{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/5718", "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": 5718, "subject": "The Two Katherines", "messages": 9, "voices": 5, "first": "2010-08-16T20:53:18+00:00", "last": "2010-08-17T19:33:58+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Lee Berman", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2010-08-16T20:53:18+00:00", "subject": "(urth) The Two Katherines", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Ryan Dunn: Or Severian was tipsy himself, and the hilt was indeed heavy." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " \nI used to think Severian might be already drunk by this point but somebody,\nJeff maybe?, has just argued that Severian hasn't drunk anything yet.\n \nIf the hilt was indeed heavy then why didn't WOlfe say it was heavy? Why\ndid he instead take pains to describe the blade of the sword as light? \nA heavy blade would accomplish WOlfe's goal of making Severian lose his \nbalance better than a heavy hilt. You keep ducking the question- why does the \nlight weight blade feel heavy? From the text, without speculation, no ifs or \nmaybes. Can you answer?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "So two khaibits, one of them killed behind closed doors to provide blood \nfor the event? Why not pig's blood? what would the difference be to the viewer? \nThe difference to the guild is immense, use the blood of the animal slayed for \nthe feast, or kill some prostitute who the torturers never see for theatrics?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " \nNo, Ryan, as the theory goes, the khaibit who is killed is right there on stage\nbeing killed by a real blade. Her head and body are spirited away and the live\nkhaibit takes her place, with a wax head and a fuligin cloth over her real head.\nYour questions about appropriateness of fake pig or prostitute blood being used \nas a sacred crism for the torturer guild in their most holy ceremony have already \nbeen answered. A true client's fresh blood seems best." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "The Feast of Holy Katharine does not involve a woman dying." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " \nNow that is a truly amusing statement on several levels." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I refuse to believe it. REFUSE! I say.:)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " \nRefuse is a word that has more than one meaning. But you are a cool dude Ryan. :- ).\n\n \n\n \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Ryan Dunn", "address": "ryan at liftingfaces.com" }, "date": "2010-08-16T21:01:16+00:00", "subject": "(urth) The Two Katherines", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Aug 16, 2010, at 4:53 PM, Lee Berman wrote:\nIf the hilt was indeed heavy then why didn't WOlfe say it was heavy? Why\ndid he instead take pains to describe the blade of the sword as light? \nA heavy blade would accomplish WOlfe's goal of making Severian lose his \nbalance better than a heavy hilt. You keep ducking the question- why does the \nlight weight blade feel heavy? From the text, without speculation, no ifs or \nmaybes. Can you answer?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Besides calling the blade batten with an old hilt, where does he go to \"pains to describe the blade of the sword as light\"?\n\nWolfe says that from the moment the sword is picked up, Severian thinks it's heavy. The batten could be double sided with beads inside to shift the balance the way Terminus Est does. The tip of the blade could be of a heavy lead then covered with tinsel decoration. Who knows?\n\nThe point is the blade is described as false. Severian claims to have hit a fake mechanism. He calls it a wax head. And the \"beheaded\" Katharine rises up after the beheading to put on the fake head in a slight of hand maneuver common to cheap magician stagecraft.\n\nI'm not sure what I'm defending anymore, other than I believe the text as it's written, not that there is some subversive trick played on Severian that he cannot see. I don't see why they would have him kill somebody as a trick. Nor do I see why a real person would have to be killed in order to provide smeared blood on the wax head.\n\n...ryan" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Tony Ellis", "address": "tonyellis69 at btopenworld.com" }, "date": "2010-08-16T21:30:08+00:00", "subject": "(urth) The Two Katherines", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "James Wynn wrote:\nOn page 2 of Shadow of the Torturer, Severian makes an error of fact\nregarding whether Drotte or Roche said the men were carrying pikes." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Or Wolfe does." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dave Tallman", "address": "davetallman at msn.com" }, "date": "2010-08-17T00:04:54+00:00", "subject": "(urth) The Two Katherines", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Ryan Dunn wrote:\nI'm not sure what I'm defending anymore, other than I believe the text as it's written, not that there is some subversive trick played on Severian that he cannot see.I don't see why they would have him kill somebody as a trick.\n\nNor do I see why a real person would have to be killed in order to provide smeared blood on the wax head." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I had better state my theory again, before it gets any more confused in\npeople's memory.