{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/1653",
    "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it.  Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.",
    "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'"
  },
  "archive": "urth",
  "thread": {
    "id": 1653,
    "subject": "Jonas and the sardines (herrings?)",
    "messages": 1,
    "voices": 1,
    "first": "1999-05-31T17:46:27+00:00",
    "last": "1999-05-31T17:46:27+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0027-0036@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi",
        "address": "mantis at sirius.com"
      },
      "date": "1999-05-31T17:46:27+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) Jonas and the sardines (herrings?)",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "Okay.  So do we sort of agree that Jonas-the-android-bits was created on Urth?\n\nNow then, let me walk through the current antechamber set: Jonas sees the\nlove of his looong life, then get bonked on the head and thrown into the\nantechamber with all the sardines. The central point for Jonas is that\npeople don't get out of the antechamber, all the seeming clues that do not\nmatch this point are discarded as red herrings: \"Kim Lee Soong\" as a name\n(it is a signpost to big time because Jonas says it was common in places\nnow sunken); the one, two, or three spaceship crashes/events (the only time\nmarker here is that of generations of prisoners since their crash); details\nof the original structure of the room; the way that Jonas never sees\nHethor, even when they are both prisoners in the antechamber; etc.\n\n(The mystery of what happened at the city gate is a case of too little\ninformation; in contrast, this reading of the antechamber set offers a\nplethora of red herrings.)\n\nThe crashprisoners talk of their crash on the grounds of the House\nAbsolute--or on Urth at least (crash number one), which reminds Jonas of\nhis crash--on Urth? (crash number two).  After the attack of the exultants\n(hey, didn't the exultants attack at the play--no, that was Baldanders who\nstarted it), Jonas becomes sort of unhinged, and believes that he is back\nin a ship incident (crash number three--may not be an actual \"crash\").\n\n(If the prisoners didn't crash in the gardens of the House Absolute, then\nthey must have been arrested for just trespassing as a body--like Severian,\nJonas, Hethor, and Beuzac.  Lessee, they were looking for a port . . . in\nTyphon's time, Citadel Hill was called the Old Port, implying a new Port\nsomewhere else)\n\nSeverian finds the way out--Jonas goes with him.  Free! Now all he has to\ndo is find Jolenta and declare his love!  Yet, look, here's a mirror . . .\nI'll just duck in and freshen up.\n\nWho knows what Jonas has in mind?  He seems to think he can do something\nhimself--he certainly isn't counting on the Claw to bring him back.  And\nyet that is what happens, and maybe this, finally, is the reason why Jonas\nis brought in to hijack Miles (if that model is the case): Jonas stepped\ninto the mirror intending to return to Urth, he wasn't suiciding (we agree\non this, I assume); Severian knew it, and the Claw did, too (if you want to\ngrant it more intelligence than a dumb object); so EVEN THOUGH Severian\nneeded a friend out there near the battle front and hence regained Jonas\n(we all agree this is a good reason for Severian--it is just a unique use\nof the Claw), ALSO Jonas had gone and vowed to return, so it was an\nimportant thing on =his= side, too (even if he wasn't expecting it to\nhappen that way).\n\nAnd doesn't =that= seem like a very \"deal with the fairies\" sort of thing?\nLike the protag in \"A Cabin on the Coast,\" Jonas went to the fairies and\nsomehow paid for his dream of re-construction to take place, and then he\nwas returned to Urth at the easiest opportunity (either as a spirit to\nhijack Miles, or already within the Miles body crafted for him in Yesod),\nonly to learn that his love had already died.  The moral?  Don't deal with\nfairies!  Or \"better to have loved and wooed while flawed than to have done\nthe Charles Atlas thing and let the babe wilt unto death.\"  Or \"she needed\nyou, man, and you weren't there--her death is on your head--you were the\nonly one who could have saved her, and you were off at the gym.\"\n\nLookee here!  The tin soldier didn't desert the paper ballerina in her time\nof trouble--hell no!  He hopped in there, right with her to the end.\n\n=mantis="
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}