Ouen and Dorcas and ??

Ryan Dunn · 07 Dec 2010, 01:38 · from 2010-December.txt.gz

This is the message as the crawl holds it, before anything here touched it. What the conversation shows has been through ingest: transfer encodings decoded, attachments dropped, quote markers repaired, and the archiver’s ? resolved into quotation marks and dashes. Those repairs are judgements and some of them are wrong, which is what this page is for. Email addresses are obscured here as they are everywhere else on the site, so it is before our repairs rather than byte for byte.

From: ryan at liftingfaces.com (Ryan Dunn)
Date: Mon, 6 Dec 2010 20:38:19 -0500
Subject: (urth) Ouen and Dorcas and ??
In-Reply-To: <4CFD8EFF.2060405 at verizon.net>
References: <AANLkTindDeG=GGZi=jJjHCzfaF3vtP-u1UOSWakQRU3o at mail.gmail.com>	<CAA38081-65BF-4B32-9DE7-06ADD7B38BA3 at liftingfaces.com>	<21C71EAE81C747188E21D6B2DAF14668@jill>	<4CFD8AC3.1090708 at verizon.net>
	<C766D17F-8571-4BC9-AFDD-4CECBA2EF77D at liftingfaces.com>
	<4CFD8EFF.2060405 at verizon.net>
Message-ID: <61763F8F-D731-498F-B3D2-6E09FD52D221 at liftingfaces.com>

On Dec 6, 2010, at 8:33 PM, David Stockhoff wrote:

> Sorry---I wasn't clear. I'm just saying that's how it's done in translated editions of a work in another language. Wolfe would stick closely to the form he is aping (parodying? at least having fun with).
> 
> Same with Latro's scroll. If you see a translation of Egyptian or Tibetan or something that clearly doesn't follow Western traditions---even Greek or old Norse or what have you---you will see chapter headings and other breaks that were entirely introduced by the translator, functioning as an editor, who is taking control and ownership (almost) of the work. They are constructions imposed upon the text for the convenience of the modern reader.

In the Latro series, it is told to us that the titles of each break represent the first words of that specific entry, and each chapter is a different journal entry. Right?

If nothing else, it means that G.W. gives those sorts of things some thought.

The only reason it is important in my view, relating to BotNS is because, as some have said, they can be evidence of an enlightened Severian who learned his own mysteries after they happened to him. It also means he intentionally used chapters to give us hints to certain things. No more evident than in the use of "Dorcas" for the chapter where she only appears at the very end, and not even then (that hand that grabs him from beneath is not hers, right?).

In any case, maybe I should inquire it of G.W. directly, seems like not TOO out of bounds to ask.

...ryan

An unofficial mirror of a public mailing list · about & removal requests · download the archive · before the list · original archive at urth.net