Subject: (urth) Jungle Garden revisited

From: LJ Janowski <eforlesen at hotmail.com>
Date: Wed, 07 May 2003 04:19:58 +0000

Hello, I'm LJ and I'm new to the Urth list.  While the Jungle Garden 
discussion seems to have died down, I would like to add a little 
nevertheless, particularly in response to the Library/Garden comparison in 
Nutria's post of April 21.  The Bible/Eden : Library/Botanic Garden idea 
struck me as very interesting, and I would like to add some thoughts on the 
Eden side.

Nutria wrote:

The fact that the Garden contains missionaries and also is a place of death 
is Edenic, broadly speaking. IIRC, the avern is a "delight to the eyes" but 
brings death. Only the Conciliator can wield it with full profit. Mere Adams 
are advised to stay away from it. And of course, it comes from the heavens. 
Those who are trapped in the Garden are those who fantasize about the past, 
and don't want to live in the real world (?). A return to Eden is a trap; 
"salvation" lies only in the future, after judgment. Probably a look at 
Talos's "Eschatology and Genesis" would provide more indications. Just some 
thoughts.

While I found Nutria’s Eden/Botanic Gardens parallel to be an interesting 
suggestion, I would submit that Nutria's suggestion to look at Talos’ 
Eschatology and Genesis (EaG) is helpful but tends to lead me away from a 
direct interpretation of the Botanic Gardens as an Eden parallel.  The play 
takes the gardens of the House Absolute as its “Eden”.  The manicured nature 
of the House Gardens indicates that they are  designed along the lines of a 
recreational garden, which seems close to the paradise as garden of delights 
idea.  This in mind, it is easy to forgive the newly born Meschia and 
Meschiane of EaG when they assume that the Autarch, ultimate master of the 
House’s Gardens, to be their God/Pancreator. Both the reader and EaG’s 
spectators know that the garden was tailored for the dwellers of the House, 
but Meschia and Meschiane can remain blissfully unaware of the fact, lending 
a ironic twist to the Eden parallel.

By contrast, the Botanic Gardens are an example of nature hostile to man.  
Despite their name, which would suggest a sedate collection of various 
specimens, the “Botanic Gardens” appear to be wild terrain, partitioned from 
the flow of time and linked to a particular place by Inire’s ingenuity.  
Unlike those above the House Absolute, these “Gardens” pose very real 
dangers to those who choose to enter.  (There are dangers in trespassing 
near the House, but those come from the House's guardians, which offers 
another Eden parallel.)  Examples of the dangers of the Botanic Gardens 
include a drowning pool, lethal flowers, and several individuals who seem to 
have permanently lost their way.  While the Gardens were partitioned by 
Inire’s conscious action, they are essentially savage and inhospitable 
within.

If the House's gardens function as an Eden, what are the Botanic Gardens?  
The Botanic Gardens seem to function as a species of anti-Eden fit for a 
dying Urth--an opposite to the new Eden that EaG suggests that might herald 
the coming of Ushas.  They function as a place of death and descent into 
confusion where the aware becomes the unaware. By contrast, the House 
Absolute is, as the home of the autarch (and Severian specifically) and thus 
associated with the potential for enlightenment and the origin of a new 
creation.

I think this reading also fits Nutria’s idea of the avern as tree of life 
parallel rather well.  In a parody of Eden we would expect a tree of death, 
which the avern clearly is.  Also, the whole idea of an anti-Eden provides a 
nice resonance with the zoanthropes, who have abandoned the pain of humanity 
for a return to a bestial state, and other examples of loss of humanity in 
BOTNS.  This idea of Eden parody also fits Nutria's insightful suggestion 
that such reversion is "a trap", in the case of the Botanic gardens very 
literally!

Just a few thoughts,
LJ

*------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Mon, 21 Apr 2003 09:41:12 -0500
From: James Jordan
Subject: Re: (urth) Jungle Garden

Tom wrote:

>Could [the Garden] be a dual to the Library?  Another place where people go 
>and some never come back.  Both places have hazy boundaries.  Both places
>have old men who look for things.  Severian goes to both places on an
>errand: one for books, another for an avern.  Both recipients end up dead.

         I suspect so. Compare the Bible with the Garden of Eden as "deep 
sources" for the pair. The Library undergirds (literally) the Commonweath 
civilization. The Garden is also underground. Both are broad images of 
foundations and origins, relating to the past. The fact that the Garden 
contains missionaries and also is a place of death is Edenic, broadly 
speaking.
         IIRC, the avern is a "delight to the eyes" but brings death. Only 
the Conciliator can wield it with full profit. Mere Adams are advised to 
stay away from it. And of course, it comes from the heavens.
         Those who are trapped in the Garden are those who fantasize about 
the past, and don't want to live in the real world (?). A return to Eden is 
a trap; "salvation" lies only in the future, after judgment.
         Probably a look at Talos's "Eschatology and Genesis" would provide 
more indications.
         Just some thoughts.

Nutria

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