Severian's skin colour

Severian is white: "I've never seen such white skin coupled with dark hair... Do you think my own skin white?" "Very white, Chatelaine." "So do others, but it is dun next to yours. You must flee the sun when you're a torturer, Severian. You'll burn terribly." TSOTT, chapter X.

Yaaaay! Textual evidence! Hallelujah! And, incidentally, this adds credence to the theory that Sev is at least an optimate and possibly an exultant by birth... --Dan'l

There's also this fascinating description by Mr Wolfe himself from THRUST 19: Thrust: If Severian were standing in front of us, describe him externally and internally. Wolfe: You didn't say at what point in his life, so I'll choose him at the time he leaves the Citadel. He is 6' 1" and weighs 175 pounds. He is pale, with dark eyes, dark straight hair, and good teeth. His face is long and rather bony; high, square forehead, moderately high cheekbones, strong chin. He is muscular; his hands are a little larger than average. He wears heavy, black, knee-length leather boots, coarsely but strongly made; soot-black trousers of a fabric like soft wool; and a long, hooded cloak (unlinted) of the same material. He wears no shirt. Mentally, he is an unconscious intellectual--that is to say, he is fascinated by ideas, including problems of ethics and morality, but he is not aware that he is an intellectual and for the most part he lacks the vocabulary. He is a great deal less like most men than he thinks he is. Even so, he knows himself to be alienated by his eidetic memory. Subconsciously, he has been further marked by the loss of his mother in infancy. He has difficulty in forming relationships because of that, although he does sometimes form them; and he tends toward strong erotic attachments to women who subconsciously suggest the mother he lost. On the simplest level, this means toward women who are physically larger than he--Thea, Thecla, the undine--and to Jolenta, who has unusually large breasts. Of course, everyone is attracted to Jolenta, or at least nearly everyone. On a more subtle level he is attracted to women who act as guides, Agia, or counselors, Dorcas. msg

Irony. ;-) ~ Crush