How does Infelice know the Despiser's intent?

Book 3 of the Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant

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Mighara Sovmadhi
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How does Infelice know the Despiser's intent?

Post by Mighara Sovmadhi »

And what don't the Elohim know? For one, I don't think they know the true names of any of the Insequent. If they did, then the original Guardian of the One Tree would have been able to use that knowledge to stop Kenaustin Ardenol. All Insequent intercession in the affairs of the Earth would be open to being thwarted by such information, even, and the Elohim don't seem like they would've shirked this opportunity to humiliate their would-be humiliators (forgive that word!).

On the other hand, they know Her true name. And so, therefore, does Esmer. Maybe Esmer is the one who told them the Despiser's supposedly ultimate goal.

What if the Despiser himself told them? Misdirection? SRD in the GI vaguely suggests exactly this when he says that the Despiser's only logically possible ultimate intent is escape from Time/involved destruction of Creation (if you have access to the TLD forum, SkurjMaster has the relevant quote in a thread there).

Now for the deeper intent of this thread: Covenant early in AATE remarks that everyone in this situation has their own blind spot. What blind spots does each character/group have? Here are some (partly) confirmed examples:

1. She Herself doesn't know Her own true name. Arguably neither do Foul, Roger, the Ravers, or the croyel (else they could've just told it to Her to break out of Time--unless there'd be some problem with this way of breaking out that white gold doesn't involve).
2. The Elohim didn't know why the white gold wielder and the Sun-Sage were separate people (at least, they didn't know that they would be united as one person down the road instead of all along).
3. According to Esmer, quite a few lorewise and powerful folk didn't know Linden's reason to seek out the krill in Andelain.
4. Kevin didn't know that Foul's Lord-form was a pretense.
5. Timewarden Covenant might not have known where Jeremiah was (he says "if I ever even knew" or something upon his incarnation).
6. The ur-viles didn't know that the Waynhim kept Vain's secret safe.
7. Caerroil Wildwood didn't know the answer to the question he posed to Linden.

Without serious recall or rereading, I can't come up with any more cases of people missing crucial information in the series, but I recall(!) that there are more.
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Post by dlbpharmd »

I think Foul does know She's real name, but doesn't want to have anything to do with her because of her awesome power and ages-old beef with him.
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Re: How does Infelice know the Despiser's intent?

Post by Hashi Lebwohl »

Mighara Sovmadhi wrote:2. The Elohim didn't know why the white gold wielder and the Sun-Sage were separate people (at least, they didn't know that they would be united as one person down the road instead of all along).
This is because they hadn't gotten married yet, the two becoming "one flesh". Joan no longer has any valid claim on her ring so its rightful owner reverts to Covenant, who may give it to whomever he chooses.
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Re: How does Infelice know the Despiser's intent?

Post by dlbpharmd »

Hashi Lebwohl wrote:
Mighara Sovmadhi wrote:2. The Elohim didn't know why the white gold wielder and the Sun-Sage were separate people (at least, they didn't know that they would be united as one person down the road instead of all along).
This is because they hadn't gotten married yet, the two becoming "one flesh". Joan no longer has any valid claim on her ring so its rightful owner reverts to Covenant, who may give it to whomever he chooses.
Covenant and Joan were divorced. He has no claim on her ring. It belongs to Roger, her sole heir.
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Re: How does Infelice know the Despiser's intent?

Post by Hashi Lebwohl »

dlbpharmd wrote:Covenant and Joan were divorced. He has no claim on her ring. It belongs to Roger, her sole heir.
I suppose that depends upon whether or not you believe in divorce and the circumstances surrounding it. In centuries past, divorce was not an option except in certain rare cases and "contracting leprosy" was not one of those cases. Sure, we modern folk realize that divorce can be for a variety of reasons and that a divorce decree ends a marriage contract but that might not apply in the Land. *shrug*

Would Joan's ring rightfully become Roger's upon her death or would it revert to Covenant? Wouldn't she have relinqushed any legitimate claim to it upon receiving her divorce? If so, then the ring would not be rightfully hers but the text makes it clear that it is. Similarly, we are given the impression that Covenant's ring becomes Linden's at the end of WGW--he even tells her to pick it up because it is hers now; Covenant's death nullifies his claim on the ring.

