{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/325", "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": 325, "subject": "Severian's Slivers", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "1998-01-31T05:26:00+00:00", "last": "1998-01-31T21:22:21+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "m.driussi", "address": "m.driussi at genie.geis.com" }, "date": "1998-01-31T05:26:00+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Severian's Slivers", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Reply: Item #6021037 from URTH at LISTS.BEST.COM@INET02#\n\nChristopher,\n\nI admire the work you are doing here, but I disagree with some\ndetails.\n\nI theorize that Severian has Sliver-selves, or, if you like, he sheds\nhis skin like a snake and becomes something new--but the skin lives\non as the old self. (Remember that whole \"hologram\" thing? Each\nfragment contains the whole, however distorted.)\n\nSo there are =literally= more than one Severian scattered in our\nnarrator's wake.\n\nApu-Punchau is one of them. The Apu-Punchau Severian meets for the\nfirst/last time in the Stone Town is the same one he meets for the\nlast/first time in the tomb. It isn't \"him\" anymore, but the way he\nwas \"then,\" now living on and having adventures which Severian knows\nnext to nothing about (e.g., when Severian finally gets out of the\ntomb and avoids imploding, he sees Apu-Punchau going out to be among\nhis people again).\n\nAnd remember--the vivimancer Apu-Punchau was called up in the ruins\nof the Stone Town, or called the summoners back into the deep past\nwhen the city was alive . . . but since Severian did not have that\nadventure while he was in the past (i.e., he did not close the loop\nat that end--did not see the same scene from the other angle, which\nis what happens at one point in A VOYAGE TO ARCTURUS) then it must\nhave been done by somebody else.\n\nThe dead Severian on Tzadkiel (remember: he saw a body there) is\nprobably another sliver--perhaps the one who helped arrange the\nmiracle eclipse via the ship's sails. This \"sailor Severian\" is also\na top candidate for \"who is buried in Severian's mausoleum,\" since\nthe heraldic crest (featuring a flying ship) would be especially\nappropriate for a former sailor.\n\nThe Claw is also a sliver, or semi-sliver since it doesn't have much\nof a body. But it is quite independent.\n\nSince we don't know what \"Canog's Book of the New Sun\" says about the\nfinal days of the Conciliator, we know precious little ourselves.\nDid he really vanish into thin air at Mount Typhon? It may be that\nonce again there was a body left behind, which then reanimated and went\nabout its business.\n\nHow often is \"entering the corridor of time\" merely a symptom of\nphysical death?\n\n=mantis=\n\nP.S. Oh yes, one more thing about the futures hanging in suspension.\nThere is a thread that might be separate, but no, it ultimately leads\nback into the Ragnarok future: the future that had Baldanders on the\nPhoenix Throne rather than Severian. See, the folks from Yesod were\nquietly testing Baldanders until they could see which of the two\nfutures he would follow . . . once they saw, they dropped him. Or\nwas it the other way--they aided him to make Severian struggle\nagainst him and do the opposite? (It is so tricky figuring causality\nwhen they are moving =backward= in time.)\n\n=m=" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "CRCulver", "address": "crculver at aol.com" }, "date": "1998-01-31T21:22:21+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Severian's Slivers", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Mantis said:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "The Claw is also a sliver, or semi-sliver since it doesn't have much\nof a body. But it is quite independent.<" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " Who's to say that the Claw isn't simply a device made by Tzadkiel to\nhelp Severian bring the New Sun? I'm pretty much ruled out the idea that it\nis an invention of the Hierodules due to the nonchalant response given it by\nFamulimus, Barbatus, and Ossipago." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "it ultimately leads back into the Ragnarok future: the future that had\nBaldanders on the Phoenix Throne rather than Severian.<" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I would like page references for this, if you wouldn't mind. Incidentally,\nBaldanders would most certainly fail the test, because he seemed to think of\nthe New Sun, the Claw, and the BotNS lore as superstition. So, Baldanders as\nAutarch would = Ragnarok. " }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "So there are =literally= more than one Severian scattered in our\nnarrator's wake.<" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " So, can I explain this away by hypothesizing that there were, in fact,\niterations of Briah before Apu-Punchau1's? I don't know about slivers, as\nthat would suggest more Severians than I am prepared to account for.\n\nChristopher R. Culver \nhttp://members.aol.com/crculver/index.html\n------------------------------------------------\n\"Ignorance, that light of fools steers a wayward path\"\n-Brendan Perry" } ] } ] }