Scale of people involved

[thoughtcube]

I've been thinking that one reason why the last chronicles feel "different" is that the scale of people involved changed quite a bit. In the first chronicles the people of the land are fighting for their lives against the despiser. In the second, they are less involved as the sunbane has pitted stonedown against stonedown, but still the people of the land appear and play a role. But in the third chronices, we have Liand as the representative of the people of the land - and even that goes away.

Now, of course the battle is for the entire earth in the third chronicldes, so the fate of all people living is in the balance. That's a huge scale. But it doesn't feel like it. Compare to TPTP where Mhoram leads Revelstone against the siege - we see the people of the land involved, struggle, worry about hunger and death and madness, etc. Whereas in the last chronicles, there is a battle in a woodhelven, but the people there are almost scenery. Otherwise, all we see are the main characters.

Overall, the last chronicles is a story about Covenant, Linden, Jeremiah, and a bunch of other non-residents of the land who fight against the Despiser. While the stakes involve others, it feels like a small-scale affair, at least to me.

[bikebryan]

How could it involve the people of the Land? They have all been held ignorant, by the Haruchai, of what should have been their birthright. They don't even know there is something worth fighting for!

[lurch]

..yea..so uniformed are they,,that Linden has to go back to BereK Halfhand's time to find them fighting for something..

Yet,,the Feroce get up and do what they can. The Dead certainly add their advice and even the ur-viles chip in thru-out the LC even as both sides of the coin. Fascinating it is,,the Feroce and the ur-viles are more involved in " saving" the Land than the people of the Land are involved. How very metaphoric it is..that all the female spirits held by SHE..will probably be of more influence on the future of the Land, than the current people of the Land..In a way, all of these characters are the only ones who knew something was wrong. The people of the Land are not part of the equation cuz they couldn't even see that things were not adding up.

[thoughtcube]

Well yes, the people of the land were ignorant. My point was more what effect that had on me as a reader - without them, it wasn't as emotional a struggle. Mhoram leading thousands of people in a struggle against a siege or Hile Troy leading an army had much more impact. The last chronicles felt "small scale". I just realized that and was curious if other people felt the same.

[SleeplessOne]

Well yes, the people of the land were ignorant. My point was more what effect that had on me as a reader - without them, it wasn't as emotional a struggle. Mhoram leading thousands of people in a struggle against a siege or Hile Troy leading an army had much more impact. The last chronicles felt "small scale". I just realized that and was curious if other people felt the same.

definitely, I've seen many mentions of the 'empty' Land on this site ..

I almost had to laugh at the end of the TLD when Linden despairs

"But all those people," Linden said sadly. "Millions of them. Tens of millions..."

SRD has spoken many times of never adding more world-building to a story than is necessary to that story, but I think his failure to even hint at the Land's community in the LC's severely undermined the sentiment Linden expresses in the epilogue; it's simply unearned to reflect upon or even mention the tens of millions of lives lost when they've been overlooked for the entire story.

Bikebryan has a point with regard to the Land's people being stripped of their agency by the Masters, and therefore unable to contribute meaningfully to the shaping of their own fate - but it doesn't necessarily mean SRD made the right choice by not depicting them *at all* (well, one woodhelvin aside) - I too felt it eroded my suspension of disbelief, and reduced the scale of the story, as you said in your OP Thoughtcube ...

[wayfriend]

The Ramen are people of the Land.

The Haruchai, the Giants, and the Insequent are, if not of the Land, are people of that world.

[Zarathustra]

How could it involve the people of the Land? They have all been held ignorant, by the Haruchai, of what should have been their birthright. They don't even know there is something worth fighting for!

The same thing could have been said about the 2nd Chrons. And yet, TC and LA felt that it was important enough for the people of the Land to be awoken to their plight, they left Sunder and Hollian behind to inform and rouse the people. Sure, it didn't work, but at least it was mentioned and considered. And we got to see several villages throughout The Wounded Land ... their depiction added much to our understanding of the plight of the Land.

The people of the Land could have very easily been involved in this story. Our heroes could have considered the damage done by the Masters to be serious enough to warrant doing something to reverse the damage, like telling every Woodhelven/Stonedown they encounter about Earthpower, letting Liand demonstrate his newfound legacy. They could have tried to raise the people of the Land much like Frodo and the other Hobbits roused the Shire to fight off Saruman. At the very least, the people of the Woodhelven which Linden saved might have shown just a tiny bit of curiosity for the great powers they just witnessed, and want to take part in something that transcended their understanding of their lives.

