Key to the Universe

Ryan D., I liked your post. It was very long and especially difficult for me to read since I do not read people's posts in email form but rather straight from the Urth Archives where it is easy to re-organize the posts by Date or Subject or even Author. Your long sentences go waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay out past here------------------------> in that format. So I went back and read yours as an email. I thought you did a good job of interpreting each of Malrubius' lines and acknowledging where more than one interpretation is possible. Thanks for calling attention to the circular shape of the universe implying that the beginning and end are together. I hadn't paid enough attention to that. Helps explain what Severian sees as he leaves Briah. I may need to do some re-thinking. I also agree that the metaphor of "divine year" implies linearity. We rarely see calendars organized into a circle. Might go along with my guess about the shape of the cosmic sequence is (in our comprehension). Spiral- is circular yet also linear. I'm not sure where you get Hirodules as, "another kind of cross-bred alien, likely some primitive reptilian creatures". This reptilian part sounds a bit like Inhumi. I agree that Hierodules are so perfect looking they seem engineered, but I don't see where we can guess at the source material. But, all in all a very good and appreciated post.