\n\n1) My theory is about what happened at Severian's graduation specifically.\nWhat normally happened was probably much more like the trick Severian was\nexpecting.\n2) This is a after several time iterations. The Guild leadership knows he is\ndestined to be the New Sun, and that he has supernatural powers. They wish\nto test them at this ceremony.\n3) The leadership is not surprised. This was expected. The younger guild\nmembers get a better show than usual. They aren't surprised because they\nthink it was a trick.\n4) It is a real sword, because it is heavy.\n5) Severian doesn't do what he thought he was going to do with it because of\nsome trick (not drunkenness, but likely hypnosis or other guild conditioning\nwas used).\n6) He did not turn away the blade. The woman was beheaded and the block\nbeneath her head was split.\n7) The resurrection of the victim was a real miracle.\n8) The youthfulness of the victims is because new khaibits are used each\ntime.\n9) The original of the khaibits is Severian's mother.\n10) Sev saw his mother on the Path of Air, about to be sent back to the past\nso he can be born.\n11) There are clues in the play that relate Contess Carina to Severian's\nmother, and all of her maids have names of beheaded women saints.\n12) Severian's own account contradicts himself from one sentence to the\nnext. First he says it was all a trick, but later he says \"I beheaded her.\"\nSo it's not a matter of just believing the plain text -- one has to choose\nwhat to believe." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Lee Berman", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2010-08-17T00:56:38+00:00", "subject": "(urth) The Two Katherines", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Dave Tallman- 1) My theory is about what happened at Severian's graduation specifically.\nWhat normally happened was probably much more like the trick Severian was\nexpecting." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " \nThank you Dave! You are so much better at presenting your theory than I am. Now I know where\npeople were getting that ideal of a resurrection happening. Since there are identical khaibits\nwaiting in the wings, I don't find a resurrection necessary, but it isn't out of the question. \nEither way I don't find it changes the theory much." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "12) Severian's own account contradicts himself from one sentence to the\nnext. First he says it was all a trick, but later he says \"I beheaded her.\"\nSo it's not a matter of just believing the plain text -- one has to choose\nwhat to believe." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I have made this point in regard to a few other issues recently. There are some who latch onto\none viewpoint based on one section of \"the text\" making them blind to Wolfe's contradictory \nstatements also in the text.\n \nBefore I started posting on this board, I did my best to peruse through the seven years or more \nof previous Moonmilk/Urth Archives. Now that would be an almost impossible painful task. I think \nit would be about 13 years worth of even more densely packed stuff (and more nonsense).\n \nBut reading those old archive gave me a sense that maybe some puzzles have easier or more sure \nsolutions than others. And I'll just spitball in saying that the puzzles with a 90+% plausibility\nwere all discussed and \"solved\" in the first five years. The 80%, 70% and maybe even 60% plausibility\nsolutions were all hashed out endlessly in the next seven years. \n \nSo what we have left to discuss are going to be much more difficult things to \"prove\" convincingly.\nThat's just how it is. Those who would shout down all new ideas are essentially saying \"shut up. you\nare only allowed to discuss the topics from earlier years\". Such history in nice, in a way but\nis that really all this board is about? \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dave Tallman", "address": "davetallman at msn.com" }, "date": "2010-08-17T04:45:25+00:00", "subject": "(urth) The Two Katherines", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Lee Berman wrote:\n\nI have made this point in regard to a few other issues recently. There\nare some who latch onto one viewpoint based on one section of \"the\ntext\" making them blind to Wolfe's contradictory statements also in\nthe text.\n\n\nHere is another quote from that section, ambiguous but possibly\nsignificant, \"I knew even as I watched her that her head was only\nconcealed in the cloth; but it seemed there was nothing there. I felt\ndizzy and tired.\"\n\nHe had seen the illusion many times, and this time much closer. Yet\nthis time \"it seemed there was nothing there.\" He also felt dizzy and\ntired, perhaps because healing power was going out from him." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4C6A571D.6040004@io.com>", "from": { "name": "Jeff Wilson", "address": "jwilson at io.com" }, "date": "2010-08-17T09:32:13+00:00", "subject": "(urth) The Two Katherines", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 8/16/2010 7:04 PM, Dave Tallman wrote:\n10) Sev saw his mother on the Path of Air, about to be sent back to the\npast so he can be born." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "My counter-theory is simpler and avoids most time-meddling:\n\n1) Ouen confirms that he had Catherine, who was dark and taken by the \nlaw for running off from \"an order of monials.