Urth Digest, Vol 71, Issue 48

From: Ant?nio Pedro Marques <entonio at gmail.com> I'll have to ask yet again - clues to what, please? IF some of the characters that appear throughout the book are Inire in disguise, then what? What happens? What doors open? What new understanding of the story is enabled? What's the net worth of such a knowledge? What is it that we don't grasp about the book that we'd begin to grasp that way? No one has answered this so far. _____________ Well, in the case of Inire, it depends on how much time travelling influence outer elements have had on Severian's life and specifically the difference between Sev1 (not optimised) and Sev2 (optimised). Was Sev1 almost but not quite the candidate for New Sun in which case he only needed a little gentle prodding or was he way off in which case he needed quite a lot of help? If he was close to being the New Sun then we can theorise that appearances by Inire are moments where Sev1 needed a little push perhaps and Inire wants to be sure that these moments occur. If the second option then do we believe that the forces of entropy are also interfering with Severian's progress in which case Inire's presence may be to ward off such negative influence? Far from having a single reading of these books (which I have reread many times now) I value the variety of interpretations that can be extracted from readings and rereadings. I don't want to go off topic but has anyone seen the film Primer? If so they will know that a key scene is the bench scene, multiple viewings of the film have convinced me that there is no correct reading of this scene. I don't want to say more as we are getting into spoiler territory but I feel the same way about Wolfe - to reduce the books to a single correct reading is to cast aside the wonderful multiplicity of interpretations one can find within.

Tim O'Donnell wrote (07-07-2010 17:13):

What I don't see is how Rudesind and other characters being FI in disguise has much to do with any of those questions.

Yes - the pervasive idea that there must be correct readings of a given situation is wrong. Sometimes several readings are correct. Sometimes non is (rarer, but happens). Thanks for the movie tip.

And that is precisely my beef with the drive to reduce characters to some specific trait that doesn't mean anything by itself. - Agia must be a robot because blablabla - but at a certain point, what is the relevance of her precise nature? - Rudesind must be FI in disguise because Fechin is a ranga - but what does that gain us? If there is a common theme in the GW works I've read so far - I'm not fortunate enough to have done significant rereading already - is how characters break free from their native, starting conditions. Trying to pin down exactly what those conditions are, and trying to come up with (or outright invent) a definite answer, as if it had in itself a deep significance, is in my view misguided - and harmful when it blinds the mind to the rest. Their precise nature may be explanative of something else, but I just can't see that it can be an interesting fact all by itself.

"- Rudesind must be FI in disguise because Fechin is a ranga - but what does that gain us?" No one has made that argument, as far as I can tell As for the (ultimately, failed) theory I built concerning Agia, I made the narrative implications very clear. That was indeed the point of the exercise---to take the perceived possibility of a connection between Agia and the doll and test it against the principle that it must add meaning. But it required making up too much stuff---more than it explained---which is a different principle entirely. --- On Wed, 7/7/10, Ant?nio Pedro Marques <entonio at gmail.com> wrote: From: Ant?nio Pedro Marques <entonio at gmail.com> Subject: Re: (urth) The mystery of the image of an astronaut cleaned by Rudesind To: "The Urth Mailing List" <urth at lists.urth.net> Date: Wednesday, July 7, 2010, 12:39 PM Tim O'Donnell wrote (07-07-2010 17:13):

And that is precisely my beef with the drive to reduce characters to some specific trait that doesn't mean anything by itself. - Agia must be a robot because blablabla - but at a certain point, what is the relevance of her precise nature? - Rudesind must be FI in disguise because Fechin is a ranga - but what does that gain us? If there is a common theme in the GW works I've read so far - I'm not fortunate enough to have done significant rereading already - is how characters break free from their native, starting conditions. Trying to pin down exactly what those conditions are, and trying to come up with (or outright invent) a definite answer, as if it had in itself a deep significance, is in my view misguided - and harmful when it blinds the mind to the rest. Their precise nature may be explanative of something else, but I just can't see that it can be an interesting fact all by itself. _______________________________________________

Actually, it at least gave me the insight that the "things" Agia "does" for Hethor probably involve lying very, very still...(shudder)

So it wasn't a complete waste! ;) --- On Wed, 7/7/10, John Watkins <john.watkins04 at gmail.com> wrote: From: John Watkins <john.watkins04 at gmail.com> Subject: Re: (urth) The mystery of the image of an astronaut cleaned by Rudesind To: "The Urth Mailing List" <urth at lists.urth.net> Date: Wednesday, July 7, 2010, 1:25 PM On Wed, Jul 7, 2010 at 1:23 PM, DAVID STOCKHOFF <dstockhoff at verizon.net> wrote: " As for the (ultimately, failed) theory I built concerning Agia, I made the narrative implications very clear. That was indeed the point of the exercise---to take the perceived possibility of a connection between Agia and the doll and test it against the principle that it must add meaning. But it required making up too much stuff---more than it explained---which is a different principle entirely. Actually, it at least gave me the insight that the "things" Agia "does" for Hethor probably involve lying very, very still...(shudder) --- On Wed, 7/7/10, Ant?nio Pedro Marques <entonio at gmail.com> wrote: From: Ant?nio Pedro Marques <entonio at gmail.com> Subject: Re: (urth) The mystery of the image of an astronaut cleaned by Rudesind To: "The Urth Mailing List" <urth at lists.urth.net> Date: Wednesday, July 7, 2010, 12:39 PM Tim O'Donnell wrote (07-07-2010 17:13):

And that is precisely my beef with the drive to reduce characters to some specific trait that doesn't mean anything by itself. - Agia must be a robot because blablabla - but at a certain point, what is the relevance of her precise nature? - Rudesind must be FI in disguise because Fechin is a ranga - but what does that gain us? If there is a common theme in the GW works I've read so far - I'm not fortunate enough to have done significant rereading already - is how characters break free from their native, starting conditions. Trying to pin down exactly what those conditions are, and trying to come up with (or outright invent) a definite answer, as if it had in itself a deep significance, is in my view misguided - and harmful when it blinds the mind to the rest. Their precise nature may be explanative of something else, but I just can't see that it can be an interesting fact all by itself. Subscription/information: http://www.urth.net -----Inline Attachment Follows-----

That's an interesting insight. What is the source of it? As far as I know there are three or four different kinds of pervert that Hethor could be. My source is ten years employment by clinicians treating sex offenders. .

That is seriously a matter of opinion. .

DAVID STOCKHOFF wrote (07-07-2010 18:23):

I was satyrising it, but aside from the straightness and use of slang it's the one reliable piece of evidence that has been aduced.

I can agree with this. I'll further suggest that in reading this work of science fiction, we have a spectrum of preferences ranging from the more scientific to the more fiction/artistic. Some prefer to understand this story with the tools of science- objective observation of the "facts" and parsimony (Occam) in interpretation. Others enjoy artistic interpretation which relies on in-depth cultural understanding and intuitive leaps of faith. Credit to Gene wolfe for creating literature which appeals to both ends of the spectrum and those in between.