Severa

Lee Berman · 04 Dec 2011, 17:57 · from 2011-December.txt.gz

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From: severiansola at hotmail.com (Lee Berman)
Date: Sun, 4 Dec 2011 12:57:33 -0500
Subject: (urth) Severa
Message-ID: <SNT123-W46E8103838C4ADA21E1024CFB40 at phx.gbl>

>> What's convoluted about it?

>Gerry Quinn: The explanation?  Just that the torturers take the trouble to select 

>a twin?s name for the boy, but then say nothing to the witches.

You are not thinking correctly. The "torturers" did not take the slightest bit of

trouble to select a name for Severian. Gene Wolfe did. The torturers did not put

Severian in a cabin in the wilds and learn that Severian and Severa are twin names.

Gene wolfe did. You have to ask why the author did these things, not the characters.

Did Gene Wolfe create the cabin scene to make us think Severian didn't have a sister

at birth?

Obviously not. WOlfe created the scene to imply the possibility or even liklihood that

he did. While I"m sure WOlfe meant for us to have some doubts on the issue I have

trouble believing he meant us to arrive at a point where we say, "well, maybe there is

a sister but the witches didn't name her Severa, so, well, okay they named her Merryn.

So that's it. Severian meets his witch sister. End of story. No incest. No mythological

connection to Oedipus. No connection to other family characters such as Dorcas or 

Catherine. Just a rippingly good yarn with no depth, allusion or mystery, as Gerry would 

have it.

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