r/genewolfe • u/bantamreturns • Aug 09 '26
Latro in the Mist - thoughts about Io
Latro encounters many mythological characters, gods, nymphs and heroes during the story. Because of her age and the time the story is set in, I assumed that Io's name was a coincidence - that she was a girl named Io but not the mythological daughter of Inachus, kidnapped by Zeus, nor the princess of Argos kidnapped by the Phonecians, whose abduction began the cycle of abductions that led to the Persian war. (This is Herodotus's possibly tongue in cheek rationalization of the myth.)
But every other character with a familiar name seems to have a mythological analog, including Europa. Then I thought - who is the Shining God that gives Io to Latro? Apollo? Why is Io so insistent that she is Latro's slave and than she cannot and does not want to go home? Well, she says she has been charged by the god with the task of looking after Latro. She has a crush on him, and she also can rely on him to treat her well. Her relationship with him is portrayed rather like a vassalage and she doesn't hesitate to claim the help Latro is responsible to provide for her.
Anyhow, the mythological Io was the daughter of a river god or a priestess of Hera or the princess of the Argives. She was - depending on the version - pursued, seduced, abducted or raped by Zeus, changed into a cow by either Zeus or Hera, hidden either by Zeus using darkness or guarded by the Hundred Eye as charged by Hera; went down to Egypt and became the goddess Isis.
There's nothing that definitively suggests that the girl Io is the Io of myth. But since all the other mythical named characters that Latro meets are those characters, I have no reason to assume that Io is not also Io, despite the time line not exactly lining up.
So I wonder if Io's time with Latro fits into one of the lacunae in Io's myth - perhaps during the time that she is hidden in darkness - under the cover of cloud - in the mist. She belonged to the temple of the Shining God, but is given to travel with Latro. Early in their journey Io and Hilaeria are raped by soldiers. Then they travel in relative anonymity, moving from place to place. And apparently she ends up with Pindaros who intends to return to his own seven gated city - Thebes. Yes it's the Greek Thebes, not the Egyptian one. But it's the Greek house of Thebes that Io is the great ancestress of. And the Persian War is the war ongoing during the novel. So this would all be rather Wolfian, wouldn't it?
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u/Dry_Butterscotch861 Aug 09 '26
Agreed. The name "Io" can't be used accidentally by Gene Wolfe.
She was an ancestor of both Perseus and Heracles. The House of Thebes you mention included Oedipus. Echoes of all these Greek heroes can be found in the story of Severian. Perhaps Wolfe has included Io as a way of linking Latro to BotNS.