From: Peter Grimes <grimes@waste.org>
Subject: Re: (urth) Book and Urth; A & M; black hole
Date: Fri, 19 Jun 1998 17:13:47 

On Fri, 19 Jun 1998, adam louis stephanides wrote:

> > Is it certain, for instance, in the
> > first four books that Severian himself will one day become the
> > Conciliator?
> 
> I would say there is no hint in the first four books that Severian
> was/will become the Conciliator.  But I could be wrong.

Of course I'm citation-less here, but I think that you are wrong.  IIRC,
there are at least a few clues vaguely scattered throughout BotNS that
Severian maybe, just maybe is the Conciliator.  The most obvious is the
fact that the we discover that his powers don't come from the Claw of the
Conciliator but from himself.  These powers (healing people) are the same
as those attributed to the Conciliator.  In addition, the Conciliator is
also referred to as the New Sun.  We are certainly led to believe that
Severian will bring the New Sun, which is another link.

I think there may be other clues but I couldn't say off hand.

And of course, all this is much more "obvious" (as much as anything by
Wolfe is obvious) after reading UotNS because you're suddenly looking for
clues (and possibly finding ones that aren't really there).


-Dave


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