(urth) Drotte-Roche mixup (was: Introduction and Breath)

Sat Apr 16 13:53:36 PDT 2011

I wrote:
> I've always felt that this looks far more like a faux-pas on the part
> of Wolfe than anything to do with Severian's memory.

and António Pedro Marques:
> Obviously one can't complain about feelings, but I just can't
> understand how you may feel that way. Only if you feel it's too
> cartoonish to be true, but this isn't at all the only instance of such
> humour by GW.

A few reasons why I feel this way:
Firstly, because substituting one name for another is an easy mistake
for a writer to make, and a hard one for an editor to spot. Mistakes
get published all the time.

Secondly, because substituting one word for an associated one is a
common error not of memory, but of language. We all do it. You
mentally reach for a word, and because your attention is elsewhere,
you don't notice that you've taken the one that was lying next to it
instead. If a journalist writes that 'the sherrif opened the new
sports field' when he meant to write 'the mayor opened the new sports
field', it isn't because he remembers a man with a pointy badge and a
ten-gallon hat cutting the ribbon.

If Severian consistently recalled that Roche was the one who said he
saw the pikes, and then three books later, in a chance remark, Drotte
remembered saying it, that would be a good way to show that Severian's
memory was suspect. But that doesn't happen. Severian says Roche said
it, then almost immediately he says Drotte said it. If that's an error
of memory, then Severian has not only remembered an incident in two
completely different ways in the space of a couple of paragraphs, but
he's forgotten what he *wrote* just two paragraphs ago. That's not
imperfect memory. That's serious brain damage.

