Lord Foul's Bane Chapters 7 & 8

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SoulBiter
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Post by SoulBiter »

I think what TC really wanted to get by changing POV's was the fact that she was terrified.
"As she caught her balance, got one last, clear, terrified look at him, she felt sure that he meant to kill her."
So the purpose is for the reader to really 'feel' with Lena what was going on, and what she was going through, so that you understand (as if you didnt already) how heinous what he was doing was. Thus the subtle shift of POV for us to 'see' through Lena's eyes.
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Post by Cord Hurn »

In Chapter 8 of [i]Lord Foul's Bane[/i] was wrote:His shoulders bunched to strangle the thought. Through locked teeth, he breathed to himself, I've got to go to the Council.

When he had steadied himself, he asked grimly, "What did the elders say?"

"There was little for them to say," she replied in a flat voice. "I told them what I know of you--and of the Land's peril. They agreed that I must guide you to Lord's Keep. For that purpose I have come to you now. See"--she indicated two packs lying near her feet--"I am ready> Trell my husband has given me his blessing. It grieves me to go without giving my love to Lena my daughter, but time is urgent. You have not told me all your message, but I sense that from this day forward each delay is hazardous. The elders will give thought to the defense of the plains. We must go."

Covenant met her eyes, and this time he understood the sad determination in them. She was afraid, and did not believe that she would live to return to her family. He felt a sudden pity for her. Without fully comprehending what he said, he tried to reassure her. "Things aren't as bad as they might be. A Cavewight has found the Staff of Law, and I gather he doesn't really know how to use it. Somehow, the Lords have got to get it away from him."

But his attempt miscarried. Atiaran stiffened and said, "Then the life of the Land is in our speed. Alas that we cannot go to the Ranyhyn for help. But the Ramen have little countenance for the affairs of the Land, and no Ranyhyn has been ridden, save by Lord or Bloodguard, since the age began. We must walk, Thomas Covenant, and Revelstone is three hundred long leagues distant. Is your clothing dry? We must be on our way."

Covenant was ready; he had to get away from this place. He gathered himself to his feet and said, "Fine. Let's go."

However, the look that Atiaran gave him as he stood held something unresolved. In a low voice as if she were mortifying herself, she said, "Do you trust me to guide you, Thomas Covenant? You do not know me. I failed in the Loresraat."

Her tone seemed to imply not that she was undependable, but that he had the right to judge her. But he was in no position to judge anyone. "I trust you," he rasped. "Why not? You said yourself--" He faltered, then forged ahead. "You said yourself that I come to save or damn the Land."

"True," she returned simply. "But you do not have the stink of a servant of the Grey Slayer. My heart tells me it is the fate of the Land to put faith in you, for good or ill."
I felt automatic tension when first reading this passage, because Atiaran is already tormented about her past failure, and you know what Covenant did to her daughter is going to hurt her so much worse when she finds out.

On some level, Covenant seems to be burying from memory what he did the previous night to Atiaran's daughter--yet retains enough awareness of it to want to get out of the area as soon as possible. But he was in no position to judge anyone. Absolutely true!
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Post by Cord Hurn »

In Chapter 8 of [i]Lord Foul's Bane[/i] was wrote: After a time, he urged her to continue. "Can you tell me about the Loresraat?"

The bitter vehemence of her reply surprised him. "Do you remind me that I am of all people the least worthy to talk of these matters? You, Thomas Covenant, Unbeliever and white gold wielder--do you reproach me?"

He could only stare dumbly at her, unable to fathom the years of struggling that filled her spacious eyes.

"I do not need your reminders."

But a moment later she faced forward again, her expression set to meet the north. "Now you reproach me indeed," she said. "I am too easily hurt that the whole world knows what I know so well myself. Like a guilty woman, I fail to believe the innocence of others. Please pardon me--you should receive better treatment than this,"
What an ironic passage.
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Post by Cord Hurn »

In Chapter 8 of [i]Lord Foul's Bane[/i] was wrote:"In my years at the Loresraat, the High Lord was Variol Tamarnatha-mate son of Pentil. But he was old, even for a Lord, and the Lords live longer than other folk--and our Stonedown has had no news of Revelstone or Loresraat for many years. I do not know who leads the Council now."

Without thinking, Covenant said, "Prothall son of Dwillian."

"Ah!" Atiaran gasped. "He knows me. As a Lorewarden he taught me the first prayers. He will remember that I failed, and will not trust my mission." She shook her head in pain. Then, after a moment's reflection, she added, "And you have known this. You know all. Why do you seek to shame the rudeness of my knowledge? That is not kind."

"Hellfire!" Covenant snapped. Her reproach made him suddenly angry. "Everybody in this whole business, you and"--but he could not bring himself to say Lena's name--"and everyone keeps accusing me of being some sort of closet expert. I tell you, I don't know one dame thing about this unless someone explains it to me. I'm not your bloody Berek."

