/lit/ - Literature

Popular topics in the last thread:

>Valeria's origins
>Severian's age
>Is Agia still human?
>Where else can a Wolfe addict get his fix?

And I will add: what's your favourite of the jokes? Drotte and Thecla made me laugh, Jonas had a cute joke and Dr. Talos I'm not sure I understood.

Fucking love these books. Love Wolfe. I love Wolfe even more because through Wolfe I discovered Borges, and now I love BOTH of them. They're both major influences on my own writing.

>>22153742
I've been reading Shadows of the New Sun, see pic for Table of Contents. I recommend it.

>>22153773
A bit about his influences I cropped from the book, I added the years. In 1973 he says he respects Lafferty but not influential on him, but in 1980 he says Lafferty has influenced him.

Where did Hethor's sex doll go? And how close are we to having sexbots of our own?

>>22153742
These two paragraphs really stuck with me when I read BotNS. I love Severian's moments of pondering. Looking forward to finally re-reading them soon.

And it came to me that these trees had been hardly smaller
when I was yet unborn, and had stood as they stood now when I
was a child playing among the cypresses and peaceful tombs of
our necropolis, and that they would stand yet, drinking in the
last light of the dying sun, even as now, when I had been dead
as long as those who rested there. I saw how little it weighed on
the scale of things whether I lived or died, though my life was
precious to me. And of those two thoughts I forged a mood by
which I stood ready to grasp each smallest chance to live, yet in
which I cared not too much whether I saved myself or not. By
that mood, as I think, I did live; it has been so good a friend to
me that I have endeavored to wear it ever since, succeeding not
always, but often.
Chapter 9 of Claw

And what of the dead? I own that I thought of myself, at times, almost
as dead. Are they not locked below ground in chambers smaller than mine
was, in their millions of millions? There is no category of human activity
in which the dead do not outnumber the living many times over. Most
beautiful children are dead. Most soldiers, most cowards. The fairest
women and the most learned men—all are dead. Their bodies repose in
caskets, in sarcophagi, beneath arches of rude stone, everywhere under
the earth. Their spirits haunt our minds, ears pressed to the bones of our
foreheads. Who can say how intently they listen as we speak, or for what
word?
Chapter 26 of Citadel

>>22153784
Who he admires from 1988 interview. Looks like he says he was directly influenced by Lafferty in his novel Peace. Peace was published in 1975, so it makes sense that he'd change in opinion from 1973 to 1980. But I wonder why Lafferty was "not my thing" in 1973.

Wolfe French cover
Guess for which book it is

>>22153833
Book of the Long Sun?

>>22153773
>>22153784
>>22153766
Interesting. I'll have to try more Lafferty eventually.
>>22153794
Haven't read Borges yet, he wrote his books in spanish, correct? Do you read translations?

>>22153791
Right after he speaks of the countless dead he takes his boots off because he is on holy ground, right? Love that part.
>>22153833
Haha, I'm all for it. The art should be allowed to match the author in horniness. I haven't read There Are Doors, but this cover sure piqued my interest.

>>22153835
>long soleil
I think it's 5th head

>>22153848

>Right after he speaks of the countless dead he takes his boots off because he is on holy ground, right? Love that part.
Close, it happens later in chapter 31.

What struck me on the beach and it struck me indeed, so that I
staggered as at a blow—was that if the Eternal Principle had rested in that
curved thorn I had carried about my neck across so many leagues, and if it
now rested in the new thorn (perhaps the same thorn) I had only now put
there, then it might rest in anything, and in fact probably did rest in
everything, in every thorn on every bush, in every drop of water in the
sea. The thorn was a sacred Claw because all thorns were sacred Claws;
the sand in my boots was sacred sand because it came from a beach of
sacred sand. The cenobites treasured up the relics of the sannyasins
because the sannyasins had approached the Pancreator. But everything
had approached and even touched the Pancreator, because everything had
dropped from his hand. Everything was a relic. All the world was a relic. I
drew off my boots, that had traveled with me so far, and threw them into
the waves that I might not walk shod on holy ground.

>>22153858
Thanks, it's been a while. On second reading of the countless dead quote, I noticed that the word countless doesn't appear. I'm sure Gene sat there and thought, let's just not do that and instead describe the meaning of countless in a sentence or two. Millions and millions, and it works so well. Maybe this is something writers do all the time, I don't have a clue about these things.

Another question to everyone: what was your favourite moments in the Solar Cycle not including BoTNS+Urth?

Long Sun: Brothel visit, Talus factory, anytime someone was possessed.

Short Sun: Sailing with Seawrack, Krait bromance, Italian wars.

>>22153888
Fuck, I should have saved that picture as Purrsia.jpg

Oh well.

>>22153742
How are these threads so good? How is this possible on /lit/?

>you now remember little Severian
Post yfw

>>22154106

>>22153987
Passion

>when Sevarian first leave he puts on a cloak of fuligin which is the color darker than black
>when he returns he puts on a coat of argent, the color brighter than white
HOLY fucking KINO bros

>>22154113
>have to behead a tranny
>uses the male edge of Terminus Est
Heh, notin personel, troon

>>22154106
It hurt but some others hurt worse for me. When I read the part with the old man in a boat I suspected the entire Dorcas plot (minus the incest) before she even appeared. Gave me a gut turning feeling, I really felt bad for her and the widower.

>>22154113
The wikipedia page for executioner swords is also pretty kino.

Sword says:
Wan Ich Das Schwert thue Auffheben - So Wünsche Ich Dem Sünder Das Ewige Leben "When I lift up this sword - I wish the sinner eternal life"

Red pill me on the wizard knight?

>>22154127
He's a wizard and he's a knight
Also he doesn't afraid of anything

>>22154123
I love how Typhus(forgot his name?) Calls it
>this is a place of parting
Lmao because Sev parts their heads from their bodies, get it?

Post art

>>22154135

>>22154135
but why is it not called the knight wizard when the knight is the first book and the wizard the second

>>22154113
I love that citadel indulged a little. We get an epic battle and then the protagonist basically becomes the ultimate power fantasy: able to summon catgirls with a single word of power.
>>22154140
Messes me up too.

>>22154147
For me, everything rally came together in sword
I liked all of them, but the adventure in the mountains felt really good
3 > 1 > U > 4 > 2 probably, but it's splitting hairs desu

>>22154140
The japanese read from right to left anon

>>22154127
tfw no aelf gf to make me into a knight

>>22153791
Severian sounding like Solomon here

One of my favorite parts in the whole series is when he's traveling through the mountains and he comes across some shepard's food. He eats it because he's starving, then ponders for like 10 pages about the nature of the universe and the Pancreator and how everything is a microcausm and a macrocausm of what's below and above it in scale and then he leaves a scarf as payment for the meal before going off to continue his journey north
Sev's philosophical ramblings are a big part of the SOVL of these books
I cant wait to read long and short sun
New sun is one of my favorites
I also loved the whole passage where he was defending his craft to Dorcas when she was silent

>>22154113
>fuligin
>argent
The journey from priest to pope

>>22154151
Who would I have to pay and how much to get an Anime adaptation of this series? Nips are literally the only ones on earth who I'd trust with this task.

>>22154127
It's portal fantasy BotNS but easier to read.

>>22154149
i think for most, urth is such a departure from the other 4 books for the first half of its story that a lot of people write it off or it becomes their least favorite of the 5, but the second half of it to me is so damn magical that once i completed it, it became my favorite. it has to have a different feel to it because severian is no longer retelling the story and feelings of a young man but of a wise autarch. the "gospel of severian" arc, gut punch of veleria, the call back to his undines dream and his conversation about them putting a crown on his head is realized while he walks through the drowned kingdom of nessus, apu punchau arc; all of this while he realizes and comes to terms with who he is and trying to do good just felt so surreal reading it. his kind words to the people of ushas following it all were so simple yet profound. i fucking loved it.

>>22153788
from last thread, it could be agia. sex to her seems like a trivial matter and then there's the small bit:
>Her head struck the stone, and though it must have been padded by her abundant hair, the sound was as sharp as the tap of a mason’s hammer.
that sound might be a wolfe herring but could suggest she's not human. also explains hethor's infatuation with her. the eyes being a different color than the doll could be cosmetic as agilus and her did run a costume shop.

