I'm reading The Book of the New Sun. I'm currently roughly two thirds through Claw of the Conciliator...

I'm reading The Book of the New Sun. I'm currently roughly two thirds through Claw of the Conciliator. I just got to the part where It's revealed the pimp from the House Azure is actually the Autarch. And not only that but he's in league with Vodalus, who as you know is supposed to be a rebel attempting to dethrone the Autarch.. So what the fuck? I mean you probably can't explain this without spoiling the story for me, so I have no clue why I'm even asking. But this really threw me for a loop. Unless it's supposed to be like how the US government overthrows a communist dictator but replaces them with someone just as bad only because the replacement isn't communist.

It is possible that Severian had some presentiment of his future

How? It's implied the pimp is the Autarch.. Not Severian.
I guess what I want to know is if this odd detail is made clear in the future.

kek

Sorry m8 but there's no brakes on Severians wild ride.
Buckle up.

Why not work with the rebels and make sure anyone inclined to anarchy is off larping in the woods? It's more efficient than suppressing rebellion through force.

And now I'm wondering what the vague implications that the Conciliator is Jesus Christ mean. I mean what could the claw be? The Holy Spirit made tangible? Some sort of Catholic relic? A gem from the holy grail?

Oh, keep going, it's worth it. At the time, I was assuming relic myself, but it gets explained. (somehow less cryptically than most things in those books)

It’s just a claw, bud. Severian is Jesus Christ.

I mean, if we're going full spoilers, Severian isn't quite Christ. Tries to be, often fails, kinda a twisted imitation of. Conciliator is Jesus Christ, though.

No, he is Jesus, the son of God. I am Gene Wolfe, I know.

God i wish I were you. Just finished the series and currently numbed by the realisation that I will never read it for the first time again.

Enjoy Sword of the Lictor, its pure kino.

Can someone tell me what the fuck is happening at the beginning of Claw? If BotNS is Sev. writing his memoirs as Autarch (I'm pretty sure that I read that narrative framing in Shadow), then why would he leave such a huge gap in between the first two books? Also, is Agia black?

how did severian survive the flower fight?

Severian is the Conciliator. The Conciliator is the New Son/Sun.

>why would he leave such a huge gap in between the first two books?
Because the events weren't relevant to the story of how he became Autarch.

You nigger. I'm not finished yet
REEEEEEEEEEEREEEEEEEEEEEE
YOU RUINED MY READING EXPERIENCE SPOILER THAT SHIT YOU INCONSIDERATE NIGGER

This is a good question. Hopefully it gets explained later on. It might have been because he had the claw on his person so it healed him and brought him back from death.

what kind of retard wants to discuss one of Veeky Forums's fav books before he finishes it? dopey cunt

No he isn't

But he is Christ-like

I think I'm idiot. I thought the magic in the Claw was after Severian visited Atrium of Time, he could occasionally intertwine alternative timelines with his own, causing the thorn to slip into the Claw and bringing people from death by pulling them from other timelines were they are still alive.

>It might have been because he had the claw on his person so it healed him
It's not that.

Most people discuss books before they finish them. Crawl out of your cave and join a reading group or take a literature class.

>letting other people form your opinions for you before you've even had a chance to interpret the material for yourself

Holy shit, might as well just scoop out your brain and let them control your bodily functions while you're at it.

>Most people discuss books before they finish them.
No they don't, and spoilers are the reason why.

>not challenging or strengthening your interpretation by listening to others'
It's like you don't know anything about building truth and knowledge.
Join a reading group. Take a lit course. You're wrong. Accept it.

>why would he leave such a huge gap in between the first two books?

Because part of the text is missing.

The real reason is apparently that it's a fuck you by Wolfe because the publisher wouldn't let him put the whole thing in one volume.

It is that tho.

> Unless it's supposed to be like how the US government overthrows a communist dictator but replaces them with someone just as bad only because the replacement isn't communist.

I at first thought that the book was sorta inspired by what America in Central and South America, especially given it was written in the early 1980s and Wolfe is a Catholic.

