Covenant's Beard

[Zarathustra]

[Okay, I posted this one in another thread. But no one took me up on it, so I figured that maybe no one is reading that thread anymore and overlooking this point. If the mods don't like a double post, delete it.]

While rereading TIW today, it occurred to me that Covenant's beard trick is kind of pointless. How would it prove anything to arrive back in the "real" world without a beard? If he accepts that his body is still lying on the floor of his home while he's in the Land, then isn't it obvious that the body which is walking around in the Land and growing the beard ISN'T THE SAME BODY as the one lying unconscious on the floor of his home? If they are not the same body, then there's no discrepancy in one growing a beard and the other not growing one. Two bodies can have two different properties. There would be no contradiction either way.

But wait, you say, two bodies? Where did you get that?

Look at it this way. During LFB, his body in the real world was first in the street (after getting "hit" by the car), and then later in the hospital. No one ever claims they saw him disappear for a while. His body never went ANYWHERE. Just his mind.

Therefore, either he has one body for the real world and one for the Land (which is ridiculous), or he was never in the Land physically to begin with (which is what I've always claimed). Either way, his beard trick is pointless. He doesn't need a way to prove it's a dream because he already knows his body never goes anywhere.

For me, this settles it. He couldn't have physically gone to the Land as a physical place unless you accept that he has two bodies. Period.

[lurch]

...Paradoxes,,don't you love them? Donaldson is so full of paradoxes. The cool thing about them is that there are two elements, two sides, two realities that are required to make a paradox,,each in opposition to the other, and each as valid as the other..paradox. They drive folks crazy.

As soon as I get done with this coffee and post, I'll execute a portion of most homeowners paradoxes...Cut the lawn. Now,,we water and fertilize the grass ,,then we cut it all down,,and throw out the cuttings,,to the garbage! Then we water and fertilize the lawn....and cut it all down,,and throw the cuttings in the garbage. Over and over..what the heck is wrong with us? Make it grow, then cut it down,,make it grow,,then cut it down....????,,,oh well. I have friends who have gone with the bald look,,by choice. I think i'm starting to understand their choice...........MEL

[Warmark]

Hmm, dont want to start debating it again ( There seems to have been alot of discussions here before ) But for me the Land is real, And the Last line of WGW, i took to be my proof.

Therefore he must have two bodies. Period.

[Edge]

For me, this settles it. He couldn't have physically gone to the Land as a physical place unless you accept that he has two bodies. Period.

The debate over whether or not the Land is a 'real' place, has absolutely nothing to do with its being a 'physical' place. 'Real' does not mean 'physical'.

Likewise, the debate as to whether he was 'actually' there has nothing at all to do with the issue of his being 'physically' there.

either he has one body for the real world and one for the Land (which is ridiculous)

Says who? An astral body in the Land & a physical body in the 'real' world... nothing remotely ridiculous about it; sorry; next question?

[Ageless Stranger]

i think he may have meant two physical bodies. not one astral and one physical.

[Borillar]

Before the Second Chronicles, the concept that the Land was in Covenant's mind still held water for me. One detail I noticed recently that I had missed for a long time is that Warhaft Hoerkin's name for himself, "The Door", is the same name as the bar that Covenant goes to where he sees Susie Thurston. Bits like that make it easy to imagine that Covenant's subsconscious is constructing the Land for him.

But by bringing Linden into it, it became much tougher to support this concept.

[wayfriend]

Let's remember that the 'beard trick' wasn't about proving whether the Land was real or not!

He would have to find or make some discrepancy, some incontrovertible proof that the Land was a delusion. He could not trust his emotions; he needed logic, an argument as inescapable as the law of leprosy. [...] Clearly, he was not going to find any easy solutions to his dilemma. If he wanted proof of delusion, he would have to make it for himself.

Covenant isn't trying to see if the Land is real; Covenant is trying to see if the Land is a delusion. This is distinctly different: the onus is not on the Land, but on Covenant himself.

The Land may be unreal and yet not spring from Covenant's delusional mind. Covenant never cares to consider this choice. He never looks for an outside agency to blame for what he is perceiving. His concern is whether or not the Land is the projection of his own mind.

He needs the answer to that question in order to answer how he responds to it. He needs to know if he is a Designated Savior, or if he is lost in an adventure of self-healing (or self-anhilation).

He has already encountered the non-discontinuity phenomenon on his first visit. He could have dismissed the whole thing as a dream ... except for that phenomenon. It prevents him from being certain; there is something else going on; it may not be only a dream.

Of course the Land seems like a dream. It's no place on this earth. There is magic. The fact of his bodily persistence in this world is only one more clue in a pile of clues pointing to a dream. But the question still remains ... if it is a dream, why is Covenant restored before he returns? This question remains enough to cast doubt on the dream view. And Covenant wants to eliminate that doubt.

