(urth) Theories

[Gerry Quinn]

From: Ryan Dunn 

> I don't think anybody disputes the substance to the visible story, but on its
>  own, Severian's hero quest is not "best sci fi series of all time" material, 
> sorry to say. It is the subverted meanings, the parables within the text, the
>  actual "style" of the novel also (unreliable narrator) that make the story 
> truly special. 

> As far as Severian as a puppet. No if that were the visible story, it would 
> not be interesting at all. But as a potential hidden story unbeknownst to 
> the narrator telling it to us, it certainly is a crafty, interesting, and 
> potentially genius revelation, no?

But the thing is, we *do* have a great underlying story, and it’s certainly quite reasonable to argue that in that story Severian is in some senses a puppet.  He is surely observed and to some degree manipulated by great forces, after all.  On the other hand, it seems he both understands his part to the extent of his ability, and plays it willingly, and that is not the description of a puppet, unless we are all puppets.

But to extrapolate this to make the entire storyline into a shadow play, in which no character is what they seem, and no element of the overt story or the aforementioned underlying story has any meaning or verity, seems to verge on mistaking BotNS for the sort of story that the Turkey City Lexicon calls “The Jar of Tang”.

It’s not that story.  And if Wolfe had wanted to write that story, he would have written it better, and the substitutions and unveilings would actually work to explain things.

- Gerry Quinn


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