B*tch slapped!! (spoilers)

[Hashi Lebwohl]

Her name is irrelevant. The only things that matter are that Linden discovered a way to heal Elena, give the Waynhim and ur-viles a new Wyrd, and helped She heal herself and return to where she belongs.

[Kevin BeerDrinker]

Are there any parts of TLD that struck you as funny, even considering the tone or setting?

I'll have to think about it, but on a related note: as someone who watched a lot of movies in the 80's, I kept thinking of The Worm of The World's End as a giant Sta-Puft marshmallow man.

[elksabe]

I think my initial issue with Her being the instrument that ultimately took Foul down (in the oh so dramatically built up final reckoning, the culmination of 10 books, etc.) was that She wasn't introduced until the third series.

Surely, it was going to be something woven into the story from WAY back, no? SRD is good at that. (e.g. Theomach/Brinn).

I guess I was just waiting on something that was going to make me go back and look at previous books. Instead, I just had to flip back a few pages...

[Innominate Theurgist]

Her name is irrelevant. The only things that matter are that Linden discovered a way to heal Elena, give the Waynhim and ur-viles a new Wyrd, and helped She heal herself and return to where she belongs.

Well-said, sir. She was Linden's final crucible, in that regard.

That aside, I will always think of her as Diassomer. If not, she might as well be called Ennoia or Sophia, but I digress...

[dlbpharmd]

Surely, it was going to be something woven into the story from WAY back, no? SRD is good at that. (e.g. Theomach/Brinn).

I agree that this worked out well, although by accident. Like She, SRD thought of the Insequent merely as a necessary plot device to help the characters get from one place (or time) to another. Having The Theomach turn into AHKA was really cool.

However, unlike the Insequent, She really didn't turn out to be anything much. Yes, she's a really pissed off god, but what was her purpose in the story? I said in another thread She was a source of power for Kevin's Dirt, but SRD could have easily conjured up some other bane under Mount Thunder to explain that. After all, we've known from the beginning there were many banes (other than the Illearth Stone) hidden there.

Did SRD just need her as a plot device to smack Foul down at the end? Or, did he need some way to give Elena and the demondim spawn peace?

Why was She in the story?

[iQuestor]

Surely, it was going to be something woven into the story from WAY back, no? SRD is good at that. (e.g. Theomach/Brinn).

I agree that this worked out well, although by accident. Like She, SRD thought of the Insequent merely as a necessary plot device to help the characters get from one place (or time) to another. Having The Theomach turn into AHKA was really cool.

However, unlike the Insequent, She really didn't turn out to be anything much. Yes, she's a really pissed off god, but what was her purpose in the story? I said in another thread She was a source of power for Kevin's Dirt, but SRD could have easily conjured up some other bane under Mount Thunder to explain that. After all, we've known from the beginning there were many banes (other than the Illearth Stone) hidden there.

Did SRD just need her as a plot device to smack Foul down at the end? Or, did he need some way to give Elena and the demondim spawn peace?

Why was She in the story?

I think 'She' was written in to give Linden her very own Lord Foul. SHe was especially repulsive and powerful against Linden's weakest traits and darkest fears.

[elksabe]

[quote="dlbpharmd"]

Did SRD just need her as a plot device to smack Foul down at the end? Or, did he need some way to give Elena and the demondim spawn peace?

Why was She in the story? [/quote]

This is what I was getting at I suppose. It just seemed a bit shallow that the She was the final thing/being/force/plot-device that dealt the final blow to Foul.

The way things had been so intricately intertwined and constructed, it seemed to not do the first 2 trilogies justice in my mind.

It was, however, a really cool connection and resolution to the ur-Viles. I thought that was well done.

[Horrim Carabal]

I agree with the disappointment over SWMNBN's name. I completely missed it until I read your comments. I thought she hadn't been named! "I am MYSELF" is not a name.

At least it wasn't "Moonchild".

