{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/3636", "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": 3636, "subject": "The Blushas Challenge: Round Two", "messages": 6, "voices": 4, "first": "2002-12-02T17:08:30+00:00", "last": "2002-12-03T03:50:42+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "ddanehy at siebel.com" }, "date": "2002-12-02T17:08:30+00:00", "subject": "(urth) The Blushas Challenge: Round Two", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I wrote:\nI offer extra credit if it does not include any lame \ninvocations of relativity. (\"Oh, see, well, 1000 years have \npassed for the cargo of the Starcrosser, so they project to \n1000 years after when the Duko left...\")" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "And several people responded, beginning with Jeff Veyera:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I thought that Pas/Typhon's daughter Scylla had possessed \nOreb at that point. They went back to Urth as she had been \nborn there." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That explains _where_, but not _when_ -- if Scylla-in-Oreb \n\"guided\" the Narrator and company back to Urth then, just \nlike the Duko, one would expect her to \"lead\" them back to\nthe Time of the Tyrant.\n\nNice try, though.\n\n\nThe ever-fertile mind of Marc Aramini came up with two theories\n-- which, to his credit, he describes as \"absurd,\" and even\npoints out one flaw (not the biggest) in his first:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Here is one: that Severian is actually going back with them \nto be placed in the tomb he will one day lie in - part of \nScylla is Severian, who is ACTUALLY the dark spot floating\nnext to the boat in both worlds (as the Vanished Person \nSwimmer who comes up on Horn's boat)- and perhaps he is \nfolded into himself in the past of Urth and this explains why\nSeverian always had some presentiment of his future from the\nvery beginning. Of course, this only accouts for Severian's\npresence on Blue in the last two visits to Urth, not in the\nfirst case with Rigolio. Or perhaps when he goes back he\njoins up with Scylla to rest inside Oreb. But it does account\nfor his statement that he will end up in that tomb, which we\nhave never seen actuated." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The biggest flaw, it seems to me, lies in that this \"explanation\"\nworks only if we accept that Scylla (or, rather, Li'l Scylla-in-\nOreb) carries a \"piece\" of Severian, thus invoking an additional, \neven more dubious and hypothetical construct, to provide \n\"evidence\" for the one my challenge calls into question." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "The other is that Severian is a vortex of time - a \nvivimancer, who attracts anyone with the ability to cross\ntime (like the green man or Ossipago, et al.)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "This strikes me as the best of the explanations offered.\nIt even has (I think) surface plausibility -- Severian \ndoes appear to have a remarkable knack for running into\ntimewalkers, whom, I think, we must regard as a relatively\nsmall population. \n\nOn the other hand, if we take into account that the Hieros \n(and others) manipulate many-to-most of the significant \nevents of Severian's life up to (at least) the time he \nsummons the New Sun, then neither coincidence nor Severian\nas vivimancer seem necessary to explain _that_. Furthermore,\nWolfe describes a vivimancer as a dead person who calls\nthe living to him -- and I don't think we can reasonably \ncall Severian \"dead\" at the time of the Narrator's visits ..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Or the affinity between Malrubius and Silk could serve as \nthat anchor. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I guess we can consider this a third, bonus, theory from \nMarc, though it falls prey to the same flaw I shall invoke\nin a moment against this one, from Don Doggett..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "... If the person in the pit who \nrevives Horn is Severian as a Vanished Person then there was \na comingling of the two. Whether you accept that it was \nSeverian or not, at least grant me that there was a mingling \nof \"whatevers\". " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "(Umm ... on what ground should we grant this?)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Therefore the narrator is also part Severian \nin addition to being part Silk and part Horn, and could thus \ntravel to Severian's time. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Now, wait a minute.\n\nFirst, you have made a huge leap here. Even if I accepted\noutright that the person who revives the Narrator is (for\nsome meaning of \"is\") Severian, that does not automatically\nmake the Narrator part-Severian, any more than it does,\nsay, Miles-Jonas.