(urth) Just discovered this list‏

[Lee]

>Darrell Burgan: Is there any symbolic or literal relationship between Seawrack of 
>Short Sun and Mamelta of Long Sun?

Like Marc, I think there may be a bit of both. As I see it, Wolfe deliberately
confuses spiritual (via electronic) possession and biologcial possession (in the form 
of genetic parenting, both via the natural process and cloning). People gain the essence 
of their "parents" in different ways, but with similar results. 

Thus Horn has biological children in the form of Sinew, Hoof and Hide and quasi-children 
in the form of Krait, Fava and Jahlee and it gets a bit mixed up.

In an interview, Wolfe takes care to specify that Aphrodite was a sex goddess not
a love goddess. I think this relates to the intensely passionate pairings we see
in various couples as the timeline of the story progresses.

So, perhaps back on Urth it was Typhon and Mamelta who were so passionately paired.
Then within the Whorl they became Pas and Kypris. This couple passed something along
to Silk and Hyacinth and the same relentless passionate connection occurred. In Short
Sun we find the same attraction between Horn and Seawrack.

There is a fairly clear quasi-father/son relationship depicted as we move from Typhon
to Pas to Silk to Horn. So, by parallel principle I think we can trace a line from 
Seawrack back to Hyacinth, back to Kypris, back to Mamelta.

Thus when Silk is staring up at Mamelta's crotch he can (as Marc points out) catch
a glimpse of his own genesis/mother.  But I think he also gets a hint of Hyacinth, 
and the attraction is naturally quite disturbing.

And I agree that the giant fish eating Mamelta is symbolic but I think it is 
also a real, personality driven event. We are told that Scylla and the others
escaped Pas' return and his wrath by possessing animals. I think this fish is
surely an example of that and we can understand fishy Scylla wanting to support her
snake-mother Echidna by destroying Mamelta, the origin of the object of their continued
jealousy, Kypris.