Silk/Horn in the Matachin Tower

Antonin Scriabin · 07 Feb 2013, 03:43 · from 2013-February.txt.gz

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From: kierkegaurdian at gmail.com (Antonin Scriabin)
Date: Wed, 6 Feb 2013 22:43:23 -0500
Subject: (urth) Silk/Horn in the Matachin Tower
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Another idea popped into my head, albeit on a different topic:

Jahlee says, right before her death, "We take their minds from your blood.
Their minds are yours. Here, long ago, I drank the blood of your small son.
Krait was my son, the only one who lived with the mind it took from yours."

This strikes me as very similar to the alzabo Severian encounters, that
eats the family he stays with.  The father, I believe, is eaten first, and
his mind "bubbles up" in the alzabo and speaks to the family when it breaks
into their home.  There are few shared dynamics in these scenes.  For
example, apart from the implication that the minds of the human characters
are contained in their blood / flesh, there is an eerie, "unnatural"
connection between one son (Krait via Jahlee) and his father (Horn) in the
one case, and another son (little Severian) and his father (surfaced in the
demeanor of the alzabo, addressing him) in the other.  Thoughts?

There is also the eating of Thecla's flesh and the transfer of "mind"
(powered by alzabo glands) ... the sacramental mechanics are pretty clear.
Is there any meaningful connection between alzabo and inhumu, or is this
"blood / flesh as mind" just a recurring notion in the two series, one that
Wolfe is particularly fond of?

On Wed, Feb 6, 2013 at 1:47 PM, Marc Aramini <marcaramini at yahoo.com> wrote:

>
>
> --- On *Wed, 2/6/13, DAVID STOCKHOFF <dstockhoff at verizon.net>* wrote:
>
>
> From: DAVID STOCKHOFF <dstockhoff at verizon.net>
>
> Subject: Re: (urth) Silk/Horn in the Matachin Tower
> To: "The Urth Mailing List" <urth at lists.urth.net>
> Date: Wednesday, February 6, 2013, 10:12 AM
>
>
>  You're always a few steps ahead, Mark. :)
>
> Is there a consensus that it's Typhon's mausoleum? Does this suggest
> Severian "looks like" Typhon? Or someone else?
>
> Also, do you think the stiff-legged "bird-like" person you mentioned is
> actually tree-related, and that's why he's stiff-legged ? (not really
> birdlike at all, in other words)
>
>
> No consensus on the mausoleum and if it is the infamous one of which
> Severian claims, "I have seen my tomb and now go to lie in it" or something
> to that effect, but that would certainly establish a very strange genetic
> relationship between Typhon and Severian that I had previously only been
> able to firmly ascribe only to Silk, as Typhon's probable "heir".
>
> As far as the stiff-legged thing in the "colorless cloak" on the high
> ground on Green, I think that is probably an echo of maimed Severian on his
> high island, now that the waters have receded, or at least some eidolon of
> Sev, effectively immortal.  Unless it is just a Vanished Person ...
>
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