\n\nBut second, and this seems to me the greater flaw, and the\none I mentioned above: it invokes the Blushas theory to \nsupport itself in a rather painfully circular manner. That\nis: the Narrator's party can travel to Urth of Severian's \ntime _because_ the Narrator contains some bits of Severian. \nThe Narrator contains bits of Severian _because_ Blue =\nUshas ... but that very hypothesis required us to raise\nthe question of astral time-travel in the first place. If\nwe leave out the Blushas theory, then we can simply assume\nthat all the astral travel sections in tBotSS take place at\nthe \"same\" time (ignoring, again, relativistic quibbles\nabout simultaneity) as the place travelled from. Rigoglio\n(and, possibly, Scylla-in-Oreb) help the Narrator to astrally\ntravel to the place they come from, but not the time they\ncome from -- Severian's late childhood and the foreground \naction of Short Sun take place at, more or less, the same \ntime.\n\n* * * * *\n\nSummary as of Round One:\n\nI grant that the Blushas theory, with these time-travel \nworkarounds, has a certain degree of self-consistence, as far \nas it goes, but I could begin by hypothesizing that Silk \"is\" \nreally Santa Claus, and then explain everything that seems \ndifficult away by invoking Santa magic -- after all, Santa, \nas we all know, has mickle powers. \n\nWhile I appreciate Don's suggestion that Wolfe might have\nbuilt a deliberate ambiguity into the text, it seems to me\nthat the Blue = Ushas \"reading\" introduces all sorts of \nproblems and complexities which simply disappear if we \naccept the more straightforward idea that the Bleen system\nlies a few dozen lightyears (or however far the Whorl might\nreasonably travel in 1000/300 years) away from the Urth\nsystem. The question of why the Narrator's party would\nastrally travel to Urth at a time when none of them had\nbeen there seems to me to stand as emblematic and typical,\nbut hardly exhaustive, of these problems. \n\nIf the proponents of the Blushas theory cannot, then,\nproduce an answer to this question which neither invokes\nthe Blushas theory to explain itself in circular manner, \nnor invokes additional tortured hypotheses to support the\nprincipal unproven -- in other words, if they cannot\nsimplify the otherwise-unnecessary complexities which the\ntheory imposes upon any understanding of the events of the\nstory -- then I think we have to regard the theory as\ndeeply flawed." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "James Jordan", "address": "jbjordan4 at cox.net" }, "date": "2002-12-02T18:03:53+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) The Blushas Challenge: Round Two", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " I should think that everyone admits that Wolfe intends some \nanalogies between the Blue-Green system and the Urth/Ushas-Lune system -- \nmaybe particularly Ushas, since we have *On Blue's WATERS* and the Ushan \nGreen Man to think about. These surface analogies invite thematic \nreflection, so that Blue may be showing us things about the possible future \nof Ushas, but without being the same planet as Ushas.\n Analogy is not identity, however. Consider the analogy between the \nNeighbors and the Narrator. The Neighbors leave and then return to turn \nBlue over to humanity, and leave. The Narrator leaves (to the Whorl, where \nsome of the Neighbors also went) and then returns and brings about several \npolitical reformations and sets humanity on a better course -- which they \nmay or may not follow -- and then leaves. We could probably come up with \nmore analogies, analogies that help us understand the shape of the \nnarrative. But clearly the Narrator is not a Neighbor.\n Wolfe deals with analogies a lot, chinese boxes wherein one system \nof things is duplicated to some extent at a \"higher\" or \"lower\" or \"later\" \nlevel. Viron-Ayuntamiento-Silk is a kind of smaller analogy for \nWhorl-rebellious gods-Pas. Viron-Silk and Whorl-Pas is kind of like \nIsrael-Jesus and Rome-Emperor. Commonwealth-Severian is like \nUrth-Conciliator. Etc.\n With this in mind, I should think that there are fruitful things \nto be investigated about Ushas-Blue analogies. But these would be analogies \nand parallels, in terms of how Wolfe sets things out. From this standpoint, \nthe Narrator's visit to Severian is not just something thrown into the text \nto satisfy fans, but also an indication that Blue's waters tell us \nsomething about the future of Ushah's waters. It helps solidity the analogy \nand adds more dimension and depth to the overall super-narrative. On a \nstrictly literal level, the Starcrosser ark just goes to another planet. On \na deeper level, but only by analogy, the ark goes through the flooding \nwaters of Urth and comes to Ushas.