(urth) Severian / Christ / Logos / Apocatastasis

[Son of Witz]

On Nov 24, 2008, at 9:00 PM, Craig Brewer wrote:

>>> Yes, "just."  Even in its internal cosmology, it's very clear that
>>> Severian's actions are in no way the last word about the humans of
>>> Urth--they're a hit of the reset button so that, in time, the humans
>>> might evolve into Hieros and escape into a higher plane of  
>>> existence.
>>> That moment, if/when it comes, would be a transcendent moment akin  
>>> to
>>> a Last Day.  This is a wiping away of the bulk of humanity to leave
>>> behind a virtuous remnant, exactly like the Biblical flood.  It  
>>> would
>>> be a pretty dramatic error to read the Flood in Genesis and the  
>>> Second
>>> Coming of Christ as equally important pieces of Christian mythology.
>>
>> *sigh*
>> I'm not claiming a one to one correspondence.
>> I'm looking at this in poetic and metaphorical terms.
>> and it's TOTALLY there in the text.  this is not much of a stretch  
>> of the imagination.
>>
>> ~sonofwitz
>
> Of course you're right that the metaphorical suggestion is there.  
> But what I think others are trying to do is to figure out exactly  
> how far the metaphor carries.

Thats exactly what I'm trying to do. I just read these books twice and  
am only getting this on the second read. the more I look at it through  
this lens, the more I find.
if it hadn't yielded this, I wouldn't keep looking at it. I'm not  
trying to prove this to anyone really, I'm no writer or critic. I'm  
just fucking stoked on how deep these books resonate, and I"m just  
getting a whiff of it.


> It's one thing to say that there's a poetic metaphor of the Second  
> Coming working in the text. It's another thing to say that it's the  
> most important metaphor, even and especially if, for example, the  
> Flood metaphor is also there.

not arguing for primacy of reading.
not denying the flood metaphor. there would be no point. a plot flood  
is symbolic of a flood myth. easy peasy.
but what does the flood mean?
in context of Urth/Ushas, I'd say destruction/rebirth.

"resurrection & death" is the title of the first chapter of Shadow.
"resurection" is the title of the last chapter of Citadel
Phoenix Throne
Amphisbaena

again, I"m not looking for the Primary reading crowd,
but I think some of this speculation is very apt and I'm surprised to  
not having already found a lot of posts about it.
if this shit is old, lemme know.

> So what if Wolfe was doing something even more interesting than just  
> writing a sf/fantasy version of the Second Coming? What if he was  
> intentionally was trying to conflate the Old and New Testament  
> stories in such a way that neither works as a master metaphor for  
> the text, but actually something quite different? That doesn't  
> negate what you've said, nor does it argue for a one-to-one  
> correspondence. Instead, it takes both the metaphors and the text on  
> their own terms to see how they're using all of this mythic material  
> in unique ways.

I'm absolutely with you here.
instead of one to one, I'm trying to triangulate from two texts that I  
think are talking about similar things.
you had mentioned collapsing the priorities of the meanings, which  
Wolfe does.  any good writer who is going to do something this  
audacious better be fucking sly about it.
no waaaaay would I have read this book if I had thought that this was  
JUST a twisted take on Jesus. (which I surely don't think it is)

>
> I don't think anyone doubts all that you've pointed out about the  
> various metaphorical ways that the Gospel and Christian myth works  
> in the text.

thanks.  I guess I was looking for a bit of that.  I'm lit on this,  
wanting to nudge some other geeks and go "holy shit, get a load of  
this craziness"

> I think they're trying to look at the ways that the book diverges  
> from the metaphor in order to find out what Wolfe might be  
> creatively doing to the myth(s) by changing them, mixing them, etc.,  
> which is what he always does with myth, even those which he  
> apparently thoroughly believes.

flips my lid. he's so good at it.

~witz