Thecla's fourth book

Adrian Robert · 02 Oct 2006, 12:56 · from 2006-October.txt.gz

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From: arobert at cogsci.ucsd.edu (Adrian Robert)
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2006 08:56:52 -0400
Subject: (urth) Thecla's fourth book
In-Reply-To: <BAY103-F109740DE93254A22C04B42D71F0 at phx.gbl>
References: <BAY103-F109740DE93254A22C04B42D71F0 at phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <02C164F3-0BBE-4FBD-B8C8-52F19E38509F at cogsci.ucsd.edu>

On Oct 2, 2006, at 7:27 AM, b sharp wrote:

> I still have trouble seeing how Canog could write such a detailed  
> book, in
> first person, based only on Severian's spoken words.

Embellishment?  (Marco Polo's "Travels", anyone?)  As far as the  
unexpected yet coming-to-pass incident of the flood, this could be  
drawn from the collective unconscious (either ? la Jung or Mr.  
Clarke, _Childhood's End_).  Or simply consciously extrapolated --  
some form of destruction occurs, fire and water are the chief  
candidates..

Regarding the creation of the tale itself in a closed loop, we are  
told time is a river, and rivers have eddies.  This analogy seems not  
a stretch in the context of Severian's own semi-looping, semi-linear  
travels through time.

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