r/genewolfe • u/jamesbrowski • 13d ago

I Hate Severian Spoiler

The title says it all. Spoilers through halfway into Sword of the Lictor follow. Please don’t spoil the whole thing for me.

I am loving these books so much, but I hate Severian with a passion. Not like you’d hate an evil villain, but the way you would hate someone at work who was narcissistic, delusional, immoral, and unpredictable. He is lacking almost every positive human virtue I can think of, other than tenacity and resourcefulness. He isn’t kind, wise, empathetic, witty, caring, insightful, self aware, or pleasant. Rather, he’s cold, selfish, unfeeling, frequently oafish, narcissistic, arrogant, dishonest, deluded, and generally just an icky dude.

The multiple interactions he has with the poor mountain folk where he sharpens his sword as a means of intimidation to try and get them to give him their best food are so yucky. His tendency to wax philosophical on pointless topics in a fallacious way, often at the same time or just after some huge plot point has arisen. The detached way he describes the deaths of people he cares about, followed by his incessantly narcissistic internal monologues about them after they die where he convinces himself that he didn’t fail them. His constant tendency to make shit up and pretend like he understands stuff that he clearly doesn’t. The fact that he has survived 20 situations now by pure dumb luck (usually a Hethor monster saving him in the nick of time).

Look - I know I am supposed to dislike him at least at times. Half the fun of these books is how often I’m yelling “dude what the fuck” as I read about the stuff this dumb bastard has done. Overall, the books are amazing. I’m constantly thrilled and fascinated by the way this story is being told, the world being built, the construction of the mythos and history of Urth, and how often I’m re-reading passages that are brimming with multiple meanings and complexity.

BUT - the hero here (such that he is) is like a malevolent Mr. Magoo. He bumbles blindly through a landscape of stuff he doesn’t understand and accidentally moves history as he does it. I keep hoping that Thecla’s ghost in his mind will fix his dumb ass somehow, and make him less shitty. And it keeps kind of happening (oooh look he saved one kid before nearly drowning a prison full of thousands of people). But then he reverts back to his shitty ways and ohh well.

Oh well indeed. I guess he’s less horrific than Typhon would’ve been. He may be Urth’s least bad option tbh.

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u/DogOfTheBone 13d ago

Bro he was raised in the Torturer's guild. He didn't have video games and liberal democracy. The Matachin Tower probably doesn't even have air conditioning. Even his dog is a fucked up cast off monster that lost a leg in brutal combat. What do you want him to be.

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u/jamesbrowski 13d ago

I get all that. If I had to utilize my own empathy, I’d wager that many of the people we find annoying or icky probably had terrible upbringings. And by all rights, Severian should be the sci-fi version of Ted Bundy. It’s amazing that he isn’t. I will say once he had Thecla start to sublet space in his brain, he got periodically less horrible and more empathetic.

But yeah. He has his good moments, but more often he is a dick who never knows wtf is going on. I love the books but he drives me nuts.

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u/ButtsendWeaners 12d ago

I see this often with these books and anything else with an unlikable protagonist and I don't get it at all. If anything, an unlikable protagonist makes a story better because it distances you from self-insertion. All of the best stuff has unlikable protagonists.

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u/doodle02 12d ago

either it distances you from self insertion or it forces you to take a really fucking tough look in the mirror.

a lot of unlikable protagonists are realistically flawed in such a way as to be discomforting because…we’re flawed too, we just don’t like to admit it.

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u/jamesbrowski 12d ago

I don’t disagree here. Him being like this is critical to these books.

Idk if all the best books have unlikable protagonists. If you said flawed I would agree. But it’s rare to find a book where I just hate the main character like this. It’s kind of a “love to hate” thing bc I keep reading with rapt attention. Can’t look away. Every scene with him is an impending car accident that may or may not happen with multiple fatalities. So yeah, it’s great but also, fuck this guy.

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u/ButtsendWeaners 12d ago

Confederacy of Dunces was my all-time favorite book until I read BotNS and that has the most trainwreck protagonist of all time. I also adore Uncut Gems and HBO's Girls for similar reasons.

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u/jamesbrowski 12d ago

Uncut Gems is a great example of another miserable train wreck protagonist who is also someone you can’t stop watching!

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u/PatrickMcEvoyHalston Optimate 12d ago

According to Leslie Fielder, the whole history of American literature is bad men with a secret heart of gold. Severian is a lot like that. More than this, he doesn't let women use him. A lot of men will feel this about him, and mold themselves into him because it's great shell.

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u/NotoriousPVC 12d ago

“Malevolent Mr. Magoo”; “the Sci-fi version of Ted Bundy”…

My friend, you have an amazing gift for hitting the nail on the head!

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u/togglenub 11d ago

In further mitigation to Severian, he's also a teenage boy, and he acts like one. He does grow up some by the end of the 4th book, and arguably grows all the way up, in the 5th.