From: "Roy C. Lackey" 
Subject: Re: (urth) Who is the Long Sun?
Date: Sat, 6 Sep 2003 10:46:58 -0500

>Crush responds:
>I'd forgotten about that. Okay. This is the wierdest puzzle I've come
across
>in the whole LS/SS series. Which is, how is Auk Silk? They evenly divide
>between them the activities of three totally separate mythological
>archetypes. Yet in one of those archetypal references, Auk is Silk's
>brother.

The most obvious analogy (but one which can't be ignored, given the title
word "Exodus"), is with Aaron and Moses.

>I've considered that Auk is a clone of Severian (both are dark featured,
>sexually attractive, and carrying swords) and that their differences in
>build are due to differences in upbringing and environment.

The _Whorl_ was launched a thousand years before Sev was born. How could Auk
be his clone?

All this casual talk of cloning that's been going on lately from various
quarters strikes me as improbable, given what we know of Typhon. He wanted
to live forever--and he wanted to do it with the same face he started out
with. If cloning had been a workable option available to Typhon, why didn't
he use it, rather than resort to the bizarre choice of having his own head
cut off? When the clone was mature enough, he could have had his brain scan
downloaded to it, just as was done with "possession" in LS. He had the time;
the _Whorl_ had to have taken many years to build and had been launched
before he lost his struggle with Piaton for control of the body behind that
curtain.

-Roy


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