Subject: (urth) Severian's sister/ancestry - query.

From: Jane Delawney <jane_delawney at sky.com>
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2010 01:16:06 +0000

Just wondered if any more knowledgeable person on the list had any 
suggestions about this query, which has bugged me for years.

Severian speculates early in *Shadow* that the elders and masters of his 
Guild must have information on the ancestry / antecedents of newly 
recruited apprentices. Indeed this is highly likely given the 
recruitment methods of the Guild which takes its apprentices solely from 
amongst the children of their 'clients' (victims). We get only brief 
insights throughout the four volumes of BOTNS into the bureaucracy of 
the Commonwealth, and less than that into the records kept by the 
Seekers of Truth and Penitence; but there *are* records, and we are not 
given any reason to doubt that early speculation on Sev's part.

So - well, when Severian becomes Autarch, he has, effectively, total 
command of the Commonweath and its various bureaucracies. He has the 
Words and he has the authority. After ten very, very successful and 
popular years in power (he is by that time 'Severian the Great' after 
all) he has likely won over many early hold-outs who may have 
disapproved of his succession or of the Autarchy in general (though I 
doubt he's won over the 'Agiatii' or whatever they are called after 
Vodalus's unlamented demise ... what wouldn't I give to hear more about 
this no doubt epic struggle!). So one may assume that most if not all of 
the Commonwealth's bureaucracies are his to command.

He has 'reformed' but not abolished his old Guild; also of note, since 
there would have been no need for a wholesale destruction of records 
during a mere 'reformation'. One would hope indeed that the Autarch's 
representatives would have been able to prevent such a thing had it been 
thought of.

So ... why on Urth, with the  power and authority invested in him as 
Autarch, does Severian not require access to the records of the Seekers 
of Truth and Penitence, and thus learn beyond any doubt just who are his 
parents, his grandparents, and his sister? The flip answer is of course 
'because GW does not want us to know', but I hope for more than that. 
Sev could have asked, and he would have been obeyed. He doesn't ask.

Why? Any ideas?

jd

---

From: Paul B <pb.stuff at gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2010 02:15:51 +0000

One possible explanation is that it's guild tradition not to tell (sorta
like an adoption agency, see), and Severian didn't want to resort to
something like having Palaemon or Gurloes tortured for the information.
I find that all the more plausible since Severian seems to be the sort of
guy who doesn't contradict rules, especially ones he was raised in, even if
he technically can now.

Paul

On Thu, Aug 5, 2010 at 9:16 PM, Jane Delawney <jane_delawney at sky.com> wrote:

> Autarch, does Severian not require access to the records of the Seekers of
> Truth and Penitence, and thus learn beyond any doubt just who are his
> 'because GW does not want us to know', but I hope for more than that. Sev
> could have asked, and he would have been obeyed. He doesn't ask.
>
> Why? Any ideas?
>
> jd
> _______________________________________________
> Urth Mailing List
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From: Jeff Wilson <jwilson at io.com>
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2010 03:45:13 +0000

> Sev could have asked, and he would have been obeyed. He doesn't ask.

I believe he does open the records, which is how he knows his mother's 
name and hair color, which Ouen confirms, and that he does it almost 
immediately upon his ascension, before Dorcas can get over her grief of 
the boatman and flee their house in the ruins.

-- 
Jeff Wilson - jwilson at io.com
IEEE Student Chapter Blog at
< http://ieeetamut.org >

---

From: Jeff Wilson <jwilson at io.com>
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2010 04:08:18 +0000

On 8/5/2010 9:15 PM, Paul B wrote:
> I find that all the more plausible since Severian seems to be the sort
> of guy who doesn't contradict rules, especially ones he was raised in,
> even if he technically can now.

Dude, are we reading the same books? Sev says multiple times he's broken 
every oath he's ever made, every guild stricture, ...he breaks rules 
left and right, starting with treason as he breaks curfew on his way 
home from playing truant and swimming in polluted water. He is 
*literally* a rebellious youth from opening page until he crowns his 
career of evil by eating the king's brains!

Then he takes about a decade break and only lies,, cheats, and steals in 
the approved fashion of statecraft before he shows he still has what it 
takes to break all the rules by allying with alien monsters from another 
universe that help him destroy the world!

---

From: Ryan Dunn <ryan at liftingfaces.com>
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2010 04:14:32 +0000

On Aug 6, 2010, at 12:08 AM, Jeff Wilson wrote:

> Dude, are we reading the same books? Sev says multiple times he's broken every oath he's ever made, every guild stricture, ...he breaks rules left and right, starting with treason as he breaks curfew on his way home from playing truant and swimming in polluted water. He is *literally* a rebellious youth from opening page until he crowns his career of evil by eating the king's brains!
> 
> Then he takes about a decade break and only lies,, cheats, and steals in the approved fashion of statecraft before he shows he still has what it takes to break all the rules by allying with alien monsters from another universe that help him destroy the world!

