finally - a mechanism: baptism

James Jordan · 04 Dec 2002, 17:34 · from urth-v0212.mbox · original

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From: James Jordan <jbjordan4 at cox.net>
Subject: RE: (urth) finally - a mechanism: baptism
Date: Wed, 04 Dec 2002 11:34:50 -0600
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At 05:28 PM 12/3/2002, Blattid wrote back to me:

> > If this does not seem like "good SF," remember that Silk's
> > enlightenment was a "purely spiritual event" not paralleled
> > by anything "scientific."
>
>I have trouble accepting that ... Wolfe, throughout the Sun
>books, goes to a great deal of trouble to maintain a sort of
>ambiguity where the events that seem supernatural also have a
>naturalistic explanation (though those explanations often feel
>quite unsatisfying when stated baldly). In the case of Silk's
>enlightenment, he tosses us Crane's theory of a cererbral
>accident -- as a herring _so_ red that nobody in their right
>mind will believe it; leaving us wondering where the "real"
>naturalistic explanation lies. I have never found it, but
>remain convinced, because Wolfe has otherwise kept his method
>so consistent, that he must have planted it somewhere: possibly
>someplace where Crane's theory hides it from us...?

Yeah, but in the interview Wolfe said it was purely supernatural, and my=20
question was whether it as purely "scientific" or both in a parallel way. I=20
agree that we really seem to "need" something more than just a spiritual=20
link between Silk and Severian; I was just pointing out that if this is all=20
there turns out to be, it is not wholly unlupine.

> > In this narrative the Outsider is a player, though only
> > openly an occasional one.
>
>With the exception of Silk's enlightenment, does the
>Outsider make any other interventions that don't have
>alternate, "naturalistic" explanations?

Is there another explanation for Silk's resurrection?

Nutria


--=20

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