>>22154173
>I cant wait to read long and short sun
By the end of Short Sun I realized I liked Silk more than Severian, which I didn't think was possible. But yes you should be excited, they're great.
>Long Sun
Les Mis starring Kermit the frog. Don't get memed on by the tunnels in the third one, they're basically the equivalent of the play from New Sun. Push through and get rewarded with Short Sun, which Wolfe clearly already knew what he wanted to do and probably had the basic plot laid out while he was writing Long Sun.
>Short Sun
How do you even write this book? Absolutely insane and genius and the only book I've ever had to lay down and cry over. I wouldn't dare spoil it for anyone.
Spoilers for Short Sun but my personal headcanon is that because Severian met Silk as a boy and mistook him for Malrubius there were aquastors of Silk and Horn at his trial in Urth who fought for the New Sun to come and I absolutely refuse to be convinced otherwise

Hey losers, I hear you missed the Z-Library
https://mega.nz/folder/FXAXCZ7D#nGF2yIY0R5H7s1Y57xeEkw

>>22154657
i've been told to avoid the omnibus editions of long sun as an editor thought a typo in one of the chapters and corrected an intentional gene wolfe plot twist.

>>22154683
I remember that typo meme. It says I.

>>22154608
>Les Mis starring Kermit the frog
This makes short sun mgs5 starring kermit the frog. Silk even wears an eyepatch like venom snake

>>22153747
>Valeria's origins
>Severian's age
>Is Agia still human?
Does any of this matter at all?

I'm enjoying the books, but the threads give me an ever-growing feeling that people who are focused on over-analyzing them are mentally ill. There's not that much to analyze in BoTNS at all, really.

>>22154745
Mentally ill here. Can confirm.

>>22154745
Because there's a bunch of details and worldbuilding that aren't obvious in his books people take it to mean every little detail is actually some secret to figuring out a mystery that doesn't exist. Like you said, it doesn't really matter who Severian's mother is, and at this point I'm not sure there's even a way to figure it out. But you can't run a podcast or build up fame in a niche corner of the internet by just talking about the themes of the book, you have to enter an arms race of wilder and wilder theories about Wolfe's writing.

>>22154745
>autism bad
Do you know where you are?

bit of a dumb question anons so sorry, but is this a series i can get into as a Christian, more specially my main thing stopping me reading it is the fact I've heard something about the main character literally being Jesus, if this is the case i feel it would be idolatry to even read something like that.

>>22154843
There are no more christian elements in it than in The Chronicles of Narnia

>>22154843
he's a messiah type figure, yes and it does draw a lot from the bible. think of botns reconciling science and religion into an epic adventure. wolfe was a devout catholic and this was his magnum opus in my opinion.

>>22154977
He wasn't a devot christian. He converted because of pussy.

>>22155016
he was more educated on it than most people who are christians from birth. you can tell from his writing and inspiration.

>>22154843
He's not "literally" Jesus, just a space messiah in his own fictionnal universe

>>22154843
Book of the New SON

It will make you more religious if you read. I wasn't beforehand

>>22155090
>most people who are christians from birth
That's the point. It's not different from the people that turn into buddhism when researching animal rights and ecological crisis

>>22155571
i don't really understand the point you're trying to make; especially with those assumptions. you can tell by his interviews about the subject he has a deep understanding and a strong faith. he's not some tourist gathering information for his novels; it's the reverse. his beliefs inspired his tale of the solar cycle.

>>22154745
It only matters if it's fun for you. There are people out there obsessively creating detailed family trees that loop around due to time travel, only for everyone else to disagree with it for different reasons.

Those are a bit beyond my pay grade but the little things are fun to discuss. It really depends on how far your autism goes, who knows how deep Wolfe wanted the reader to go.

>>22154584
She would use sex as a tool while still running the costume shop. I think if she's something else at any point, she was changed by Hethor after the execution.

Does anyone have Letters Home 1991 by Wolfe? I'll suck your dick for it

>>22156133
No way fag

>>22154843
He's not literally Jesus, he's a messianic figure and he himself becomes more spiritual/developes faith over the course of the book

>>22156133
Just looked it up and now I want it too. I didn't know there was stuff where he talks about his service.

It's worth remembering that even though Wolfe read up a lot on Catholicism before converting so he could get married, he always described himself as a heretical Catholic, hence why New Sun has some gnostic stuff in there. It's similar to how he read up on evolution and decided it's true, but the actual correct model is Lamarckism.

redpill me on this series? is it genuinely good or is it one of /lit/'s memes

>>22156492
As long as you're willing to be patient with a book and not demand everything be immediately spelled out for you, it's genuinely great. Don't listen to redditor memes about not understanding any of it, you'll get most of it even as you miss a bunch of the finer details, which will fill in when you reread it.

>>22156524
You dont even need to reread if you have a decent memory and can remember things from previous chapters
The book is like a puzzle
The more you read the more it makes sense

>>22156524
Sounds good then, thanks!

The funniest little detail scattered throughout the book is that you can make out that Severian is a boob man because he likes to try to slip in small comments about titties but makes a small aside that he thinks Agia's ass is too big

>>22156615
It's not subtle man
He burried his face in Jolentas massive milkers

Am I the only one that read and enjoyed Pirate Freedom? I love trying to read between lines in his major works, this was just a wonderful adventure.
If I had read this as a kid and gotten past the anal rape I think I would have had a major pirate phase.

>>22154764
>it doesn't really matter who Severian's mother is
Speaking of, I don't like the theory that Sev's mother is the woman who played the part of Saint Catherine in the initiation ritual. Rereading that part after reading Long Sun it becomes blindingly obvious that she's a chem.
>doesn't age despite doing the ceremony every year for decades, looks the same every time
>when Severian takes part in the ceremony he swears he actually feels resistance when bringing the blade down on her neck
It makes more sense that she's literally just a prop that gets pulled out of tower storage every once in a while to be used on holidays, and Severian just ignorantly assumes to know how the magic trick with the execution happens.

>>22156948
>Speaking of, I don't like the theory that Sev's mother is the woman who played the part of Saint Catherine in the initiation ritual. Rereading that part after reading Long Sun it becomes blindingly obvious that she's a chem.
Agree, chem seems most likely. Seeing how things are done at the Hose Absolute (also read The Cat) and the guild, I don't see a good reason why his mother would be anything but a corpse. Everything points to her conceiving with the son of Dorcas (commoners) and getting sent to the torturers for it.
I don't remember if it was a problem because she was a noblewoman and he was a commoner, or because she was already supposed to belong to some nobleman.

>your picture
what is wrong with his hand?

The only way to read BoTNS is to read the 4 original hardbacks without covers. If you have not done so yet then you have not truly read them. This is not up for debate.

>>22156948
I don't like it either because it rests solely on us knowing that Severian's mother is also named Catherine and then making up a bunch of complicated time travel/resurrection stuff that isn't supported anywhere else in the book. Reading elaborate fanmade backstories for her so she can be the St. Catherine actress is maddening. IMO the point of them sharing a name is likely symbolic of the guild being Severian's mother, and his initiation into the full powers of the autarchy being his abolishing the guild.

>>22156988
What if mine have covers but I took them off while reading?

Does anyone else think that Wolfe got some major inspiration from The Chronicles of Amber for The Wizard Knight?
I'm about half-way through picrel and the similarities between WK and the Avalon sections are uncanny.

>>22157234

>>22153742
I had fat man sign a can of pringles for me once. I think I was one of the first to ask that because he laughed for a minute straight at the request. God I miss him

>>22156492
It's good. Don't fall for the reread meme. Smoothbrains think you need to reread every previous novel before reading the next one.
>>22156615
My favorite sex description is when he compares Jolenta's pubes to a newly hatched chicken kek!
>>22156948
Catherine=Severian's mom is a Michael Andre-Dirussi theory published in Lexicon Urthus before Book of the Long Sun came out. Urthus is worthless without Gate of Horn, Book of Silk. Unfortunately, most people stop with BotNS. The popular theory on Reddit is that Cyriaca is Severian's mom or at least his aunt.
Also the Punic laughing mask on Severian looks really cool, but I doubt anyone sacrifices children in the guild.

>>22158318
Based Anon, bless you. Do you still have it?

>>22159119
This is a nice chart and is posted in every sci fi thread, but it fails to sell the Book of the Long Sun and its sequel, Book of the Short Sun. Long Sun is a valid entry point for Wolfe and the Solar Cycle. It doesn't include the short stories either.

