Date: Tue, 08 Jul 2003 13:21:45 -0700
From: maa32 
Subject: (urth) Juturna and the skull

One thing has always bothered me about Sev's meeting with Juturna in Urth of 
the New Sun: she doesn't know about saving him, but indicates that now that 
she has been told, she will save him in the past and not allow him to drown.  
Does this imply that the Urth Severian is on at the conclusion of Urth of the 
New Sun is a different iteration, a different timeline?  Has he traveled even 
further back into the previous cycle of existence?

If Juturna never saved him in that past timeline could the skull be his?  Then 
how was he alive to wed Valeria?  The multiple lifelines are disturbing.  Is 
there any way that Ash and the Green Man aren't mutually exclusive?  If the 
future Urth is dragged into a past cycle, then one planet can have the green 
man and the other can have master ash. It is quite clear that in some 
time-lines Severian is not the New Sun, right?  The timelines in which he died 
as a child?  Or is that inconsequential?

Marc Aramini



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