Ouen and Catherine

James Wynn · 22 Dec 2010, 03:44 · from 2010-December.txt.gz

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From: crushtv at gmail.com (James Wynn)
Date: Tue, 21 Dec 2010 21:44:30 -0600
Subject: (urth) Ouen and Catherine
In-Reply-To: <AANLkTi=2+dhA8omAk_2LNJR3hiLyc2STTQuvH8jqbocA at mail.gmail.com>
References: <AANLkTi=2+dhA8omAk_2LNJR3hiLyc2STTQuvH8jqbocA at mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <4D11741E.1080005 at gmail.com>

>> James Wynn-
>> But another answer to your question might be that Dorcas is
>> the /only/ one who is important, and Ouen is her son. And in some sense
>> by reuniting the two of them, Severian is reuniting himself to Dorcas.
> Andrew Mason-
> OK, that explains his meeting with Ouen. It still seems to leave his
> speculation about Ouen and Catherine as a totally false trail.[snip]
> Yes indeed - another very striking one is Mucor as Marble's
> granddaughter. But I wouldn't call these links false exactly, just
> skewed - not the kind of relationship one would normally expect.
> Whereas Severian's relation to Ouen seems to be simply a mistake.

Well, not necessarily. In fact, I disagree. Ouen is similar to Severian 
in appearance. Very very similar. However, no one AFAIK actually SAYS 
he's Severian's father. This is a paradox and one I would like spelled out.

Look, I say that TUSSAH calling SILK his son is of the skewed kind, but 
explanation of most people would seem to put it in your second category. 
You can say he was his "adopted" son, but Tussah was not married to 
Silk's mother, did not formally adopt him, and if Silk ever met him, he 
doesn't remember it. He's arguably less Tussah's son than Mucor is 
Blood's daughter. Yet Tussah called him "his son", even though (as was 
true for Horn with Hoof, Hide, and Krait) "he was not the son of his 
body". Note that it was not necessary for Tussah to name a son as his 
successor and he left no method for anyone to ascertain that Silk was 
the one he was talking about anyway. He was merely making a statement of 
fact, as he saw it. In Horn's discussion with Silk on the floater, he 
tries to broach that riddle and Silk brushes it aside.

What I'm getting at is that perhaps Ouen's relationship is of this 
peculiar skewed kind, but we are missing something key about their true 
relationship. I think Ouen is associated with Severian, I just suspect 
he's not associated in exactly the way we're led to believe.

> I don't think [Severian's fulfillment of the myth]
> has to be detailed. When Jesus is said to fulfil
> myths, he isn''t expected to follow them in every detail; and the way
> in which stories (like Dr Talos's play, or Frankenstein) reflect
> reality but in an obscured way is an ongoing theme in the series.
> Severian is a twin, his mother was a vrirgin priestess, he was brought
> up by torturers, who can well be called wolves, on a site adjoining
> graves; the Naked One is in a way like Inire - though in another like
> Palaemon.

Hmmm...I think we irreconcilable expectations from Wolfe's allusions. I 
think this is a 'real' story.

> Andrew Mason-
> (I don't know about 'The Student and his Son'. Any attempt
> to apply it either to Severian's life or to past events has the
> problem that the sea-monsters aren't dead.)

I'm really not certain about that. I think Erebus might well be dead and 
only living on as a name or a ghost. As the southern monster he's the 
one arguably closest to the Commonwealth, but the CW is apparently only 
in open war against the agents of Abaia in the North. Erebus and Abaia 
are often spoken of as a pair but only Abaia seems to have significant 
agents. Only some pirates raiding the southern islands, right? Finally, 
there's Erebus's name, which is synonymous with the Darkness of the 
Underworld, Death. So it is suspicious that the husband of Nox in 
mythology, the "stepfather of princess Noctua" as Wolfe has declared was 
the ogre killed in that story.

On the other hand, I /am/ inclined to believe that the Student falling 
from his tower describes Typhon's death. So, who knows?

> But as Lee said, time-travelling is undoubtedly present - we know of
> two journeys Severian made (within Briah) and he tells us he intends
> to make more. So I think that is the simplest answer (to the question
> of the mausoleum. Not having read RTTW, I can't say how Typhon fits
> in.)

No. I really like Witz's association with the stream to the Brook 
Madrigot.  We don't really have anything solid on Severian's actual birth.

u+16b9

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