>>22158496
>Unfortunately, most people stop with BotNS
I cannot comprehend why that is. For me BotNS is the best out of the three, but if you loved it so much that you sperg about the little details online why wouldn't you continue reading it?

If that applies to the anon reading this, finish the Solar Cycle NOW.

>>22160340
Exactly. New Sun is just the story as told by a single protagonist. It's incomplete without Silk and Horn. Besides, LS and SS are much easier to digest once you're done with goddamn Urth.

>>22160340
I finished new sun and have urth on the shelf, but the end of new sun just seemed like a good stopping point since combined it is quite a tome, I've been reading other things but urth is next on my list.

>>22154127
pages and pages of detail of the logistics of sex between giants and their human slaves.

>>22159226
The only problem with starting with Long Sun is that Wolfe clearly knew what he wanted to do with Short Sun and have it be the second half of Silk's story, and that won't hit nearly as hard without having read New Sun first. I couldn't bear to deprive anyone of reaching the chapter title The Red Sun or near the end when the boy tells him that he's unable to forget anything and it hits you that it's Severian
>>22160340
Agreed to all of this, and it just makes the whole setting richer. I really can't believe that the glue holding the whole cycle together was Typhon

Who's your favorite deity? Mine is Echidna, mother of gods.

>>22160729
are the giants female?

>>22160860
The Increate. Also the possessions were great, Scylla Chenille is best Chenille

Pic related represents one of my favourite parts of Short Sun. Remember what it was like when Krait made his first appearances? When we didn't know shit about the inhumi?

>>22161074
we knew the important things from the previous novel such as:
1. they bleed
2. they can be killed
Your pic reminds me of Babbie

Recently poked my head into the rabbit hole of young women starving themselves and their thought patterns. There's literally a girl posting her 2020 to 2023 "progress" from a well formed thin girl to an absolute stick zombie and all the comments are like "omg goaaals" and "you're so beautiful <3". There was one girl who has thankfully recovered (hopefully not infertile) who said she felt like she needed to reach 100lbs despite being 6 foot 1. She said the fear of being called fat just made her want to become thinner than all the others so she can call them fat instead.

I initially wanted to post the 2020-2023 pic but it's actually too disturbing. Really sad stuff.
Have some fresh off the presses Dorcas fanart instead.

All that made me think of Mucor too. I would save her and forcefeed her cheeseburgers while her spirit is out there doing whatever.

>>22161837
>There was one girl who has thankfully recovered (hopefully not infertile) who said she felt like she needed to reach 100lbs despite being 6 foot 1
I should also mention that all her hair fell out. This topic is so grim but I barely ever looked into it.

Anyways, those too curious for their own good: here's the 2020-2023 pic. View at own risk.
If you really wanna get depressed about the topic, go to twitter and type in #edtwt.

>>22161837
>tfw no dorcas gf to cough up lead onto your dick and then betray you for her past

>>22161886
I don't see what's wrong with the picture. She just wanted to better understand the experience of Holocaust victims.

>>22162500
>method acting for a role that doesn't exist
Yikes

I have come from a /tv/ thread and have brought and AI generated image of live action book of the new sun for you all to enjoy

>>22161837
I imagine Mucor to look like that really old Angelina Jolie anorexia photoshop, you know the one.
>>22162483
Severian betrayed her more times. She was only clinging to him out of desperation.
>>22162630
What am I looking at?

>>22162630
Soulless but thanks I guess

>>22162630
>>22163757
Here's some AI generation that's a bit older but some of it makes me think of New Sun.

>>22163917
None of that makes me think of The Solar Cycle

Thoughts on this german cover?

>>22157834
The similarities go beyond just "it's vaguely Arthurian" anon.
>>22164207
It's literally the same as the American cover. None of the original American covers are actually good covers except Shadow.

>>22164207
>>22164254
In my opinion for a series such as this all illustrations should be kept as vague and non-detailed as possible. Seeing character faces or even Severian's mask on the cover bothers me.
That's why I also prefer all the first drafts of the covers made by the artist you posted.

Just let people paint their own whorl of imagination and if they want, they can look up art afterwards or produce their own. Guess it wasn't that simple in the 80s. When I see fanart now, so much of it was clearly inspired by what they already saw. Personally, pic related fits most with how it looked in my head.

>>22156948
>It makes more sense that she's literally just a prop that gets pulled out of tower storage every once in a while to be used on holidays
"I was conscious that someone was in the tiny cabin with me, and for some reason I could not have explained I thought it was the young woman who had taken the part of our patroness"

I agree. That's why this is my favourite cover. You don't really get anything from it yet the idea of the Whorl is fully there.

>>22164300
>I was conscious that someone was in the tiny cabin with me, and for some reason I could not have explained I thought it was the young woman who had taken the part of our patroness

The following is from: https://www.patreon.com/posts/59799049
There's also some interesting stuff about all exultants being clones like Typhon.

After the feast, Severian also records, “What became of the maid I do not know. She disappeared as she has each Katharine's Day I can remember. I have not seen her again.”

This is the most solid refutation against the maid being Severian’s mother at all. As Severian writes this, as Autarch he WOULD 100% know what became of that maid if she were his mother - - and every detail of his mother's death and execution.

This also refutes my assertion that the Autarch ate her after her death: In his mind (at this writing) would be the memories of himself each Katherine’s Day.

Accepting this claim as written, refutes that the False Thecla is the maid and certainly that his mother was in the Autarch. And it also refutes that the maid is Severian's mother.

Besides that one Spanish covers in general are fucking hilarious.

>>22164357
That is now also my favourite cover. Surprised I haven't seen it, but I looked at some spanish-language covers before and thought they were really nice.

>>22164396
Just found out Pirate Freedom is called "Confesiones De Un Pirata" in spanish, nice title change actually.

>>22162626
kek

>>22164300
>all the apprentices get a night with the communal fuckdoll after decapitating her during their graduation ceremony
The Torturer's Guild is so soulful

Book recommendations for someone who has never read sci-fi? My favorite books are The Corrections, Suttree, and Infinite Jest (unironically)

>>22164970
Well, have you tried Shadow of the Torturer? If you haven't I think anyone in this thread will tell you to GTFO, stop looking at anything else and just read it.

I can't tell you if it matches your favourite books since I haven't read them.

Gay

>>22164985
Please recommend heterosexual books

can you guys tell me about the catholic/christian stuff in these books? how blatant is it?
I'm catholic and it's actually what sparked my interest. I read last thread and it was compared to Narnia but I haven't read Narnia.
also spanish is my first language and I think Libro del Nuevo Sol sounds better than Libro del Sol Nuevo.

>>22165075
Not blatant. If you desire blatant read Pirate Freedom.

Is a wolfe general sustainable or will it die after the third thread?

>>22165075
It reconciliates christianity with space-age scifi and the idea that the universe is so much bigger than humanity.

>>22154657
Chad. Thanks.

>>22165447
I think it's ok if it dies after about a hundred posts. There's usually enough people willing to discuss his books, last thread even went to bump limit.

>>22165447
It seems like the discussion has mostly run its course for now. This probably works better as a once or twice a month thing.

Entropy

>>22164961
>masters make sure to give some money to the older apprentices so they can go get laid
now THIS is how you take care of the incel problem

>>22165447
It's nice not to be relegated to SFFG.

>>22165447
There aren't really generals for a single author on /lit/. Maybe some turbo normie author like King or Murakami could pull it off.
>>22165569
Hookers don't count. Gurloes bribed the torturers with hookers to keep them content. When Severian went on a dry spell, he abolished the fucking guild.
>>22165575
Fuck those guys. Every thread is the same. Radix poster, Read Cradle!, some litrpg goyslop for people who've given up on reading, the guy who reviews horrible book, that Ooohhh myyy courtesan book, people stopping reading Hyperion before the Fall... It feels like they're all chatbots at this point.

>>22165697
That's every general to be fair

>>22165697
>people stopping reading Hyperion before the Fall
I read Hyperion until after Agincourt happens and I just didn't care. Every character being so bland and sucky dialogue helped. I didn't like Asimov's Foundation either and I finished it. I've had a lot of similar experiences but I now distrust any jew to write a good sci-fi/fantasy story and suspect they're overhyped.

I have greatly enjoyed more sci-fi/fantasy books by Gene Wolfe than by all the others I've read put together. Granted, I probably haven't read that much but I also assume that 90% of what I have not read is complete shit.

