{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/4729",
    "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": 4729,
    "subject": "Thecla's Green Book",
    "messages": 2,
    "voices": 2,
    "first": "2006-10-15T06:53:17+00:00",
    "last": "2006-10-16T05:27:46+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<20061015065317.ADDB5DA81F@mailserver7.hushmail.com>",
      "from": {
        "name": "thalassocrat at nym.hush.com",
        "address": "thalassocrat at nym.hush.com"
      },
      "date": "2006-10-15T06:53:17+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) Thecla's Green Book",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "Probably been pointed out before, but Wolfe seems to have made a \nslip juggling his books. When Sev gets the 3 volumes from Cyby, the \ngreen book is \"no thicker than my index finger\" and \"hardly larger \nthan my hand\" - in other words, unusually small, and presumably the \nsmallest of the lot.  But when he delivers the books to Thecla, \nboth it and the saffian (heraldry) book are too wide to fit through \nthe slot in her door. \n\n "
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "message_id": "<001501c6f0e3$d55381e0$ee3ec6d8@rclackey.stic.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Roy C. Lackey",
        "address": "rclackey at stic.net"
      },
      "date": "2006-10-16T05:27:46+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) Thecla's Green Book",
      "in_reply_to": "<20061015065317.ADDB5DA81F@mailserver7.hushmail.com>",
      "reply_link": "subject",
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "Andrew wrote:\nProbably been pointed out before, but Wolfe seems to have made a\nslip juggling his books. When Sev gets the 3 volumes from Cyby, the\ngreen book is \"no thicker than my index finger\" and \"hardly larger\nthan my hand\" - in other words, unusually small, and presumably the\nsmallest of the lot.  But when he delivers the books to Thecla,\nboth it and the saffian (heraldry) book are too wide to fit through\nthe slot in her door."
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "I'm glad you brought this up. I was going to post about it but didn't. It\nwasn't until I read \"Books in _The Book of the New Sun_\" in PE, then looked\nat the two places in the text you mention, plus the part where Severian\nvisited Thecla's cell and took the brown book just before leaving for exile,\nthat I was able to sort it all out. I don't think Wolfe made a mistake; he\nwas just being particularly devious.\n\nWolfe was trying to say as little as he could get away with about _The Book\nof the New Sun_. There is only one oblique mention of it in NEW SUN, and\nthat only by a process of elimination, and even then he muddied the waters.\nThe problem resolves itself when you finally realize there are *two* green\nbooks.\n\nOne of them is the smallest book of all, the green one about the size of a\nman's hand, the book of theology with the devotions and enameled pictures.\nThe brown book was \"hardly larger\" than the little green book. These are the\ntwo books that fit through the cell door.\n\nThe smaller of the two remaining books that are too wide to fit through the\nslot is also green. That one is _The Book of the New Sun_. The other is the\nmuch larger folio with the arms on the cover.\n\nThat essay makes it absolutely clear that the theology book with the\npictures is *not* _The Book of the New Sun_. Therefore, there are two green\nbooks.\n\n-Roy"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}