The Gradual Interview

Post by **aliantha** » Fri Aug 19, 2005 5:03 pm

Variol Farseer wrote:Strictly speaking, it was way before MS-DOS as well. There was CP/M back in 1977, but the number of microcomputers running the OS off of C: drive could have been counted on the fingers of one elbow.

So be careful, aliantha, before picking technical nits. There's always a bigger pedant.

Shows ya what I know, huh? Thanks for setting me straight, VF.

Post by **duchess of malfi** » Sat Aug 20, 2005 3:29 am

Wayfriend wrote:

Lord Foul the Despiser Error Message.

That is a classic.

Post by **Variol Farseer** » Sat Aug 20, 2005 5:55 am

aliantha wrote:Shows ya what I know, huh? Thanks for setting me straight, VF.

Oh, don't sweat it! I was mostly having fun with what you said. It reminded me rather of the old Usenet rule that any post criticizing someone's spelling or grammar will itself contain an error of the same kind. It is both tempting and dangerous to pick other people's nits; one so exposes one's own. I know it generally works that way when I open my yap!

Big fleas have little fleas
Upon their backs to bite 'em,
And little fleas have lesser fleas,
and so, ad infinitum.

Post by **dlbpharmd** » Sat Aug 20, 2005 12:24 pm

Big fleas have little fleas
Upon their backs to bite 'em,
And little fleas have lesser fleas,
and so, ad infinitum.

LOL! Thanks for this, you started my day off right!

Post by **Edge** » Sat Aug 20, 2005 12:38 pm

Variol Farseer wrote:
aliantha wrote:Shows ya what I know, huh? Thanks for setting me straight, VF.
Oh, don't sweat it! I was mostly having fun with what you said. It reminded me rather of the old Usenet rule that any post criticizing someone's spelling or grammar will itself contain an error of the same kind. It is both tempting and dangerous to pick other people's nits; one so exposes one's own. I know it generally works that way when I open my yap!

Big fleas have little fleas
Upon their backs to bite 'em,
And little fleas have lesser fleas,
and so, ad infinitum.

Shouldn't that read, 'and so on, ad infinitum'?

- Sorry, couldn't resist.

Post by **aliantha** » Mon Aug 22, 2005 4:14 pm

Post by **Furls Fire** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 8:40 pm

From the GI wrote:Brian Gannon: Hi,
I have just one quick question for you. Have you ever thought of writing a short story on the giant story of 'Baghoun The Unbearable and Thelma Two-Fist who tamed him'? (forgive my poor spelling from memory). I've always wanted to hear that story.

Thanks

Bri

Frankly, I've always wanted to hear that story myself. <grin> But for now, I'm afraid this falls into the category of RAFO.

(08/24/2005

Looks like we're gonna be meeting up with some Giants before this thing is all done!!

Post by **dlbpharmd** » Wed Aug 24, 2005 11:12 pm

You beat me to it, Furlsy!

Post by **Furls Fire** » Thu Aug 25, 2005 1:14 am

Post by **Variol Farseer** » Thu Aug 25, 2005 5:22 pm

Edge wrote:Shouldn't that read, 'and so on, ad infinitum'?

- Sorry, couldn't resist.

Of course it should, but then it wouldn't scan. In other words, it wasn't an error in my post, but in the original poem, which, as I have just managed to discover, is credited to Augustus DeMorgan. So blame him.

There is no such difficulty in the earlier version by Jonathan Swift:

So, naturalists observe, a flea
Has smaller fleas that on him prey;
And these have smaller still to bite 'em;
And so proceed ad infinitum.

Post by **Warmark** » Thu Aug 25, 2005 8:43 pm

Furls Fire wrote:
From the GI wrote:Brian Gannon: Hi,
I have just one quick question for you. Have you ever thought of writing a short story on the giant story of 'Baghoun The Unbearable and Thelma Two-Fist who tamed him'? (forgive my poor spelling from memory). I've always wanted to hear that story.