Back to the original topic...I think Infelice is bluffing. Sure, anyone who knows anything about Foul knows that he wants to destroy the Arch of Time; his claims to want anything else are outright lies.
Foul's has two blind spots: 1) he cannot see, or chooses not to see, his own personal Despair and self-loathing--I think he hates what he is
and 2) I don't think he can think like a "normal" person--being Corruption personified, he is incapable of perceiving or even understanding the deisre to preserve something simply because it is beautiful. He knows only how to pervert something that someone else has made or done.
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Post by Cord Hurn »

Another intriguing question concerning the Elohim! I think becaue the Elohim know about Jeremiah's ability to contruct a trap for them, they reason that Foul wants Jeremiah to contruct a trap for somebody else. And who would Foul want to trap? Being vengeful, he would want to trap his old enemy the Creator as "payback" for being trapped within the Arch.
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Post by JIkj fjds j »

Cord Hurn wrote:Another intriguing question concerning the Elohim! I think becaue the Elohim know about Jeremiah's ability to contruct a trap for them, they reason that Foul wants Jeremiah to contruct a trap for somebody else. And who would Foul want to trap? Being vengeful, he would want to trap his old enemy the Creator as "payback" for being trapped within the Arch.
I don't believe that Jeremiah can trap the Elohim. It's probably that the Elohim fear being trapped that make Jeremiah's constructs or portals seem like prisons. When actually it may very well be more akin to prisms, transforming them from light speed into bands of pristine colour.
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Post by Cord Hurn »

I think Jeremiah can trap the Elohim, but he has no desire to do so.
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Post by wayfriend »

Yes.
In [i]The Last Dark[/i] was wrote:"So what are they afraid of?" Jeremiah asked. "I mean, the Elohim. I'm just a kid. Why are they scared of me? What do they think I can do that's worse than being eaten?"

"Infelice told us," he answered himself. "She thinks I'm going to trap them. And she knows I can do it. I can make a door they can't refuse. No matter how far they scatter, or how hard they try to hide. They can't refuse. That's part of who they are. They'll have to come if I make a door. I mean, the right door. The right size and shape. The right materials. I can construct a doorway that forces them. They'll have to pass through it.

"So of course she thinks I'll make a door they can't get out of." - the Worm is mere extinction. "That's what the Vizard wanted. It's what she would do if she were me." The prison which the boy will devise is eternal helplessness, fully cognizant and forever futile. "She thinks I'll trap the Elohim forever."

"But she doesn't know me, Mom." Jeremiah sounded almost smug. "She doesn't know what I've been learning all these years.

"I'm not crazy like the Harrow. I know I can't build anything big or strong enough to hold the Worm. But I can make a door that sucks the Elohim in. A door that takes them to a place where the Worm can't get at them. Only it won't be a prison because my door will let them leave whenever they want. I can keep them alive until they decide it's safe to come out."
He can.
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Post by JIkj fjds j »

Exactly.
Spoiler
It's just not in his nature to trap the Elohim in a prison of eternal helplessness. As he says, given the opportunity the Harrow would.
I keep thinking of Jeremiah's fairy castle construct, back at the front door to Linden Avery's house. As if to show us how the Elohim can find their way home.

*I really must read Part II of The Last Dark.
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Post by Cord Hurn »

Rune wrote:*I really must read Part II of The Last Dark.
Yes, you must, Rune! :) I highly recommend it! :soapbox:

I also recommend using the TLD dissections in Group Readings after you read each chapter, to further illuminate your journey! Jump right in! :read:


I don't think you'll regret it, but that's just my opinion. :2c:

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Post by wayfriend »

I think that, up until Jeremiah doesn't trap the Elohim, it's very much an open question as to whether he would or would not. Because no one is precisely sure how Lord Foul has "marked" him. Like Pietten, he may be a piece that is laid in stealth and used for a certain purpose at a critical time.
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Post by Mighara Sovmadhi »

The deductive-logic explanation sounds the most plausible independent on other evidence, maybe. In fact, the author seems to like playing with quasi-Christological concepts a lot, so him having the dark side of the Creator be trapped-Incarnate and the Resurrection be the event that brings about the apocalypse, lead me to believe that the audience could have figured out the Despiser's deeper purpose by reflecting on Jeremiah's talent and the history of the Creator-Despiser duality.

There is one other time I can think of off the top of my head where SRD did this, kind of, it was the "shadow on the heart of the Earth" stuff. Basically, the audience could have figured that out. If they'd abstracted outwards enough and noticed the quasi-symmetry of the Insequent and outsiders-to-Time vis-a-vis the Elohim, and kept track of SRD's habit of intensifying his stories towards some maximum for the concepts involved, they would have realized that there were, in fact, beings of power who cast a shadow over all that the Elohim did, and it was precisely the temporal outsiders.

Additional argument: the Despiser is the maximum of the concept of iniquity, sin personified, the archetype of evil, yadayadayada. The Elohim know this. The Elohim know what Jeremiah can do
Spoiler
(with Forbidding, a power that when invoked by the Forestals proved able to dissolve one of the Elohim, after all)
and therefore reason thus:
  • 1. A-Jeroth will do the most evil thing possible, if possible.
    2. Imprisoning the Creator would be the most evil thing possible.
    3. Jeremiah's talent can imprison the Creator.
    C. Therefore, the Despiser will try to corrupt Jeremiah into creating a prison for the Creator.
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