Subject: (urth) New Sun miscellany

From: adam louis stephanides <astephan at students.uiuc.edu>
Date: Wed, 17 Jun 1998 20:54:13 +0000

A few days ago I finished rereading BotNS and UotNS and skimming through
the archive's posts on the books.  (Whew!)  I've already posted a few of
my thoughts.  I have some more questions and comments on various topics,
which I'll gather up here.

1)  I haven't seen the map in Plan[e]t Engineering, but I've read the
discussion in the archive and accepted that the Commonwealth was South
America, and thought I had a fairly good grasp of the topography.  But
then I came across this sentence in Citadel, ch. V: "I did have the
impression (though I could not be sure it was correct) that it [Ascia] was
a single land mass, and not a chain of islands like our south..."  Where 
does this fit in with what else we know about the Commonwealth's
geography?  Of course, maybe Severian just means that the south _contains_
a chain of islands; but that's not what he says.

2) After Little Severian dies, Severian is thinking about how that whole
family is now dead, and tells us: "I knew then, on the arm of that giant
figure, the ambition to conquer time..." (III, ch. 24)  And as the New
Sun, he does conquer time.  Of course, before he actually becomes the New
Sun he doesn't realize time travel is part of the package, but even the
"bringing the New Sun" he expects to be doing would be "conquering time"
in a sense, since it's reversing the effects of entropy.  We know that the
Hierodules are shaping Severian to maximize the probability that he will
aspire to and succeed in bringing/being the New Sun; this raises the grim
possibility that they somehow brought about Little Severian's death to
help motivate Severian.

3) A few months ago, there was a discussion as to why Thecla's personality
was so well preserved within Severian.  Me and someone else both thought
we there was a passage saying it was because the Claw brought her to life
within him, but couldn't remember where it was.  I found it: it's in the
conversation between Severian and the postulant Ava in IV, ch. 10.  It's
Ava who puts forward this theory, so it's not as authoritative as if it
had been the old Autarch or the Hierodules, but Severian is convinced by
it (his words at the altar, IV Ch. 14).

4) Does it strike anyone else that Severian's behavior at the start of
Urth is just a tad irresponsible?  He is (or so he believes) soon to
undergo a trial which will have the most momentous consequences for Urth,
as well as for himself.  You would think he would be devoting himself to
planning his strategy at the trial and figuring out what his predecessor
had done wrong.  Instead he first wastes what must be days recopying the
manuscript of (our) BotNS (how long would that take, anyway?) so that
people in other universes will know of his exploits.  (Not even Typhon was
so vainglorious.)  Then, apparently out of sheer boyish exuberance, he
tries to jump to the top of the mast and nearly gets himself killed.
To be sure, he may have spent a lot of time pondering his strategy for the
trial that he doesn't tell us about, but from his performance at the
"trial" it doesn't look like it: all he can think of to do is to
unconsciously parrot the old Autarch's speech, which a little thought
would indicate is not necessarily the best move.  Of course, his "trial"
turns out to be a put-up job, so his dereliction doesn't matter.  And he
does have his guardian angel looking out for him, though I don't know
whether even Tzadkiel could have done anything about his being lost in
space (even the eidelon trick wouldn't work, with no dead brain to draw
memories from).

5) My final question is one that probably only Wolfe can answer, though
the answer may be in some interview.  We know that _Urth of the New Sun_
was not part of Wolfe's original intention, but was written as a
compromise with his editor.  And _Urth_ makes explicit a number of matters
highly relevant to BotNS, but which are much more obscure there, and would
often probably have gone unsuspected without _Urth_.  My question is
twofold: In doing the final revisions of BotNS, did Wolfe have the
eventual existence of _Urth_ in mind?  In other words, would these matters
that are made explicit in _Urth_ have been equally explicit in BotNS, had
Wolfe gained his first preference and not written _Urth_?  And to what
extent can we assume that Wolfe's vision of the New Sun universe is the
same in _Urth_ as it was in BotNS?

As usual, comments are actively solicited.

--Adam

*More Wolfe info & archive of this list at http://www.urth.net/urth/

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From: CRCulver <crculver at aol.com>
Date: Thu, 18 Jun 1998 05:02:01 +0000

<5) My final question is one that probably only Wolfe can answer, though
same in _Urth_ as it was in BotNS?>

It is certain there are some things in the BotNS that would make no sense and
have no observable purpose if Wolfe didn't already have some elements of UotNS
planned. The first thing that springs to mind is the winged Tzadkiel in the
Autarch's book.

