Subject: (urth) Liars, TWHF

From: Roy C. Lackey <rclackey at stic.net>
Date: Wed, 17 Nov 1999 01:45:46 +0000

Two instances where Severian admits to lying have already been given (I,III
and IV, XXXV); below I will give a third.

First, an instance where he acknowledges his memory isn't perfect:

After returning to the Ship after his phony "trial", Sev tells his story to
Big Tzadkiel, the ship's captain. She offers to take away the memories of
all his hard travails. He declines: "I don't want to forget, Tzadkiel. I've
boasted too often that I forget nothing, and forgetting--which I have known
once or twice--seems to me a kind of death." (V, XXIV) This quote
establishes from his own mouth that his claim to a perfect memory is a
boast, not a fact, and that his boast is lie.

The subject of lying is an integral part of the conversation Sev has with
banished Small Tzadkiel in the chapter "The Brook Beyond Briah". After again
telling his story to this version of Tzadkiel he adds: "But you, who are my
reader, know all these things (if indeed you exist), because I have written
them here, omitting nothing, or at least very little." This is his admission
that he has deliberately left things out of his story. Note that he doesn't
say that he has left out only unimportant details--that much is
obvious--just that he has omitted to relate some things. Indeed.

At the conclusion of his tale she says:

"No wonder I accepted you; in all those words there was not one lie."
        "I've told lies when I thought there was need of them, and even when
there was none."
        She smiled and made no answer.
        I said, "And I'd lie to you now, mighty Hierogrammate, if I thought
my lies would save Urth."

How much plainer can he be? He lies when he finds it expedient and he lies
just for the hell of it. How many times does Wolfe have to write it?
Severian is a liar. He is like all those oh-so-dangerous-people who are
absolutely convinced that they are Right; *they have no scruples* when it
comes to establishing what they think is Right--especially when they have
the power to impose their beliefs on others. He admitted to her face that he
has lied and will not hesitate to do so again. She *knows* he has lied to
her; that's why she said not *one* lie, and only smiled when he told her of
his lies, like an indulgent mother to a willful child. Who knows how many
lies he has told? There's no way to know because his manuscript *is*
tantamount to literary solipsism; there's nothing to check it against.

She knows all about lying because she/he/it isn't any better. She asks him
what is seen, in the plowman's view, in comparable places on Urth to where
they are now at the Brook Madregot. Sev finally gives the answer she wants:
"wild things". She is, herself, a "wild thing" banished to the Brook between
Briah and Yesod. Why was she banished? Because she is the rogue element of
the Hieros, the Dionysian principle spurned by the Apollonian, just as was
the case for mankind when they strove to be as gods, just as Cyriaca told
Severian.

Sev wants to return to Urth nearer the time when the New Sun will arrive.
She says: "And you want my help." She paused to stare at me with as serious
a face as ever I was to see her wear. "I've many times been called a liar,
Severian, but I would help you if I could."

Now who, exactly, would be in a position to call an angel-like being a liar?
Why would anyone do so? That, at least, is obvious; because they lie.
Severian was lied to at every turn by agents of Yesod. And the last thing he
heard of Small Tzadkiel was her mocking laughter ringing in his ears.

Rostrum wrote:

[snip]
>>TWHF also attempts to answer the
question of why God, if he exists, does not simply show himself to us, but
the book is much less overtly Christian than Lewis's other fiction.  I
think it's a great story, but would be interested to know what folks who
aren't Christians think of it.<<

It's been 25 years or so since I read it, and my memory isn't the best, but
as a non-Christian I still liked it.

Roy

*More Wolfe info & archive of this list at http://www.urth.net/urth/

---

From: Alex David Groce <alex_groce at gs246.sp.cs.cmu.edu>
Date: Wed, 17 Nov 1999 12:57:18 +0000

(All re: Roy's post)

This interpretation of BOTNS can be supported from the text, with a lot of 
work, but I strongly disagree with it.  It seems to me that you're seeing smalland largely disputable points in Severian's narrative as evidence that 
(A) Severianis a bald-faced liar and the narrative we have is not merely 
incomplete, but actually a complete distortion of actual events we can never, 
in any way, know, and (B) the cosmic plan outlined (why we should believe in 
it at all, I'm unsure--why not say Severian is a poor torturer's apprentice 
who, in a fever, dreams he is a savior of the world?) is in fact the work of 
what seems almost a fallen angel, or, perhaps, as others have stated some time
ago on the list, a kind of sneaky  colonization plan by Empire-builders from 
Yesod :).