[Trumpet77]

There's no more danger in knowing her name since She is gone.
I liked my initial reaction to the Fist of God moment as being, as the Arch was finally open, the one and only time the Creator could safely act and he acts.....perfectly.
Then I learn it was She.....still kinda cool. Not as much though.

I don't mind that it was SHE as SRD that she might even be more powerful than foul - but with the arch open a cameo by the creator at this time as I initially thought may have been cool

[shadowbinding shoe]

Her name is irrelevant. The only things that matter are that Linden discovered a way to heal Elena, give the Waynhim and ur-viles a new Wyrd, and helped She heal herself and return to where she belongs.

Well-said, sir. She was Linden's final crucible, in that regard.

That aside, I will always think of her as Diassomer. If not, she might as well be called Ennoia or Sophia, but I digress...

Diassomer Mininderain was the name of Kestenessen's mortal lover so it couldn't be She's original name. It's possible that the female swallowing male destroying being we meet in AATE was actually the combination of She and Diassomer Mininderain's powers and purposes and Diassomer Mininderain was the driving force in this being.

Not much proof (aside from the name) for this but this whole plot felt rushed.

My take on the lack of name on rereading is that naming this being diminishes her and is an attempt to control her. I AM MYSELF is the feminist answer to the attempt to categorize the female force of creation.

[lurch]

b@*ch slapped indeed!!..quite the reversal , a character so horrendous doing something that brings a YAY! from the reader...Much like the Lurker and the Worm,yes?...Its the opposite of a good character doing something so wrong. Subjectivity of good and bad on display.,,and of course, the Power of Hope demonstrated.

[dlbpharmd]

Her name is irrelevant. The only things that matter are that Linden discovered a way to heal Elena, give the Waynhim and ur-viles a new Wyrd, and helped She heal herself and return to where she belongs.

Well-said, sir. She was Linden's final crucible, in that regard.

That aside, I will always think of her as Diassomer. If not, she might as well be called Ennoia or Sophia, but I digress...

Diassomer Mininderain was the name of Kestenessen's mortal lover so it couldn't be She's original name. It's possible that the female swallowing male destroying being we meet in AATE was actually the combination of She and Diassomer Mininderain's powers and purposes and Diassomer Mininderain was the driving force in this being.

Not much proof (aside from the name) for this but this whole plot felt rushed.

My take on the lack of name on rereading is that naming this being diminishes her and is an attempt to control her. I AM MYSELF is the feminist answer to the attempt to categorize the female force of creation.

This is incorrect. Kasty's mortal lover was Named Emnareau (sp?) Vrai. Diassomer Mininderain was the topic of Sunder's song in TWL, the "maid of might" who ran off with the Creator's enemy.

[wayfriend]

That aside, I will always think of her as Diassomer. If not, she might as well be called Ennoia or Sophia, but I digress...

Early on, Covevant does seem to say that Diassomer is SWMNBN.

"But being trapped in Time is different for Love than it is for Despite." Covenant frowned again. "This is all just words." Then he resumed. "It outraged the Despiser, but it made Diassomer Mininderain insane. The Despiser tricked her. And the Creator can’t free her without dismantling what he created.

[...]

Linden could believe that the bane was Diassomer Mininderain as Covenant had described her, The mate of might - If so, its powers - Hers - were beyond measure. She had gone mad and slumbered, instead of tearing Her way out of the depths to ravage the Earth, because She did not crave simple destruction. She hungered instead for mortal lives that could love and be loved.

But later on, Donaldson speaks of them as separate.

The evil that had consumed Diassomer Mininderain and Emereau Vrai and countless others was certain of its prey.

She grasped the first spectre shrieking past her: a woman who could have been anyone, Diassomer Mininderain, Sara Clint, Joan herself, anyone at all.

The discrepency might be partially accounted for by the fact that SWMNBN "becomes" what she consumes. Identities merge.

And on yet another hand, we have Diassomer being only a myth, inspired by SWMNBN.

Hers was the tale which had given rise to that of Diassomer Mininderain, seduced and misled; abandoned to darkness.

Which falls on the side of She NOT being named Diassomer, if anything.