- Christopher R. Culver

---

From: Peter Westlake <peter at harlequin.co.uk>
Date: Thu, 18 Jun 1998 10:20:27 +0000

>it (his words at the altar, IV Ch. 14).

I'm half a book behind Adam, and I spotted that too. Didn't someone
on this or the Whorl list say that birds in Wolfe always tell the
truth - and does "Ava" count? :-)

There's also a bit somewhere (books at home, sorry) where it is
made fairly clear that the Autarch's "spirit" is alive in the
same way as Thecla, almost certainly because of the improved
method of transfer, using living brain cells. And in UtoNS
there's reference to the Autarch talking to Severian before
they all merged into a single(ish) personality.

>Urth is just a tad irresponsible?

I get the impression he expects to have a very long voyage, so a
few days don't matter. Climbing the mast *is* rather silly, though
I can see how he might get carried away once he was out there.

>compromise with his editor.

I hadn't heard that. What happened?

>And _Urth_ makes explicit a number of matters

You took the words right out of my mouth! It seems to me that any
puzzles in BotNS ought to have answers in BotNS, subject only to
modification by things we find out later in UotNS. For instance,
at the end of BotNS, we discover that the Severian who would have
existed if the Hierodules had not intervened (and who did exist in
an "earlier" time-track) travelled the corridors, spending some
time as Apu-Punchau, eventually leaving the stone town for the
last time and some time later dying and being buried in the
mausoleum. In UotNS it turns out to be more complicated than that
(right? I haven't re-read that far yet), but still consistent with
the earlier book. This is an instance of what might be called the
Reichenbach principle - exploitation of our lack of omniscience
about what "really" happens in the world of the story. I think
we should answer questions about BotNS first with reference to
that book alone - as we would have had to for several years in
real time - and then apply the extra knowledge from UotNS. If the
answers come out differently, that in itself is interesting.

>planned. The first thing that springs to mind is the winged Tzadkiel in the

Granted we don't find out who that is, but do we really need to for BotNS?
There are plenty of references to amchaspands and things outside time to
give some clue as to what *kind* of thing Severian might be seeing. He
gets a glimpse of a higher reality; it's one of those passages that give
the impression that the author knows more about the world of the book than
he is telling. It's one of the things the best authors can do, and
contributes strongly to our belief in the world of the story.

While we're being miscellaneous, some older threads about things
that I hadn't re-read at the time:

Jonas and Miles: Severian isn't the only one who sees Jonas in Miles.
The Pelerine who sees Thecla in Severian comments that Miles is "like
that too". Jonas really is there somehow. How he gets there, and what
happens to his previous body, is another question!

Armigers: somewhere in the archives is a comment to the effect that
armigers are people who are allowed to bear arms, like Samurai. In
fact, the kind of arms "armiger" refers to are coats of arms, like
the rose/ship/fountain in the mausoleum. My apologies to those of
you who knew this perfectly well already!

Hildegrin: I get the idea about S and A-P "merging", I think,
especially after reading "Twin Mounds". William asked why one
Hildegrin appeared to be struggling with something invisible;
could it be that Severian is really seeing one Hildegrin, but
with two pairs of eyes? As Apu-Punchau, he sees Hildegrin trying
to capture him; as Severian, he sees H but can't see A-P. Not
being able to see people who aren't quite in your own time is
common to this and "Twin Mounds", though I would never have
worked it out for myself. I'm still not entirely clear on this
episode, in fact. Why was it fatal to Hildegrin?
Would someone like to explain it all to me slowly?
Bears are not universally intelligent, remember. [*] 

Narrative reticence: I subscribe to the "remembering to put
in details only when they become relevant" theory, mostly,
with some clear-cut cases of "torment the reader". Severian
not saying why he was leaving Thrax is a prime example.
The disturbance at the gate of Nessus, where we only learn
bit by bit that someone had tried to take a wagon along the
road and been caught, is another.

Final Ignorant Question: what is Texas A & M, please?

Spectacled Bear.

[*] For the Whorl list, I adopted the name Spectacled Bear because
(a) they are the only bear that lives in South America (and who
would have thought reading Gene Wolfe would give new insight into
the work of Michael Bond?!) and (b) I heard someone describing on
the radio her research work with spectacled bears, in which a male
bear was given a pole with which to knock down fruit that had been
placed high up out of his reach. Instead he held it upright and tried
to climb it, giving me a perfect analogy and excuse for unsupported
conjecture. The research concluded that "bears are not universally
intelligent".

