Abaia and the undines

David Stockhoff · 12 Dec 2008, 14:58 · from 2008-December.txt.gz

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From: dstockhoff at verizon.net (David Stockhoff)
Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 09:58:09 -0500
Subject: (urth) Abaia and the undines
In-Reply-To: <mailman.41485.1229030991.21489.urth-urth.net at lists.urth.net>
References: <mailman.41485.1229030991.21489.urth-urth.net at lists.urth.net>
Message-ID: <49427C01.3070207 at verizon.net>

On the first point, Severian writes this in TCotA before he experiences 
and writes TUotNS: Then those who walk the corridors walked back to the 
time when he was young, and my own story---as I have given it here in so 
many pages---began. The second thing is this. He was not returned to his 
own time but became himself a walker of the corridors. I know now the 
identity of the man called the Head of Day, and why Hildegrin, who was 
too near, perished when we met, and why the witches fled. I know too in 
whose mausoleum I tarried as a child, that little building of stone with 
its rose, its fountain, and its flying ship all graven. I have disturbed 
my own tomb, and now I go to lie in it. Problems: ---He can't yet know 
that HD/AP is himself in his own future, as well as an aquastor who 
presumably is immortal. Later he is stunned when he finds out. So he 
must be another Severian---Sev 1 out of 2, or else a corpse the single 
Severian left behind. ---If the man in the tomb is Severian 1, who put 
him in it? You can build your own tomb but you can't put yourself in it. 
Also, you wouldn't build your own tomb unless you expected to die, and 
any Severian who is mature and alive before Severian himself is born 
knows he won't ever die, because otherwise, what would he be doing 
there? ---If the time-walkers did take him back to the time of his 
youth, he would have been dead then, or else he would have been a threat 
to the Throne. They would have had to go to the Autarch and say, Build 
us a tomb, we have a corpse of a failed god. It's true that Apheta and 
Tzadkiel are unclear on Severian's fate if he fails; perhaps Severian 
1's fate is to be put to sleep in a coffin, honored and forgotten, in a 
time when no one knows him. (Do the coffins preserve bodies somehow? If 
so, isn't there a danger of Severian merging with the corpse, whatever 
it is? If not, could the corpse be an aquastor corpse?) ---But if the 
corpse is Sev 1, he can't also be the Sleeper because the Sleeper is Sev 
2. It may make sense that Sev 2 lies in a coffin while the other of the 
5 gods do not, but who are the other 2 there and when did he get put in 
the coffin? Did the Sevs merge at some time? On the second point, your 
theory sounds good. Severian is a god when he returns to Urth. It would 
basically be coincidence, then, that his "icons" and his god-self 
resemble one another ... but not if you see one as the echo of the 
other. ------------------------------ Message: 8 Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 
14:29:49 -0700 From: "Dave Tallman" <davetallman at msn.com> Subject: Re: 
(urth) Abaia and the undines To: urth at lists.urth.net Message-ID: 
<1bf4dd40812111329j659754f9i9c4727c8374b7f70 at mail.gmail.com> 
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" David Stockhoff wrote:

> > Although I still don't understand the corpse in the tomb where Severian
> > played. And now that I understand that he did not move into a new body on
> > the starsailship but was recreated by Tzadkiel, I don't understand why his
> > face was changed when he returned from Yesod. Valeria recognized him for the
> > first time then.
> >
>   

The mausolem is indeed a mystery. One thing we know for sure is that
it is Severian's. "I have disturbed my own tomb, and I go to lie in
it." It contains three closed coffins and two empty coffins. Who could
be in them?

I like the suggestion in Lexicon Urthus that the Sev of UotNS went
back in time and had it constructed for himself when he got old. The
rose, spaceship, and fountain markings on the tomb look like a coded
message about the New Sun. The three closed coffins could be the
remains of Odilio, Pega, and Thais. Perhaps the two open coffins were
for Severian and whoever was his wife in his old age. Perhaps they
were raided by tomb robbers or relic-seekers.

For the face-changing issue, they are talking about how the faces of
rulers are idealized and ennobled in portraits and sculptures. He
didn't look that noble in real life, even on the day he came to claim
Valeria. But now he does -- after his character-transformative
experiences of becoming the New Sun and the Conciliator. Valeria
laughs and cries because now it is too late for her.
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