Severian's miraculous eclipse

Rex Racer · 26 Apr 2006, 12:14 · from 2006-April.txt.gz

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From: rex.racerx at gmail.com (Rex Racer)
Date: Wed, 26 Apr 2006 08:14:26 -0400
Subject: (urth) Severian's miraculous eclipse
In-Reply-To: <20060426065600.CB804DA81A at mailserver7.hushmail.com>
References: <20060426065600.CB804DA81A at mailserver7.hushmail.com>
Message-ID: <d046a0310604260514k54343995s7f25f0498ca0dd95 at mail.gmail.com>

Hello. I am delurking as the timelines involved have been of interest for me
for a good number of years.

I am at work, and do not have my books handy, but I did believe the
blackhole was inserted as punishment for Humanities' sin of taking its wars
and strife out amongst the stars. I do believe this happened under Typhon.
This punishment/crisis triggered not only the Conciliator appearing, in
order to give comfort to the people and prophesize the coming of the New
Sun, but in his arrogance (thinking he could get around the planet's death
sentence) the Tyrant built and sent out the starcrossing Whorl with himself
and his family as its gods- no Heirodules or other true representatives of
the Increate to hamper the now Pas' rule either aboard the ship or on the
new worlds to be settled!

I thought that Apu Panchu heralded the beginning of the movement of the New
Sun (white fountain) towards Earth's sun, and not the insertion of the
blackhole, so that it could arrive after its long voyage to Urth a the
proper time after her epitome was found True.

There are references of the time from Typhon to Severian as being counted in
chiliads, and when Silk is in Nessus (I personally think at this point
Silkhorn is no longer an apt name) to bury poor, young Scylla/Cilinia (sp
from memory, sorry if wrong) he says she has been dead for "many centuries."
Had the span been only 300 years as the calendar inside the Whorl seems to
indicate (the Cargo do not seem cognizant of possible time dialation do to
the speed of flight of the Whorl, not even the chems, like Marble who
doesn't understand how her internal chronometer could be off by such a large
factor- and the Crew doesn't exactly chat up the Cargo about the scientific
specificiations of their travels, though they are friendly enough when
encountered), I think Silk would have used "several" or "a few" centuries to
quantify the time past.

Leaving Wikipedia's reliability aside, though vastly clever and intelligent
both, Mr. Wolfe is telling a story so a period of about 3-4000 years from
Typhon and the fatal stab into the Sun's heart to punish Humanity until
Humanity and Urth's renewal is not unreasonable- to me anyway.

Oh, and to be actually on topic, I think that it is indeed Tzadkiel's ship,
heralding the "transformation" of Severian to Apu Panchu and the birth of
the New Sun in its far off creche, by making all dark over Earth until the
Epitome brought back the light so to speak, balancing his bringing of the
New Sun at Urth's end. Tzadkiel was with Severian in several forms during
his voyage to stand for all of Humanity so I can easily see him standing by
Severian one last time, though chronologically, the first. It just ties
together so nice and symbolically.

Well, for what it is worth, there is my response. Be gentle, please- it is
my first time!
:-)

On 4/26/06, thalassocrat at nym.hush.com <thalassocrat at nym.hush.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> On Wed, 26 Apr 2006 16:32:11 +1000 I wrote:
>
> >I tend to side with the Tzadkiel ship explanation, but it is
> >interesting to think about what it was doing there & at that time.
> >
> >
> >Maybe it was dropping a black hole into the sun? This would be a
> >nice touch, I think: the beginning of the end of the Old Sun and
> >the distant birth of the New, at about the same time.
> >
> >I've always assumed the black hole thing happened around the time
> >of Typhon, but is that necessarily the case?
> >
> >The death of the Old Sun is clearly a long, long process: how long
> >
> >must have the black hole been eating away at it, for the effects
> >to
> >be noticeable by Typhon's time?
>
> FWIW, a long time from black hole insertion to noticeable effect on
> Urth is consistent with solar physics. Eg from the often-reliable
> Wikipedia: 'Estimates of the "photon travel time" [from core to
> photosphere] range from as much as 50 million years to as little as
> 17,000 years.'
>
> In story terms, I don't have UOTNS here, but isn't there a
> reference to the death of Apu Panchu being the death of the Old
> Sun? Or something like that.
>
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