Thanks

Bri

Frankly, I've always wanted to hear that story myself. <grin> But for now, I'm afraid this falls into the category of RAFO.

(08/24/2005
Looks like we're gonna be meeting up with some Giants before this thing is all done!!

I've always wanted to hear that story.

Post by **Edge** » Thu Aug 25, 2005 8:54 pm

Variol Farseer wrote:
Edge wrote:Shouldn't that read, 'and so on, ad infinitum'?

- Sorry, couldn't resist.
Of course it should, but then it wouldn't scan. In other words, it wasn't an error in my post, but in the original poem, which, as I have just managed to discover, is credited to Augustus DeMorgan. So blame him.

His poetic license is hereby revoked.

Post by **wayfriend** » Wed Sep 07, 2005 9:27 pm

In the Gradual Interview was wrote:Greg Larson: Mr. Donaldson,
I first heard of Chronicles of Thomas Covenant from my 7th grade reading teacher, Mrs. Fritsch. (later to become Mrs. Wheeler) She had a Lord Foul's Bane poster and I was sold!

I want a Lord Foul's Bane Poster!!!!

Post by **dlbpharmd** » Wed Sep 07, 2005 9:29 pm

There's a poster???!

Post by **dlbpharmd** » Thu Sep 08, 2005 1:32 am

Funny how sometimes a often asked question brings such a wonderful answer from SRD:

Greg Larson: Mr. Donaldson,
I first heard of Chronicles of Thomas Covenant from my 7th grade reading teacher, Mrs. Fritsch. (later to become Mrs. Wheeler) She had a Lord Foul's Bane poster and I was sold!
I have read both trilogies and am very excited to see 'Last Chronicles' come out!
I am in the process of rereading the first of the series again and once again find myself falling in love with the Bloodgaurd! How did you come up with the idea for the Bloodguard?

Thank you so much for sharing your imagination with the rest of of! It is truly inspiring!

As I keep saying, I can't explain how my imagination works. Details aside, however, I had three guiding concepts in my creation of the Land and its peoples. 1) The Land is the opposite of leprosy. 2) My story in the first "Covenant" trilogy is the opposite of Tennyson's in "The Idylls of the King." Tennyson took one heroic, romantic, mythic character, Arthur, and surrounded him with ordinary, fallible, self-conflicted, and (to coin a word) debase-able human beings--with the result that the grand dream of Camelot failed. I took one ordinary, fallible, self-conflicted, debase-able human being and surrounded him with heroic, romantic, mythic characters--with the result that the human being eventually discovered a capacity for grandeur in himself. 3) My story is one of extremes: it's about people who push their own beliefs and personalities beyond all rational limits. So, in the case of the Bloodguard, mere fidelity isn't enough: it has to be deathless, sleepless, super-human fidelity or nothing. For Kevin, it was victory or nothing. For the Giants, it was pure untarnished love of life or nothing. And for Lord Foul, it's (for lack of a better term) absolute transcendance or nothing. Only a few characters--Lord Mhoram, Saltheart Foamfollower, Covenant himself--find salvation between the extremes.

(09/07/2005)

Post by **wayfriend** » Thu Sep 08, 2005 2:02 pm

dlbpharmd wrote:Funny how sometimes a often asked question brings such a wonderful answer from SRD

\
Had it been noted elsewhere the connection to Idylls ?? This is news to me.

But I still want a poster.

Post by **dlbpharmd** » Thu Sep 08, 2005 7:03 pm

So do I - I didn't even know there were posters.

Post by **Warmark** » Thu Sep 08, 2005 9:41 pm

I want a poster!

Post by **aliantha** » Fri Sep 09, 2005 5:48 pm

Me too!

Post by **Alynna Lis Eachann** » Fri Sep 09, 2005 6:22 pm

Ditto on the poster! What a great answer, though. It's so rare to get a straight answer from SRD.

LOL, actually I guess this wasn't a straight answer for the person who sent the question, but it sure put things in perspective for me.

Kevin's Watch

Kevin's Watch

The Gradual Interview