vault backup: 2025-11-15 17:52:25

the-story-of-ymar.md

@@ -9,11 +9,15 @@ tags:
   - exclude-from-word-count
 title: The Story of Ymar
 description: |
-  An excerpt from Chapter 17 of _The Shadow of the Torturer_ by Gene Wolfe,
+  An excerpt from _The Shadow of the Torturer_, Chapter 17 "The Challenge" by Gene Wolfe,
   with my analysis in comment blocks.
 ---
 # The Story of Ymar
 
+%%
+From [[wolfe_1980_shadow#XVII - The Challenge]].
+%%
+
 Now I begin again.
 It has been a long time
 (twice I have heard the guard changed outside my study door)
@@ -29,10 +33,10 @@ I have spent weary days in reading the histories of my predecessors,
 and they consist of little but such accounts.
 For example, of Ymar:
 
-<!--
+%%
 Severian is speaking of his predecessors _to the autarchy_.
-Without knowing this, Ymar and "the Autarch" read as separate characters.
--->
+Without knowing this, Ymar and "the Autarch" may read as separate characters.
+%%
 
 > Disguising himself, he ventured into the countryside,
 > where he spied a muni meditating beneath a plane tree.
@@ -44,20 +48,20 @@ Without knowing this, Ymar and "the Autarch" read as separate characters.
 > and at last a dog trotted through the dust.
 > Ymar rose and followed the dog, laughing.
 
-<!--
+%%
 - muni: An inspired or holy man; a sage; an ascetic or hermit.
 - oriflamme: A banner or standard.
--->
+%%
 
 Supposing this anecdote to be true, how easy it is to explain:
 the Autarch had demonstrated that he chose his active life by an act of will,
 and not because of the seductions of the world.
 
-<!--
+%%
 Analysis 1:
 Ymar ignored the mortal pleasures of glory, wealth, and beauty
 ~~simply for the sake of it.~~
--->
+%%
 
 But Thecla had had many teachers,
 each of whom would explain the same fact in a different way.
@@ -65,11 +69,11 @@ Here, then, a second teacher might say
 that the Autarch was proof against those things that attract common men,
 but powerless to control his love of the hunt.
 
-<!--
+%%
 Analysis 2:
 Ymar ignored the mortal pleasures of glory, wealth, and beauty
 but broke for an equally base indulgence.
--->
+%%
 
 And a third, that the Autarch wished to show his contempt for the muni,
 who had remained silent when he might have poured forth enlightenment and received more.
@@ -79,11 +83,11 @@ Nor could he when the soldiers passed, nor the merchant with his wealth, nor the
 for unenlightened men desire all those things,
 and the muni would have thought him one more such man.
 
-<!--
+%%
 Analysis 3:
 Ymar ignored the mortal pleasures of glory, wealth, and beauty
 to prove to the wise man that he could resist temptation.
--->
+%%
 
 And a fourth, that the Autarch accompanied the dog because it went forth alone,
 the soldiers having other soldiers,
@@ -91,11 +95,11 @@ the merchant his mule and the mule his merchant,
 and the woman her slaves;
 while the muni did not go forth.
 
-<!--
+%%
 Analysis 4:
 Ymar wasn't ignoring the other travelers at all,
 only waiting for one to walk with.
--->
+%%
 
 Yet why did Ymar laugh? Who shall say?
 Did the merchant follow the soldiers to buy their booty?
@@ -107,9 +111,9 @@ Ymar is dead, and such memories of his
 as lived for a time in the blood of his successors
 are long faded.
 
-<!--
+%%
 Severian is focused on details irrelevant to the parable.
--->
+%%
 
 So mine in time shall fade too.
 Of this I feel sure: not one of the explanations for the behavior of Ymar was correct.
@@ -145,8 +149,8 @@ though the rider is but some hitherto unguessed part of ourselves.
 Perhaps, indeed, that is the explanation of the story of Ymar.
 Who can say?
 
-<!--
+%%
 Analysis 5:
 Ymar ignored the other travelers but left with the dog
 on a passing interest.
--->
+%%