(urth) Pike/Oreb

[James Wynn]

On 11/3/2011 4:44 PM, Jerry Friedman wrote:
> I read that passage quite differently from you.  What's your evidence for a
> "struggle"?
>
> I'd think it more accurate to say that he thing that Silk tries to explain to
> himself is why he said "sir", not why he said "my son". In fact, he seems to
> have been trained or to have worked out ways to address older or higher-status
> men more respectfully than "my son".
> The reason he comes up with for his
> switch makes sense.  If we think he's hiding another reason from himself, one
> possibility is that he switched from "sir" to "my son" after he went from begging
> to doing an augur's job of explaining something about the Outsider to a layperson.
> He might hide this from himself because it might feel like sinful pride to him.  I
> don't see any hint that he unconsciously sees Blood as something like his son
> in a physical sense or that Wolfe is inventing this to give us such a clue.

I wish I had put it as succinctly as David. The exposition is peculiar. 
As is often the case, I think Wolfe has a remarkable ability to provide 
exposition on multiple channels at one. There are many times Wolfe has 
his characters chattering on about something that seems barely relevant 
and in an overly verbose way and suddenly I have an epiphany that as the 
character speaks, Wolfe is there, in the same spot. He is speaking the 
same words but he is looking at me, the reader, from the corner of his eye.

> And what about Severian's mistaking Silk's astral appearance for Master
> Malrubius's ghost?  There's no doubt about that, I take it.  I'd think that gets
> priority as something needing explanation, and that the explanation for it
> might shed some light on Silk's mistaking his future astral self for Patera
> Pike.

Well, what of Malrubius? If we have a repeated pattern in which someone 
meets a character for the first time and mistakes him for someone he 
knows quite well....not everyone, mind you, only in two very specific 
instances...well, why should we not conclude that he looked unncannily 
like each of those persons. And if A = B = C then A = C. In other words, 
why is not simplest explanation to conclude that if Severian had met 
Patera Pike, that he might also have mistaken him for Malrubius as well.
It's not like Wolfe has never peopled his stories with inexplicable 
twins (genetic or temporal) running around with seemingly separate agendas.

I have some suspicions. They are are beyond my ability to even argue 
them. They just seem to fit on the overall horizon. I believe that Don 
Doggett was on track in his theory that Severian was in some way a 
descendent/relative to Typhon and Ymar. He was wrong at certain points, 
I think, but his concept was valid.  I think members of Typhon's family 
(such as it is) are to be found all over the Sun Cycle. What is missing 
is a valid tree and the role each plays.

> Incidentally, there's a possible discrepancy in the theory that Pike's ghost is
> Silk's future astral self.  The only description of Oreb's astral appearance I
> could find is as a fat bird up to Silkhorn's belt (RttW, Ch. 17).  The young Silk
> would hardly call that "Oreb" without further comment.  I suppose one could
> say that Oreb was big to contain the version of Scylla, and that after she was
> removed from him, he would have looked like his normal self.  However, Hoof
> goes along on that expedition, when Cilinia is separate from Oreb, and doesn't
> comment on any change in Silk, unless I'm missing something.

We have an explanation for why Oreb did not look like a bird at the 
time. It was because he was possessed. Actually, I believe (IIRC, ho ho 
ho) that the text explains this. An astral Oreb, unpossessed would have 
an animal soul and would look like itself.