From: Kieran Mullen <kieran@phyast.nhn.ou.edu>
Subject: (whorl) Re:  Digest whorl.v007.n013
Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 13:24:55 


[Posted from WHORL, the mailing list for Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun]



>Then I drift from book to book and notice that in TBOTNS it is Agia
>who is associated with peacocks with her "pavonine" brochade dress.
>Which is interesting--Agia as an avenging Hera, Dorcas as Io (not to
>mention the Soldier series), and Severian as Zeus the amorous.  I've
>often wondered about the animal fable layer to TBOTNS, especially
>when some characters have clear animal names: Dorcas means gazelle,
>Hildegrin is called the Badger, Talos has the face of a stuffed fox,
>and so on.  So I watch for other animal aspects to show up.

    I think you are off the mark with the Dorcas allusion.  Dorcas
was the name of a woman brought back from the dead (by Peter, I think)
in the New Testament.  (I don't have my RSV here, but it something 
like her name was Dorcas, but she was also called Tabitha).

             Kieran Mullen