The first time “S” meets Corbeau in person (p89), she looks S up and down before shaking his hand and saying, “I know enough.” The marginalia discusses how people like Filomela and Durand must be able to intuitively read whether or not someone is interested in a relationship, much like an archaeologist must draw conclusions from what he finds.
Later, as S and Corbeau leave Zapadi’s house in hopes of escaping B__ unnoticed (pp129-132), S is struggling to grasp something hidden in the design of the shutters. Corbeau clutches his hand, and S turns back to look at the house and finally sees it – two S symbols, one a mirror of the other, etched into the scrollwork of the shutters. Immediately underneath the symbols in the text of Ship of Theseus, Corbeau tightens her grip on S’s hand. She says, “Relax. Pretend we belong together.” In the margins, Jen says, “That’s sweet.” There is an insert in the book showing an S symbol inside a cave. S and Corbeau discuss the S symbol. Shortly after, they discuss connections.
Finally, as Corbeau and S are trapped by the detectives at the mouth of the cave high above the sea (pp194-197), she interlaces the fingers of her good hand with his. They have just walked through an S-shaped curve in the cave. One of the detectives bullies, “That’s so sweet.” The paragraph that follows, according to Jen, has its own isolated page in the original manuscript. Corbeau then says, “Push off hard. Jump out as far as you can.” And then, they leap together, hand-in-hand. As they do, S has a memory of corks (sobreiro) flying on a New Year’s Eve. S has a sense of himself as someone. And then we have the mysterious clue from VMS: They way out was down. Is down.
Does anyone see a pattern to when (and why) they hold hands, what happens, and what they say?
The first time they meet, he is soggy because he emerged from the waters that allow their tradition, be it spycraft or power politics. he has been initiated in the trade, but they are unsure if he is to be trusted.
Durand and Ekstrom both want to give him a chance. Remember that this S. is still the imposing and stately figure the influential Harbormaster wanted to be common with, and the Hotel lady imagined to be good for money. Not the poor czech boy.
I think the question whether he is an opposing agent or not is already enough mystery for this scene, no need to complicate it more apart from personal attraction. From the non fictional timeline, we knew that S. was considered a lost son by Ekstrom and that he got close to Amaranthe during or before his sickness and the eventual birth of Signe.
A possible interpretation of an S and mirrored S symbal seen through shutters SƧ is that, if pushed close together, forms a heart, if we ignore the lower vestiges. with bold lines, and turned on itd head, it may form eyes and mouth of a monkey head https://browse.startpage.com/do/show_picture.pl?l=deutsch&rais=1&oiu=https%3A%2F%2Fcdnb.artstation.com%2Fp%2Fassets%2Fimages%2Fimages%2F002%2F737%2F351%2Flarge%2Fdaniel-scholes-scheduledshapes-01c.jpg%3F1465152243&sp=bdf8306974fe515ad227251870b28bcd&t=default. Again, relax and sweet may really only need to mean the obvious, love or atttaction.
Hands and feet are already used ambigously in this chapter. Corbeau put her hand into the dark substance, S. dipped his toe in. She wanted to grasp the personification of power greedily, he only reluctantly. Both got burned severely.
The rest is mirroring the irl timeline. Ekstrom is killed, they are together from about 1930 to 1936, she dies New Year of 1937 in Spain by lynching during Revolutionary war. He goes down and lies low, that is he disappears for a while, the way out is down. Remember, the Story starts in France, Corbeau and Bouchard are french, and the Chateau later is in france. The deep see fish he sees while diving impossibly low should be from portugal or Madeira, though, not spain, so maybe i am wrong here or its habitat stretches a bit towards the spanish coast as well.
But the core of what i am saying is, the fictional Story of his appearances on land (the stories with the bird cide names) are a retelling of their actual lives as writers.
If not, then it would be interesting to see were the word sweet appears. I would think at least with the love story of agents 9 and 41.
If i remember correctly, this is also the time where the S. shatters and no one can trust each other, Garcia is falsely accused where on fact Mac was Judas, not Tiago.
Sorry, should have included the rest in the post above, did not want to spam.
Anyway, the way out is down could have another interpretation. They are on the cliff and see the water below. So the way out for him may be an even deeper i immersion into the substance their craft sails on and relies on. If this is spycraft or power politics or betrayal, this might be it. At the start we are unsure if he is an agent for the enemy. He aided them the protestor,rebels at the beginning at the explo ion at the pier, but his questionable incompetence with the valise (tools of the trade)got the crew killed.
He enjoys a few moments of bliss with Corbau while falling or flying (being in love), but that got her killed too.
Either their trade is just very dangerous, or his incompetence is suspicious.
