hirsute sev

John Watkins · 13 Nov 2008, 21:03 · from 2008-November.txt.gz

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From: john.watkins04 at gmail.com (John Watkins)
Date: Thu, 13 Nov 2008 16:03:50 -0500
Subject: (urth) hirsute sev
In-Reply-To: <932752.81656.qm at web37602.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
References: <292697.51765.qm at web58201.mail.re3.yahoo.com>
	<932752.81656.qm at web37602.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <93d4039f0811131303n6f1c3c14ne97324f884e145c1 at mail.gmail.com>

I just figured Severian was sun-browned from his travels by the time
he meets Cyriaca, but pale from his time in the Citadel back in
Shadow.

On 11/13/08, Craig Brewer <cnbrewer at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Just a small point on Severian's coloring, but I was just looking back over Cyriaca's story in _Sword_, and, at one point, Severian mentions looking down at his "brown fingers." She also of course mentions the dark hairs on his hands, but the brown fingers seems interestingly different from Thecla's comment about his pale skin.
>
> So...pale with ruddy hands because his hands aren't covered by a mask/cloak, as is the rest of his body? Is "brown" here just a loose rendering of "vaguely beige" skin color? Or is this a contradiction? Or is Thecla's "pale" a relative pale rather than actually white or devoid of color? Why, in the end, would it matter, and what would Severian's skin color signify? An illustrator is of course naturally interested, but is Sev's skin color supposed to indicate something about his ethnicity, which would of course be filtered through years of Urth history. I'm simply trying to figure out if Sev's coloring is actually significant, or if I should stop worrying about it.
>
> I also thought I should mention that Thecla's worrying about a sunburn under a pale, dying sun seems odd. Yes, ultraviolet need not be accompanied by a "bright" light, but a deliberate mention of worrying about the harmful effects of a dim sun seems to stand out.
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message ----
> From: Marc Aramini <marcaramini at yahoo.com>
> To: "urth at urth.net" <urth at urth.net>
> Sent: Saturday, November 1, 2008 12:19:21 PM
> Subject: (urth) hirsute sev
>
> The description of Sev is one of paleness punctuated by dark head hair - Thecla says he must stay out of the sun or his pale skin will burn terribly.  This does not seem to jive in my mind with someone who has excessive body hair that would take away this paleness and cover him from the sun - and it is the veins on the back of his hands that make him a man, not his hairy chest.
>
> But I have no chest hair and it is certainly possible I am projecting a narcissistic image upon him that has no basis in the text.
>
>
>
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