Moderator: Seareach
*half-stands, and finds himself in an awkward bow-legged squat* Well, I'm one of many people who noticed that the nature of the progression between Wards might have denied the Lords knowledge of all the Words...so I'll sort of stand and kind of be slightly recogniseddlbpharmd wrote:This answer makes all the sense in the world, and it's been proposed here on KW before, but I can't remember who said it. Stand up and be recognized!
Yeah, baby! That's what I'm talking about!!...but the names I want have suddenly fallen out of my head (except for the always stellar Morgan Fairchild).
)Great answer to a bad question. But re: Vain's partial transformation, I have always regarded that as an accident. Was this in fact necessary for his ultimate transformation?C.S.: After having discussed this with my friends who have also read the Second Chronicles, we have agreed that the sole purpose of "The One Tree" is to create the availability of Nom for "White Gold Wielder". Is this true, or was there some deeper purpose that did not come across so clearly?
Please. Do you really I think I would--in effect--waste an entire book just so I could introduce one character? "The One Tree" is crucial to "The Second Chronicles" in far more ways than I could possibly list here. However, I'll just mention that if Vain weren't partially transformed by the crisis of the One Tree, and if Findail weren't forced to trail after Covenant and Linden for so long, the eventual creation of a new Staff of Law would have been entirely impossible.
James: Greetings, Mr. Donaldson. Thanks much for allowing me to pose some questions.
(1) Why did Linden never make an attempt to use (or why did it never occur to anyone that she make an attempt to use) such things as the krill (which Covenant allowed Sunder to use), or Hollian's lianar (who died using it in an effort to alter the Sunbane), or Sunder's orcrest? At least until the time came for her to have to make use of Covenant's white gold ring.
(2) Vain demonstrated his ability to defend himself and others mightily on several occasions. Why did he refrain from going back into Revelstone or near the Clave the 2nd time? Couldn't he have used his hand gestures of power to protect against attacks aimed at him?
(3) How was the Creator able to offer to do certain things for Covenant at the end of The Power that Preserves (or able to heal Covenant from his deadly reaction to the antivenom in the "real" world), and not break the Arch of Time in so doing?
(4) How is "Atiaran" pronounced?
Thanks again!
James
OK, here goes.
1) There are too many reasons to list here (mainly because I'm sure I'll forget some of them), but I'll give you a few. a) Linden is hanging by her fingernails trying to cope with her vulnerability to the Sunbane, and she can't handle much more. b) She fears Covenant's surrender to Lord Foul, and all of her attention is focused on him. c) Nothing in her background or personality has prepared her to be a "warrior," and the whole idea of using "implements of power" as weapons goes against her nature. d) None of the "implements" you mention *belongs* to her. She isn't the kind of person who just takes precious things away from other people. e) The idea of "power" itself is foreign to her, and she has no inherent grasp on how to use it or what it can do. Only her desperation in Kiril Threndor, and the oblique knowledge gained by being possessed by a Raver, enable her to use Covenant's ring, and then the new Staff, at the end of the story.
2) Vain certainly has the power to defend himself. But he is, in a manner of speaking, a robot with very limited programming. He protects himself, and attacks Sunbane-warpped ur-viles: that's it. (With the one obvious exception that Covenant is allowed to command him once.) Other than that, he only does what he has to do to serve the purpose for which he was made. So, for example, he enters Revelstone the first time because he needs the iron heels of the old Staff, but stays outside the second time because (in terms of his programming) fighting the Clave is irrelevant to his purpose. Covenant and Linden are irrelevant to his purpose. Only Findail and the ring matter. (Remember that Vain's makers don't want to expose him to dangers--e.g. the full force of the Banefire--which may be powerful enough to damage him.)
3) OK, that does it. I'm not going to answer any more questions about the Creator(s). I think I've figured out what's wrong (I mean intellectually wrong) with this line of inquiry. It's rather like asking me whether Patrick Stewart and Leonard Nimoy ever get together when their Federation duties send them to Earth. An important and necessary distinction between "reality" and "fiction" is being blurred. The Land, the Arch of Time, and the Creator do not exist: I made them all up. That's what gives fiction its power. When fiction "works," the author's imagination is speaking directly to the reader's imagination, and thus a community which enriches both is brought into being. But this process depends entirely upon imagination, fabrication, invention, "lies" (falsehoods which have the gift of being "true" instead of "factual"). So any question that implies some sort of necessary relationship between my "fiction" and our "reality" is inherently illogical.
As to your specific question: When the Creator addresses and even effects Covenant, Covenant is in a state of transition between my fictional worlds (my fictional "Land" and my fictional "reality"). He isn't actually in the Land, but he hasn't actually returned to his "real world" yet. Therefore things literally "could go either way." And the same is true for Covenant's physical condition in my fictional "reality." Just because he has a negative reaction to the antivennin doesn't mean he can't "pull through." Stranger things happen in *our* reality all the time.
4) As far as I'm concerned, you can pronounce anything in my books any way you want to. You earned the sovereign right to do so by reading the books. But I understand your curiosity. As it happens, I pronounce Hollian: holly-ann, with the emphasis on HOL.
(06/07/2004)
LA used wild magic w/o TC's consent on at least 2 separate instances that I recall, so why would the circumstances make any difference in Kiril Threndor?Only her desperation in Kiril Threndor, and the oblique knowledge gained by being possessed by a Raver, enable her to use Covenant's ring, and then the new Staff, at the end of the story.
Because now she had learned (from her possession) when it is morally right, and when it is morally wrong, to use Covenant's ring. Particularly, that it could be morally right under the correct circumstances. And then the correct circumstances came along, and she was able to recognize them as such, and this left her free (as in morally okay with it) to do what needed to be done.dlbpharmd wrote:LA used wild magic w/o TC's consent on at least 2 separate instances that I recall, so why would the circumstances make any difference in Kiril Threndor?
I always pronounce it the Latin way: AH-tee-ahranWayfriend wrote:uh-TAY-er-in anyone?UrLord wrote:Oh, I pronounce Atiaran as Ay-TEE-a-ran
Ehm, that's what I do, maybe I wasn't clear.Variol Farseer wrote:I always say, when in doubt, go with the Italian vowels.amanibhavam wrote:I always pronounce it the Latin way: AH-tee-ahran
