The Two Katharines

Lee Berman · 17 Aug 2010, 00:38 · from 2010-August.txt.gz

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From: severiansola at hotmail.com (Lee Berman)
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2010 20:38:37 -0400
Subject: (urth) The Two Katharines
Message-ID: <SNT123-W499D1719C4AD2136901BCCCF9C0 at phx.gbl>

>Ryan Dunn- Besides calling the blade batten with an old hilt, where does he go to 
>"pains to describe the blade of the sword as light"?

Tinsel is, by definition, lightweight just like a batten. If Wolfe wanted to depict a
heavy blade he'd have described it as silver painted mahogany or blunted shiny steel.

>The batten could be double sided with beads inside to shift the balance the way 
>Terminus Est does. The tip of the blade could be of a heavy lead then covered with 
>tinsel decoration.

I asked if you could say why the sword made of lightweight materials feels very heavy without
resorting to "ifs" and "could be's" and other hypotheticals. You can't. No shame to you, 
Nobody could do it. You like to speculate that Severian has lied and it is made of lead
not wood. I find it more interesting to speculate that it is a real sword that cuts. But both 
are equally speculations.

(Terminus Est is filled with liquid mercury, btw, which is even denser than steel)

>I'm not sure what I'm defending anymore.

Why is it even a fight? And who/what was attacked?

If those last two questions could be answered by all, I think a lot of problems on this board
would be solved. But, c'est la vie.

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