Date: Wed, 25 Sep 2002 10:28:31 -0700
From: Michael Andre-Driussi 
Subject: (urth) Pinocchio vs. the Tin Man


>Matthew Weber taunts:
>Wouldn't Jonas be a case of exactly that?
>
>Crush goes for the bait:
>Yep. He would, among others.

I'm not sure what is going on with Jonas, what he means by his intent to
become repaired (presumably it means he wants to become fully biological so
as to be better suited for Jolenta).  I guess it all resolves this way:
since Severian heard the utterance and saw Jonas go into the mirror, the
Claw heard it too, so that later on at that point in Severian's life when
he really needed a friend, yet all there was at hand was a corpse, then the
Claw drew down the Jonas software from the borderland between Briah and
Yesod, installed it in the reanimated corpse, and thereby solved two wishes
with one snappy miracle.

In any event, the transition from non-biological to biological is the
Pinocchio scenario.  Which is interesting because we tend to talk about
Jonas as being the posterboy for the opposite, the Tin Man of Oz (a
biological made non-biological).  Or Jonas as the Steadfast Tin Soldier
(crippled; in love with a woman not of his type; swallowed by fish,
delivered back to his first place, then cast into fiery dissolution).

=mantis=


Sirius Fiction
booklets on Gene Wolfe, John Crowley
29 copies of "Snake's-hands" until OP!
http://www.siriusfiction.com/



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