S&S vs. SF in BotNS

Lee Berman · 21 Dec 2011, 14:33 · from 2011-December.txt.gz

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From: severiansola at hotmail.com (Lee Berman)
Date: Wed, 21 Dec 2011 09:33:43 -0500
Subject: (urth) S&S vs. SF in BotNS
Message-ID: <SNT123-W1343E3850F50A87115C715CFA50 at phx.gbl>

>David Stockhoff: Ultan's remarks are key, although I think they do not refer only to the 
>analeptic alzabo but to larger concepts of interest to Severian and Wolfe. At any rate, 
>the principle of what you might call "spiritual cannibalism" already exists---that is, 
>the pre-scientific concept that when you eat the seat of your dead enemy's soul, you eat 
>his soul. Any further details will be particular to the genre, setting, or audience---in 
>our case, "plausible" science.

An excellent point. Along with all the other persistent faerie/magic elements from human
mythology, cannibalism belongs in this book along with vampires, giants, shapeshifting, 
etc. I'll even assert that the only kind of cannibalism among humans is "spiritual". I 
don't know any examples of cultural prescription of cannibalism for the sake of nutrition.

(FWIW, centuries before "Mad Cow Disease" appeared in our news, Papua-New Guineans, hoping to 
augment their own courage, were giving each other a prionic dementia disease called "kuru" from 
eating the brains of fallen warriors.)

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