You had me until alien monsters. Severian at no point that I saw allies with alien monsters with the intention of destroying Urth.

Do you really think his action of bringing the New Sun was breaking all the rules? And eating the king's brains was an act of evil? Are you sure?

He did break curfew, though, and was more than happy to help his masters deceive the Autarchy by staging his own death after giving Thecla the knife.

For starters.

...ryan

---

From: Jeff Wilson <jwilson at io.com>
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2010 05:06:13 +0000

> You had me until alien monsters. Severian at no point that I saw allies with alien monsters with the intention of destroying Urth.

Alpheta, Tzadkiel, Famulimus, Barbatus, and Inire are all alien 
creatures from beyond time and space whose existence follows physical 
laws foreign to all urthly experience. They masquerade as humans, 
befriend and seduce Severian in furtherance of their alien agenda and 
are the parties responsible for the White Fountain and its genocidal, 
climate changing, mass-extinction-event, continent shuffling flood.

They all had good reasons for doing all this, but it's not like they 
asked permission or gave due process.

---

From: Ryan Dunn <ryan at liftingfaces.com>
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2010 05:12:50 +0000

On Aug 6, 2010, at 1:06 AM, Jeff Wilson wrote:

> Alpheta, Tzadkiel, Famulimus, Barbatus, and Inire are all alien creatures from beyond time and space whose existence follows physical laws foreign to all urthly experience. They masquerade as humans, befriend and seduce Severian in furtherance of their alien agenda and are the parties responsible for the White Fountain and its genocidal, climate changing, mass-extinction-event, continent shuffling flood.
> 
> They all had good reasons for doing all this, but it's not like they asked permission or gave due process.

True, I just got wrapped up in the hero quest aspect of the text, I guess, and the need for a new Sun, come hell or high water (or both).

...ryan

---

From: David Stockhoff <dstockhoff at verizon.net>
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2010 12:14:15 +0000

When did Severian stage his own death?

Ryan Dunn wrote:
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---

From: Ryan Dunn <ryan at liftingfaces.com>
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2010 13:28:11 +0000

I meant the scene where he's offering Gurloes ways of "dying" so that his betrayal won't shame the guild, even though to do so would be illegal and immoral.

I believe he offers up drowning as an option, which sort of made me laugh on a second reading, knowing what we know of Severian and drowning.

...ryan

---

From: Ryan Dunn <ryan at liftingfaces.com>
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2010 13:36:43 +0000

I shouldn't have put quotes around dying. He truly meant to die for his sin.

...ryan

---

From: Lee Berman <severiansola at hotmail.com>
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2010 14:06:04 +0000

>Jeff Wilson- I believe he does open the records, which is how he knows his mother's 
 
I generally agree with Jeff Wilson. Severian is least forthcoming with us in regard to
his problems with incest. We are given enough information to fairly easily deduce that
Dorcas is his grandmother though he never comes out and says so.
 
Given his initial intense curiousity, it seems almost impossible that, as Autarch, he 
would not use his power to investigate his own family tree (just as it seems impossible
that there was no buggery going on among torturer's apprentices). Such things draw 
attention to themselves by their conspicuous absence.
 
How can Severian admit to us that he discovered all the major loves and conquests of his
life were family members, Dorcas, Thecla, Valeria, Jolenta and Cyriaca all being prime
candidates, I think.  Sometimes I doubt whether Wolfe would set up a scenario and then
disguise it so impenetrably. Then some other new subtle revelation makes an appearance
30 years after publishing and I once again believe it.

---

From: David Stockhoff <dstockhoff at verizon.net>
Date: Fri, 06 Aug 2010 14:11:05 +0000

Right, of course.

Yes, there are some hilarious passages. I am currently rereading by 
audiobook, and am enjoying Severian's dalliance with Jolenta (rhymes 
with "polenta") and the comic play that follows.

Ryan Dunn wrote:
> Tested on: 8/6/2010 9:28:59 AM

---

From: Jane Delawney <jane_delawney at sky.com>
Date: Sat, 07 Aug 2010 01:14:44 +0000

Sorry for monkeying with the subject line again, I want to get my own 
posts sent back to me and this is the only way I can get Sky's mail 
server to do this. And apologies *again* if you have heard this a few 
too many times already.

On 06/08/10 04:45, Jeff Wilson wrote:
> immediately upon his ascension, before Dorcas can get over her grief 
> of the boatman and flee their house in the ruins.

