What was Really Happening in those Final Paragraphs?

[lurch]

I'm not even sure of the Time . Joan did create a caesure. The When of it all is subjective.

A Land without the sun will seem that way. Subjectively.

Fascinating! , isn't it.?..no difference between the subterranean and the terrain,
who can " see" into the dark and who can't.ect ect...all the possibilities to play with!!

Heres another question that deals with assumption..will Linden and Jerry et al,,also be in a sunless Land? Perhaps TC will be reaching out to Linden from the future..? Who Knows!

[lurch]

Wow..seems a bit of time stutter there itself..a double post..and I don't even know how I did that!

[thewormoftheworld'send]

I'm not even sure of the Time . Joan did create a caesure. The When of it all is subjective.

A Land without the sun will seem that way. Subjectively.

Fascinating! , isn't it.?..no difference between the subterranean and the terrain,
who can " see" into the dark and who can't.ect ect...all the possibilities to play with!!

Heres another question that deals with assumption..will Linden and Jerry et al,,also be in a sunless Land? Perhaps TC will be reaching out to Linden from the future..? Who Knows!

Those are interesting questions. I'm not sure how far west this gloaming effect extends at the moment. Remember that the sky to the east began to light up, like a promise of dawn, but then it stopped and the lighting remained the same as if the sun had stopped rising at a certain point. Another weird effect that hasn't been mentioned here yet: the stars appeared to get brighter, or perhaps come closer, just before they began to wink out of existence.

[Rigel]

Yes..that establishes " where". Yet..the tsunami...it strikes me as a great metaphor for " Sea Change"..a transformation. Again, the author harkens back to Shakespeare...beauty. So..I'm feeling a " interaction" here between the author and the reader, on the scale of the Thomas Convenant and Jeremiah of FR. Time is assumed,,yet the author makes no mention of it as he does Place. The Dark...is Mystery itself..the Unknown...the Future. All pretense must fall aside.

Time isn't mentioned?

Cav-Morin mused:

“Your time lies beyond our ken. You are needed then, not here. You are loved then, not here."

And this:

In the sequences of her life, he had not been absent for more than a few moments: that was obvious.

Only in subjective terms..seems to me. Look at " then". Its in the future from that POV. That sentence doesn't say exactly when the Need is..

But the Ranyhyn were there. So the time couldn't have been too far off.

[ninjaboy]

I'm not even sure of the Time . Joan did create a caesure. The When of it all is subjective.

A Land without the sun will seem that way. Subjectively.

Fascinating! , isn't it.?..no difference between the subterranean and the terrain,
who can " see" into the dark and who can't.ect ect...all the possibilities to play with!!

Heres another question that deals with assumption..will Linden and Jerry et al,,also be in a sunless Land? Perhaps TC will be reaching out to Linden from the future..? Who Knows!

Jerry? Who's Jerry?? Ohhhh you mean Jeremiah.
Right now I believe only TC and the Masters are in this 'sunless' Land - as on page 737 it is written:

"Later Covenant realised that Branl and Clyme were still with him. Wild magic and Joan's death had removed them from the caesure before the Arch healed itself, locking them out of their proper time forever."

However with the White Gold, Ranyhyn and haruchai 'with the inferred possibilities of wild magic' they should suffice to make a ceasure to take them back to their 'real time' I would have thought..

Either way I am really looking forward to whatever happens next..

[Hashi Lebwohl]

Joan's last caesure acted normally, collapsing all moments in time into one localized event in space, but it also had the effect of teleporting Covenant down onto the ocean floor with her. Her blasts of wild magic brought him back into the present where Joan was awaiting the tsunami--she was not inside a caesure. The dawn that should have seen a sunrise but didn't was three days (or is it four?) after Covenant and Linden split up--the next day after Jeremiah manages to restore himself.

No one is in the future at the end of the book.

[Vraith]

No one is in the future at the end of the book.

[/color]

I agree...or in the past, either...though 'narratively' Linden and crew might be behind this moment...I don't have my book handy to look.

