was in magazine print before the later parts were even written, as I understand it. Wolfe…
13 Jul 2003, 21:41
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Perhaps this point has been made, but what is even more striking about the contradictions is that this is the SECOND time Sev. has written this, and evidently the SAME Sev. Would…
13 Jul 2003, 21:34
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It's been assumed that the Ushas Flood destroyed the Library, but I wonder. As Don noted, it's Borges's library, and is transcendental. Also, it's physically protected, arguably,…
11 Jul 2003, 03:14
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I think your first parallel is right on. Silk plants seeds in young Sev. I notice that he meets Pastor Silk right after his baptismal resurrection. In Sev's own books, it is that…
10 Jul 2003, 15:08
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I assume you refer to the possibility that the previous autarchs are brought back to life in Sev. I don't know of an explicit clue either, but Wolfe has said that he "only says t…
10 Jul 2003, 14:53
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COOL! Just like something Umberto Eco would do. I don't know about adding another Sev, but the rest is a neat thought. Nutria…
10 Jul 2003, 14:40
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And Sev does not just get their memories, any more than he just got Thecla's. They come to life in him. This is part of how he passes the trial. I originally thought this…
09 Jul 2003, 15:45
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Seems right to me. I was commenting on possibly why Wolfe would pick these two, and call the second "unicorn." Markus Nutricious Latro…
09 Jul 2003, 13:58
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Marc, I guess I've been asleep, but if this is something that's been discussed and is now agreed upon, I missed it. What evidence is there for this? Nutria…
09 Jul 2003, 13:53
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The thought that each time Sev dies he leaves an old body behind is a new one for me, but it seems to be in the text. Has anyone made a list of all the deaths of Sev, and…
09 Jul 2003, 02:23
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I'd take it as Christ and the Church, since the Unicorn is associated with virgin women. Nutria…
09 Jul 2003, 02:19
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I'm confused. (duh! who isn't in these books?) Earlier Sevs did not have the power to come back to life and to grant resuscitation. Our Sev did, and I've assumed this is…
09 Jul 2003, 02:17
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Having read all of Wolfe's short stories, except for recent ones published in odd and hard to find (expensive) books, I would say this: There are two kinds. Wolfe has written som…
27 Jun 2003, 16:03
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At a symbolic level, we should remember that ancient cities (before cannon fire) were always walled. Especially Jerusalem (book of Nehemiah). We're symbolically in Byzantium, of …
19 Jun 2003, 19:02
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At 01:13 PM 6/19/2003, you wrote: IIRC it is a feature of the dying I believe it's Lewis Mumford who points out that the building of huge buildings and monuments is an aspect…
19 Jun 2003, 18:29
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I thought the Whorl was a hollowed out asteroid, thus made in space. But the rest of your suggestion makes some sense. Even ordinary rockets blasting off might require a high wal…
19 Jun 2003, 18:23
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Or maybe that "Persian" does not refer to race per se, but to those considered part of Persia, which was pretty multifarious racially. Latro could have been an adopted "Persian,"…
17 Jun 2003, 20:24
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I won't bother with spoiler space. Fair warning. Dinner presents LACity (sp?) as a new Jerusalem, with walls and gates, as in the book of Nehemiah. Also a new Eden appear…
03 Jun 2003, 18:27
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I haven't noticed any, but Wolfe does like Powers, so it's entirely possible. Send your thoughts. Nutria…
03 Jun 2003, 14:23
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Yes. Twas me. But Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, where the original man-eating shark dwelt. But I'm hampered in analysis, not having the full text. Wel…
14 May 2003, 15:26
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Reposted from Nutria, since Crush is still out of pocket:…
10 May 2003, 21:13
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Thanks for putting us onto this, Nigel. A mother named Mary and a son named Adam certainly seem significant. If Baden really did not know about them, they he's been away …
10 May 2003, 18:52
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Could it be this: Latro's lapses of memory between each day provide for him a much fuller alternation of day and night than for other people. I don't remember very much f…
09 May 2003, 16:12
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Lions, eh? Well, since we don't know where Wolfe is going in this series, if he ever gets to go there, maybe it is worth pointing out that the royal house of David are the Lions …
09 May 2003, 14:50
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I likewise am gazing with wonderfully appreciative eyes at mine. Kudos to all those folks who donated time to do this. Nutria…
09 May 2003, 00:07
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Okay, I don't have a lot invested in this either way, though I lean toward a later date for a number of reasons, which are moot here. The only real question is what Wolfe may be …
08 May 2003, 23:18
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"Zarathustra began his prophetic mission about the middle of the sixth century...." Olmstead, HIstory of Persian Empire, p. 94. I.e., ca. 550BC. I think this is pretty much the c…
08 May 2003, 20:50
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08 May 2003, 20:41
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08 May 2003, 20:40
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