Dunno. Seems to me that Sev has had sufficient information prior to 
becoming Autarch to at least be able to make an informed guess that 
Dorcas was probably his grandmother and Ouen his father. Opening the 
records would have provided confirmation for sure, but did he really 
need that to take the actions he did ie. compel Ouen to care for Dorcas 
(since he knows that he (Severian) would be the last person D. would 
ever want to see again after her return to Nessus).

Whether this is the case or not though - one is still left to wonder 
why, given that he simply must have been able to demand the relevant 
information from the Guild, Severian still does not know (even at the 
end of UOTNS he does not know - one might think that by that time, both 
Sev and GW have passed beyond worrying about it, but if Juturna is in 
the mix that is not the case at all, is it?) who his *sister* is. GW 
spends altogether too much time and effort setting Severian up as one of 
twins (or at the very least of a brother-sister pair with appropriate 
names) for this to be an irrelevant or insignificant question, surely?

I gather that in one of GW's later works (which I have not read) there 
is a scene set within the Matachin Tower which involves Severian, a 
'cacogen', and Merryn (at the time either apprentice or 'journeywoman' 
Witch) and that during this scene Merryn claims that Severian is her 
brother. This may be a generic term (Severian refers to 'the Witches, 
our sisters' in 'Shadow'; here the usage appears to be generic, though 
for any individual Seeker or apprentice there is the possibility that 
this term is literally true, given what we are told about how these two 
guilds obtain recruits) but it's possibly not. Merryn I know has been 
fingered as Severa by more than one commentator, but so have quite a few 
other characters (Juturna, the mandragora, Jolenta, and so on and so 
forth). If Sev as Autarch can be assumed to have confirmed his earlier 
suspicions and deductions about Dorcas, Ouen et al., then why, 
apparently, has he not succeeded in discovering further information 
about his sister?

I still think this is a major lacuna and pretty strange.

jd

---

From: Jeff Wilson <jwilson at io.com>
Date: Sat, 07 Aug 2010 11:18:54 +0000

> names) for this to be an irrelevant or insignificant question, surely?

Let us think what information that the guild would have retained. We 
could expect them to have:

* the official documentation commanding Catharine's imprisonment and her 
torture and execution if any. These would record her name, residence and 
position,  a brief or lengthy physical description doe identification 
purposes, and the charges against her.
* the official guild records kept for inspection by the authorities, 
accounting for her disposition and that of any children who arrived with 
her or she bore.
* the internal accounts or logs kept by the masters for later 
consultation of their own, their fellow masters, and masters yet to come.

I don't think this would necessarily include any details of any family 
members who had not fallen into their hands, except by chance inclusion: 
"...found guilty of the murder of her husband the Autarch's servant 
Pancras for which the sentence of death is to be carried out...". Of 
course, an exultant's family would be identifiable from their name, *if* 
that name were faithfully  recorded and there was no complicating 
factors like disinheritance or abdication.

Of any siblings, the guild records would say that a girl with 
such-a-color hair and eyes and marks was given to the Witches if the 
birth came after incarceration, or such-a-color hair and eyes and marks 
and the name of X if the girl came with her mother to the tower.

Severian's lack of mention of a sister suggests to me that either he 
came without one, or that any on record are no longer locatable.

---

From: Lee Berman <severiansola at hotmail.com>
Date: Sun, 08 Aug 2010 10:27:45 +0000

>Jeff Wilson- Severian's lack of mention of a sister suggests to me that either he 
 
This is a plausible explanation and it surely could be what Gene Wolfe had in mind
with regard to "severa".
 
Among the most popular alternate explanations I've seen are that Severian's sister is the 
witch, Merryn as hinted at in Return to the Whorl. Another is that he discovered that his 
sister is someone he had sex with and doesn't want to openly reveal it, managing to drop 
(conscious or not) hints about it, similar to the hints regarding Dorcas being his 
grandmother and similar to the hint Agilus drops that he and his sister have a sexual 
relationship. 
 
I think Wolfe leaves it to each reader's personal preference which explanation to lean
toward. There is even latitude for those who are comfortable with the ambiguity of three
(or more) parallel explanations and no need for choosing one over the others.

---

From: Jane Delawney <jane_delawney at sky.com>
Date: Mon, 09 Aug 2010 00:07:55 +0000

On 07/08/10 12:18, Jeff Wilson wrote:
>> GW
> * the official documentation commanding Catharine's imprisonment and 
> her torture and execution if any. These would record her name, 
> residence and position,  a brief or lengthy physical description doe 
> identification purposes, and the charges against her.
Of course, this kind of  record would have been routine for any 'client'.