After all you had at that time the dirty war against Nicaragaua, aiding the dictatorships of Guatemala and El Salvador where the Catholic Church was heavily targeted. And aiding the rightwing dictatorships further south.

But then I read him say he was a Buckley fan, and thought he mellowed out towards the end.

So that threw my idea in the trash.

Severian is an Apollo figure, not a Christ figure

>>not challenging or strengthening your interpretation by listening to others'
You do that AFTER you're done reading so you get a variety of ideas, rather than forming a consensus from the first chapter and killing alternate interpretations before they can even form.

It only kills alternate interpretations if you're a brainlet who goes with anything anyone says. Which I guess you are since you're advocating that position.

You can't un-hear things.
No matter how smart you are, hearing someone else's interpretation will alter how you read the rest of the story.

>what is considering your own opinion against others
Yeah, it's almost like it broadens things rather than constricting, which is your position. Holy shit I can't believe you're this retarded. You don't have to blindly accept the opinion or interpretation. You just consider it against your own and see how it challenges your interpretation or see how the other interpretation might fall flat. It's called critical thinking, which you clearly don't possess.

does this look like a book club to you?
does this look like a group read to you?

you started a thread knowing full well what would happen and now you're paying the price, you're lucky i'm not a cheeky cunt who will spoil all the good twists for you but I sure hope someone else does

Holy fuck. I'm not saying don't compare your interpretation against other people's. I'm saying you should wait to so until after you've read the material on your own at least once. That way there is a diversity of complete interpretations to consider when you do discuss with a group.

>edgy
I thought I was posting on Veeky Forums not iFunny

boy am I close to telling you Jolenta is the waitress who becomes beautiful through surgery and magic that wears off, killing her

If you didn't realize that by the end of Shadow you should give up on the series 2bh

C O P E

>implying they weren't both sun gods

doing my second reread rn

>nigga has a gov't job
>qt that's been with him through thick & thin
>erryone fears him

this picture could not be more true

>when he fuggs Jolenta

Likely not the case, but that's a pretty sick interpretation man.

>Also, is Agia black?
I got the impression she was middle eastern.

You're both partially right. The claw didn't technically "heal" Severian, but it brought him back in time slightly to a point where he wasn't dying.

1. You should've expected this by coming onto Veeky Forums to discuss it before you were done. You've learned a lesson and I would leave now if I were you.
2. I'm of the belief that the best books cannot be affected by spoilers. Everyone knows the story of the Odyssey, does it make it worse to read when you know Odysseus wins? I don't think so, and I'd say BOTNS is the same way.
3. That spoiler is not entirely accurate.

I thought she was Asian.

Does anyone have the book on hand to screenshot the passage that describes her? I'm curious how we came to such different interpretations.

she's a fucking jew
>her and her brother are humble merchants and scam artists
also, there are no blacks on urth

I think Agia has high cheekbones and almond shaped eyes. And she's not very tall.

>also, there are no blacks on urth
kek, it's true that I don't remember anyone being described with negroid features. I wonder if blacks were incapable of surviving Urth's increasing cold?

Examples of controlled opposition, or, entities propped up by the Anglo-Judeo Atlanticist establishment as means to certain ends:
Osama bin Laden / Al Qaeda
Fidel Castro / Communist Cuba
ISIS
The Kim family / DPRK

seems about right, I remember that when Severian back in time he mentioned how much brighter everything was, and that in his time there is a constant dusk, so melanin enhanced individuals wouldn't be very comfortable

Every read is better for me, at least.
>Severian at the beach in the end
Cry like a bitch everytime

I prefer the theories that he isn't, actually, and is a replicant like everyone else in the brothel. Either they are all genetic replicants or that they're all real, whores included.

Remember that it is both a POV book and a historical account.

then why did he play along when severian called him out on it

I got the impression that races don't work like right now anymore because so much time passed and that Agia is the equivalent of an Asian woth curly brown hair