>>22165075
he's a messiah type figure and there are some obvious things pulled from the bible but that's it. he's not a jesus by any means. he's a young guy kinda figuring how to deal with this huge responsibility upon him. like this anon said >>22165522, it blurs the lines and really makes you think. if anything, you might even have a stronger faith after reading it. it is so fucking good.

Bumping this shit right back up top

>>22164396
Fugg, that has to be the best art of Agia I've seen. I love hair that curves like it's both straight and wavy, for some reason it gets me.

Why are the spanish language covers so good?

>>22153833
>>22153857
>long soleil
looks like it's from the book of the long sun. patera silk and hyacinth? don't know why he isn't wearing his robe.

>>22166400
It's Lakeside. Silk also has brown hair for some reason also.

>>22162820
>I imagine Mucor to look like that really old Angelina Jolie anorexia photoshop, you know the one.
You mean this one? I always imagined that Mucor is not only thin but also of a small frame. So she looks like the kind of girl that you might mistake for an old woman from afar, especially if fair-haired (I can't remember her hair/eye colour but I'm pretty sure she was pale).

Shame there's no art of Mucor. Maybe she's present on covers of Long Sun, I will have a look.

>>22153791

Solar Cycle anime when?

>>22166529
>The crowd drew back, then surged forward against the leveled
lances. I heard the fat man’s exhalation distinctly, precisely the sound he
might have made at climax when he sweated over some hired woman. From
far away came a scream, Agia’s voice as unmistakable as a face seen by
lightning. Something in its timbre made me feel she had not been watching
at all, but had known nevertheless when her Onii-chan died.

>>22166529
adaptations wouldn't work. they give away too much. not only visually like matachin tower being an old rocket, neil armstrong's painting, or atrium of time being satellite dishes but severian's word being truthful when in fact it is unreliable at times. the world of urth does seem like a dream to me and i would love to see it on the screen but the adaptation would suck.

>>22166529
i think the most cinematic moment in the books that popped out to me was when typhon doubted severian and was asking for a display of power. severian said, if i could kill a man by slamming my hand onto your table, would that suffice? he then pulled out the dagger from his boot snuck to him by another prisoner and thrust it into the table, showing he wasn't properly searched and the captain guarding him would surely be killed for that mistake. such a cool misdirection.

>>22166719
>>22166737
For an adaption to not suck I think it would have to be a passion project of insane magnitude. I know people said the same thing about LotR, but in this case I think every trick in the book of live action is not enough to pull it off. You would need high quality animation and then use every trick in the book of animation.

But let's be real: we will likely witness Shadow getting an adaption in the next 25 years and it will suck.

>>22164396
>Agia
Would be perfect if one titty was out.
>>22166399
>Valeria
Perfection.
>>22164364
>Hammerstone
Silly,would be more suitable for Urth
>>22164412
>Severian
Okay if painted by a teenager.
>>22164357
>Mamelta
Excellent choice!
>>22164207
Who's the stereotypical German guy attacking Severian?
>>22166415
>Hy
Dignifying. I imagined her as short and whorish.
>>22163917
Nothing is related to NS. Seems like Midjourney. Perhaps I can generate something similar with Stable Diffusion.

>>22167024
>Hy
It's not actually Wolfe fanart. But I thought it looks like Severian with his mask in the background (and long hair I guess) and Thecla in front.

>>22165697
>people stopping reading Hyperion before the Fall
I wish I stopped reading it before Fall desu.

People complain about schizo theories from devoted weirdos, but more complaints should be leveled at people who immediately start groveling about how Wolfe writes women badly because they've only read New Sun and can't understand why Wolfe wrote Severian to think like that.

>>22167130
>people who immediately start groveling about how Wolfe writes women badly
They are not here.

>>22167142
It's one of the best things about Wolfe threads on here

>>22167130
This. Severian is like Goku before Bulma normalized him.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgwBYevtXTY

>>22166719
People always say BotNS is unadaptable because of this reason, but what you lose in visual ambiguity you gain in visual aesthetics. It would be worth it just to see the pure size of Nessus depicted, and Severian's fuligin cloak, and the permanently darkly lit days with stars always visible, everything shaded red from the light of the sun during the day and shaded green from the light of Lune during the night. I'd love to see this shit in a movie.

>>22167377
You would, but normies would have no idea what's happening. Have your friends seen Dune? Most of mine couldn't follow anything.

>>22167391
This is the catch right here. I'm with >>22167377 that a lot of great stuff could come from an adaptation and I'd appreciate seeing 12 movies covering the full cycle and what the director decides on how to depict it, but no matter what you do, normies have been conditioned that SF is all star wars or YA adaptations where everything is directly in your face and only stops short of looking directly at the screen and giving an explanation for every little thing.

>>22167130
It's absolutely retarded. Severian includes the bad parts and hints at worse parts, so we can assume he's not that much more of a piece of shit than he describes. He worries for the women in his life, risking his own to give Thecla mercy and even throwing everything away for Cyriaca who he just met.

When he first spots weakness in Dorcas, he ashamedly admits that even then he knew he's going to betray and hurt her. If he did not care about hurting her, why make the remark?

When I was Severian's age I didn't understand women at all. I wanted to try as many as possible and even when I dearly loved them I treated them like shit. I think that's quite normal for young men even without growing up among seekers of truth and penitance.

Are these the words of a complete sociopath?


Possibly most important, my
thoughts were oppressed by worry for Jonas, and by the feeling (which had
been growing on me all day) that this place was the end of my journey; that
I would never reach Thrax; that I would never rejoin poor Dorcas; that I
would never restore the Claw, or even rid myself of it; that in fact the
Increate, whom the owner of the Claw had served, had decreed that I who
had seen so many prisoners die should end my own life as one.

>>22167377
I'm all for many and varied adaptations of all media, but the first big movie/TV adaptation of a book is always touchy since it risks coloring all future public perception of how it "should" look.

>>22158568
Sorry I forgot this thread even existed for a bit. Yes I still have it I keep it inside my safety deposit box alongside a signed first edition of urth of the new sun. The pringles can is far more valuable to me.

Did Gene Wolfe have any personal connections to Argentina? Or was him making Nessus be Buenos Aires just a giant homage to Borges?

>>22168115
Nessus is not Buenos Aires, the ocean is literally directly to the west of Nessus. Nessus is in Chile

>>22168115
>>22168291
And the Ascians are from north America. Implying that USA turns into commie bugman land. Abia and Erebus represent the joos who manipulate the world. Wolfe really was a prophet

Does the Apu Punchau thread lead anywhere?
Asking for a friend

>>22168291
it's so far in the future the continents have probably shifted significantly to the point at which the geography is practically unrecognizable

>>22168412
Why would you ask this when you havn't even read Urth of the new sun?

>>22168429
Because i may never do

>>22168432
This thread is for mega faggot wolfe obsessed retards. If you're not one of us then get out!

So can anyone help what is the most possible fate of Miles and his link to Jonas? This is one of the things wherew I cannot reach a consensus.

And most interesting question of all: Do we see Jonas in Urth ?

>>22168394
They're not even antagonistic in Solar Cycle. Entire cast of Long Sun worships them. Just because they're not hieros doesn't mean they're absolutely evil.

>>22168508
Just don't care about Urth. Don't think anyone really does.

How many years in the future is BoTNS?

>>22168756
>future
kek

>>22168811
How many years in the past is BoTNS?

>>22168813
it's set in antediluvian time, in the book of Genesis, but it's sci-fi

>>22168596
>"Is all the world a war of good and bad? Have you
not thought it might be something more?"

>>22168756
>>22168813
There's the idea that universes go through cycles of being created, destroyed, then creating a new universe repeatedly. These universes are similar to each other, but do have differences. So the idea is that Severian's universe is a different cycle than our own. In Severian's universe, the story takes place very far in the future compared to our corresponding time in this universe.

>>22168687
>Don't think anyone really does
what. It's an incredibly important part

This thread makes me want to reread New Sun/Long Sun and finally dig into Short Sun, but I'm currently balls deep in The Wheel of Time so it will be awhile before I have a chance...
Don't get me wrong, WoT is good, but the prose is so repetitive and comparatively vanilla when put beside Wolfe's.