[Zarathustra]

An astral body in the Land & a physical body in the 'real' world... nothing remotely ridiculous about it; sorry; next question?

Nothing remotely ridiculous about an astral body growing a beard? Okay, then my next question is: should Gillette be looking into this potential market by offering their new line of astral razors?

[Warmark]

If we ae talking about astral bodies, would you then consider it rediculous for there to be an afterlife?

It would be much the same thing, our 'real' body would be left here, while our other would go to the afterlife etc whatever you want to call it.

[Variol Farseer]

Careful, Warmark: a lot of people (not I) do consider that very thing ridiculous.

However, some of those same people don't consider it ridiculous to talk about uploading the entire contents of a human brain to a computer so that the mind can go on living a virtual life after the body has died.

Although that idea demonstrably is ridiculous, for reasons inherent in quantum mechanics and information theory. If you tried to do it electromagnetically, the current required to carry that much data in a reasonably short time would also be enough to fry every cell in the brain. And then there's the problem of building a computer that could accurately simulate the parallel processing done by 10 billion neurons.

I consider the idea of an afterlife vastly more probable, on the grounds that it would require an omnipotent and omniscient God to pull the whole stunt off. Which is why I don't have any particular problem with the question of Covenant's translation into the Land, particularly when we see the Creator involved.

[Warmark]

Careful, Warmark: a lot of people (not I) do consider that very thing ridiculous.

I am not questioning anyones beliefs, but, if people can believe there is a afterlife, which would require you to have a body or some sort - be it astral or otherwise - then the idea of you having a body in the land doesnt seem at all rediculous.

Which is why I don't have any particular problem with the question of Covenant's translation into the Land, particularly when we see the Creator involved.

Exactly if people in this world believe God will take us somewhere when we die, then why not when we are living?

For me it became very difficult to deny the Land as soon as other were affected by it.

[ur-bane]

Now, IIRC, Covenant continued shaving throughout the Chronicles, but it very quickly became a force of habit, or necessity...a way to steady himself. He had given up on proving the Land a delusion, but still shaved at what sometimes could be called the most inappropriate times.

Just as his VSE was vital to his survival in his original world, The "Beard Trick" was vital to his survival in the Land.

In essence, shaving was his "VSE of the Land."

[Avatar]

Interesting twist there on a question which we've discussed before (all over the place).

I would just like to note however, that not all concepts of an afterlife necessarily require a body, physical, astral or otherwise. Not all of them even require a consciousness. (An idea I find ridiculous.)

--Avatar

[Nav]

One thing I noticed in Runes (and I submitted it to Romeo as something that SRD might want to look to change in the paperback) is that, during her escape from Mithil Stonedown, Linden curses herself for not maintaining the physical conditioning she had built up during her previous travels in the Land with Covenant.

Reading this felt wrong straight off the bat, as it implies a direct physical connection to the Land. If the stamina Linden acquired was still with her in her own world, then she hadn't left the Land in exactly the same condition that she had arrived in.

[Zarathustra]

Hey, someone still reading my little thread!

Yes, your point is well made. However, I don't think it is accidental. I think SDR intentionally tries to blur the line between the Land being real and a dream.

Something I've been noticing lately in PTP is the chapter that starts with Mhoram's perspective without Covenant in the Land at all. I didn't remember SDR ever doing this. I seem to remember him even saying in the intro to Gilden Fire (DoR) that one reason he was willing to take out the chapter was because it violated the Land-from-Covenant's-perspective. (Hile Troy's passages in TIW were okay because he was from the 'real' world).

So does this mean the Land is real? Not really. That chapter could be a glimpse into his subconscious, meaning that since he's not in the Land yet, the Land is still running in the background of his consciousness; it fully takes over his consciousness when he's "in" it. Also, his mental state could mean that he's already half-way there anyway.

Something else I've noticed: the Bloodguard leave the Lords' service at exactly the same time that Covenant stops taking care of himself physically. Are the bloodguard symbols of his rigid, "absolute" practice of performing his visual inspections for injuries?

[wayfriend]

Something I've been noticing lately in PTP is the chapter that starts with Mhoram's perspective without Covenant in the Land at all. I didn't remember SDR ever doing this. I seem to remember him even saying in the intro to Gilden Fire (DoR) that one reason he was willing to take out the chapter was because it violated the Land-from-Covenant's-perspective. (Hile Troy's passages in TIW were okay because he was from the 'real' world).

I think it was more a matter of GF's POV was too soon, not categorically wrong. It takes some running room to set up the story enough to where a Land character POV won't disrupt the balance of ambiguity and would be beyond the point where real/unreal mattered to the reader.