Atiaran gave him a look full of skepticism--the fruit of long, harsh self-doubt--and he felt an answering urge to prove himself in some way. He stopped, pulled himself erect against weight of his pack. "This is the message of Lord Foul the Despiser: 'Say to the Council of Lords, and to High Lord Prothall son of Dwillian, the the uttermost limit of their span of days upon the Land is seven times seven years from this present time. Before the end of those days are numbered, I will have the command of life and death in my hand.'"

Abruptly he caught himself. His words seemed to beat down the file like ravens, and he felt a hot leper's shame in his cheeks, as though he had defiled the day. For an instant, complete stillness surrounded him--the birds were as silent as if they been stricken out of the sky, and the stream appeared motionless. In the noon heat, his flesh was slick with sweat.

For that instant, Atiaran gaped aghast at him. Then she cried, "Melenkurion abatha! Do not speak it until you must! I cannot preserve us from such ills."

The silence shuddered, passed; the stream began chattering again, and a bird swooped by overhead. Covenant wiped his forehead with an unsteady hand. "Then stop treating me as if I'm something I'm not."

"How can I?" she responded heavily. "You are closed to me, Thomas Covenant. I do not see you."

She used the word see, as if it meant something he did not understand. "What do you mean, you don't see me?" he demanded sourly. "I'm standing right in front of you."

"You are closed to me," she repeated. "I do not know whether you are well or ill."

He blinked at her uncertainly, then realized that she had unwittingly given him the chance to tell her about his leprosy. He took the opportunity; he was angry enough for the job now. Putting aside his incomprehension, he grated, "Ill, of course. I'm a leper."

At this, Atiaran groaned as if he had just confessed to a crime. "Then woe to the Land, for you have the wild magic and can undo us all."

"Will you cut that out?" Brandishing his left fist, he gritted, "It's just a ring. To remind me of everything I have to live without. It's got no more--wild magic--than a rock."

"The Earth is the source of all power," whispered Atiaran.
His words seemed to beat down the file like ravens, and he felt a hot leper's shame in his cheeks, as though he had defiled the day. I like the wordplay involving "file" and "defiled". It's not something I have noticed, before.

Covenant's anger at being seen falsely as knowledgeable of the Land's situation actually makes it possible for him to admit to his leprosy, which he previously would have felt uncomfortable doing. But it feels more uncomfortable for him to accept the powerful image that Atiaran (and Lena, previously) have of him being powerful, heroic and wise. So he can discuss his leprosy if it gives him a chance to lower expectations of what he knows and what he can do. This is another moment of irony, as Atiaran is about to have her expectations of Covenant lowered considerably without an verbal persuasion from TC: Triock arrives to inform Atiaran of her daughter's rape.

"It's got no more--wild magic--than a rock."
Covenant fails to be persuasive here, forgetting that in this world stone has already been shown to have power that can be tapped and directed.
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Post by Cord Hurn »

Then the truly uncomfortable moment arrives, when Atiaran knows Covenant raped her daughter. I had this eerie, somewhat nauseous fascination with reading on to see what would happen to Covenant as a result of his violent act.
In [i]Lord Foul's Bane[/i] Chapter 8 was wrote:Slowly, Atiaran raised her head and spread her arms, as if opening her breast to an impaling thrust from the sky. Her face was covered in pain, and her eyes were dark craters of grief, looking inward on her compromised humanity. "Trell, help me," she breathed weakly. Then her voice gathered strength, and her anguish seemed to make the air about her ache. "Alas! Alas for the young in the world! Why is the burden of hating ill so hard to bear? Ah, Lena my daughter! I see what you have done. I understand. It is a brave deed, worthy of praise and pride! Forgive me that I cannot be with you in this trial."

But after a while, her gaze swung outward again. She climbed unsteadily to her feet, and stood swaying for a moment before she rasped hoarsely, "Loyalty is due. I forbid your vengenance."

"Does he go unpunished?" protested Triock.

"There is peril in the Land," she answered. "Let the Lords punish him." A taste of blood sharpened her voice. "They will know what to think of a stranger who attacks the innocent." Then her weakness returned. "The matter is beyond me. Triock, remember your Oath." She gripped her shoulders, knotted her fingers in the leaf pattern of her robe as if to hold her sorrow down.

Triock turned toward Covenant. There was something broken in the young man's face--a shattered or wasted capacity for contentment, joy. He snarled with the force of an anathema, "I know you, Unbeliever. We will meet again." Then abruptly he began moving away. He accelerated until he was sprinting, beating out his reproaches on the hard floor of the file. In a moment, he reached a place where the west wall sloped away, and then he was out of sight, gone frome the cut into the hills.

