Rudesind of the Apes

Roy C. Lackey · 26 May 2006, 20:04 · from 2006-May.txt.gz

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From: rclackey at stic.net (Roy C. Lackey)
Date: Fri, 26 May 2006 15:04:44 -0500
Subject: (urth) Rudesind of the Apes
Message-ID: <002401c680ff$a5ba3ea0$753ec6d8 at rclackey.stic.net>

msg quoted and wrote:
>This does not necessarily negate bsharp's argument -
>that Inire is possibly  disguised as the human
>Rudesind.
[snip]
>>Furthermore, dismissing the naming conventions of saint, myth, and
monster,
and then claiming that a shape-shifting, mask-wearing, alien could be
anyone, even including a shadow child from St. Anne, you wind up with a
farrago of chaos --not a novel by Gene Wolfe.<<

I have trouble with the idea that a member of an alien species could
successfully interbreed with a human. ( The product of the Severian-Apheta
union was *not* biological.) That is, I can't see Inire fathering a child
(or children) on Dorcas. If Dorcas did have another child, as the text
implies, and that child had offspring, that would make Ouen, Severian's
daddy, something of a monkey's uncle. <g>

Actually, Severian looked very much like his father, and neither resembled
Inire -- or a monkey -- or any other of Inire's alleged human disguises. I
see no evidence of shape-shifting in NEW SUN, but even if Inire had that
ability, such a non-human characteristic further weighs against the
likelihood of viable progeny, in my opinion.

As for the Boatman being a grieving Inire (though I suppose the story of the
forty-year search for Dorcas was all a lie, given the stated assumption that
a man who hadn't even been born when the search began was needed to call her
back from the dead), there was no need for any such rigmarole. All that was
needed was another Hierodule-made eidolon. If it can be done for a damn dog,
it can surely be done for the Conciliator's grandmother and Inire's lost
love. A few weeks of eating and breathing would be all that was needed to
make her as "real" as Severian.

-Roy

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