As I argued before, this way lies complete literary solipsism--given that 
Severian  acknowledges that he lies to other people from time to time (which 
strikes me as the admission of a fairly honest narrator) and that his memory 
is, I would argue, perfect enough that Severian certainly BELIEVES it to be 
accurate to call it perfect, and given the fact that at least some of the 
inconsistencies are pointers to the existence of more than one past for
Severian (or more than one Severian, depending on how you look it)--this is a
fairly difficult interpretation to reach.  Ignoring the fact that from external
evidence Wolfe didn't mean BOTNS/Urth to be an ironic examination of a liar's
distortion of his past, it seems to break a general Occam's razor of narrative:
before one interprets a narrator as unreliable to this extreme (willful lying,
as opposed to incompleteness or misunderstanding), I think it's best to have
MUCH stronger evidence than what has been given.  Some of the points are
certainly worth bringing up, and I myself have swung over more to thinking that
Severian only has a VERY powerful memory, but imperfect, and only believes
himself to have a perfect memory.  However, I think the extrapolation is
unreasonable.

In fact, given this approach, I'm curious--could you elaborate on what you see
BOTNS as "about," in this case?  It strikes me that most of the underlying 
themes I see in it are undercut by this interpretation (which reminds me of the
"Weer is a mass-murderer, and kills EVERYONE in Cassionville" version of 
PEACE). 

The statement:
"He is like all those oh-so-dangerous-people who are absolutely convinced that
they are Right; *they have no scruples* when it comes to establishing what 
they think is Right--especially when they have the power to impose their 
beliefs on others."
would seem to be the heart of this conception, but I don't for a moment 
believe Wolfe meant to make such a cliched idea the heart of his masterpiece.  
Anyway, I have a feeling Wolfe is, to some extent, one of those 
"oh-so-dangerous-people who are absolutely convinced that they are Right", in
the sense being considered here.  I think the text makes it clear that despite
the awful price, <the author> thinks that Severian was absolutely right to 
bring the New Sun's purging floods, and avoid the safe but ultimately dead
future of "Ragnarok."  Typhon's there for contrast, not as a mirror of the
narrator.

(By the way, Tzad's laughter as Small Tzad strikes me as being possibly related
to Chesterton's comment that the one thing never heard in the Gospels in
Jesus' laughter, possibly because the humor of God is too awesome for us to
behold.)

"And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." John 8:32
--
Alex David Groce (agroce+ at cs.cmu.edu)
Ph.D. Student, Carnegie Mellon University - Computer Science Department
8112 Wean Hall (412)-268-3066
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~agroce

---

From: Ouroboros <ottofaij at yahoo.com>
Date: Thu, 18 Nov 1999 09:05:58 +0000

<<<<Severian is a liar. He is like all those
oh-so-dangerous-people who are absolutely convinced
that they are Right; *they have no scruples* when it
comes to establishing what they think is
Right--especially when they have the power to impose
their beliefs on others...Who knows how many lies
[Severian] has told? There's no way to know because
his manuscript *is*
tantamount to literary solipsism; there's nothing to
check it against.>>>>>

Gosh, you sound very sure of your opinion about those
people as well as your take on TBOTNS. Hmmmm. Of
course, that's natural, because thesis/anti-thesis is
the only way human beings can reason regardless of
their scruples. It's also the only method we have of
divining reality from delusion.

What's my point? Well, while I agree that Severian's
memory is far from perfect, I'm convinced Wolfe's
memory (for the purpose of this work) *is* reasonably
secure and objective. 

I'm  unconvinced you have found *any* lies yet. !BUT!
I don't believe you'll find a place where Severian
>>lies<< as the narrator where Wolfe doesn't provide a
clear signal of it in the text. Otherwise, Wolfe would
be permitting himself to play tennis without a net(to
borrow an analogy from Robert Frost). Of course, if
TBOTNS is "literary solipsism" how *could* you discern
a lie, a delusion, or an objective fact (see the
importance of thesis/anti-thesis?). Actually, TBOTNS
seems to me more in the tradition of J. Bach rather
than John Cage.

If you *can* convince me that TBOTNS is "literary
solipsism", you can have my 5 hardback volumes, 'cause
I won't be needing them anymore.

-Ouroboros
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Bid and sell for free at http://auctions.yahoo.com

---

From: Daniel Fusch <dfusch at hotmail.com>
Date: Thu, 18 Nov 1999 19:15:09 +0000

(snip)
>There's no way to know because
>his manuscript *is*
>check it against.

Literary solipsism????

What do you mean? How is the manuscript a solipsist document? I assume 
you're referring to solipsism in the moral sense and not existential 
solipsism.

______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com