I finished the Book of the New Sun tetrology around this time last year. I liked them well-enough, and I remember the main plotpoints obviously, but I know I've forgotten a lot of the minutia of the small plots and lore. Is it worth reading Urth of the New Sun? I feel like I missed the window to fully appreciate Urth when the series was fresh in my mind.

>>22169101
Just listen to Alzabo Soup's overviews of every BotNS novel.

did Jonas really "come back" as the amnesiac soldier?
I feel like I never quite got why Severian would think that.

The whole series is a transgender allegory.

>>22169359
Severian fools himself into believing a lot of weird stuff because he feels guilty or alone and passes it along to the reader as cope. This includes being as much Thecla as Severian, a delusion that lets him not feel guilty about what happened to her. She's no more alive and an equal part of him than any of the previous autarchs, he just has her memories and uses them to cope just like Silk in short sun

>>22169359
severian was very sick and dying at that point and it could have been a projection/hallucination of what he wanted. jonas was his first true bro and i think he missed him and his jokes.

>>22169101
You're supposed to reread new sun many times throughout your life, might as well do it again

>>22169390
>Severian fools himself into believing a lot of weird stuff because he feels guilty or alone
Remind me of a few examples, please.

>>22169383
You're a transgender allegory

Is Gene Wolfe a slipstream writer? I've seen some of his works on slipstream lists.

So what the fuck were godlings?
Giants like Baldanders and Abaia?
Why did Typhon put them on the whorl when they were his enemies on Urth?

>>22170326
I think Typhon is much like the megatherians in that he prefers enslavement to annihilation. He tried to control Severian as well. Just my 2 cents.

>>22167377
Dont worry
I will make this kino one day
>>22167391
One of the biggest problems with (((hollywood))) is that movies are made with the largest audience in mind
You can't adapt a book in a way that the fans would be happy with because it comes at the cost of alienating everyone who doesn't understand
It would only work if it's intentional ambiguous, mysterious, and misleading, like the book. But normies wouldnt watch it

>>22169101
You literally are told by Sev to reread botns immediately bro
Urth is absolutely worth it tho, give it a read
It will feel different, but it all comes together and there's some absolutely beautiful moments

Does anyone know the passage where Severian is talking to the Autarch and it goes something along the lines of the autarcg says
>what do the people of urth need? Justice, order, peace? Or is it warmth, full fields, and a new sun?
I've tried finding it but I can't
I think it's the time it's revealed that the Autarch is a servant of the conciliatior. I think it's when they're talking, but it migjt also be when Sev is talking to his master at the end of the book, and he might be saying it
Pls help

>>22170563
If you're looking in Citadel maybe check their meeting in Claw and vice versa.

>>22169677
The issue is that the book makes it hard to separate out what's really happening psychologically with Severian from what he's telling you, so all anyone can offer is their own explanation. My choices would be
>Miles is Jonas returned
>Severian needs someone, anyone to be his friend as he's dying and Jonas is the only one who he ever felt was his friend as an equal
>Severian is equally Thecla but only has the other autarchs' memories and can control them but not her
>absolves him of having to choose in the trolley problem that was the end of her life, and bolstered by him having gotten her memories directly, but shouldn't he have perfect memories of Appian then too?
>the perfect memory in general, though I think that's more complicated
>Jolenta
>she's basically a story of a small town girl getting eaten alive by hollywood like mulholland drive, but Severian is very sure she wanted it because otherwise he's complicit in this
>a more explicit moment is when he's trying to explain to Dorcas in Thrax why torture is necessary, but he's clearly trying to explain to himself because he doesn't really believe that anymore
Probably lots more examples, but Severian'ss problam is that he pretty much never tells outright falsehoods, he's usually passing on lies he's told himself about his life
>>22170563
You're thinking of the conversation with Master Malrubius at the end of Citadel, where he asks if people need justice and peace or a New Sun. Awesome passage.

>>22170647
>otherwise he's complicit in this
How tho? Talos did his thing on her when Severian was away.

>but he's clearly trying to explain to himself
Nah, I read it as him being autistic to Dorcas. At that point he still definitely believes in his duty.

Generally I didn't see Severian guilt-tripping himself into delusions - mostly just him being dense and callous and sometimes as asshole.

I feel like pretty much every significant scene was deliberately constructed to at first invite anticipation of great pathos, but ultimately it's just a confused young boy acting on his simplistic convictions or fears, which Severian's own narration sometimes highlights and sometimes misses.

>>22170660
>how tho?
anon is referring to severian raping her while she fell asleep on the boat in the absolute garden
>nah, i read it as
i don't know how you can, when immediately after he allows cyriaca to escape and then frees/heals every prisoner in the vincula on his exit. at the end of citadel he clearly has a different idea of how things should work.

>>22170667
>severian raping her while she fell asleep on the boat in the absolute garden
Nah, fuck off. Either Jolenta knew what she was doing or Severian fabricated literally everything concerning their interactions prior and afterwards.

>immediately after he allows cyriaca to escape
Well, it's either Severian having a tremendous overturn of his ethical worldview through rational examination of his morals, or he's just terribly susceptible to pity towards beautiful woman in dire situations and just can't do anything about it. Knowing our Severian, I strongly doubt the former. He's young and not very smart, dawg.

>then frees/heals every prisoner in the vincula on his exit
He does realize that he needs a distraction if he hopes to escape. Plus they won't get any proper justice if he's gone, so releasing them is preferable in his world-view to leaving them in the hands of cruel incompetents.

The strongest point tho is that had he actually given up on the Art at that point, he would've left Terminust Est behind. He could've gotten something actually useful like a soldier's lance instead - we know that he has access to Vincula's armory. Instead he carries the stupid thing still like his soul depends on it, even though it mostly serves to impede him.

>>22170680
>fuck off
lol. what? i was just redirecting you to what that other anon meant because it went over your head. he himself specifically uses the word "rape" in, i think, citadel but maybe urth, because it's obviously on his conscience as questionable.
>Well, it's either Severian having a tremendous overturn of his ethical worldview
that's what anon is saying. he had a pre existing dilemma which started in shadow of the torturer during the morwenna execution. if you reread that section again, now aware she was not guilty, it was a terribly crushing moment for severian. here he is, even show boating with his horizontal stroke and not the traditional vertical, because he didn't follow tradition to inspect the platform and be meticulous in preparation as he is supposed to be, ie during agilus execution, when the idea that justice was not served comes down on him. he copes and deflects during the following conversation with jonas, but the reality is, he felt terrible after this and it might be the true reason he never mentions executions again through out his journey.

>>22170716
>he didn't follow tradition to inspect the platform
He did though - that's how he noticed that the block is unfit before positioning the girl.

>ie during agilus execution
Or, look here, there's another mighty interesting pattern for you to recognize - Morwenna is a women.

>it was a terribly crushing moment for severian
Reeks of intense over-analysis. If Severian was strongly preoccupied with justice then already had Thecla (as an innocent victim), Vodalus (as an opposition to Commonwealth's justice) and Agia (as a definitely repeatedly guilty party) to resolve this. Postponing the moral confrontation until Morwenna only serves to make him appear even dumber and slower than he is.

My impression that even in Sword Severian is still very much convinced that the world needs justice, and justice is him doing (what he believes) the only thing he knows to however appropriate authority points out to him, and at the time he's mostly very angry with himself for not fitting into these shoes and his own vision of his place in the world - but it is softened by his narration which has a different point of reference.

>>22170733
man you're retarded. he only noticed that right before the execution took place. he's supposed to be there hours before hand, like he did with agilus, to inspect and make sure everything is in order. he was feeling himself too much, the great attraction in saltus, and he fucked up. the platform was shod and the chair was missing. the fact that you feel the need to make the sarcastic distinction between agilus being a man is hilarious because again, you're missing the point, just like you did with the other anon. i think you don't analyze enough.

>>22170326
I always assumed they were just chems but bigger.
Also that cover art is retarded, because the claw on the godling's head was actually a claw on his finger, Silk mistakenly thought it was "on his head" because the godling's fingers were curled over him while Silk was sitting in the palm of his hand.

>>22170744
i just remembered the didn't even have a brazier ready for the branding, the kid had to go to a house and grab a torch or something.

