{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/whorl/1182", "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": "whorl", "thread": { "id": 1182, "subject": "RTTW spoilers, crutch of Horn", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "2001-02-17T20:36:44+00:00", "last": "2001-02-18T20:40:39+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi", "address": "mantis at sirius.com" }, "date": "2001-02-17T20:36:44+00:00", "subject": "(whorl) RTTW spoilers, crutch of Horn", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Alex David Groce wrote:\nNote that there is also Nutria's reading: Horn isn't delusional, but\nhis family & Remora (our editors) are." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Right, that would be 0% Delusional for the narrator; the outsiders cannot\ngrok it, but the Outsider can." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I find the most convincing reading to be a mixture of the Quixotic and\nthe delusional: Horn and Silk are both present in the body from the\nmoment of the transfer from Green. Silk, however, is in a funk--while\nhe contributes to the actions of Silkhorn, at first he does not wish\nto acknowledge himself as still alive. Equally, Horn doesn't want to\nadmit to himself that he's \"dead,\" but certainly can't say \"I'm Silk\nnow\"--both because he's sane enough to know that he isn't the Silk\nthat New Viron needs, even if he is the real Silk in some sense. He's\nalso having a hard time admitting that Silk is in him wishing he were\ndead. The Long Sun narration makes it clear that the little suicide\nscene on top of the airship was traumatic for Horn. This is much\nworse." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I agree with just about all of the material you posted (I would go on more\nabout how, after all this build up of \"natural king\" stuff, the events of\nGaon, and Viron before that, prove that there is no way Silk can do it\nright, etc.). I just had this sense that N was grasping at =all= straws\n(following rumors that Silk was in hotel; catch whatever comes out of Pig's\neye; etc.) while he was on the Whorl in an attempt to better complete his\nmission. It didn't feel to me like he was entirely delusional in his\nQuixotic quest.\n\n(The whole issue of psychic \"fragments\" separate from body and spirit might\npoint to a tripart system, like body/soul/spirit. I don't know. But my\nintuitive model agrees with what Nutria said about how Silk's brainstuff is\nstill there for N to use, just like his super-muscles are, even if Silk's\nspiritual essence is gone away.)\n\nOn to the new topic: if we can agree that \"Horn is a crutch,\" and I can\nreadily go along with that, then suddenly I find myself asking \"why?\" It\nis strange, because I went along with it in the book (it especially seemed\n\"right\" after the whole wooly \"laying Cilinia to rest\" thing), but at the\nmoment it seems odd. As if Thecla suddenly imploded ala Master Ash. Or\nperhaps Jonas imploding within Miles as the news of Jolenta's death gets to\nhim?\n\nThe \"easy\" answer is: well, Thecla was meant to be Severian's female side,\nhis constant companion; she has no goal beyond that, she had no life quest\nthat seeks completion, where completion leads to dissolution. But Horn\ncompletes his quest, and is now free to die? So his whole purpose was to\nbe the crutch? (Granted, there's that powerful twin-theme again: one dies,\nthe other is immortal.) Why not stay around? Unless such a state is, er,\n\"a fate worse than death\"?\n\n(Note that you are in direct contradiction of Nutria here, since he says\nthat Horn is becoming more like Silk rather than imploding. And I can see\nhis reading, too, fwiw.)\n\n(Eek, come to think of it . . . the equivalent of Thecla imploding might\nvery well be that part in URTH where she appears in her own body, etc . . .\nhmmm.)\n\nOTOH, if it is Horn back at New Viron, then what is the attempted\nsuicide-by-inhumi-attack, a sort of exorcism of dark Silk through enactment\nof the thing itself? (I mean, it hardly seems like the sort of thing one\nis going to do as one becomes \"Silkified\" . . . unless . . . ) And then,\nhaving done that, N is a Horn/repaired-Silk?\n\n=mantis=\n\nSirius Fiction\nCatalog and errata sheet at http://www.sirius.com/~mantis/\n\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Adam Stephanides", "address": "adamsteph at earthlink.net" }, "date": "2001-02-18T20:40:39+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) RTTW spoilers, crutch of Horn", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "on 2/17/01 10:36 PM, Michael Andre-Driussi at mantis at sirius.com wrote:\nOn to the new topic: if we can agree that \"Horn is a crutch,\" and I can\nreadily go along with that, then suddenly I find myself asking \"why?\"" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Good question. There are actually two questions: why does Horn's spirit go\naway, and why does it go away when it does? Both are mysteries. I can't\nhelp thinking it must have something to do with the \"coincidences\" that Horn\nis dying at the same time that Silk is either dying or attempting suicide,\nand that the Neighbor picks Silk's body to transfer Horn's spirit into.\n\nThe thought occurred to me that maybe in some non-literal sense Silk and\nHorn are the same person even before the spirit transfer, that Horn is the\nSilk who didn't run back after Hyacinth but followed the plan of Pas, as\nMint put it (the twin-theme you mention again). I don't know if this makes\nany sense or not; I'm just throwing it out as possible food for thought.\n\n--Adam\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] } ] }