The Citadel of the Autarch was published by Timescape Books in 1983, completing The Book of the New Sun. Severian, wandering after his mountain exile, encounters the war between the Commonwealth and the Ascians (a totalitarian empire whose citizens can speak only in approved quotations from their rulers) and is drawn into the conflict. He is wounded, healed, and eventually reaches the Citadel of the Autarch — the ruler of the Commonwealth — where the mysteries of his identity and destiny are partially revealed.
The revelations of the final volume are characteristically Wolfean: they answer questions while raising larger ones. Severian learns that he has been chosen to bring the New Sun — to journey to a higher court of judgment that will decide whether Urth deserves renewal or extinction. The Autarch, dying, transfers his office (and the accumulated memories of all previous Autarchs) to Severian. The torturer becomes ruler; the exile becomes savior; the unreliable narrator becomes the author of the text we have been reading.
This last point is crucial: Wolfe reveals that the entire narrative is Severian’s memoir, composed after his accession to the Autarchy. Everything we have read is shaped by Severian’s purposes as ruler — purposes that may not include full truthfulness. The “perfect memory” he claims may be genuine, but the selection of what to tell and what to omit is strategic. The Book of the New Sun is thus a political document as well as an autobiography, and the reader’s relationship to the narrator is never simple.
Collecting The Citadel of the Autarch
First edition (Timescape Books, New York, 1983): Cloth binding, dust jacket. Completes the tetralogy.
Market values:
- First edition in dust jacket: $60–$200
- Complete set of four first editions in jackets: $600–$1,500
- Without jacket: $15–$35