Subject: (whorl) FTP Pig; Clute's Review; Not Boredom

From: David Lebling <dlebling at ucentric.com>
Date: Thu, 22 Feb 2001 09:36:23 +0000

1) Pig(Passilk) -> monitor -> Silk(Horn)? No.

From: "Patrick O'Leary" <poleary at sloth.cecom.com>
<<1. Passilk does not infiltrate Silk in Pig's Post-Op scene. Yes, there
is a monitor.>>

From: "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" <ddanehy at siebel.com>
<<4. At the West Pole, the scanned Silk reenters the body
-- *not* from Pig, but from the glass.>>

I agree with Patrick here. I've read that scene three or four times now, and
I don't see anything that indicates Passilk enters Silk/Horn's mind at this
point. There is no change in Silk/Horn's (or Pig's!) demeanor or style of
speech, no subtle hint, no nothing.

Some have argued that Passilk leaves Pig and then enters Silk/Horn. Bah.
Again, no evidence in favor.

Against, there is the fact that Horn talks about how if he had brought Pig
to Blue, he wouldn't have failed in his mission. When gods de-possess
humans, they leave. If Passilk went to Silk/Horn, he'd be gone from Pig, and
I think Silk/Horn would know, if only subconsciously, that such a transfer
had happened.

2) Horn Lives!

<<From: Jim Jordan <jbjordan at gnt.net>
>Though I should add an amusing personal note. Wolfe has read and deeply
>appreciates John Clute's
>SF Weekly Review of RTTW.
Well, that being the case, I must bow and admit that Horn is dead and Silk
lives. I was never certain, but I thought a case should be made for the
Horn Lives standpoint. I'll have to rethink a few categories...>>

I just reread Clute's review and I don't see where it says Horn is dead.
"Enfolded," yes, they "write each other," yes. The closest he comes to
saying Horn is dead is this: "By spending something like his life (but of
course he has been something like dead for most of the trilogy) Horn
succeeds in his quest and bids us farewell."

I don't think this plus "deeply appreciates" is enough to declare Horn dead.
Horn is dead in exactly the sense that Thecla, the old Autarch, and Pas
himself are dead: they exist as remnant identities in another medium. Horn
indeed bids us farewell at the end of RttW, but so does Silk.

3) Boredom?

From: <akt at attglobal.net>
<<It seems to me that, if GW should want to write another book about these
people (my guess is not, because he seems so tired of them at this
point--but you never know). it will be important to the plot to have the
dual Silk/Horn interface. Like having Windows and Linux on the same
machine.>>

(I deeply appreciate this comment, because I do have Windows and Linux on
the same box.)

But seriously, I take the disquisition by Hoof on how scary Silk was, and
Severian's comment that no one would believe him if he wrote about Silk, as
a way of expressing how hard it is for Wolfe to write about this character.
He may not be so much bored with him as exhausted by him. When you come
right down to it, would you rather spend an evening with Silk or with Horn?
Wolfe has spent a long time with this scary guy in his head.

Which brings up another thought. All of the "Sun" books are concerned to a
greater or lesser extent with authorship, writing, publishing, imagining,
and most importantly, the effect of having someone else's personality stuck
in your head for long periods. These are all the chief day-to-day concerns
of the writer, aside from where the next cup of coffee and next paragraph
are coming from. I'd love to see someone scan the books to pull these out as
a coherent essay. It would be fascinating. As Horn becomes more Silk-like
over time, has Wolfe? Wasn't there a reported comment by Wolfe's wife
Rosemary that Silk was the character most like Wolfe himself?

    Dave Lebling
    aka vizcacha

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---

From: Dan'l Danehy-Oakes <ddanehy at siebel.com>
Date: Thu, 22 Feb 2001 08:41:43 +0000

Vizcacha wrote:

> I agree with Patrick here. 

On further thought, so do I. There is no real indicator that
(Pas)Silk downloads into Silkhorn at any time. My reasoning
was that (1) Silk's spirit was dying, (2) Horn takes over,
(3) Afterwards, Silk's spirit seems to be active. But, thinking
about it, I believe Silkhorn makes a few of the same kind of 
confusions before the West Pole as he does after (though I 
could be wrong; I don't have my copy here at work). What's
certain, though, is that there is no clear moment when it
happens or could happen. 

Though... Given the provenance of that scene, would the twins 
and their wives have known? I dunno. At any rate, there is no
direct evidence for a download, of which I am aware.

What _is_ clear, though, is that the reason it was so critical
to get Pig his e'en, or at least one, was so Silk-in-possession 
could reintegrate with his Mainframe self -- the reason the
narrator says (in OBW? IGJ?) that he couldn't have left Pig 
blind.

---

From: James Jordan <jbjordan4 at home.com>
Date: Thu, 22 Feb 2001 15:37:04 +0000

>indeed bids us farewell at the end of RttW, but so does Silk.

         Well, I'm happier with such a view. The thought that Horn's last 
words are "I should not have come back", followed by his departure from 
this world, makes the trilogy into a real tragedy. Also, I don't understand 
why Silk, who has never met Seawrack, would want her along on the way to 
the Whorl (unless all these extended speculations about Hyacinth, Kypris, 
etc. are valid -- but I'm a bit dubious about them).

Nutricious

---

From: Alex David Groce <alex_groce at gs246.sp.cs.cmu.edu>
Date: Thu, 22 Feb 2001 17:59:34 +0000

Nutria said:

> words are "I should not have come back", followed by his departure
> from this world, makes the trilogy into a real tragedy. Also, I
> don't understand why Silk, who has never met Seawrack, would want
> her along on the way to the Whorl (unless all these extended
> speculations about Hyacinth, Kypris, etc. are valid -- but I'm a bit
> dubious about them).

>indeed bids us farewell at the end of RttW, but so does Silk.

I agree, but not completely.  Severian contains multitudes, but I at
least don't think that we can say "Severian is Thecla" in quite the
same sense we can say "Severian is Severian."  And certainly the more
ancient personalities within him are less essential to the Severian
who writes BOTNS than Severian or Thecla.

I think that until Remora's "exorcism," we have a situation analogous
to Severian going through the rest of CLAW, SWORD, and CITADEL after
the feast with Vodalus saying "I am Thecla.  I am not Severian."  The
first sentence is true, but far from completely true, and the second
sentence is false.  Mind you, I think that though Severian is Thecla,
it is also legitimate to say that Thecla is _dead_.  The Thecla in
Severian is (like the Horn in Silk) both something more and something
less than a ghost.  Horn is dead, though something of him lives on in
the man he died seeking.  Horn can properly fall into the role of a
Theclaish presence once Silk is willing to acknowledge his own
identity.

--
"And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." John 8:32
--
Alex David Groce (agroce+ at cs.cmu.edu)
Ph.D. Student, Carnegie Mellon University - Computer Science Department
8112 Wean Hall (412)-268-3066
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~agroce