---

From: Michael Straight <straight at email.unc.edu>
Date: Thu, 18 Jun 1998 10:15:19 +0000

> same in _Urth_ as it was in BotNS?

Wow!  I've been considering for days now how to ask this very question.

Like many people, I read the BotNS and was entranced but knew I wasn't
getting all of it, and now know that I missed much more than I suspected
at the time.

I read Urth directly after BotNS and was so disappointed that for a while
I wanted to ignore it, pretend I'd never read it.  The answers it gave to
questions raised in BotNS were so different from the provisional ones I'd
come up with, it was hard to reconcile.  

I was also disappointed with the flow of the book.  The first half spends
a long time on Severian's journey in the ship to Yesod, a leisurely pace
that I suppose is in keeping with the BotNS, but which made me impatient
at the time, seeming too much like a digression.  

Then the second half of the book seemed really rushed, like Wolfe had this
checklist of things Severian needed to do to fulfill all the prophesies -
do miracles and become the Concilator (check), meet Typhon for the "first"
time (check), go back in time to become Apo Punchau (check), bring the New
Sun (check).  They all just seemed kind of tacked on and not fully fleshed
out.  In light of you comment about Wolfe making a "compromise" I almost
wonder if he initally wanted to leave these scenes to the reader's
imagination but the editor convinced him to spell things out that he only
wanted to hint at.  

I also admit that I liked my initial impression that in BotNS the
Concilator legend was a jumble mixing stories of Jesus with a contemporary
of Typhon and possibly other historical/mythological figures.  So I was
disappointed to see Severian acting it out so literally.  If the
Conciliator is "just" Severian and not in some way also a memory of Jesus,
then it's harder to place Severian as the "Christian figure" Wolfe wants
him to be.  And it seems then like the New Sun/Long Sun multiverse is
merely a new, self-contained, mythology rather than an extension of
Christian mythology (which I would find more interesting, and I thought
was Wolfe's intent). 

Getting back to Adam's comments, I'm reminded of Borges, who was very
interested in the idea of how our reading of a text changes because of
what else we've read.  (See especially "Pierre Menard, Author of the
Quixote" and "Kafka and his Precursors").   I think Wolfe very
deliberately and successfully created with Exodus a book that almost
rewrites the earlier books in the Long Sun series and am fascinated by how
different a re-reading of them is after finishing Exodus.

Reading this list has convinced me that what Wolfe has done with Urth does
in fact make BotNS more interesting than my original reading, and I'm way
overdue in re-reading BotNS, but I'm also still interested in BotNS as it
stands without Urth.  I'd be interested in alternate interpretations of
events in BotNS that Urth rules out.  Is it certain, for instance, in the
first four books that Severian himself will one day become the
Conciliator?  Are there any reviews or discussions of BotNS I could get my
hands on that predate Urth? 

-Ramblin' Rostrum

---

From: Michael Straight <straight at email.unc.edu>
Date: Thu, 18 Jun 1998 10:22:32 +0000

On Thu, 18 Jun 1998, Peter Westlake wrote:

> modification by things we find out later in UotNS. 
> I think

A fascinating, but at best difficult exercise!  Some might argue it is
impossible, that having read Urth, there are some possibilities we just
won't be able to see in BotNS anymore.  I can't imagine, for instance,
pretending anymore that the Urth is so old that the Sun is dying of
natural causes, even though I read the whole series without catching on
about the black hole. 

The best route might be to read reviews that predate Urth or remember
interpretations we had before we read Urth and in discussing them limit
the "evidence" to BotNS.

-Rostrum

---

From: Peter Westlake <peter at harlequin.co.uk>
Date: Mon, 29 Jun 1998 09:55:28 +0000

At 11:20 1998-06-18 +0100, a foolish Bear wrote:
...
>you who knew this perfectly well already!

I couldn't find that in the archives when I wrote the message;
imagine my embarrasment on finding it in the afterword to _Claw_!
It actually says that the name suggests a fighting class, rather
like the Samurai. The stuff about coats of arms is still true,
of course, and arms were usually granted to knights, who were
a fighting class too. My thanks to all who refrained from
pointing out my mistake ;-)

>Bears are not universally intelligent, remember.

Now this bit, I stand by.

SBear.