(urth) Father Inire

[Ryan Dunn]

On Dec 27, 2011, at 10:17 PM, Jeff Wilson wrote:

> I think Rudesind is tall because he has big body parts and when he sits atop a stepladder he makes it look like it is merely a high stool.

This may very well be. But let me string together all of the descriptions I could find and just share my perception. Before I do, however, has anyone else commented on the fact that Rudesind refers to the Urth in the painting as "your blue Urth," as though it belongs to Severian and not him? Does this prompt anyone to wonder whether the masters may not be Urthlings? Or, at least, Rudesind himself, as the servant to a cacogen?

Anyhow...

"... I came upon an old man perched on a high ladder."

- While perched does not explicitly infer sitting nor standing, I can't help but read this passage as a small old man standing atop a stepladder. Your reasoning would imply that Severian assumed an old man appeared standing up on a stool instead of sitting on a ladder. It seems an awkward impression for Severian to have, but if a Short man was standing atop a stepladder, it might look like someone sitting on a stool from afar.

"He had a weak glance, reminding me of the turtles we sometimes frightened on the banks of Gyoll, and a nose and chin that nearly met."

- While a weak, turtle-like glance doesn't refer to height, I find the description more Lilliputian than leggy.

"... he scrambled down from the ladder like an aged monkey, seeming all arms and legs and wrinkled neck; his hands were as long as my feet, the crooked fingers laced with blue veins."

- Scrambled errs on the side of someone slight of stature, and an aged monkey implies a hunched-over posture (I can't think of any monkeys taller than a human when hunched over). Maybe if he stood erect he would be less stout, but as it stands he's a hunched over hook-nosed elderly man to me.

"As I drew nearer, I found that what I had taken to be a stool was a stepladder, and that the old man perched on it was cleaning one of the pictures."

- Here he is, perched again. Odd that the eidetic Severian finds a familiar prop in a familiar setting with a familiar old man so unfamiliar on first glance, though. Plus, I'm finding the recurrence of that word "perched" a bit peculiar now.

"Gripping the sides of the ladder, he began to descend, his sponge still in his hand."

- Would a tall man grip the sides of a stepladder? I'm not so sure a short person would either, may be a simple slip up in the prop Gene had in mind through these scenes?

"He thumped his own bosom with the sponge, then bent close to me, whispering though there was no one but ourselves in the long corridor."

- Now here is something interesting. If he indeed bent close to Severian to whisper, it stands to reason he may be in fact TALLER than the torturer's apprentice. Assuming he bent to reach Severian's ear, and didn't just bend as a return to his base posture after thumping his chest.

"He pulled the edge of my cloak, and I followed him."

- And a few sentences later, Rudesind is tugging on the edge of Severian's cloak. But what edge? The hem? the in-seam? Unclear, but feels like a short person tugging at a taller person's garb to me.

"He made a countrified bow."

- I dunno, but an informal, awkward bow also feels stunted and clumsy, but I am beginning to think I am simply biased about wanting this man to resemble Inire now (or Fechin or whomever else has monkey-like features and a weathered visage).

"The old man hung his head and pulled at his thin beard. I could see the dry skin of his face rise in hollow-sided, tiny cones as it sought to follow the white hairs."

- Tiny, coned indentations on his face implies to me a smallish head. Again not connected to height, but consistent with a series of shriveled up descriptions.

...ryan
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