Eric,<br><br>These are great questions for examples of how to unpack the layers<br>of meaning Wolfe stuffs into his texts.<br><br><div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
1) What is the larger significance of the story Sev reads to Jonas about<br>the man fleshed from dreams? I get that it's a re-working of the<br>Theseus and Minotaur story, but is it anything more than an entertaining
<br>interlude? Is it some kind of commentary on the surrounding narrative -<br>or Jonas' story? Severian finishes the story with a dismissive comment<br>about it being an idle tale, but I'm suspicious something more is going
<br>on here.</blockquote><div><br>At one level, of course, it's a retelling of the Greek hero-tale of Theseus<br>and the Minotaur. The bit about a hero fleshed from dreams foreshadows<br>the concept of "aquastors" and in particular the fact that the Severian who
<br>becomes the New Sun is himself an aquastor, fleshed from his own will<br>(dream) when his body dies on the star-sailing vessel, who will pass <br>through the spacetime labyrinth to bring the New Sun and destroy the<br>
monsters that beseige Urth.<br><br><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">2) When Severian meets Rudesind the second time before meeting the
<br>Autarch, is Rudesind's confusion about where they are - he keeps talking<br>about being back in the Citadel, and how they can check the map in<br>Ultan's library - intentional? Is he hinting something to Severian?
</blockquote><div><br>I don't think Rudesind is confused; I think that the Citadel and the House<br>Absolute are in some way the same place. Mirrors...<br> <br></div><div> </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
3) Is there a deeper significance to the code phrases Vodalus gives<br>Severian? There's so much about ships elsewhere in the book (the<br>pelagic argosy) - the ship on the tomb Sev rests in as a boy, the ship<br>he sails to Yesod in - and the Autarch drops the phrase to Sev. as he's
<br>talking about the higher world Severian will eventually travel to. Or<br>is it "just" a phrase?</blockquote><div><br>There's a *lot* here.<br><br>First, when a pelagic (deep-sea) argosy "sights land," it means that the
<br>long voyage is nearly over. This is true, but not perhaps in the way that<br>Vodalus intends.<br><br>Second, the argosy is "pelagic" in the sense of Pelagianism: the <br>HeiroFoos are guilty of the heresy of trying to perfect humans through
<br>natural means rather than relying on divine grace.<br><br>The ship on Sev's tomb *is* Tzadkiel's ship; at one point, it is implied<br>that there is only one ship of this sort in the Universe. <br><br>There are no coincidences
<br> [COINCIDENCE: You weren't paying attention to the other half of<br> what was going on. -- Chad C. Mulligan, "The HipCrime Vocab"]<br>in the Book of the New Sun; what seems to be a coincidence is<br>
always at least a synchronicity and most likely part of someone's<br>plan, if only Wolfe's map of the meanings of the Book. <br><br>One of the many things I love about the Book is that what appears <br>at first to be driven by a series Dickensian coincidences turns out
<br>to be a causally-driven plot (though, admittedly, the causality does <br>not always work forwards in linear time).<br></div></div><br>On another level, of course, it's just a phrase.<br><br>Someone else wanna unpack the second password?
<br><br>-- <br>Dan'l Danehy-Oakes, writer, trainer, bon vivant<br>-----<br><a href="http://www.livejournal.com/users/sturgeonslawyer">http://www.livejournal.com/users/sturgeonslawyer</a><br><a href="http://www.danehyoakes.com">
http://www.danehyoakes.com</a><br>I am miserable, he is miserable,<br>We are miserable.<br>Can't we have a party? Would he rather have a party?