>>22166465
>>22154173
>>22153773
Does he talk about Joyce as an influence? Microcosm/macrocosm talk and the river as the cycle of time reminds me of Finnegans Wake

>>22170744
>to inspect and make sure everything is in order, like he did with Agilus
You mean like that one time when Agilus' body got mutilated by the sumpter getting scared from the smell of his blood? There's even nothing in the scene indicating that Severian examined the scaffolding and tools beforehand during that execution - only that he stood there for hours to look scary for the crowd. In the case of Morwenna and the cattle thief, he did give precise instructions to the alcalde the evening prior.

>he was feeling himself too much, the great attraction in saltus
No, he was looking for Agia and talking to the Green Man, not dillydallying because of his nerves. He was nervous, but as he said to Jonas beforehand - that was the first time he executed a woman. This being the first and the last time he pulls that off somewhat successfully. But that naturally means nothing whatsoever.

>the kid had to go to a house and grab a torch or something
Wrong:
>"Jonas had just set a bucket of glowing charcoal on the scaffold",
p. 447 of the Shadow and the Claw.

>i think you don't analyze enough
I think this anon >>22154764 was right:
>But you can't run a podcast or build up fame in a niche corner of the internet by just talking about the themes of the book, you have to enter an arms race of wilder and wilder theories about Wolfe's writing.
Like notice that you give no arguments whatsoever, only going
>you missed the point
>you missed the POINT
>YOU MISSED THE POINT

>>22170751
I think it's just a Phrygian hat.
>>22170849
To think some redditor is going to use our threads as a source for inspiration...

>>22170647
Thanks bro, I was thinking it might have been there
It's one of my favorites

>>22170660
Only a few chapters after that speech he abandoned his duty and said
>I was a torturer no longer
He probably still believes it to an extent tho, judging by his last conversation with Palemon, where he vows to reform the guild, not destroy it

>>22170667
>rape
When a woman gets on a boat with you she understands the implication

>>22154745
Wolfebros, I feel severely mentally ill today. I can't stop imagining Father Inire as Nurpo Nurpo bringing little kids to his room.

>>22171385
I can't stop imagining too

>>22170857
You just know that somebody's going to make a shitpost here about how actually First Severian is Severian's mother and he's actually disguising himself as all the women Severian fucks so actually Severian only ever fucks himself and in a week you'll see someone on reddit referencing the Eternal Severian Selfcest Theory

>>22171475
Severian is a chem. Whenever he dies, he gets rebooted. Think about it. He never gets wounded or anything. The only time he does is when he damages his leg, which doesn't heal naturally before he meets the high-thech people from space who mend him.

>>22170857
Doubt it. I'd be surprised if redditors didn't already made up 80% of effortposts in these threads

>>22171747
80% of posts in the last two threads have been written by me.

>>22170314
In the sense that he blurries the line between sf and fantasy? Probably.
In the sense of Pynchon winning the National Book Award and getting nominated for a Nebula? Probably not

There's a lot of art from the folio edition of BotNS that I still haven't seen good scans of. I don't like most of it and I would never buy this edition, but I would like to at least see all of them in high resolution.


>>22171806
We can see the number of posters, you know?

>>22171950
When does this happen in the books?
>>22171806
I phonepost.

>>22171955
They have sex just before Severian enters the cell to talk with Agilus before his execution.

Chapter "Agilus" in Shadow:

>Inside a naked man lay upon straw. A chain ran from the iron collar about his neck to the wall. A woman, naked too, bent over him, her long, brown hair falling past her face and his so that it seemed to unite them. She turned to look at me, and I saw that it was Agia. She hissed, “Agilus!” and the man sat up. Their faces were so nearly alike that Agia might have been holding a mirror to her own.

Same chapter, later:

>I picked Agia up and thrust her torn gown into her arms, then opened the door and led her out. She was still dazed, but when I gave her an orichalk she threw it down and spat at it. When I reentered the cell, Agilus was sitting cross-legged, his back propped by the wall. “Don’t ask me about Agia,” he said. “Everything you suspect is true—is that enough? I will be dead tomorrow, and she will wed the old man who dotes on her, or someone else. I wanted her to do it sooner. He couldn’t have prevented her from seeing me, her brother. Now I will be gone, and she won’t have even that to worry about.”

Also another crazy detail from the same amazing chapter:

>I slapped her wrist, perhaps harder than I should, and she flew at me, clawing for my eyes as Thecla used sometimes to do when she could no longer bear the thoughts of imprisonment and pain.

>>22172000
Oh, I totally forgot about that. Also, why is Agilus' face obfuscated in every piece of art? He's usually wearing a helmet of something.
Agia always gives off creepy vibes. No wonder not even Severian wants to do anything with her.

>>22172000
Sorry for replying again but when was Thecla in position to go for Sev's eyes? Did they ever fight? Is it something he wrote out of the book so it doesn't show she was in position of power over him when he was an apprentice?

>>22172329
>when was Thecla in position to go for Sev's eyes
One of any times when Sev was still basically spending all day every day in her cell, but after she was subjected to torture.

>Did they ever fight
They basically went through all stages of a marriage in the time between Thecla's becoming a client and him bringing her the knife. They did have spirited arguments that Severian remembers in the book, and that was before Thecla got a self-mutilation impulse driven inside her brain.

>>22172304
>Agia always gives off creepy vibes.
It's just her being opportunistic and scheming. She's not evil or doing it for pleasure.
>No wonder not even Severian wants to do anything with her.
The few times that she offered Severian sex, it was obvious neither lust or love were present towards him.

I didn't dislike her character at all.

Another clue for Valeria being Severian's twin sister:

The sister-wife of the Sun god, Inti (aka Apu Punchau) is Mama Killa (Mother Moon). She was also the patroness of Time. The Atrium of Time is a fitting place for her.

This has to be on purpose. Inti is also depicted on Argentina's flag and several south american coat of arms by the way.

>>22172550
>ValERIA
>SevERIAn
That's enough for me desu

>>22172560
Why her name not Severa tho?

>>22172777
It would be too obvious

>>22172793
Yeah, I guess. I've actually not heard that theory or picked up on it myself. That would be pretty hot if they were twins

>>22172847
I actually remember reading about it in some blog 20 years ago.

Personally I'm of the very boring opinion that Severian's twin sister is just Merryn the witch girl.
If still you're desperate for twincest she seems like the only girl Severian really interacts with before Thecla and Valeria so that obviously must mean they fucked

>>22172915
I don't even remember merryn at all

>>22170716
>the morwenna execution. if you reread that section again, now aware she was not guilty
I still have to do a re-read of New Sun, but looking back at that section it seems that Morwenna is guilty. So I am curious about what you're basing this off of.

>>22172329
>>22172363
>Sev's eyes
Could it be that Severian is doing that thing where he is unknowingly merging his POV with Thecla's? It would make sense that he is remembering from her perspective after being tortured and having her own hands trying to claw her eyes out.

>>22172847
>>22172915
Valeria is clearly outed as a twin with the Shakespeare reference.

Viola: "I am all the daughters of my father's house,
And all the brothers too."
She says this because she thinks her twin brother dead.
Valeria: "I am all the sisters we breed. And all the sons."

She also just like Severian has a name that implies a twin of the opposite sex.

Add to that her features similar to Severian. There is even more but together with the Inti thing this seems to be what Wolfe implies.

There is a lot of incest in BotNS. Maybe it was just a subject Gene was interested in at the time.

>>22172959
Merryn might also be off the table because she may not even be a real person- at least not anymore. Here's a passage describing her during the Cumaean's ceremony.

Dorcas lay as if in sleep. There was no foam flecking her lips,
and she was more solid in appearance than Hildegrin. Merryn
had collapsed into a blackclad doll, so thin and dim that slender
Dorcas seemed robust beside her. Now that intelligence no
longer animated that ivory mask, I saw that it was no more than
parchment over bone.

>>22172976
Body modification/abandoning your humanity appears not that uncommon.

On one hand, Severian never comments on any cyborg clients. On the other, there is Jolenta, Merryn(?), Agia(metallic sound, changed by Hethor?) and the last coming to mind right now are the furries that lobotomized themselves.

Maybe the angels in Citadel's battle scene too, but they might be military tech from birth.

>>22172957
i thought it was pretty obviously eusebia, woman in the crowd yelling, set her up out of jealousy. she knowingly inhales the bouquet to kill herself after the execution, although severian gives a ridiculous explanation that morwenna must have put the poison in the bouquet during the execution which is fucking absurd and more severian cope.