\n I think the argument for identity does founder exactly where Dan'l \nsuggests: the question of WHY the Narrator returns to Urth precisely when \nhe does. Those arguing for identity have to show two things: 1. that this \nastral travel can also be time-travel for someone in the parties who make \nthe trip, either the Narrator or someone else; and 2. importantly, the \nreason why the time-travel takes the party to precisely this particular \ntime on Urth. Unless both of these can be credibly shown -- and maybe they \ncan -- then we need to be content with analogy and not identity.\n A subsidiary matter: Does time-travel also involve spatial travel? \nI don't recall from the Severian narrative, but I think it does. But I note \nthat the astral travel to Urth does involve returning to a particular place \nin the life of one of the travellers. That is, astral travel is spatially \npegged, so it should be temporally pegged as well. But we don't go back to \nthe time that this man (name escapes me) came from, and that's what we \nshould expect to do if the connection in space is also a connection in \ntime. This fact only strengthen Dan'l's question. If they are travelling in \nthe corridors of time, then why are they snapped back to this particular \nplace? Why not some other place? If the link is with Severian somehow, and \nSeverian at this particular time of his life, then why did they not arrive \nin his presence immediately?\n Naw. They go back to Urth because one member of the party was from \nUrth. They go where they go because that's where he was. They go when they \ngo because it is the same time on Urth as on Blue/Green, because there is \nno time-traveller among them.\n Also, let's assume for discussion's sake that there are smart \ntrees on Urth and that they are related to Neighbors and inhumi. This does \nnot prove identity, because we know that Urth people had been to the stars; \nwe know that Scylla has a presence on both Urth and Blue; we know that for \nsome reason Typhon sent a ship to Blue -- I've suggested Scylla's prompting \nfor this. So, even if we were to find smart trees in the Severian Quintet, \nthis does not indicate identity, only contact between the two worlds at \nsome earlier time and the transport of Blue/Green lifeforms to Urth.\n\nFWIW\n\nNutria" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Jerry Friedman", "address": "jerry_friedman at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2002-12-02T22:50:48+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) The Blushas Challenge: Round Two", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "--- James Jordan wrote:\n I should think that everyone admits that Wolfe intends some \nanalogies between the Blue-Green system and the Urth/Ushas-Lune system\n-- \nmaybe particularly Ushas, since we have *On Blue's WATERS* and the Ushan\n\nGreen Man to think about." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "...\n\nI don't admit that. This is from the interview with Nick Gevers:\n\n\"[NG] [Trying again:] Can your readers usefully view The Fifth Head of\nCerberus as being set in the same science-fictional universe as New Sun,\nLong Sun, and Short Sun? Why does Fifth Head's pattern of blue/green\nsister worlds recur so tantalisingly in Urth/Lune, Blue/Green?\n\n\"[GW] I don't know.\"\n\nThis was a very good opportunity for Wolfe to say which question he\nwas answering, or to answer part of the second question--just the\nreference to Urth/Lune, Blue/Green. Regardless of what an answer\nwould have done to the slope of the playing field, I wish he had. In\nany case, I think it's quite possible that the answer is simply that\nWolfe likes pairs of worlds, and that when they're science-fictional\npairs of planets he likes the blue-and-green color scheme, the two\nmain colors of Earth. It's also quite possible that we're to see\nthem as analogous, as you point out. And Marc's recent list of\nsimilarities, which I consider inarguable (Finally! But no doubt\nsomeone will argue.) makes it quite possible that they're the same\nplanet.\n\nBy the way, Dan'l challenged people who believed that Silkhorn's\ndreams of Severian crossed time as well as space to explain why he\nprojected to that particular time. To me, that's not even an\nobstacle. From Wolfe's point of view, he seems to think that\nhaving Silk and Severian in the same universe was a gun on the wall\nthat had to go off. And from the point of view of the fictional\nuniverse (the deictic point of view?), there are powers above the\nstage, and they may easily have had some reason for wanting to\narrange a meeting--such as to have Severian resurrect Silk.\n\nI'd still like to see some fingerprints, though.\n\nJerry Friedman" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "ddanehy at siebel.com" }, "date": "2002-12-02T23:03:09+00:00", "subject": "RE: (urth) The Blushas Challenge: Round Two", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Jerry F wrote..