Severian as Conciliator

Dan Parmenter22 Jun 1998, 12:30original as archived

SWORD OF THE LICTOR Ch. 25 "Typhon and Piaton" Typhon speaks... "Then too, a wonder-worker had arisen, as such people do. He wasn't really a trrboublemaker, though some of my ministers said he was. I had withdrawn here until my treatment should be ocmplete, and since diseases and deformities seemed to flee from him, I ordered him brought to me." "The Conciliator," I said, and a moment later could have cut my own wrist for it. "Yes, that was one of his names. Do you know where he is now?" "He has been dead for many chiliads." "And yet he remains, I think?" ********* Let's give Wolfe the benefit of the doubt and assume that he knew that Severian would meet Typhon again in URTH, which is of course later in Severian's life, but it takes place earlier in Typhon's. Now of course Typhon could have said "and that wonder-worker was you!" but that's not his style really. Perhaps this was his motivation. Realizing that the Severian in fromt of him hasn't fully come into his power yet, he seeks to either kill him or enslave him, thus preventing him from gaining the power that will ultimately serve to Typhon's hold over his "minions". Perhaps Piaton remembers as well, which is why he suggests (in his way) to Severian that he punch him (Piaton) in the nose. By the way, getting back to all those "mountain autarchs", I'm assuming that Ymar may have become autarch because Severian told Typhon's ex-cronies to be on the lookout for Ymar, just shortly after he told Ymar that he might well become a new type of ruler called an autarch. Found the autarchy AND your own guild AND thumb your nose at the prevailing monarch whose ass you've already kicked AND do some righteous healing, all in a week! I wonder if Ymar's mind is among all the other autarch's in suspension in the phallus-shaped vial? Severian says that the older autarchs minds tend to be somehwat murky to him, though accessible (only Thecla and the previous autarch are fully represented). Did Wolfe decide it would simply be too much to have Severian-as-all-autarchs-including-Ymar speak to Ymar as Ymar, which would be like an Alzabo eating someone and then going for a time-trip back to speak with the prey's own voice a day earlier. D

Michael Straight22 Jun 1998, 17:33original as archived

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On Mon, 22 Jun 1998, Dan Parmenter quoted:

13 quoted lines

"Then too, a wonder-worker had arisen, as such people do. He wasn't really a trrboublemaker, though some of my ministers said he was. I had withdrawn here until my treatment should be ocmplete, and since diseases and deformities seemed to flee from him, I ordered him brought to me." "The Conciliator," I said, and a moment later could have cut my own wrist for it. "Yes, that was one of his names. Do you know where he is now?" "He has been dead for many chiliads." "And yet he remains, I think?" ********* Let's give Wolfe the benefit of the doubt and assume that he knew that Severian would meet Typhon again in URTH, which is of course later in Severian's life, but it takes place earlier in Typhon's. Now of course Typhon could have said "and that wonder-worker was you!" but that's not his style really. Perhaps this was his motivation. Realizing that the Severian in fromt of him hasn't fully come into his power yet, he seeks to either kill him or enslave him, thus preventing him from gaining the power that will ultimately serve to Typhon's hold over his "minions". Perhaps Piaton remembers as well, which is why he suggests (in his way) to Severian that he punch him (Piaton) in the nose.

As I read this (with the hindsight of URTH), Typhon recognizes Severian, and thinks Severian is playing coy with him. I doubt Typhon suspects that the Conciliator he met was a future Severian. Rather he might think Severian is some sort of descendant of the Conciliator, or that the Concilator is somehow very long-lived. He thinks Severian is either pretending ignorance of the Concilator, or pretending not to remember Typhon. -Rostrum