The Shelved by Genre podcast inspired me to do a re-read of Book of the New Sun. I thought I would maybe follow along with them and read something else on the side. Well, that didn't work out so much, as I have been too caught up in it and have read far ahead at this point.
This morning before work, I began The Citadel of the Autarch.
I think what I have forgotten most over the course of reading these isn't so much the details such as characters or plot events, but mainly about when in the narrative different things are introduced. For example, I could have sworn the named Hierodules (Ossipago, Barbatus, & Famulimus) were introduced much earlier. I thought they appeared in Claw in the House Absolute for some reason. Idk. Many such things like that as I've been reading.
Another thing that has struck me over the course of re-reading these, having since read Long Sun & Short Sun and some other Wolfe stuff, is how much Wolfe really seems to be primarily occupied with a few core ideas or themes over the course of his entire bibliography. It's kind of astonishing to go back to New Sun and see the same thematic threads reintroduced that you've been reading about in all these other books too. The man is absolutely obsessed with self-identity (not so much in the categorical sense, but in the sense of self-conception/self-perception), truth as it moves through different layers of communication, memory (e.g. Severian = "perfect" memory, Latro = "no" memory), religion obviously, symbols, narrative in general... explorations of all of these are pretty much present throughout all of his works.
I think I will just read through Urth b/c that's where Shelved by Genre is stopping. I am interested to see what they say about Urth, since I think at least one has said they don't like Urth. But anyway there is too much other stuff I want to read, I don't want to commit to a full Long Sun + Short Sun re-read at this point.
Okay, so I completed Citadel of the Autarch on my lunch break. Turns out I had also forgotten what events were in Citadel vs what were in Urth of the New Sun.
No spoilers or anything, but I am pretty happy with how this one plays out overall, especially once we get back in touch with the Autarchy proper. (Don't think that's a spoiler, since the whole BotNS is framed as being written from Severian's perspective as Autarch at time of writing.)
I'm glad that the Ranged Touch guys took this one on b/c it was nice to have an impetus to re-read. I know I am way ahead of the podcast, but I think I'll just keep the momentum rolling into Urth and close it out, indulging my reminiscent curiosity instead of attempting to first read something else distractedly.