Five Severians - Severian-as-Clone

David Stockhoff · 20 Dec 2013, 14:16 · from 2013-December.txt.gz

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From: dstockhoff at verizon.net (David Stockhoff)
Date: Fri, 20 Dec 2013 09:16:47 -0500
Subject: (urth) Five Severians - Severian-as-Clone
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On 12/20/2013 12:21 AM, Jeff Wilson wrote:
> I don't personally see how Severian would ever be a clone. He *is* an
> aquastor duplicate for two stretches of URTH's narrative, as demonstrated
> by the dead material bodies left behind. That could account for two of the
> closed coffins, the third might be from his drowning/not drowning at the
> opening of SHADOW. He records Juturna saving him, but perhaps she lifted
> his clinically dead body from the murk into the light where the White
> Fountain empowered his gift.
>
> Aquastored - fall on Ship, killed by Stone Villagers
>
> self-raised - avern duel and  earthquake in the citadel, possibly drowning
> in Gyoll
>
> please fill in any others, it's late here.
>

On the Ship, he clearly leaves his ruined body behind, so only that and 
the stoning should count as deaths. But since 5 is the Number of Man, it 
works best for there to be exactly four "real" deaths and for the final 
death to be transcended. I'm still not sure how to count them to get 
four---whether our Severian is #4 or he is #2 with bonus lives. Are 
aquastorized Severians and re-cycled Severians on the same level---are 
the coffins for murdered Severians or only for judged and discarded 
Severians?

A simpler idea than the Severian-iteration theory may be that the five 
coffins represent five chances for a single Severian. After all, what's 
the real difference between resurrecting him/letting him resurrect 
himself and starting him all over? Death is surely a lesser error than 
not passing the Test, but it's impossible to gauge how much effort is 
required from the puppetmasters for each level of intervention if they 
control all time and space.

Finally, if Ossipago, Famulimus, and Barbatus did build the mausoleum, 
knowing how many coffins were needed (give or take one), then the 
mausoleum would already be thematically associated not only with deep 
time but also with backwards time, i.e., premonition. And that's what 
Severian feels there, although not as explicitly as in the tunnels under 
the Atrium. But the mausoleum itself is traveling forward, not backward, 
and so the three occupied coffins are not lives to come but lives 
already expended. Our Severian must be the ultimate or penultimate one, 
or there is no point in telling his story.

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