{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/940",
    "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": 940,
    "subject": "LU Questions Answered",
    "messages": 2,
    "voices": 2,
    "first": "1998-07-09T00:35:00+00:00",
    "last": "1998-07-09T02:54:33+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0016-0018@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "m.driussi",
        "address": "m.driussi at genie.com"
      },
      "date": "1998-07-09T00:35:00+00:00",
      "subject": "(urth) LU Questions Answered",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "Adam Louis Stephanides,\n\nFirst, thank you for buying a copy of LEXICON URTHUS.  Perhaps even\nmore importantly, thank you for your kind words about it!\n\n\"Lexicon Urthus: Additions, Errata, &cetera (vol. 1)\" (AE&1) is still\navailable directly from the publisher for $1 plus $1 postage.  (If you\nordered LU directly from us, then we owe you a copy.  Let me know in\nprivate e-mail.)\n\nRe: Atrium of Time as a time travelling structure.  The usual\ndisclaimers apply: your mileage may very, etc.  John Clute mentions it\nglancingly in one essay on Wolfe (1983) and directly in the famed\nCatherine essay (1986).  Others have mentioned it, I'm fairly certain.\nThe clues are: Valeria's clothing seems out of time; her lineage is so\nancient that it may stretch back to Ymar; the place she lives in does\nnot exist on any maps, nor can it be found from aerial survey or\nreached in any other way than by the one true path through the maze\n(exactly like the trail to Last House); and not the least, we know that\nthe Atrium is not named for the sundials--the sundials where put there\n=because= it is the Atrium of Time.\n\nRe: Valeria's Regency in the Valeria entry.  Do you consider it an error\nbecause technically she became regent the moment Severian left Urth?\nRather than \"during the decades of [Severian's] absence\" (which sounds\nvague and gradual)?  Your question makes it seem more likely that you\ndoubt Valeria was his regent while he was visiting Yesod.\n\nI'm nearly positive that Severian uses the term \"regent\" or\n\"Valeria's regency\" somewhere in URTH.\n\n(FWIW, Feeley's essay uses the phrase \"Valeria's ten-year regency in\nhis absence\" [NYRSF No. 32, p. 14], and while I'd argue with the number\nof years as being a gross underestimate, I wouldn't quibble at all\nwith the rest.)\n\nBut it is true that Valeria had a loss of faith during the many\ndecades of his absence--nobody had any idea it would take so long,\napparently.  (The medieval analogy is one of a king going off on a\npilgrimage to the Holy Land--figure a couple of years ought to do\nit.  Set up a regency to irritate Robin Hood and sail off.)\n\nSo at some point it seems Valeria had to consider Severian lost at\nsea (see the cenotaph, chapter 41).  Out of political necessity she\nthen called herself Autarch (with a capital A, rather than autarchia,\nwhich she was before) and out of loneliness and/or additional\npolitical necessity (to keep the Commonwealth together) she married\nDux Caesidus.  But the autarchy is broken since she hasn't eaten the\nbrains of her predecessor--she isn't a real autarch.  Even the\ncommoners via Eata know that there's some sham to this \"autarchy,\"\nthat she \"doesn't know the words.\"  What can one do?  The war with\nAscia continues, etc.\n\nYour quotes from chapters 4 and 16 of URTH are given slightly out of\ncontext: the conversations are onboard the starship at the edge of\nthe universe, and in the example from chapter 16, the issue at hand\nis that of determining which of two \"autarchs\" on the ship is the\nreal one.\n\nIn the general case, again using the analogy of a king going by ship\nto the holy land:\n\nPassenger: \"So you still claim to be king of England while you are on\nthis ship out in the middle of the Mediterranean?\"\n\nKing: \"I was king--now I'm on holiday, so I'm the grand poobah of\npartydom.  Good thing my regent is minding the kingdom while I'm away!\"\n\nOr, to put it in a skiffy way: if John F. Kennedy gets into a time\nmachine and travels to the Restaurant at the End of the Universe, is\nhe still \"President\" while he sits there eating his meal and watching\nthe universe collapse in the Grand Gnab?  His nation is gone, his\nplanet is gone, his solar system is gone.\n\nDinner Cow: \"So you still claim you're really the President?\"\n\nJFK: \"Well, I was.  And I will be when I get in the time machine and\nget back home--after I've finished eating you, of course.\"\n\n=mantis="
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "message_id": "<urth-v0016-0022@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Matthew Malthouse",
        "address": "matthew.malthouse at guardian.co.uk"
      },
      "date": "1998-07-09T02:54:33+00:00",
      "subject": "Re: (urth) LU Questions Answered",
      "in_reply_to": "<urth-v0016-0018@digest.urth.net>",
      "reply_link": "subject",
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": "m.driussi at genie.com wrote:\nOr, to put it in a skiffy way: if John F. Kennedy gets into a time\nmachine and travels to the Restaurant at the End of the Universe, is\nhe still \"President\" while he sits there eating his meal and watching\nthe universe collapse in the Grand Gnab?  His nation is gone, his\nplanet is gone, his solar system is gone.\n\nDinner Cow: \"So you still claim you're really the President?\"\n\nJFK: \"Well, I was.  And I will be when I get in the time machine and\nget back home--after I've finished eating you, of course.\""
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "No, the protocol officer flunked briefing you there. :)\n\nOnce a President always a President. If you ever have a Very Large Cheque to\nwaste on an after dinner speaker remember this, otherwise Mr President Ford,\nMr President Carter or Mr President Bush may decline the invitation.\n\nOn the other hand you could fire the protocol officer, split the money 50/50\nand I'll do the speaking engagement. I doubt anyone will really care.\n\nMatthew\n(Appologies for the trivia)"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}