\"\n\n2) She is flogged for being a runaway slave of the Pelerines, then \ncondemned to the torturers to be fatally excruciated for some greater \ncrime, like the attempted theft of a certain relic.\n\n3) She is discovered to be pregnant and given a stay of execution to \nallow the Pelerines to claim the child as compensation.\n\n4) The Pelerines have gone too far to be located, and Catherine is \nexecute but not before her appearance has been imprinted on Severian's \nsubconscious.\n\n5) From then on, Severian's attention and sometimes fascination is drawn \nto dark-haired, oval-faced, dark complected women. This includes the \nwoman at the Path of Air, whoever the Holy Katharine maid is, the dead \nwoman in the necropolis (her lividity and morbidity give the appearance \nof dark skin in the dark), and numerous others.\n\n6) The woman at the Path of Air is being taken to repeat her story of \nhaving seen the long-lost Severian on the grounds. She reacts to his \npresence from fear born of incomprehension; is he following/haunting her?" }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Jeff Wilson - jwilson at io.com\nIEEE Student Chapter Blog at\n< http://ieeetamut.org >" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Ryan Dunn", "address": "ryan at liftingfaces.com" }, "date": "2010-08-17T14:59:08+00:00", "subject": "(urth) The Two Katherines", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Aug 17, 2010, at 12:45 AM, Dave Tallman wrote:\nHere is another quote from that section, ambiguous but possibly significant, \"I knew even as I watched her that her head was only concealed in the cloth; but it seemed there was nothing there. I felt dizzy and tired.\"\n\n\nHe had seen the illusion many times, and this time much closer. Yet this time \"it seemed there was nothing there.\" He also felt dizzy and tired, perhaps because healing power was going out from him. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I guess if you're trying to make it fit your theory, then sure those could be clues (albeit vague at best).\n\nDoes Severian feel dizzy during other resurrections? I think that is important. I don't think so, at least not with Triskele or Dorcas.\n\nHowever, he DOES get out of sorts when he's nervous, as in his first \"real\" beheading just after Sanguinary Field. My interpretation of the passage you mentioned was that he had some stage fright, and was relieved to have it over. He so much as says he KNOWS that her head is in the cloth, but the sight of a missing head likely made him a bit light-headed.\n\n...ryan" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dave Tallman", "address": "davetallman at msn.com" }, "date": "2010-08-17T19:33:58+00:00", "subject": "(urth) The Two Katherines", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Jeff Wilson wrote:\n* 1. Why would it be desirable to avoid most \"time-meddling\"? We do have time-\n*>* travel in the story. Why is it to be avoided?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "*\nMinimal hypothesis, plus we have it that Severian was discovered *by*\ntime travelers already on the path to the throne, so he presumably had\nan origin without their direct intervention. Other changes might\nsubsequently undo that, requiring further measures to bring him back,\nbut his parents seem to be already in place and motivated to do what\ncomes naturally. It also avoids making the masters lying bastards like\nthat shameless Ben Kenobi.\n\nIf the mother of Severian comes from his future at all, then considerable\ntime-meddling may be required. Suppose she originally time-travelled back by\nherself, using the Atrium of Time or some such (perhaps to escape an Ascian\ninvasion). She got pregnant, and her son Sev1 became the Autarch and turned\nout to be a promising New Sun candidate. Now the Hierogrammates want to\nreplicate history with some tweaks. Katherine won't necessarily go back on\nher own in the new timeline, and if she does it's not a good idea to leave\nher pregnancy to chance. She might not get pregnant, or it might turn out to\nbe a girl this time. So some things have to be forced. One way is to send\nKatherine back themselves. Second is to make sure she gets pregnant with an\nexact genetic duplicate of Sev1. The answer is that Sev must be cloned and\nimplanted in Katherine in embryonic form. The Mandrigore may be a spare\nclone that wasn't required, but that's an additional theory." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "* 3. It does not explain why this is called the Path of Air. Nor why a such a small\n*>* blip in Severian's mind is so important that it should end up being expressed in\n*>* Dr. Talos' play, 60 years earlier.\n*\nA loggia is similar to a breezeway, and it's not much of a stretch for a\npath of wind to become a path of air, especially if it is surrounded by\nbaffled and baffling architecture that prevents a direct wind, but still\nlets people get some air. As for the blip, could you be more specific?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The encounter is described in UotNS, and it has a dramatic impact on Sev.\nShe can't have just gone to the breezeway to get mentioned in Talos' play,\nat least not originally. A proper time-loop needs a starter. It can't be\nfrom the first time Sev went back to be the Conciliator, either. He hadn't\nyet seen the woman at that point. It must be during his subsequent life on\nUshas that he decided to revisit that time. He told someone about the\nencounter, and it got incorporated into source materials that Talos used for\nhis play." } ] } ] }