Date: Mon, 11 Nov 2002 08:56:04 -0700
From: maa32 
Subject: (urth) king jesus, the feminine divine, etc.

Hi Don.  
Welcome!  It was very nice to hear your theories.  I think that if you posit 
that Silk is Typhon cloned and that Severian is Ymar cloned, then Silk is 
genetically Severian's father.  Patera Silk, heh heh heh.
Interesting.  
I am especially interested in your right on target claim that feminine worship 
is the target that must be overthrown, and that this is straight from Graves.  
Look at the text in the New Sun alone: Severian in the Botanical Garden meets 
up with a member of the Uappes tribe, where menstraution is the ultimate evil 
goddess.  In the play eschatology and genesis, the evil druj is a female and 
in Persian myth a female goddess is reponsible for the murder of King Manyu.  
Almost every myth that is invoked seriously as directly related to Severian 
(ie - the native of Brazil actually encounters Severian, Severian actually 
re-enacts eschatology and genesis) deals with evil women goddesses who are 
being overthrown or resisted by a masculine cult.  Except for the copulation 
that results in the birth of the New Sun ... but otherwise women divinities 
are pretty much either for procreation or are evil schemers.  Notice that this 
changes somewhat in Long Sun (despite the fact that the primary villains are a 
powerful force of women), but I really see it returning with a vengeance in 
Short Sun.  Keep in mind that Seawrack is a palpable spy of the Mother who the 
narrator (Silk) must keep an eye on at the conclusion of the Short Sun, even 
though the original lover of Seawrack (Horn) is dead and gone (into Babbie). 
The treatment of Jahlee and her own behavior kind of speaks for itself.  The 
very carefully selected mythical assocations with vile femininity are so 
prevalent in the New Sun that even I am shocked at times.  This might be the 
most direct link to Graves.  Interesting.  How do you think that Ymar and 
Typhon are really father and son?  It would be thematically interesting to 
think of father Silk teaching his surrogate, genetic son.  I always thought 
that Malrubius and Silk must be genetically cloned from the same person, but I 
could never posit a real link.  If Silk is truly related to typhon at all, 
then Wolfe definitely believes in nurture over nature - they are night and 
day.
While a neat idea, I think we might need a little bit more textual internal 
evidence.  Nice to hear from you.
Marc Aramini



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