Ouen and Dorcas and ??

Andrew Mason · 06 Dec 2010, 18:31 · from 2010-December.txt.gz

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From: andrew.mason53 at googlemail.com (Andrew Mason)
Date: Mon, 6 Dec 2010 18:31:52 +0000
Subject: (urth) Ouen and Dorcas and ??
Message-ID: <AANLkTindDeG=GGZi=jJjHCzfaF3vtP-u1UOSWakQRU3o at mail.gmail.com>

Antonio Pedro Marquez wrote:

> No one ever discussed the similarity between the names Dorcas and Casdoe?

It has been discussed, I think. That there is some connection - thus
making little Severian a relation of Big Severian - is not at all
improbable. There is some slight evidence that Dorcas's family came
from the north - she remembers someone in childhood telling her about
the blood bats in the north. So Casdoe might be her niece, for
instance, named in honour of her aunt 'Cas'.

> (Not to mention that the boatman only talks about Cas, is it Cas- or -cas?)

I think we know it's -cas, because Ouen says his mother was called
Cas, but the picture he has is of Dorcas. Also - though this is a clue
only for us, the readers, not for Severian - the chapter in which the
old boatman talks about his wife is called 'Dorcas', although that
name is mentioned nowhere in it.

Son of Witz wrote:

> I'm surprised everyone sees her so young. I've always thought 18-23 range suited her.

The estimate of her age comes from Agia. It may well be, though, that
Agia is guessing wrong, or perhaps deliberately editing Dorcas's age
downward to make her less attractive to Severian.

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