Confused.

[Savor Dam]

Diassomer Mininderain is the name given to She by the people of the Land who originated the tales that grew into the story Sunder tells in TWL. It stands to reason that no mortal under the Arch could possibly know the real name of any Eternal.

Look at how many names Foul has among the Landspeople...and none is probably the name that Creator or She called that entity when all three existed outside of Time!

[lurch]

...Betty...

[Vraith]

...Betty...

So...is Al the creator's name? Or just what she can call him when she call's him?

[lurch]

good point!..hhhmmm, howabout Mary Lou?

[hurtloam]

...Betty...

So...is Al the creator's name? Or just what she can call him when she call's him?

So then SWMNBN's name is Benny?

[wayfriend]

It stands to reason that no mortal under the Arch could possibly know the real name of any Eternal.

An excellent notion as well.

We have reason to believe that Esmer knew it though ... don't we? Is it possible that Covenant, as Time Warden, knew it as well?

Here is the thing that interests me and confounds me the most. We know that at the end She cried, “I AM MYSELF!”

But what transpired that she came to this realization?

With senses other than vision or hearing or touch, she recognized the Demondim-spawn. They stood like kings in the wreckage of their eldritch legacy. Every visage among them now shone like the loremaster’s. The proportions of their bodies were changing, as if they were becoming human; sharing the loremaster’s transfigured spirit. They seemed taller.

In unison, they chanted at the bane: a paean or invocation as alien as their guttural speech, and as incomprehensible. With every rise and fall, every beat, their hymn appeared to accrue peril, as if they were hazarding more than their own destruction; as if the accumulation of their words threatened the pediments of reality. And yet their eagerness was plain on their eyeless faces. Somehow they had arrived at a crisis of extermination or apotheosis toward which they had striven for millennia.

They may have been extolling the bane—or forbidding Her.

Her response was a cry that sent spasms through the gutrock for leagues in all directions:

“I AM MYSELF!”

It sure looks to me like the ur-viles chanting was what led to the cry. They chanted at the bane. Is there a better interpretation?

Which makes me wonder: did the ur-viles give She her name? Or did they induce her to know her own name through some means? What else would the chanting be for?

And was it the acceptance of the freed female spirits into themselves that gave the ur-viles the knowledge or capacity to utter this hymn? Or were they merely waiting for those spirits to escape She before they freed Her (so that she would not take them with her)?

The only thing that kind of makes sense is that the aspect of "accrued peril" involved with this hymn stems from the fact that giving She her name would result in "a cataclysm of such rage that it shatters the whole of Gravin Threndor". So it is both good, and dangerous. Apotheosis.

[Vraith]

Which makes me wonder: did the ur-viles give She her name? Or did they induce her to know her own name through some means? What else would the chanting be for?

And was it the acceptance of the freed female spirits into themselves that gave the ur-viles the knowledge or capacity to utter this hymn? Or were they merely waiting for those spirits to escape She before they freed Her (so that she would not take them with her)?

The only thing that kind of makes sense is that the aspect of "accrued peril" involved with this hymn stems from the fact that giving She her name would result in "a cataclysm of such rage that it shatters the whole of Gravin Threndor". So it is both good, and dangerous. Apotheosis.

I think they induced, and yes the chanting was how.
Because: They [and their ancestors, it begins with the Viles] had been seduced and reduced, betrayed, led from Beauty to self-loathing and hate.
Trapped and coerced into other than themselves. AND by the same Being.
YET: in time, they learned, they worked and altered and reframed. The amalgamation with the Lost Women was the final step in their transformation [an apotheosis-like thing, as you say]...and a sort of Rosetta Stone that allowed the ur-Viles to speak to SHE "in her own language." To guide her...to show her the pathway out of [or through] the pain/betrayal. Embodied empathy from those who have already walked the same way.
And, of course the peril...it's a risk and race: Does SHE come into her "Power" before or after she comes into her "Sanity." Does she recall her "Name" before or after she comprehends her "Place."