>>22172976
Yeah she's also described in Short Sun as looking unhealthy, pale, gaunt, and despite appearing to be a young girl "moving like a woman stiff with age."
She was probably much older than Severian and just using a glamour to make herself look younger.

>>22173012
Why are you so dead-set on Severian being a retard? He did some dumb things and so have you, he's quite young during all of this.

>>22154113
Argent just means silver in French, this is your definition of kino?

>>22173018
it's not being retarded, it's couching certain things in a better light; like other things he did during the execution of morwenna such as suggesting it was prudent to do the horizontal strike, but the entire event was pageantry on his part. his leaping onto the scaffold instead of waiting there ahead of time, him making 3 or 4 circuits carrying morwenna's head. i love this book, partially because of this unreliable narrator aspect, but you have to really read between the lines. and if you're this >>22170849 same anon, you probably just wouldn't "get it".

>>22173012
The setting her up out of jealousy is beyond dispute, I agree. Eusebia doesn't really know how Stachys and Chad died, but she assumes it's Morwenna. There's still some vagueness though because Eusebia smells the bouquet before Morwenna's execution. When she smells them again later after Morwenna's death is when she dies. Though, you could say the poison takes a bit to act or she added the poison after the first sniff.

>>22172915
>>22172976
>>22172995
You niggas need to read Long Sun/Short Sun if you want to know the true nature of the barely mentioned side character that has a dozen lines of dialogue at most

>>22173015
This nigga read them and he didn't even notice

>>22173064
Just cause I'm wearing my fuligin cloak doesn't mean I'm a "nigga.," Ascian turd.

>>22173063
>“So it was somebody else. Or sickness after all—”
is what eusibia says because she implies if morwenna had done it, should would have poisoned herself also and not been caught. she smells the flowers on the way, and even offers morwenna a whiff of them during. she eventually drops dead following another breath of them which severian uses as evidence that morwenna somehow poisoned them during the execution.

>>22173148
a very deep breath, i might add.
>With that, Eusebia plunged her face into the bouquet as though to fill her lungs to bursting with the roses’ cloying perfume. I dropped Morwenna’s head into the basket that awaited it and wiped my sword blade with the piece of scarlet flannel Jonas handed me. When I noticed Eusebia again she was lifeless, sprawled among a circle of onlookers.

>>22173148
>>22173159
I guess you have to ask yourself, is Eusebia the type of woman to kill herself for blaming Morwenna for the deaths, the deaths she believed Morwenna had been the cause of? Also, Eusebia is described as "rapturously" inhaling the smell of the bouquet the first time she smelled them, so it doesn't sound like it was a light inhale. Additionally, it would be a bit odd for Eusebia to poison her now that she's on the chopping block. Why give her a quick, painless death?

>>22173203
> guess you have to ask yourself, is Eusebia the type of woman to kill herself for blaming Morwenna for the deaths, the deaths she believed Morwenna had been the cause of?
she doesn't believe morwenna killed them though. she says morwenna is innocent and that she herself killed her, not severian. seems like a basic admittance of a set up due to jealousy. if morwenna had poisoned them, eusebia, who knew her so well, said morwenna would have kept some for herself as well; but we know from severian that stachy and their son were sick for a while, tossing and turning in bed, splashing water on their fevered faces, etc. morwenna was obviously wrongfully blamed for killing them. it is my opinion eusebia gets the last laugh and then kills herself to avoid any kind of charges.

>you need to read Long S-
How about no

I figured out why listening to Alzabo Soup annoys me. The hosts are so focused on Severian's perfect memory that they go overboard criticizing stuff that doesn't warrant criticism. Autarch Severian clearly has a literary style and they analyze his narrative flair as if it's supposed to be rote recitation of events.

>>22173305
i think they do go a bit too far sometimes with their skepticism.

>>22173279
>she doesn't believe morwenna killed them though.
The way I read it is that she is uncertain of her guilt before the execution, but after Morwenna didn't kill herself Eusebia becomes a lot more uncertain and presumes she must have been innocent after all. We have at least a couple possible scenarios leading up to the execution. In one scenario: Morwenna is guilty, if so, why would Euesbia bring poison to kill herself for blaming her? Even if she had nothing to go on she still got the right person. I doubt the people of Saltus would care if she made the accusation on hardly any grounds. Severian even mentions the people are afraid of Morwenna. Second scenario: Morwenna is not guilty and Eusebia now realizes this after the execution so then takes some poison to kill herself in the middle of her glee. Again, the townspeople seem pretty happy that Morwenna is dead, so I doubt she was fearing retaliation. And again why would she bring poison in the first place if she is uncertain before the execution?
>eusebia, who knew her so well, said morwenna would have kept some for herself as well
The general idea is that Morwenna was saving the poison for herself, but then changed plans when Eusebia got close with the bouquet.
>we know from severian that stachy and their son were sick for a while, tossing and turning in bed, splashing water on their fevered faces
I remember from the dream in chapter 1 of Claw that Severian sees Stachys writhing in agony in bed and Chad washing his fevered face, but it makes no remark on how long they were suffering. Are you referring to a different part?

You may be right. This is all just another point of view. The other possibility is that her guilt is meant to be unknown and something to be continually questioned.

>>22173386
>The way I read it is that she is uncertain of her guilt before the execution, but after Morwenna didn't kill herself Eusebia becomes a lot more uncertain and presumes she must have been innocent after all.
i really don't understand how you could have got to this point. like, where exactly do you think eusebia doubts morwenna is innocent? i think the conversation jonas and severian has right before the execution is really great. jonas was 100% right and severian was being incredibly naive. eusebia has known from the beginning morwenna is innocent. she was jealous and set morwenna up to take the blame from a simple tragic possibility of ingesting some bad water. she was the only one tormenting her while she was chained. i don't think anyone was afraid of her, as severian suggests. the townspeople were there to see a spectacle. don't forget, the alcade was a great promoter of having a real carnifex in town. he literally threw a festival around having executions.
>The general idea is that Morwenna was saving the poison for herself, but then changed plans when Eusebia got close with the bouquet.
i think eusebia is saying here that morwenna would not have been caught for the murder of her husband and son because she would have killed herself already with it. this proves her innocence. there's no believable way for her to have poison on her to cast into eusebia's bouquet during the exection.
I remember from the dream in chapter 1 of Claw that Severian sees Stachys writhing in agony in bed and Chad washing his fevered face, but it makes no remark on how long they were suffering. Are you referring to a different part?
yep, that's the part. it obviously wasn't from poison to the degree that kills eusebia if the two were feverish and bedridden; which kinda lends some truth to the possibilty of them just drinking some bad water and getting sick.

>>22173290
>reading the Iliad without the Odyssey
>reading Faust 1 without 2
>reading the Hobbit only

>>22173477
Nah
It's closer to reading Hyperion and not reading Endymion. Reading LoTR without reading The Silmarillion or reading Faust by Goethe without reading Doctor Faustus by Marlowe

>>22173490
What was your trouble with long sun? I enjoyed it. I had to push trough Apu Punchau in Claw, I had to push trough some chapters in Long Sun, but it was great.

>>22173459
>i really don't understand how you could have got to this point. like, where exactly do you think eusebia doubts morwenna is innocent?
It will depend on how you interpret her dialogue after the execution.
Eusebia says:
“So it was somebody else. Or sickness after all—”
To me this seems like uncertainty. She doesn't seem to know who/what killed them now. It seems like she suspected Morwenna, but wasn't 100% sure. Though I can see how it could be read as her always knowing it was somebody(or something) else.
And the dialogue:
“Innocent! I knew her—so careful. She would have kept something
back—poison for herself! She would have died before you got her.”
Yes it could mean she knew she was innocent the whole time, or it could mean she was still waiting for something to happen to see if Morwenna really would find some way to take the easy way out. When that didn't happen she proclaims that she must have been innocent after all.

Funnily enough, I was originally in the camp that Morwenna was innocent, but then flipped. You might flip me back.

>>22173490
But Endymiom sucks ass. Not only does it not resolve the plot holes drom Hyperion, but it introduces the new ones. Long and Short Suns make New Sun seem more clear.

