From: "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" 
Subject: RE: (urth) Typhon's vanity and Pas's Two Heads
Date: Fri, 8 Nov 2002 14:32:13 -0800

> (I guess this is one of those "It isn't a bug, it is a 
> feature!" answers.)

Well, yeah ... and I think we can also take it that Mr
Wolfe's reasons for Pas being two-headed might be quite 
different from Typhon's reasons for making Pas two-headed 
... that is, that Mr Wolfe has his emotional/thematic/
symbolic/etc. reasons for a two-headed Pas. Given this, 
Typhon's reasons (presuming that Mr Wolfe bothered to 
work them out; I don't recollect anything in the text 
that would really indicate that he did) might be nothing 
more than after-the-fact rationalizations ... on Mr 
Wolfe's part, certainly, and even more so on ours.

In fact, I wonder if we're playing the old  game of 
taking the 'reality' and 'consistency' of the fictional 
world waaay too seriously ... in other words ... acting 
like a bunch of fanboys (I'd say "and girls," but in 
fact I don't think any* of the fems on the list have 
jumped in on this topic).

-----
* Or should that be "either"?)
-----

> The only important thing about the Whorl is that Typhon had 
> the power and prestige to send it out -- it is kind of like a 
> potlatch, in that sense.

Yeah. I think it was important to him as an act of 
defiance of the Hierodules. Urth had just been 
quarantined; I envision Typhon muttering, "quarantine
_this_ assholes..." -- which also helps explain why 
it was important that he, personally (in some form) 
be present on the _Whorl_. "You won't quarantine _me_,
suckers!"


> simple narcissism, I think we can agree Typhon is not 
> narcissistic, 

... no, I don't think we can. The mountain says he is.


> (As for Typhon's self-stimulation in audience with Severian, 
> Greg Feeley first pointed out many years past that this scene 
> is rather close to a Satanic scene in James Blish's BLACK 
> EASTER.  FWIW.)

Ditto several scenes of the character known only as "the 
demon" in Arthur Byron Cover's AUTUMN ANGELS. This is a 
pretty common habit among (literary) demons. It probably
symbolizes the sterility of their acts, blablablah.

--Blattid


--