Mythic Women in BotNS

James Wynn · 25 Jan 2011, 22:42 · from 2011-January.txt.gz

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From: crushtv at gmail.com (James Wynn)
Date: Tue, 25 Jan 2011 16:42:18 -0600
Subject: (urth) Mythic Women in BotNS
In-Reply-To: <SNT123-W1B55125B6BE24DCC86CDACFFC0 at phx.gbl>
References: <SNT123-W1B55125B6BE24DCC86CDACFFC0 at phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <4D3F51CA.5070902 at gmail.com>

>> James Wynn:
>> I'm uncomfortable with your Chariots of the Gods theory...
>
> Lee Berman-
> Argh! First it was Roy giving my ideas an Einsteinian label (Grand Unified Theory), now
> I have been von Danikenized! Sheesh. J/K but really my ideas are not meant to carry any
> scientific implications at all. I mean them purely in a literary sense.

I understand. I didn't mean to denigrate by name. But gods=aliens is a 
hard parallel to miss. In the future, I'll refer to it as the Bermanian 
Theory.

>
>> James W-
>> ....at a thematic level because Severian needs to be human for the Concilliator/Mediator
>> trope to work.
>
> Lee Berman-
> Yes, this is a disagreement. I see just the opposite in the history of mythical, religious
> and legendary conciliators. Be it Hercules, Jesus, Pocahontas or Gandhi, the conciliator seems
> to usually (always?) embody a portion of both sides which are to be reconciled. Able to speak
> the language of both seems to be a prerequisite for the job. Are there exceptions in history?
> I understand the idea (shared by many) that if Severian is to be the Epitome of Urth he must
> be fully human. (yet, in the Jamesian model, isn't SilkHorn 100% human, 100% Neighbor?)

Yes! Exactly! Wolfe is capable of pulling this off when he wants to.

Um...Pocahontas? Well, never mind. It is in this way that the Christian 
conciliator (in Augustian theology) is different from Hercules. He is 
not a half-breed. He is a unique creation of God. Going all the way back 
to the Jewish philosopher Philo (who yielded to Christology so much in 
terminology), the "Son" is an eternal person, equivalent to "The Father" 
in the same way that the total collection of my memories and experiences 
is equivalent to me. Wolfe is aware of this. He reminded us in 'Soldier 
of Sidon' of the Egyptians belief in 5 human souls. And in 'The Book of 
the Long Sun' Kypris attempts to explain how Kypris-in-Chenille can be 
the same Kypris as the one in the Sacred Windows yet distinct. This 
actually fits in with the 'Jamesian' Tussah Clone theory. Silk, who is 
biologically a twin of Typhon, is the not mere the son of Typhon through 
some historical collection of DNA. He is ontologyically and 
existentially the son of Typhon through Tussah's relationship to Typhon. 
He's the son of the Calde' and his mistress from every angle that you 
look at it.

Having Severian be "half-alien" does violence to this concept. It's not 
even Arian or Xian Gnostic. It's purely pagan.
I should reiterate here that I don't consider Severian a "Christ". He's 
a Xian figure in the same way a crucifix is a Xian figure. But I 
consider him a GNOSTIC Xian figure.

But I see, from another comment in your last post that you are not 
necessarily sold on the half-alien Severian aspect of your theory.

(Honestly, though, I'm beginning to wonder whether it is necessary (by 
theme or text) for Silk to be the "son" of Typhon. Probably, it is, but 
I'm not sure.)

>> James W-
>> There _is_ some sort of connection from Inire to Typhon-- and not just because he might have
>> worked for him.
>
> Lee Berman-
> Yow! might have worked for him? You also think Typhon may have had a vizier? (do you also agree
> that the prime candidate in UotNS for this job is Ceryx? [not a saint name])

Hmmm. Well, I don't think Ceryx is human. Why is he a prime candidate as 
an advisor to Typhon?

>> James W-
>> The red hair is a flag of a Typhonian, and the connections between red hair and simian traits brings
>> us again to Inire.
>
> Lee Berman-
> Funny, I tend to see the same connection in reverse. How do you connect red hair and Typhon? (I have
> some guesses but I'm interested in what you see).

Red hair is a signifier of the victims sacrificed to Osirus. They were 
called Typhonians.
Relatedly, red hair is also associated with vampirism.
Those described as having simian features typically also have red hair.

> Lee Berman-
> One of the JW's, John Watkins suggested the Fenrir connection last year and I thought it had a lot
> of substance to it.

No! That was me! I know how these errors work their way into common 
knowledge.

u+16b9

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