Severian as Marcus Aurelius

Ron Hale-Evans · 04 Nov 1999, 13:14 · from urth-v0028.mbox · original

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From: Ron Hale-Evans <rwhe at apocalypse.org>
Subject: Re: (urth) Re: Severian as Marcus Aurelius
Date: Thu, 04 Nov 1999 13:14:00
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To those who say Severian was modelled more on Claudius than Marcus
Aurelius: Uncle! As Jim Henley put it the other day, "I yield to your
superior evidence. Indeed, I roll on my back and stretch my neck before
you, making piteous mewling sounds." (I found this retraction so charming
that I sent the snippet to a few friends.)

At 11:05 AM 11/4/99 +0000, Matthew Malthouse wrote:
>Ron Hale-Evans wrote:
>
>> Both Claudius and Severian backed into the throne, and both are lame. Bu=
t I
>> think Claudius is presented as something of a bumbling fool (though of
>> course he often plays the fool as well), and this is hard to say of
>> Severian. And Sev and Marcus Aurelius both lead armies into battle,
>> something Claudius could never do.
>
>Claudius might not have "lead" armies into battle but he did, iirc,
>command them.... [snip]
>By the time Severian ascends to the Autarchy I doubt that he's any
>more "lead" armies into battle than Claudius did.

Why the scare quotes? Do you not believe that what they do is worthy of
being called leading? (Or is it a micro-spelling-flame -- did you think I
was using the verb in the past tense?)

Assuming the former: My copies of TBoTNS have been in storage across the
country for about three years, but I broke down and bought _Shadow and
Claw_ recently, and I'll buy the next two volumes as I get to them. My
memory of _Citadel_ is therefore somewhat vague, but didn't Sev at one
point lead a charge on the battlefield? If he didn't lead an army as such,
at least he led a squadron or a battalion or something. My only point was
that this was a most un-Claudius-like thing to do, based on my limited
knowledge of the Claudius books, which came through television rather than
reading Graves. It fits with what we know of Marcus Aurelius, however.

Speaking of Wolfe and Graves, here's a slightly off-topic question: did
anyone else get the impression that Wolfe was cribbing heavily from _The
White Goddess_ in _There Are Doors_?

Ron H-E
--
Ron Hale-Evans: rwhe at apocalypse.org  ... <http://www.apocalypse.org/~rwhe/>
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