{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/480", "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": 480, "subject": "5th Head Genealogies Redux", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "1998-04-07T14:07:48+00:00", "last": "1998-04-07T19:28:02+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Robert Borski", "address": "rborski at coredcs.com" }, "date": "1998-04-07T14:07:48+00:00", "subject": "(urth) 5th Head Genealogies Redux", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Hooray! Some legitimate objections to my Fifth Head genealogy have been\nraised! Believing that a multiplicity of viewpoints is paramount to a list\nof this sort, and mindful that a friendly debate may inspire still other\nsubscribers to reread FIFTH HEAD (my truer goal), I happily accept the\nchallenge of defending my theories, all the while proclaiming they may be\nno more valid than anyone else's suppositions. \n\nTony Ellis writes: " }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Having said that, do we know for sure that even Mr Million's \n\"father\", Number Five's great-great-grandfather, was the first of\nthe line? Dr Marsch's remark could be taken to suggest that\nthe line of clones stretches back quite far. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I believe you have one too many -greats here. Or as the most pertinent\nquote from 5TH HEAD puts it, with Maitre addressing Number Five: \"You are\nhere because I did and do, and I am here because the individual behind me\ndid--who was himself originated by the one whose mind is simulated in Mr.\nMillion.\" (p.66, Scribners). \n\nAs for Dr. Marsch's remark, remember that cloning is illegal on Earth and\nthat Saint Croix has been inhabited \"less than two hundred years\" (p.37)\nand that the Maison du Chien (the structure, anyway) is\n140 years old (p.37). Five generations in 140 years, four of them cloned,\nseems acceptable to me.\n\nTony also has troubles with my Phaedria-as-sister theory." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "(1) If Maitre had sold his daughter to Phaedria's parents, why should they\nnow hope, as they do, to\nmarry her back into his family? " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "If you purchased a child from someone running a house of prostitution,\nwould you assume the child was one of the whoremaster's own or more likely\nthe child of a prostitute whose birth control had failed? Remember also\nthat the machinations of the Wolfe clan remain oblique often even to one\nanother; I cite in this regard Number Five's first encounter with his aunt,\nwhich doesn't come until he is 11 or 12. I submit Phaedria's parents would\nhave no idea she is Maitre's daughter and furthermore would find the idea\nof either marrying her into or selling her to the clan to be quite\npalatable. As Number Five astutely claims, \"Our family, of course, would be\nideal for either purpose.\" (p.40) " }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "(2) The broken ankle\\Aunt \nJeannine link seems very tenuous: a broken ankle really isn't that\nmuch like having no legs at all!" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Aunt Jeannine is _not_ legless, but \"has legs no thicker than my wrists\"\n(p.44) and when Number Five first sees Phaedria in the park he remarks how\nshe has \"an injured leg.\" (p.29) I submit that this is still a potent link\nor else why would Wolfe (the writer) give her a broken ankle? It advances\nno plot point--Number Five could just as easily have met a strolling, or\nseated, unencumbered Phaedria in the park. To think it is mere color or\ncoincidence does not do justice to Wolfe's masterly writing. \n\n (3) If Phaedria's name is supposed" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "to be a classical allusion, why not actually name her after someone\nwho committed incest with her brother, rather than a stepson? " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "To my knowledge, there is no brother-sister incest tandem in classical\nmythology that conveys the tragic dimension of violating such taboos,\nalthough the figures of Jocasta and Electra come close on a slightly\ndifferent level (parent-child). I submit, however, these are too\nin-your-face for a writer of Wolfe's skill. Moreover, I still believe\nPhaedra is more than apposite, especially since among major literary works\nRacine's PHAEDRA ranks probably only second in its treatment of the incest\nviolation to OEDIPUS REX. Again, think plot-point here: given the\nsignifiance Wolfe has always attached to names, why name your character\nPhaedria if not to draw upon the incest connotations associated with the\nname? Caprice? Because it's a nice sounding name?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I'm not sure I understand why you think letting his girls attend the\nplay would further any designs Maitre might have." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "This to me is your most salient objection. I can only surmise a\nwell-intended play might engender further such productions and thus afford\nmore time for romance to bloom between Number Five and Phaedria." