From: CRCulver@aol.com
Subject: (urth) BOTNS Manuscript Conundrum
Date: Tue, 20 Jan 1998 12:12:08 


[Posted from URTH, a mailing list about Gene Wolfe's New Sun and other works]

Friends,

    One of the most plaguing questions I've been asking myself recently is
the origin of the manuscript of the BOTNS, i.e. how it came from Severian's
time to our own so "Gene Wolfe could translate it."
     I originally thought it was answered in the scene in the first few
chapters of _Urth_ , where Severian throws the manuscript (second copy) into
space where it was set "adrift on the seas of space and time." (_Citadel_
chapter 38). Here, it seems to say that the manuscript traveled into
Severian's universe's past, where it could be translated.
     However, this problem is made complex by the revelation that's
Severian's universe is NOT the same as our own. The flow of time breaks down
into:

(Yesod?) - Briah - "Interlude" Universe - Our Universe

     Severian lives in Briah. Wolfe lives in Our Universe. Now, Briah and Our
Universe are very similar and have the same events happening, more or less,
but they are not the same. How, then, does the manuscript come to us?

(Yes, I realise the translation scheme was just a cute gimmick much like
Tolkien's playing around about his translating the Silmarillion. But if Wolfe
plays the game of translation, then he's gonna throw in enough evidence to
make it stick, 'cause he likes details).

Christopher R. Culver 
<crculver@aol.com>
<new_sun@hotmail.com>
http://members.aol.com/crculver/index.html
------------------------------------------------
"Ignorance, that light of fools steers a wayward path"
-Brendan Perry