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "By the way, Dan'l challenged people who believed that \nSilkhorn's dreams of Severian crossed time as well as space \nto explain why he projected to that particular time. To me, \nthat's not even an obstacle. From Wolfe's point of view, he \nseems to think that having Silk and Severian in the same \nuniverse was a gun on the wall that had to go off. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Agreed, so far as that goes; but the question (as I hope\nshould be clear) was intended from" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "the point of view of the fictional universe (the deictic \npoint of view?)," }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "(OK, I really do not understand this use of the word \"deictic.\")" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "there are powers above the stage, and they \nmay easily have had some reason for wanting to arrange a \nmeeting--such as to have Severian resurrect Silk." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "They may indeed, but even this is slightly askew to the \nquestion ... I am asking the pro-Blushas faction to \ndescribe some mechanism, internal to the fictive universe, \nconsistent with the text and ideally with some modicum of \ntextual support, which simplifies a reading of the \"astral\ntravel\" segments of the text at least as much as they are \ncomplicated by accepting the Blue = Ushas theory in the \nfirst place -- keeping in mind that one of the more \nsignificant complexities so introduced is astral time\ntravel itself; let the Bleen system be 800LY or so from \nUrth and we can just assume that the timelines are \nsimultaneous (whatever _that_ means in a universe which \nconforms to Einstein, Lorenz-FitzGerald, etc.)" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Jerry Friedman", "address": "jerry_friedman at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2002-12-02T23:21:51+00:00", "subject": "RE: (urth) The Blushas Challenge: Round Two", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "--- Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:\nJerry F wrote..." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "[From]\nthe point of view of the fictional universe (the deictic \npoint of view?)," }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "(OK, I really do not understand this use of the word \"deictic.\")" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "My mistake. \"Diegetic\". There, that should be much clearer. :-)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "there are powers above the stage, and they \nmay easily have had some reason for wanting to arrange a \nmeeting--such as to have Severian resurrect Silk." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "They may indeed, but even this is slightly askew to the \nquestion ... I am asking the pro-Blushas faction to \ndescribe some mechanism, internal to the fictive universe, \nconsistent with the text and ideally with some modicum of \ntextual support, which simplifies a reading of the \"astral\ntravel\" segments of the text at least as much as they are \ncomplicated by accepting the Blue = Ushas theory in the \nfirst place -- keeping in mind that one of the more \nsignificant complexities so introduced is astral time\ntravel itself; let the Bleen system be 800LY or so from \nUrth and we can just assume that the timelines are \nsimultaneous (whatever _that_ means in a universe which \nconforms to Einstein, Lorenz-FitzGerald, etc.)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "\"Simplifies\". I can't help with that.\n\nJerry Friedman" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Charles Reed", "address": "jazzy_jeeves at att.net" }, "date": "2002-12-03T03:50:42+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) The Blushas Challenge: Round Two", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Jerry Friedman wrote:\nBy the way, Dan'l challenged people who believed that Silkhorn's\ndreams of Severian crossed time as well as space to explain why he\nprojected to that particular time. To me, that's not even an\nobstacle. From Wolfe's point of view, he seems to think that\nhaving Silk and Severian in the same universe was a gun on the wall\nthat had to go off. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "No, I disagree. The gun on the wall was nothing so cosmic as having \nSilk and Severian in the same universe. It's much more simple:\n\nHorn/Silk could, in certain situations, astral-project to places that \neither he or one of his companions had actually been to. The \"sleepers\" \nfrom the Whorl -- even though their memories had been tampered with -- \nwere from Urth. If Horn/Silk were to get together with one of these \nsleepers, then . . .\n\nThat's the gun that has to go off.\n\nCharles" } ] } ] }