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Another objection is that Aunt Jeannine looks strongly like Maitre.\nYou would expect any sister of Number Five's to have the old\nfamily likeness too." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "This I categorically reject. David and Number Five appear quite dissimilar,\nafter all (David is blond and fair, Number Five dark-haired and\nbrown-eyed), so why wouldn't a sister be equally dissimilar? More\nimportantly we also learn that Phaedria has had plastic surgery to improve\nher looks! (p.40). I would maintain in light of the above that it would be\nremarkable if she did look somewhat Wolfean. \n\nI now have a question for Tony: if Phaedria is not Number Five's sister,\nwho do you think is? Surely, you don't believe Wolfe is toying with us when\nhe has Aunt Jeannine mention her--this type of thinking would also lead us\nto conclude Severian had no sister and we know this to be false.\n\nNow on to Pedro Romero's post." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Here is my theory. The original GW is the baby with the girl in the\npicture Jeannine shows #5. After all, she says she is the his true\nmother, so it is easy to figure out the girl is the mother of the\noriginal GW and the baby is #1." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " This theory recapitulates my own and is 100% congruent. To quote myself\nfrom several posts back (v009,n004), \"Gene Wolfe #1 is the original\npatriarch. He is naturally born and it is his parents we see when Aunt\nJeannine has the sepia photograph fetches for Number Five.\" Check it out\nand see.\n\nLastly then we have this from Dan Rabin (along with a very interesting\nobservation about Baldanders--neat!)." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "About the number of heads, I accept Robert Borski's persuasive scheme,\nbut\nif we count the original and Mr. Million as the same head, then the child\nat the end could be the fifth." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I find this to be an interesting fine alternative, and while others may\nhave their own subsets of five (I could probably configure several more, as\nwell as a nine to support the Jeannine=Gene 9 theory), I'm still sticking\nto my original proposal. After all, the title of the novella is THE FIFTH\nHEAD OF CERBERUS and our narrator is called Number Five; to call his son a\nfifth or #5 (unless you wish to substitute him for the murdered Maitre)\nseems a ready miscalculation. \n\nI also reject the notion that Mr. Million and the Gene Wolfe he simulates\nare one and the same. Mr. Million is the most benign character in all of\nthe narrative, while the person he simulates is the mad scientist who\nclones a line of monstrous progeny, and who if the temperament of his\ntemporally-removed twins are any indication could not have been pleasant.\nTo liken each to the other therefore strikes me as specious and\ntautolgical, especially since all of the other cloned Wolfes are one and\nthe same.\n\nRobert Borski (who now feels pretty tapped out about FIFTH HEAD and\nhenceforth can probably best be described as born-again lurker)" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Pedro Jorge Romero", "address": "bempjr at redkbs.com" }, "date": "1998-04-07T19:28:02+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) 5th Head Genealogies Redux", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I now have a question for Tony: if Phaedria is not Number Five's sister,\nwho do you think is? Surely, you don't believe Wolfe is toying with us when\nhe has Aunt Jeannine mention her--this type of thinking would also lead us\nto conclude Severian had no sister and we know this to be false." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Well, it could be because Jeannine is a woman and she assumes #5's\nsibling must be a girl too. She does not seem aware of David, so she\ncould be just guessing. After all this is a Gene Wolfe novel and what a\ncharacter thinks (in opposition to what he or she knows) could be wrong.\n\nMy real problem is: who is Jeannine? Is she the \"control\" of the\nprevious experiment?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Now on to Pedro Romero's post." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Here is my theory. The original GW is the baby with the girl in the\npicture Jeannine shows #5. After all, she says she is the his true\nmother, so it is easy to figure out the girl is the mother of the\noriginal GW and the baby is #1." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " This theory recapitulates my own and is 100% congruent. To quote myself\nfrom several posts back (v009,n004), \"Gene Wolfe #1 is the original\npatriarch. He is naturally born and it is his parents we see when Aunt\nJeannine has the sepia photograph fetches for Number Five.\" Check it out\nand see." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "You are right. I did not read your post slowly enough.\n\nBest\n\nPedro Jorge (out of witty remarks)" } ] } ] }