> accounting for her disposition and that of any children who arrived 
> with her or she bore.
Re: the second point - Well yes, one might *indeed* expect these details 
to be recorded, especially if she bore twins and one of them was 
retained by the Seekers (because a boy) and the other handed over to the 
Witches (because a girl). As I've already mentioned I think GW provides 
the reader with so many hints and suggestions re: Sev's name and the 
possible existence of a sister that I can't think why he would have done 
this, unless we are supposed to assume that he did in fact have a 
sister. Otherwise, why bother? Just to be able to turn around and say, 
'Ha ha, fooled you?'

Can't see it somehow.
> members who had not fallen into their hands, except by chance 
> inclusion: "...found guilty of the murder of her husband the Autarch's 
> servant Pancras for which the sentence of death is to be carried 
> out...". Of course, an exultant's family would be identifiable from 
> their name, *if* that name were faithfully  recorded and there was no 
> complicating factors like disinheritance or abdication.
>
> birth came after incarceration, or such-a-color hair and eyes and 
> marks and the name of X if the girl came with her mother to the tower.
For sure. But if Sev was raised by the Guild from a baby (as his 
recollection of being nursed by a woman within the Tower strongly 
suggests he was - though his assumption that this woman was his mother 
is yet another example of his 'unreliable narrator' status since he has 
informed us within the first chapter or two of his narrative that when 
the Seekers  have a suitable newborn in their hands, they will engage a 
wet-nurse; the baby doesn't necessarily get nursed by his own mother) 
and he did have a twin sister, the delivery - by natural means, or by 
the Guild's rough form of C-section as the text suggests - of twin 
babies, one of each sex and one taken or given to be raised by each of 
the sibling Guilds would surely be a notable event, and I can't see it 
not being recorded.

It's always possible of course that Catherine was subjected to this 
rough surgery and that consequently, only one of her twins survived. If 
so, why keep harping on the 'twins' theme? Unless of course the (IMO) 
wild suggestion that the mandragora is Sev's twin happens to be correct.

>
> Severian's lack of mention of a sister
Though people who came into contact with him keep suggesting the 
possibility, over and over again.

> suggests to me that either he came without one, or that any on record 
> are no longer locatable.
This on the other hand is entirely plausible. Sev as Autarch could have 
requisitioned the records and discovered that he had a sister, given to 
the Witches, who was not named at birth (because the Witches would give 
her a name) and was therefore untraceable. This bit of information would 
close out all kinds of hints and suggestions within the four volumes; 
but it's not given.

I still find this odd. Further comments more than welcome, this stuff 
(alongside plenty more in the books) has puzzled me for years!

many thanks to all who have replied and hopefully I don't have to 
explain yet again why I have altered the subject line (sticking to one 
thread at the moment because I don't want to confuse more than one of them).

JD

---

From: Jeff Wilson <jwilson at io.com>
Date: Mon, 09 Aug 2010 01:24:52 +0000

> sister. Otherwise, why bother? Just to be able to turn around and say,

There's a sister somewhere, but that doesn't mean the clues to her 
identity have to be where Severian can find them, just where the 
*reader* can find them.

> the sibling Guilds would surely be a notable event, and I can't see it

He was probably being brief for the benefit of his listeners at the 
time. The guild would not perform c-sections on *every* pregnant woman 
who comes into their hands regardless, that could be extra punishment 
without orders. But after the woman has passed, the restriction no 
longer prevents them from opening her body to take the babes.

> wild suggestion that the mandragora is Sev's twin happens to be correct.

Nah, there's likely no shortage of aborted fetuses in Nessus, and there 
seem to be viable fetuses kept at the Witches' Keep, some must go bad 
now and then. Besides, the mandragora's been locked in the alchemy lab 
for centuries.

I'm sure there's a sister *somewhere*, but even if we figure it out,
that doesn't mean that Severian ever would.

> possibility, over and over again.

I'm speaking in particular of the final sections regarding Dorcas, the 
boatman, and Ouen, the natural times for him to mention his sister with 
regard to his new information.

> close out all kinds of hints and suggestions within the four volumes;

The Witches are also a service guild of the Autarchy, and he would 
simply go to their tower and have their records opened. In fact, I 
suspect he would do so regardless. If the sister were dead, given his 
fascination with the mausoleum he almost certainly would have had the 
body moved there from its humble grave, or at least have had some kind 
of closure worthy of recording. So, the sister must surely still be 
missing as far as he and the Witched know.

> thread at the moment because I don't want to confuse more than one of

Have you considered using one of the free mail services? Or reviewing 
your posts via the list archives?