When we return to the question of the beginning, can he be trusted or is he an agent for the enemy, in considerations of his own doubts, then the only way out is down may mean that he does not have to lie low, but to immerse himself even more intensely into the tradition (of killing santorini style, that is political assassination) than before. Wanting to get out should mean getting out of a trade he once endorsed, but can also mean just getting away from being hunted.
Finally, whether S. is a former Bouchard infiltrator or not, if we go with the most obvious view, then he might as well have been just a young aspiring idealist in the beginning, snd his first failure with being to late to warn them might just be inexperience and distraction by the unreachable woman he was always chasing. The conclusion of danger for the others was already profound insight in itself. so the trap at the pier might have been unavoidable and his insecurity anout being anagent might just be insecurity or as of yet, indecission which side he should be on.
No matter, he has already been vetted before on the ship and was accepted, sonce he was dressed in the gang colors. Likewise with Stenfalks clothing. When Stenfalk dies or is executed, he made a mistake in the use of the tools, but the irl circumstances of Ekstrom wasting away possibly by poisonong are not clear.
Anyway, after Stenfalks death, S. and Corbeau have an important epihany in the cave where they discover the ideal of society as a synthesis of wolf and bird people with the one perfect representation in the lowest layer painting. At this time, S. is already avting as parent and protector for Signe, so what they found in the painting may correspond to having found meaning in the cild ynd family. After that, both decide to join hands and jump into the sea of life and work and dangerous work together.
went thru this blog (link below) again. all posts in a 3 month span sept to nov 2012, the runup to publishing the book. it certainly looks like a product of the research person or persons for the book. they simultaneously posted to fb and twitter. they got and made absolutely zero comments on all platforms. ended it as suddenly as it began.
the blog has a footnote quote from john kennedy at the foot of every page. –
“We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea, whether it is to sail or to watch – we are going back from whence we came.”
what begins at the water ends there.
you can read the research on the xebec, beloved by pirates, you can get a list of 9 Great Seaport Cities. Greek fire.
it does not look like anything an actual commercial shipping company would do. If it is a collection of book research, it probably has a lot that did not make it into the book.
and the name of the company, SVM, i would say a play on SUM,
I was reading a book on the history of the mediterranean, and the types of ships that were used. it made me think of this site and i looked it up. whoever did this site was obviously reading similar books.
https://svmshippingblog.wordpress.com/
Interesting find. i would say it is rather unusual to find an extended xebec entry combined with sum. i cannot recognize much else from SoT, but the JFK quote from 1962 is exceptional. i had heard it before but could not attribute it, nice to have more context.
“I really don’t know why it is that all of us are so committed to the sea, except I think it is because in addition to the fact that the sea changes and the light changes, and ships change, it is because we all came from the sea. And it is an interesting biological fact that all of us have, in our veins the exact same percentage of salt in our blood that exists in the ocean, and, therefore, we have salt in our blood, in our sweat, in our tears. We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea, whether it is to sail or to watch it, we are going back from whence we came.”
so the “what begins” quote is another Australia reference as it seems. mh, id have liked it to be a bit more
Are there any references to ww2 in the entire book? Don’t you think its a little strange that an alleged Czech writing in 1946 does not allude to it? But maybe he does. There are references to rendering people in Straka’s real ending. The reference is to the wine. And there are all those voices in the wine, Silenced. The weapon makers smearing their teeth in it, being stained by it. The river Sola flows out of the Czech highlands north and passes the Auschwitz concentration camp. After gassing the human beings, they were transferred to the oven, burned down to ash. The ash was dumped into the river Sola to be washed away. This ultimate crime may be a central generating idea of the book.
I think there are some. First there are 3 books printed durring the duration of WW2, 1939 Wineblood’s Mine and The Brigade, 1942 Winged Shoes and 1944 Coriolis. Then there are secondary allusions. The first that comes to mind in this regard is from the extended Straka works list where one of the S. members/agents wrote “Purpurea” in 1960. The authors name was Singh. “Purple” was the name for a famous japanese Cipher in WW2, Singh is the name of a famous author an ciphers. There are many other ciphers mentioned in the Fns, but i foubd this particularly significant for WW2. Lastly, the scene in Prague with the two agents being tricked by the radio has WW2/cold war feels.
All in all, i have to agree that apart from general cruelties and warcrimes by Vevoda’s customers, SOT is not at all explicit about WW2, so you can very much have a point.
With all the similies of water, ocean, and earth, it would be a fantastic fit for Sola to turn out to be a river, too. In this case a very gruesome one, though, given the history you revealed. A central theme in the ending is for the wine to be re-absorbed by the earth to silence the voices, the suffering and the drama. In this case, it is the wine and not Sola though.