(urth) (no subject)

[Jerry Friedman]

> From: Jeff Wilson <jwilson at io.com>

> On 1/16/2011 7:26 PM, Jerry Friedman wrote:
> >> From: Andrew Mason<andrew.mason53 at googlemail.com>
> >
> >>  Jeff Wilson wrote:
> >>
> >>> Didn't Sev pointedly reject  Daria?
> >>
> >> He did  at first. I'm not sure what happened  after that.
> >
> > He got her to run away, pulled her down by her  ankle, and tore her shift 
>off.  I
> > think they had sex after  that.
> >
> >> I think he
> >> does sometimes  list her  with other women who have been his lovers , so
> >> it may be that  the  refusal was an act.
> > ...
> >
> > Maybe to point out, as  he says, that she has no power over him.
> 
> this includes not wanting to  have sex with her. "'There is only one 
> living woman I desire, and no man but  myself.'"

If that means he's not willing to have sex with any woman but one, it
started after the encounter with Pia, and I remember no trace of this
change in him.

I'm sure I've read that many times as "There is only one living woman
I desire, and I fear no man but myself."  Yet my edition has it the way
you quoted it.  Just my unconscious editor?

> Presumably the only  woman is Agia,

My first guess would have been Dorcas, and my second, Valeria.

> and getting it on with Daria  would rather undermine the 
> impression he had been laboring to make on  her.

Severian's behavior in this whole scene is rude, crude, and socially
unacceptable (as we said in junior high).  Is your idea that he strips her
naked to underline the point that even then he doesn't want to have sex
with her?  If he does reject her, that's pretty serious humiliation, and
I'm surprised she's so friendly with him before the battle (Ch. XXI).  But
if he doesn't reject her, maybe she can write his actions off as the odd
behavior of johns.

I think the point he's making is that she has no power over him, so
their sex is going to be on his terms.

Jerry Friedman