"Impossible," Covenant murmured. "Can't happen. Nerves don't regenerate." But his fingers hurt as if they were being crushed with pain. Apparently, nerves did regenerate in the Land. He wanted to scream against the darkness and the terror, but he seemed to have lost all control of his throat, voice, self.

As if from a distance make great by abhorrence or pity, Atiaran said, "You have made of my heart a wilderland."

"Nerves don't regenerate." Covenant's throat clenched as if he were gagging, but he could not scream. "They don't."

"Does that make you free?" she demanded softly, bitterly. "Does that justify your crime?"

"Crime?" He heard the word like a knife thrust through the beating wings. "Crime?" His blood ran from the cuts as if he were a normal man, but the flow was decreasing steadily. With a sudden convulsion, he caught hold of himself, cried out miserably, "I'm in pain!"

The sound of his wail jolted him, knocked the swirling darkness back a step. Pain! The impossibility bridged a gap for him. Pain was for healthy people, people whose nerves were alive.

Can't happen. Of course it can't. That proves it--proves this is all a dream.

All at once, he felt an acute desire to weep. But he was a leper, and had spent too much time learning to dam such emotional channels. Lepers could not afford grief. Trembling feverishly, he plunged his cut hand into the stream.

"Pain is pain," Atiaran grated. "What is your pain to me? You have done a black deed, Unbeliever--violent and cruel, without commitment or sharing. You have given me a pain that no blood or time will wash clean. And Lena my daughter--! Ah, I pray that the Lords will punish--punish!"

The running water was chill and clear. After a moment, his fingers began to sting in the cold, and an ache spread up through his knuckles to his wrist. Red plumed away from his cuts down the stream, but the cold water soon stopped his bleeding. As he watched the current rinse clean his injury, his grief and fear turned to anger. Because Atiaran was his only companion, he growled at her, "Why should I go? None of this matters--I don't give a damn about your precious Land."

"By the Seven!" Atiaran's hard tone seemed to chisel words out of the air. "You will go to Revelstone if I must drag you each step of the way."

He lifted his hand to examine it. Triock's knife had sliced him as neatly as a razor; there were no jagged edges to conceal dirt or roughen the healing. But the cut had reached bone in his middle two fingers, and blood still seeped from them. He stood up. For the first time since he had been attacked, he looked at Atiaran.

She stood a few paces from him, with her hands clenched together at her heart as if its pulsing hurt her. She glared at him abominably, and her face was taut with intimations of fierce, rough strength. He could see that she was prepared to fight him to Revelstone if necessary. She shamed him, aggravated his ire. Belligerently, he waved his injury at her. "I need a bandage."

For an instant, her gaze intensified as if she were about to hurl herself at him. But then she mastered herself, swallowed her pride. She went over to her pack, opened it, and took out a strip of white cloth, which she tore at an appropriate length as she returned to Covanant. Holding his hand carefully, she inspected the cut, nodded her approval of its condition, then bound the soft fabric firmly around his fingers. "I have no hurtloam," she said, "and cannot be take the time to search for it. But the cut looks well, and will heal cleanly."

When she was done, she went back to her pack. Swinging it onto her shoulders, she said, "Come. We have lost time." Without a glance at Covenant, she set off down the file.
Only in the context of Covenant being seen as a prophesied figure of salvation can I understand Atiaran's incredible show of forbearance, especially given Covenant's belligerent and self-concerned attitude toward Atiaran after she has just learned what he has done to Lena. For Covenant, the pain in his fingers makes the Land unreal. For me, Atiaran refusing Triock's request for violence against Covenant makes the Land unreal. And yet, Atiaran is the most realistically-described character in the Land that we have encountered, so far. I can visualize her more vividly than I can Drool, Foul, Lena, Trell, or Triock.
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Lord Foul's Bane Chapters 7 & 8

Post by dlbpharmd »

I recently started listening to Scott Brick's audiobooks, and I'm currently in TIW, but I wanted to come back and post some new thoughts here.

I probably posted this before, but just to recap: I read LFB for the first time when I was in 5th grade (circa 1979.) Obviously, no 5th grader should read these books, but they came recommended by an older friend in my community and he loaned them to me, and like all of you I was just captivated. But when I first read the rape scene, as a 5th grader, I didn't truly comprehend what was happening. It wasn't until years later that I understood.

Now I'm 53 years old, and the father of two wonderful daughters who are 21 and 18. When I came to that scene in chapter 7, I couldn't listen to it. Suddenly the violence had new meaning, a different intensity. I skipped ahead to chapter 8. And then later, Triock's anger...I felt it. Atiaran's hurt, I understood a little better than ever before.

I don't think I'll ever be able to read that scene or listen to it again, but still I know what happened and I know all of the consequences that are going to come from it, so I don't have to.
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