The Ship

Jeff Wilson · 10 Jan 2012, 21:03 · from 2012-January.txt.gz

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From: jwilson at clueland.com (Jeff Wilson)
Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2012 15:03:19 -0600
Subject: (urth) The Ship
In-Reply-To: <SNT123-W44973B3A8D0D0EFC549A19CF990 at phx.gbl>
References: <SNT123-W44973B3A8D0D0EFC549A19CF990 at phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <dddf7299427752e08f4afe611b83cc2a.squirrel at webmail.prismnet.com>

On Tue, January 10, 2012 12:15, Lee Berman wrote:
>
>>Jeff Wilson: The way Sev and his emotions have nothing to do with the
>> flying cathedral?
>
>
>
> Wrong story ;-). That's the beginning of Shadow and we are all the way to
> the end of Urth.
>
> Severian has gone through some changes in the duration, yes? Anyway, there
> is no suspicion
>
> raised that Severian caused the cathedral to fly using his power.

So you are of the opinion that none of the improbable occurrences that
happen around Sev are connected to him? Despite his own,
cosmically-enhanced perception that they are?

>>Tzad already gives him legitimate godhood as the New Sun by connecting
>>him to the White Fountain. Tzad is also already complicit in at least
>>two other flim-flam jobs on Sev and the sailors.

> Yes, Tzadkiel is a deceiving scoundrel (as are his avatars on Urth, imho).
> No argument there.
>
> But it seems like overkill. Why would he/she go through the gargantuan
> effort of parking the
>
> Ship for hours and playing tug-of-war with Urth's, Lune's and the Sun's
> gravity just to save
>
> Severian's life from some primitives?

Why does he arrange the show trials? Why does he do anything? To preserve
the carefully fiddled timeloops that allow Sev to have the adventures
necessary to bring Ushas. The few hours of parking is relatively trivial
next to the centuries of sailing back and forth from Briah to Yesod as
well.

> He wasn't going to Yesod at the time of the eclipse. There was no reason
> for the Ship to be
>
> there except to participate in elaborate, extravagent and unnecessary
> theatrics.

Yes!!! The Yesodis are all about the spectacle! How many times does Sev
ponder how the events of life are like a play being put on for the benefit
for an unseen audience? In fact, putting on shows is just abut all we see
the Yesodis and their cousins do.

>  The tender captain may know more about
> the Ship than Severian
>
> but Wolfe still has Severian say the Ship has always been outside the
> circle of Dis (alternate
>
> name for Pluto). Why is this necessary?

It establishes that Sev has no experience with The Ship being near earth
at that point of his story. Due to the time travel, both can be correct
from their respective perspectives.

-- 
Jeff Wilson - < jwilson at clueland.com >
A&M Texarkana Computational Intelligence Lab
< http://www.tamut.edu/cil >

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