House Absolute

brunians at brunians.org · 01 Dec 2008, 19:23 · from 2008-December.txt.gz

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From: brunians at brunians.org (brunians at brunians.org)
Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 14:23:16 -0500 (EST)
Subject: (urth) House Absolute
In-Reply-To: <49341C9B.1080504 at verizon.net>
References: <mailman.26081.1228149840.21489.urth-urth.net at lists.urth.net>
	<49341C9B.1080504 at verizon.net>
Message-ID: <9432.67.142.130.46.1228159396.squirrel at brunians.org>

Gene Wolfe stated to me, in so many words, that Nessus is Buenos Aires.

He could have been lying, I suppose.


.


> Thanks for the links, Tim. It looks like the "exact" origin of Nessus is
> unsettled enough for my theory to fit without contradicting anyone else's
> South American theory. I agree that a nod to Borges is extremely
> likely---without necessarily dictating exact coordinates.
>
> And I think the posters' suspicions about Severian's descriptions of
> spatial relations is fair on several levels. He has occupied several
> different bodies---how could he comfortably describe Thecla's left hand,
> just as a random example, as being on his (Severian's) right, when he also
> had known it to be on his (Thecla's) left?
>
> As an aside, I'm skeptical about any theory that "extreme" amounts of time
> have passed. There is simply no thematic or plot need for Urth to
> drastically change, nor for continents to change for the 20th century to
> be utterly forgotten and for cities to rise where now no cities are. Myth
> is as much about changes that occur on the same landscape as it is about
> what stays the same when the ground changes. Severian describes plastic as
> being still near the surface. Climate, sedimentation, and minor river
> movement are all fast changes vs any kind of mountain formation; so are
> language change/loss, cultural memory loss, and the replacement of
> political systems.
>
> The pampas are still there, as are the northern jungles, the Andes with
> its lakes, and the southern mists.
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 4
> Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2008 16:43:42 -0000
> From: "O'Donnell, Tim (BOSI)" <Tim.O'Donnell at bankofscotland.ie>
> Subject: (urth) House Absolute
> To: <urth at urth.net>
> Message-ID:
> 	<63FB9AC7E0AEC7459DBCC99DC44247CA01F6AFEA at BOSIDEXDB.Bankofscotland.ie>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
>
> Hi David,
>
> I thought that Nessus = Buenos Ares was accepted here but I could be
> wrong.
>
> In the archives I can find the following discussions:
>
> http://lists.urth.net/htdig.cgi/urth-urth.net/2008-September/010056.html
>
> http://lists.urth.net/htdig.cgi/urth-urth.net/2007-December/008446.html
>
> Although I do remember further discussion on the older lists (I had a
> great few months in a new job where I had the opportunity to read through
> the entire archives).
>
> Your objection based on the flow of the river came up.  At least one
> person (Raster) suggested that Severian may have spatial dyslexia and
> raised some interesting points in this regard:
>
> http://www.urth.net/urth/archives/v0001/0021.shtml
>
>
> Just on the point of the House Absolute connecting to Nessus (and I am in
> no way welded to the idea, just throwing some ideas around)
> at least 2 ways in which this could be the case and the two could be at a
> long remove:
> i)  Some transport device like the one Typhon uses to ascend to the top of
> the mountain with his face carved on it could be used to move around.
> IIIRC there is a suggestion of anti-gravity device in operation here
> ii) One of Father Inire's devices could be at work here.  Some variation
> on mirrors for transport to allow rapid transport.
>
> Is it established how long it takes to walk between the House Absolute and
> Nessus?  The tunnels are certainly extensive enough to allow children to
> be lost and possibly for timber wolves to live in the tunnels.
> There is also the possibility that the tunnels joining these two are
> extremely long.
>
> As I say, I don't think it is that important to the story, just idle
> speculation...
>
>
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