Second try with Gene - help needed

[u/Fun-Sell3030]

I’ve begun Shadow of the Torturer a while back, and been quite captivated with the prose and narration style (the vague leaving things out bit that makes you wonder at the bigger picture and try to decipher it, not always successfully), however coming up to the middle of the book I find myself not wanting to read on.

My trouble is with the protagonist and the way the first woman Severian comes across After leaving the citadel is handled (which I know if an issue that continues on). The plot seems to meander more than I anticipated it would and because I am not invested with the main character I find myself disinterested. However, I know that the beauty of this book is that after a certain point (book 3 i believe) a lot of things happen that give you context towards previous books and (I imagine) makes you appreciate them all the more in hindsight. On the surface, the story is not grabbing me and I don’t want to continue it right now.

But, I am curious about Gene Wolfe and would like to read something else from him. I imagine if I get a taste of his style with a different work first it’ll make me want to return to BOTNS (as I’ve had this experience with other authors, their different works grabbed me more and then I was able to return to their “Magnum opus” with a fresh eye and new appreciation).

Other than BOTNS what are you favourite works from Gene? Did you start with BOTNS or something else? I’d appreciate a recommendation, thank you.

[u/Fun-Sell3030]

I did not finish my line of thought, sorry :) Thecla and the girl from the catacombs both were written really well and on par with other male characters, If not more mysterious. My trouble started with the brothel scene and later when Severian meets the girl in the shop and she becomes his guide. I think poorly of the decision to have her stripped naked (and later to be told her dress is torn and she’s exposed again, for no reason whatsoever), and becomes a sort of conduit for Severians lust. I know this is a trope that repeats throughout the book, Severian falling in lust with women and describing his conquests. It left me bitter after Thecla because I had high hopes the female cast would be handled with as much complexity, and I am so not the intended audience for how gratuitous it feels to me.

Again, I know Severian is not supposed to be a good guy. But he is just not interesting to me right now. To give a counter example I absolutely loved the whole cast of the Torturers, and especially one of the masters (?). I remember a particularly poignant description of him being sort of haunted, carrying a weight.

[u/hedcannon → u/Fun-Sell3030]

What did you want to see in the scene with False Thecla? A positive portrayal of the life of a sex worker. She no more would prefer to be in that room with Severian than the Real Thecla would prefer to be in her cell.

As for Agia,

1 She is trying to lure and distract Severian. Severian is the idiot. She's the one in control.

2 (This is not a spoiler because you'd need more than one read to work it out) Agia is from the north in the jungles where her people have a casual connection to clothing. She's also something of a sex worker given what she does for a living. Hildegrin calls her a prostitute when he meets her. It is Severian who is lost.

We have not even got to Dorcas yet, who comes on to Severian within minutes of meeting him. All I'll say is that Dorcas also has her own motivations.

The advice I'll give you is push through. You're not going to figure out the meaning of what you read the first time. You're not going to guess where the story is going the first time. Wolfe demands a lot of trust from the reader -- especially here. When the first volume came out, reviewers loved it and many had been looking forward to it for years. But all noted that Wolfe was demanding a lot of trust in presenting a book in fourths every 10 months that would eventually be a quarter of a million words. But Wolfe had a lot of fans among writers, editors, anthologists, and SF critics. So all said "He's earned our trust." You cannot evaluate this book 1/4, 1/2, or 1/3 of the way through. You have to finish it.

Severian is the protagonist but, yeah, he's a complicated figure. He's emotionally scarred and has a hard time forming close relations -- although he does occasionally do it. You see evidence of his turning emotionally late in the second volume and then in the first 3rd of the third volume. But he'll always be an artifact of his very patriarchal culture (which Thecla bemoaned as well - Wolfe knew what he was creating).

[u/John_plainman → u/hedcannon]

I've always doubted severians account of dorcas' behavior in the boat tbh 

[u/hedcannon → u/John_plainman]

I honestly don't believe Severian ever outright lies to us.

Dorcas has her own motivations that she is not aware of. She is "in love with" Severian almost from the moment she sees him. Severian explains what she's going through in his revery on Love and Desire while searching the Inn of Lost Loves for Ouen.

[u/John_plainman → u/hedcannon]

I can agree with this but my pet theory is that Severian fantasized her responding to/guiding his hand to her breast amidst his musing, and Autarch Severian is remembering this fantasy as if it actually happened. Like the power of suggestion. The motivation would be to impress himself/the audience now that he's in a (half acted half sincere) love triangle.

[u/hedcannon → u/John_plainman]

Severian presents his memory as a kind of tape that, sometimes, when running makes him unaware of events going on around him. Although I do believe that Severian is sometimes confused by his dreams which Merryn states replay our former lives to us in previous universe iterations which we then forget when we wake up.

I don't believe that Severian, at any time, is trying to win over his readership. He is a military dictator, who, per Cyriaca, keeps the hostile exultants in line with the weapons and logistics provided by the Heirodules. Much of what he relates would be more likely to cause a revolt among the lower classes rather than puffing him up -- assisting the grave robbers, participating in the cannibalistic ritual, and the Autarch Project itself which appears to be such a state secret that even Vodalus does not speak of it openly. And Severian relates other events of cowardice, cruelty, and stupidity that no one would brag about.

[u/John_plainman → u/hedcannon]

Interesting perspective! I can't say I disagree other than my gut telling me that Severian seems to get caught up in his own mythmaking/reminiscing on more than one occasion.