{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/4608",
    "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": 4608,
    "subject": "BotNS Interpretation points",
    "messages": 1,
    "voices": 1,
    "first": "2006-05-21T03:56:32+00:00",
    "last": "2006-05-21T03:56:32+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<BAY103-F241B8727CB5DFDFA6BCF03D7A50@phx.gbl>",
      "from": {
        "name": "b sharp",
        "address": "bsharporflat at hotmail.com"
      },
      "date": "2006-05-21T03:56:32+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) BotNS Interpretation points",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "At the risk of being trite I'd like to mention some scenes in BotNS which,  \nI think, are Wolfian guides on how to interpret that book (and surely others \nof his).\n\n1. In Sword, Severian is climbing down a cliff toward Casdoe's house when he \nencounters a well preserved tile mosaic on the face of an ancient building.  \n(in excerpts) he notes:"
        },
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "<What the design was those tiles traced I never knew; as I descended the \ncliff I was too near to see it.  As I walked I saw it as an insect may be \nsaid to see the face in a portrait over whose surface it creeps.  The tiles \nwere of many shapes, thought they fit together so closely, and at first I \nthought them representations of birds, lizards, fish and suchlike creatures \nall interlocked in the grip of life.  Now I feel that this was not so, that \nthey were instead the shapes of a geometry I failed to comprehend, diagrams \nso complex that the living forms seemed to appear in them as the forms of \nactual animals appear from the intricate` geometries of complex molecules.  \nI strove understand what might be depicted there (whether it was writing, \nor a face, or perhaps a mere decorative design).  I could not; and perhaps \nit was each of thsoe, or none depending on the position from which it was \nseen and the predisposition the viewer brought to it.>"
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "So should we dispair of ever making common sense of BotNS because it is too \ncomplex and because every reader's position and predispositions are \ndifferent?  Maybe, but perhaps not. While each reader's viewpoint is \ndifferent, we all share some things in common. And one thing does remain \n(fairly) constant, which is the position and predisposition of the AUTHOR \nwhich, no matter how masterfully disguised and cloaked, may be possible to \ndiscern. Especially if we work together.\n\nGene offers some hope with these:\n\n2. As Severian stares at the stars in the mountains he says,"
        },
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "\"At first the stars all seemed a featureless mass of lights.  Soon, of \ncourse I began to see that some were brighter than others, and that their \ncolors were by no means uniform.  Then, quite unexpectedly, when I had been \nstaring at them for a long time, the shape of a peryton seemed to spring \nout.  In a moment it was gone but soon returned, and with it other shapes, \nsome corresponding to constellations of which I had heard, other that were, \nI'm afraid, entirely of my own making.  An amphisbaena, or snake with a \nhead at either end, was particularly distinct.>"
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "3. As Severian contemplates a painting of a garden with a llanero playing \nguitar:"
        },
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "\"The painting was of that irritating kind which dissolves into mere blobs \nof color unless it can be >seen as a whole.  I took a step backward to get \na better perspective of it, then another.......\">"
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "So how many steps back must we take to fully grasp BotNS?  I think at least \ntwo.  One, perhaps obviously, to encompass Urth of the New Sun. But another \nto put Fifth Head of Cerberus into the picture. I think in interviews Wolfe \nhas disavowed this view or pleaded ignorance.  But I agree with those who \nsuspect that the two stories are not only set in the same universe but are \nintimately linked.\n\n-bsharp"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}