Sev's Silence about Catherine

brunians at brunians.org · 25 Jun 2008, 11:49 · from 2008-June.txt.gz

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From: brunians at brunians.org (brunians at brunians.org)
Date: Wed, 25 Jun 2008 07:49:04 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: (urth) Sev's Silence about Catherine
In-Reply-To: <48620024.6070702 at io.com>
References: <BAY103-W515978F1A600665073F319D7A00 at phx.gbl>
	<48620024.6070702 at io.com>
Message-ID: <11081.72.171.0.144.1214394544.squirrel at brunians.org>


You think someone would notice that the chick came back to life, maybe
make a fuss....



.


> b sharp wrote:
>> Brunians says:
>>
>>> I don't find any of this speculation about the woman in the torturer's
>>> elevation ceremony
>>> at all convincing.
>>
>> I have to agree. I thought I was going out on a limb to suggest the
>> remote possibility that
>> Severian had sex with Catherine and this is the reason for his silence
>> regarding this and
>> other family ties.
>>
>> But the text doesn't seem very ambiguous in this Elevation scene.
>> Severian says the sword
>> is a wooden batten. He calls it a "false blade" as he describes the
>> downstroke. It meets
>> resistance because it hits the "ingenious mechanism" that elevates a wax
>> head.  The wax
>> head and real head coveredin fuligin cloth trick is described in detail.
>> And Catherine would
>> have to have tremendous healing powers to be able to take her severed
>> head, place it back
>> on her neck and have it instantly as good as new.  Only Severian, as
>> Conciliator, is able to do
>>  anything close to that and he is limited to restoring withered arms and
>> removing giant tumors.
>> Well, I guess he cures the sick girl in the jacal also but nothing as
>> dramatic as instantly healing
>> and restoring a severed head.
>
> Stitching a freshly severed head back on is much less impressive than
> returning days-dead Zama to life, or generating an entire new body for
> himself on The Ship.
>
> --
> Jeff Wilson - jwilson at io.com
> < http://www.io.com/~jwilson >
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