>>22173515
>“So it was somebody else. Or sickness after all—”
yea, but the line before is explaining how she knew morwenna too well. she wouldn't have been caught alive so it had to be someone else, or sickness. she's known the entire time morwenna was innocent but she hated her out of jealousy and only wanted to see her fall. she likely fueled the allegations and wrongful charges against her.

severian isn't oblivious to this all, but i think he writes in a way to project that he saw and did no wrong. jonas is the window into severian's true feelings i think, even though he again tries to stone wall in the conversations before and after the execution.
>“You must remember that you are not responsible for the sentences. If you had not come here, they would have been punished eventually anyway, and probably would have suffered worse in less skilled hands.”
and what does severian say? "i thought it went well" lol

>>22173581
oh yea one last thing. if morwenna had poison on her, surely she would have just taken it and saved herself torture. the idea that she held onto it and banked on the opportunity to kill eusebia and happened to do it in front of a crowd of people without noticing is a gigantic leap.

>>22173305
>I figured out why listening to Alzabo Soup annoys me.
it's not because they hate Severian and say he raped Jolenta? Or the fact they talk for 20 minutes before the book about video games?

>>22173634
You are on a science fiction podcast. What did you expect?

>>22173822
I expect men to not be pathetic, and have a little professionalism when talking academically but I guess that's too much to ask for now

>>22173992
>men

>>22173305
You should listen to Re-reading Wolfe. The two hosts are honestly based

>>22174377

>>22174582
Don't they also have a faggy little 10 minute long trigger warning in ep 1 about how severian is heckin sexist and they totally don't condone that kind of thing? I might be thinking of another podcast so excuse my retardation, but I stopped listening when I heard that with the assumption that every episode would have some gay leftist moralizing.

>>22174622
You're maybe right, but I don't remember that

>>22173634
>it's not because they hate Severian and say he raped Jolenta?
Them hating Sev is more of a personal gripe I have than a criticism. I haven't gotten to the Jolenta chapter yet so I can't comment on their commentary.
>Or the fact they talk for 20 minutes before the book about video games?
I hate that too, but I literally just skip it every episode.

>>22174582
I try sometimes, but I feel like they spend too much time on explaining references rather than analyzing the book. I just started listening to the Triskele episode and it's 3 goddamn hours long. 3 goddamn hours for one chapter. I realize a ton of that is probably about Valeria but I made it 45 minutes in and they're only like 3 pages into the analysis. I'm just not that interested.

>>22174696
Bro, podcasts are for listening to at work. The longer the better usually.

>>22175393
I work 12 hour long warm body security gigs. I read books recreationally at work, I don't need to listen to podcasts just to fill time.

Just started The Count of Monte Cristo. Finished The First Chronicles of Ma er yesterday.

>>22175477
How often do you have to actually do anything at work?

>>22175549
I do about an hour of actual work per shift. Maybe 90 minutes on a busy day, which is rare. The longest continuous stretch of "work" I have usually takes me about 20 minutes.

Why was Wolfe so redpilled when it came to women? It seems like he was really only with his wife most of his life. Also why is he so into rape? I don't imply Severian did anything wrong, but in many of his other works, he has rape.

>>22175636
I don't remember that much rape. The most clear cut case of rape I remember was the rape of a boy.
I very much doubt that writing about it means he condones it.

>>22153742
SILK IS CALDÉ!

is this how people dress in the future?

>>22176202
We can't imagine it because they will invent new colors.

>>22176243
Are you sure? No new colors have been invented in the last 20 years.

>>22176470
Sure. Perhaps it will be like in Dying Earth, where you need to be rich and own eyes of the Overworld in order to see the cool things inaccessible to ordinary humans.

>>22176693
>in the overworld I'm someone important!
>*shits self and eats kelp*

>>22176788
I love it how Vance predicted the internet/metaverse so organically.

>>22176470
What about Vantablack?

>>22176802
That's not a color, that's as little color as possible

>>22176791
ya thought the same thing
Also saffron is the best color. How come its used so little now days. People dress like shit

There may be some obvious thing I've missed but what's the explanation of Urth speaking a completely new language that had to be translated by Wolfe, while Long Sun makes explicit references to French, Latin, Arabic being spoken by the different states?
If those languages existed when Typhon launched the Whorl, and there were ~300 years of autarchs before we get to Severian, how did things change so drastically?
Also, how is Silkhorn's gang able to communicate with Severian when they meet him towards the end of Short Sun?
You could explain it with time dilation, but the Whorl can't have been going that fast if Green and Blue are Lune and Urth, now that I think about that how did they change so radically in that timespan?
Fuuuuuuuck bros I need to read Short Sun again

>>22176984
IIRC it's been at least a thousand years since Typhon launched the whorl.
If the whorl was traveling close to light speed for 300 years the time dilation accounts for the difference. I find the theory of Urth being Green dumb for that and many other reasons.

I think the languages are confusing too. But maybe like the religion of the whorl, their languages and cultures are also artificial, modeled by Typhon after old Urth ones. Or he just populated the whorl with people from all over Urth and they really are descended from French, Arabic, etc and Wolfe is just translating them to their closest modern equivalents.

Viron seems to have a lot of Spanish influence (Ayuntamiento, juzgado) so maybe it's still similar enough to the language of the Commonwealth for them to communicate. And the Vanished People didn't have any trouble communicating despite them being aliens, so maybe it's part of astral projection that you just understand and communicate with people through their minds or something.

Guys, i think Severian may be a messianic figure

>>22177288
>

>>22176984
>Urth speaking a completely new language that had to be translated by Wolfe
If BotNS was "written" in a completely new language, Wolfe would not be able to "translate" it. The framing implies that it's a quite distant and weird, but recognizable language related to the current ones.

>>22177175
Yet in the time travel sequence when Severian gets in trouble with Typhon for the second (or first) time, everything is the same as in his time. Nobody has French, Arabic etc. names. Not even Duko Rigoglio. His name is Roger. Roger remembers Typhon. He was born before the cultural revival project.
Everything about the Whorl is artificial: habitat, religion, animals, culture, history, the government... You name it. The Whorl was a giant social experiment first, means of survival second. Just like the vaults from Fallout series (which was conceptualized as a practice run for generation ships by Tim Cain).
It becomes obvious that all these cultures were introduced to people (which came from Nessus and the future Commonwealth) to introduce differences between them. Why? To develop rivalries, invent nations, make the settlers struggle more for their own good.
>>22177875
I imagine it was written in some alien language with Gene Wolfe being the only one who could translate it just like Joseph Smith translated the Book of Mormon.

OP of this and previous thread here. I am surprised we almost reached bump limit again.

I will not make a new thread, if someone else wants to, feel free. I think we exhausted close to every topic related to New Sun and it was fun.

>>22178709
Next thread, if there is one, should be exclusively about long/short sun desu

>>22178709
It's fun to have these threads ever so often
Make another a few months from now, maube by then others will have read it and can join the discussion
>he smiles because you dont understand but he knows you are trying to

>>22178817
Only a few people read the Long Sun, even fewer read the Short Sun. Nobody has read the short stories.
I cannot blame them. It's not an easy road to take.

>>22178817
You would need a slower board for that.

I still think the nips should adapt it, Wolfe already influenced a bunch of Japanese who created popular stuff.
Need a passionate and skilled team of Japanese artists doing their best to adapt the work. And a guy who poops money to fund it all.

When I see art that reminds me of new sun, 80% of the time it's a nip artist. Gonna dump some I haven't posted yet. RIP glorious gene general.

Dorcas.

>>22179829
Valeria as Quasi-Autarch. Or maybe someone else.

>>22179834
Severian and whomstever.

>>22179836
A hierodule unmasked. All the same artist if you can't tell.

>>22179839
Toshiaki Kato is the artist by the way.

Valeria (more fitting hair colour).

>>22179854
Aaand I think I'm done. What do you guys think?

Krait.

For those who don't know: Yoshitaka Amano was responsible for at least some art for Final Fantasy and Angel's Egg. Only really watched my big sister play FF as a kid and never watched Angel's Egg, so can't tell you much.

He is a Wolfe fan and also did the Japanese covers. I remember thinking the FFX world was pretty dope even if I didn't understand much from just watching here and there. KINO Blitzball(?) cutscene at the start.

>>22179916
Pic related was the ideal looking woman for me BJO (Before jerking off). Maybe it's just me as I grew up I found asian women less and less interesting. Now I really don't care for them at all.

Just because something it's good doesn't mean it needs an adaptation.
Although i can understand someone that grows up reading manga and wishes certain product to be interpreted in that medium.
Otherwise the whole idea of a multimedia franchise baffles me.