Plant/Animal

Lee · 17 Sep 2014, 13:48 · from 2014-September.txt.gz

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From: severiansola at hotmail.com (Lee)
Date: Wed, 17 Sep 2014 09:48:31 -0400
Subject: (urth) Plant/Animal
Message-ID: <BLU175-W247A1B0DC3EC98C28BE58ACFB60 at phx.gbl>

>Marc Aramini:  Anyway, as I think Andrew Mason surmised long ago, the half vegetable
>Spring Wind is Mars/March, son of Early Summer/June/Juno, Bird of the Wood
>Is Rheas Silvia (whom Mars begets Romulus and Remus upon) ...
>so how is the Green Man related to Mars? The name of Mars is Verthandi now,
>eh? hmmm

Yep, good detective work all around!

> The story of Hyacinthus, where flowers spring up from blood, is vital to 

> the Short Sun universe.

Given the character "Hyacinth" in Long Sun, I think the theme deserves all the attention

is has gotten on this board and more.

>Perhaps the Green Man is partially alien too, and only believes himself a true descendent of 

>man.

The tale of the origin of Hieros is twisted and confused. But I think there is an implication that

they are ultimately derived from human stock. There is a term I now forget,  in animal husbandry 

which describes taking extreme variants and rebreeding them with the original stock for genetic

robusticity. I kinda think that may be what Wolfe is getting at here.

>The Green Man warns Severian that if he begets a son, it will be his enemy.
>Sev takes this as a generic prophecy.

Interesting observation. Might this relate to the relationship of Zeus and Dionysus? In ancient

Greece, rustic vine god worship was replaced by worship of the Olympic pantheon, but the 

worship of Zeus and his ilk was eventually replaced by Dionysisan worship.

Severian does not have a son. But on the Whorl it seems like the relationship between Pas and

Silk is somewhat Zeus-Dionysian.

> That Green Man might be a damn Martian ...> 

>Dan'l Danehy-Oakes: Thank you very much. Now I will never be able to reread tBotNS without
>envisioning Marvin.

Heh. Though if any Martian connection was intended, perhaps Edgar Rice Burroughs and/or Ray

Bradbury were the main reference? On the other hand, must we be snobby and assume that Wolfe 

valued these SF giants higher than Looney Toons?

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