[Zortag]

On my second read of AATE, I did make a time-line for the ending, to try to keep tabs on who was where & when. If the time when the company splits up is day #1, then...
Rest of day #1 is a travel day for both TC and Linden,
Night #1, Linden does her "cutting" thing.
Day #2 is, once again, a travel day for both TC & Linden.
Night #2 Linden attacked by Lurker, and TC is met by Feroce, but the TC/Feroce encounter is obviously after the Linden/Lurker encounter, but the two encounters are not separated by much time.
Day #3: Linden, Stave & Jerry take off and get to the "bone field" in the late afternoon. TC and the Humbled deal with the skest "attack" also in the afternoon. Jerry restores himself and TC enters Joan's ceasure about the same time, which is late afternoon.
Linden's "story" ends here. TC's does not end in late afternoon but at dawn, so TC's "end" is at least 12 hours after Linden's "ending".

As a side note, remember that Pahni and Bahpa left the company first, just before TC left; the Ardent took them to Revelstone, where they had the task of "making them listen to you". They have been "up North" for three whole days (before Jerry "returns"). And the giants have been unaccounted for for at least six hours.
Pahni & Bahpa's task has always been an interest of mine, especially taking into account SRD's frequent use of "mis-direction", and that brings up the question of who is it that Pahni and Bahpa have to make listen. The obvious answer is the Masters, and while that may well be the right one, there may be another, and that is the Dead. The Dead are ususally found in Andelain (sp?), but that region is under attack, and Loric's krill is gone; Andelain was very Earthpowerful, and with it gone the next most Earthpowerful site (other than Earthroot) is Glimmermere, just out the back door of Revelstone, where Pahni & Bahpa have been "dropped off". And who are the new members of the Dead, well there's Galt, Anele and Liand, all of whom had important "connections" with the Masters. Then throw in a whole host of people that the Masters rever, like the old Lords and the Bloodguard and you've got a very persuasive bunch, but you have to make the Dead listen to you.

[shadowbinding shoe]

For me the ending held a different meaning. The image that came to my mind was an undoing of the story of Genesis. At the end of the book we see the Creative acts of the fourth day being undone.

This fits wit Zortag's timeline. The next day will be critical if I'm right because that's the day when all the Plantlife, and Land itself will sink under the sea and be gone if nothing is done about it.

Pahni & Bahpa's task has always been an interest of mine, especially taking into account SRD's frequent use of "mis-direction", and that brings up the question of who is it that Pahni and Bahpa have to make listen. The obvious answer is the Masters, and while that may well be the right one, there may be another, and that is the Dead. The Dead are ususally found in Andelain (sp?), but that region is under attack, and Loric's krill is gone; Andelain was very Earthpowerful, and with it gone the next most Earthpowerful site (other than Earthroot) is Glimmermere, just out the back door of Revelstone, where Pahni & Bahpa have been "dropped off". And who are the new members of the Dead, well there's Galt, Anele and Liand, all of whom had important "connections" with the Masters. Then throw in a whole host of people that the Masters rever, like the old Lords and the Bloodguard and you've got a very persuasive bunch, but you have to make the Dead listen to you.

This is a great idea! I wonder how it will fit with Covenant's thoughts about being powerless on the personal level when you're all powerful. Will the Dead get off their high horses and become ordinary mortals again before they can pitch in?

[earthbrah]

Nice timeline, Zortag, very useful indeed.

Fascinating are a couple of events that happen more or less at the same time, mainly Jeremiah's self-restoration and TC's walking into a caesure.

There's been some good talk about the subjectivity of time in these last paragraphs. While I think everyone is when they are supposed to be, it's also clear that SRD has left this open for us to explore before TLD. But there is subjectivity of space as well, which seems just as important as time.