>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 4
> Date: Sat, 16 Apr 2011 12:47:16 +0100
> From: Matthew Knapton <eruantien at gmail.com>
> To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net>
> Subject: Re: (urth) Introduction and Breath
> Message-ID: <BANLkTin67m6C5LamLnbQSDRn2qxDFgK4dA at mail.gmail.com>
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>
> Hi.
>
> I haven't read any ..Sun books outside of the Book of the New Sun, and don't
> have them to hand to look up references. However!
>
> I buy into the unreliable-Severian. While it's certainly possible that his
> repeatedly-claimed perfect memory isn't actually perfect (and either he
> lies, or has convinced himself that his subconscious inventions are real
> memories), we can be generous to Severian and assume that his memory is
> indeed perfect. But that doesn't help his case, because perfect recall isn't
> the only thing required to be an omniscient narrator - he lacks perfect
> understanding as well. He might be able to remember every scene of his life,
> but if he misunderstands what he sees, or attributes purposes and
> implications to the actions and appearance of people around him incorrectly,
> he's just as unreliable a narrator as someone who doesn't well remember the
> scene in question. Maybe even more unreliable, so to speak, or at least less
> helpful, since the person-without-perfect-memory would admit to gaps in the
> story.
>
> And of course, having a perfect memory doesn't mean it's all transcribed
> into his writing. At some point I think Severian actually writes that he has
> "left out details which are unimportant", noting a few sentences later
> (without irony) that he has "no sense of perspective".
>
> Personally I also think his memory is faulty (though I tend to think he's
> deceiving himself that what he remembers is perfect, rather than 'actively'
> lying); the bits which got me early on were his recollections of Thecla.
> Like I say I don't have my copies of the books to hand, but fairly early on
> doesn't he give one account of Thecla's death, and then later (in an offhand
> comment) give an entirely different one? His description of their
> relationship as sexual or platonic seems to change as the books goes on,
> too.
>
> I feel like cataloguing examples sort of misses the point though; if there's
> one thing a reader of Gene Wolfe knows it's that he isn't going to spell
> anything out in crayon :) and "unreliable narration", for one reason or
> another, does seem to be a recurring theme throughout a lot of his books.
>
>
> On Sat, Apr 16, 2011 at 9:58 AM, Daniel Petersen <
> danielottojackpetersen at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> So glad people are asking about Severian as unreliable narrator!  I suspect
>> it's one of those ideas that someone said in a review and then it got
>> blurbed on a jacket cover and then it just became the 'official'
>> interpretation and is now in an endless repeat loop.  I don't think I have
>> ever yet mentioned it in comments or reviews about New Sun as I simply don't
>> understand it.  I'm totally open to being shown how it is the case, but the
>> reasons given in this thread are, frankly, unconvincing.  They show how
>> Wolfe's narrative art overall is strange and tricksy and indirect and
>> elusive - things I *do* talk about in commenting on all of Wolfe's fiction
>> - but not how Severian himself overall is helpfully and accurately described
>> as an 'unreliable narrator' or how this is a central and significant trope
>> that characterises tBotNS.  It's all hints and suspicions and possibilities
>> - which are great, but should be left at that I think.
>>
>> We still await the carefully documented and argued case for Severian as
>> unreliable narrator.
>>
>> -DOJP
>>
>>
>> 2011/4/15 Ant?nio Pedro Marques <entonio at gmail.com>
>>
>>> Antonin Scriabin wrote (15-04-2011 17:48):
>>>
>>>  Severian's perfect memory seems selective.  There are moments
>>>> where seems to say "I have a perfect memory, except for when I don't".
>>>>
>>>
>>> Am I misremembering, or one of the first pages of NS goes like this: 'So
>>> Drotte was doing something... did I mention I have a perfect memory? I have
>>> a perfect memory! Anyway, Roche was doing something...'?
>>>
>>> Almost cartoonish. Roger Rabbitish.
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Urth Mailing List
>>> To post, write urth at urth.net
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>>
>>
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> Message: 5
> Date: Sat, 16 Apr 2011 11:35:20 -0500
> From: Craig Brewer <cnbrewer at yahoo.com>
> To: The Urth Mailing List <urth at lists.urth.net>
> Subject: Re: (urth) Introduction and Breath
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> Depending on what you feel constitutes the beat criteria for an "unreliable narrator," I suppose SilkHorn in Short Sun would be just as good if not a better candidate for the label than Severian. His either confused or repressed or deliberately self-forgetting memory of his own identity makes him particularly difficult.
>
> On Apr 16, 2011, at 6:47 AM, Matthew Knapton <eruantien at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Hi.
>>
>> I haven't read any ..Sun books outside of the Book of the New Sun, and don't have them to hand to look up references. However!
>>
>> I buy into the unreliable-Severian. While it's certainly possible that his repeatedly-claimed perfect memory isn't actually perfect (and either he lies, or has convinced himself that his subconscious inventions are real memories), we can be generous to Severian and assume that his memory is indeed perfect. But that doesn't help his case, because perfect recall isn't the only thing required to be an omniscient narrator - he lacks perfect understanding as well. He might be able to remember every scene of his life, but if he misunderstands what he sees,  or attributes purposes and implications to the actions and appearance of people around him incorrectly, he's just as unreliable a narrator as someone who doesn't well remember the scene in question. Maybe even more unreliable, so to speak, or at least less helpful, since the  person-without-perfect-memory would admit to gaps in the story.
>>
>> And of course, having a perfect memory doesn't mean it's all transcribed into his writing. At some point I think Severian actually writes that he has "left out details which are unimportant", noting a few sentences later (without irony) that he has "no sense of perspective".
>>
>> Personally I also think his memory is faulty (though I tend to think he's deceiving himself that what he remembers is perfect, rather than 'actively' lying); the bits which got me early on were his recollections of Thecla. Like I say I don't have my copies of the books to hand, but fairly early on doesn't he give one account of Thecla's death, and then later (in an offhand comment) give an entirely different one? His description of their relationship as sexual or platonic seems to change as the books goes on, too.
>>
>> I feel like cataloguing examples sort of misses the point though; if there's one thing a reader of Gene Wolfe knows it's that he isn't going to spell anything out in crayon :) and "unreliable narration", for one reason or another, does seem to be a recurring theme throughout a lot of his books.
>>
>>
>> On Sat, Apr 16, 2011 at 9:58 AM, Daniel Petersen <danielottojackpetersen at gmail.com> wrote:
>> So glad people are asking about Severian as unreliable narrator!  I suspect it's one of those ideas that someone said in a review and then it got blurbed on a jacket cover and then it just became the 'official' interpretation and is now in an endless repeat loop.  I don't think I have ever yet mentioned it in comments or reviews about New Sun as I simply don't understand it.  I'm totally open to being shown how it is the case, but the reasons given in this thread are, frankly, unconvincing.  They show how Wolfe's narrative art overall is strange and tricksy and indirect and elusive - things I do talk about in commenting on all of Wolfe's fiction - but not how Severian himself overall is helpfully and accurately described as an 'unreliable narrator' or how this is a central and significant trope that characterises tBotNS.  It's all hints and suspicions and possibilities - which are great, but should be left at that I think.
>>
>> We still await the carefully documented and argued case for Severian as unreliable narrator.
>>
>> -DOJP
>>
>>
>> 2011/4/15 Ant?nio Pedro Marques <entonio at gmail.com>
>> Antonin Scriabin wrote (15-04-2011 17:48):
>>
>> Severian's perfect memory seems selective.  There are moments
>> where seems to say "I have a perfect memory, except for when I don't".
>>
>> Am I misremembering, or one of the first pages of NS goes like this: 'So Drotte was doing something... did I mention I have a perfect memory? I have a perfect memory! Anyway, Roche was doing something...'?
>>
>> Almost cartoonish. Roger Rabbitish.
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Urth Mailing List
>> To post, write urth at urth.net
>> Subscription/information: http://www.urth.net
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Urth Mailing List
>> To post, write urth at urth.net
>> Subscription/information: http://www.urth.net
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Urth Mailing List
>> To post, write urth at urth.net
>> Subscription/information: http://www.urth.net
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