Causality and sequence are the essence of time, the aspects that keep it being what it is, and consequently keep the Land and Earth being what they are. But the same could be said of space. Andelain, Earthroot, Glimmermere, Muir Delenoth...whatever the place, it has some partiucular significance, either essentially or as provision. The "fixed" stars winking out seems more to do with space than with time, objects in space ceasing to occupy the spot that they have for millenia. The sun rising, then ceasing to rise seems to have more to do with time, but perhaps that's because it's the closest star.

OR, it could be that the subjectivity of space is a byproduct or consequence of time losing some of its sequentialness.

[I'm Murrin]

Just finished the novel, and too eager to talk about things to read this whole topic.

The final image was the Worm at work, beginning its feast on the Elohim. This is the way Donaldson has chosen to end the Land: By making all of the creation myths true at once. Truth in contradiction. The Elohim tell of the Worm devouring the stars until it fell asleep, and the earth forming around it. Now, it burrows through the earth, hunting down and devouring the Elohim - and at the same time it travels through the heavens, consuming stars. The events are seperate but the same.

[Mr.Land]

Just my two cents, of course, but based on the text, its hard to imagine how Covenant and the Haruchai can be anywhere except in some other time.

"Wild magic and Joan's death had removed them from the caesure before the Arch healed itself, locking them out of their proper time forever."

It would seem they are trapped. In the future, perhaps? Then again, this may be simple misdirection by Donaldson or a gross misinterpretation of the text by me. It wouldn't not surprise me! Keeping my fingers crossed for a bit more time travel. Covenant in one time and Linden in another while the Land rushes toward doom in both. I like it!

[thewormoftheworld'send]

Just my two cents, of course, but based on the text, its hard to imagine how Covenant and the Haruchai can be anywhere except in some other time.

"Wild magic and Joan's death had removed them from the caesure before the Arch healed itself, locking them out of their proper time forever."

It would seem they are trapped. In the future, perhaps? Then again, this may be simple misdirection by Donaldson or a gross misinterpretation of the text by me. It wouldn't not surprise me! Keeping my fingers crossed for a bit more time travel. Covenant in one time and Linden in another while the Land rushes toward doom in both. I like it!

The quote in the second paragraph above says that IF Covenant hadn't rescued Clyme and Branl before Joan's death, they would have been locked out of their proper time forever. But now they are back in their proper time. That's why he touched their chests with the "inferred possibilities of wild magic" during the time that their existence was still just the shadowy product of Joan's fear and imagination.

[thewormoftheworld'send]

Correction: My explanation was not quite on target. Joan's death would not have locked the Humbled out of their proper time, that would have been the effect of the caesure healing itself while they were still trapped within it. Joan's death was partially responsible for bringing them back out of it.

[Mr.Land]

Sorry, I'm just not seeing the IF in the paragraph above. Is it implied in other text?

[thewormoftheworld'send]

Sorry, I'm just not seeing the IF in the paragraph above. Is it implied in other text?

The word IF is not in the sentence you quoted previously. Touching the Humbled with the blade gave them some of the help they needed to be freed from the caesure. Joan's death completed their translation back into their proper time. It was only after Joan's death that he noticed the Humbled had taken complete form, and in their proper time. This was partially made possible by touching them with the krill's wild magic, and partially by Joan's death. Caesure's only exist for a brief period of time, and Covenant had to act quickly before it dispelled, trapping them forever.

Thomas Covenant has truly exceeded himself in these final pages of AATE.

[thewormoftheworld'send]

Here is the text you quoted from AATE:

Wild magic and Joan's death had removed them from the caesure before the Arch healed itself, locking them out of their proper time forever.

Here is my revision of the same text according to my understanding of the entire context:

"Wild magic and Joan's death had removed them from the caesure before they could be locked out of their proper time forever when the Arch healed itself."

[Mr.Land]

I finally got it. Thanks!

[peter]

I got half way through ATTE on my second reading and then I'm ashamed to say gave up the ghost. Just happened to be scanning the forum and found this thread. Now I realise I can't remember what happened at the end (above a general idea of cliffs and raging seas etc) and all of a sudden I want to know. Just as well I kept my place marked!

[Orlion]

You died?!