It's fiction. The author could have invented any means to involve the people of the Land. It just wasn't important to him, which (I believe) is thoughtcube's point.

[wdcebula]

one of the greatest failures of this final series was this exact issue. I understand the scale has changed and clearly we don't need to see the same old same old, but I was hoping for some sort of awaking following the battle that sent the people back to Lord's keep. overall this series was the weakest of anything he has ever written. very sad since this had such great possibility.

[thoughtcube]

Yes, as Zarathustra said, it was possible for SRD to write in more of the people of the land - I guess I'm surprised he didn't. They apparently weren't as important to him as things like Viles or Demondim or Ur-Viles or Waynhim.

Part of the reason I loved the land in the first chronicles was the people of the land, their cultures (stonedownor, woodhelven, lords), their communities, they felt part of the land in an integral way. More so than in other fantasy fiction btw.

The 2nd chronicles are so shocking because we love the people so much, and then see them basically corrupted into separate villages that hate each other. But at least we still see them, and see that virtue remains in some, and is worthy of redemption. And we end on a note of victory - the people can return to their true state. Then in the third chronicles, not only are they not redeemed, they are not even in the story, almost.

So, again, SRD could have written in more of the people. Even without earthpower, we could have been shown how stonedownors still differ from woodhelvenin, etc. It just seems like SRD didn't feel that was important enough to revisit one last time before finishing the chronicles for good.

Btw, on this note - how did the Masters actually control the entire land? There are 100 regular people for each Master, aren't there? Even though the haruchai are immensely powerful, it doesn't seem like they could conquer it by force.

[wdcebula]

thoughtcube--SRD could have made this work if he had had the folks from the village that the heroes rescued do something. they just sort of disappear. I enjoyed the sense of hugeness and the fact that some of the people in the world (like in the 2nd series with the thaumaturge (?)) had an agenda separate from Lord Foul but were not in agreement with the heroes. I hate to say it, but SRD fell way short on what he could have done with this entire last part of the series. As to the Master's controlling the Land...that never did make sense in any practical manner to me (I don't expect realism per se from fantasy work but it ought to make sense). it could have made sense but that wasn't explored, instead we got another glimpse into MANY things that SRD could have just left alone. alas, it is sad to admit that this series was poorly thought out poorly written and created a sense of detachment that I regret that he even bothered to write them.

[Dondarion]

I am normally a Donaldson apologist with TLCs, but here I have to agree with Cube (and the others in this post). Oftentimes during my read of TLCs (and TLD in particular), I would wonder this exact question, where are all the people at? Anywhere our heroes go, nobody is around. Granted, we have Kevin’s Dirt to conveniently keep the minions ignorant to what’s happening, but they are out there, aren’t they? I mean, Linden says “all those millions” in the end, doesn’t she? It’s almost like we don’t get to care as much as she does, because we don’t get to experience what they’re experiencing. And what exactly IS their perception of what’s going on? And if they have no perception, then shouldn’t the reader get to see how this looks (beyond just Liand)? I think the reader has a right to be included in the experiences of the people of this Land that our heroes (and anti-heroes) have cast their collective lots to live and die for. But, to get nothing but empty fields and plains wherever they choose to beam into, and caesure out of, seems to me unrealistic, and frankly lazy on the part of SRD.

[Zarathustra]

Don, I'm usually a critic of the LC, but I certainly don't think you could say it was lazy for SRD to leave this out ... if it was his intention from the beginning not to focus on this part of the story. That's just faithful execution of a plan. It may not have been the best decision, if that's the case, but I don't mind a story that focuses on the bigger players. I think he did try to at least show them that one time in FR, the Woodhelven that got destroyed. He has joked a couples times that this was a "kitchen sink" scene, and I think working in the presence of the Land's people was part of the mix.

I did enjoy seeing the people of the Land in previous Chronicles. But I also like an escalation of the powers and players involved in the LC. If he had succeeded in these areas--rather than let so many of those threads simply be clipped--I think it would have been a good tradeoff.

[Dondarion]

Zar: Fair enough. "Lazy" was not the correct word. Someone who writes about 6,000 pages or whatever of Chronicles with such a high level of intellect as SRD brings to his tale, is hardly a lazy writer. But, I imho yhe plot fell a bit short with the lack of any population interplay, and I'm not really sure we could say he always had that in mind (I'll give him the benefit of the doubt on that, but to what purpose would he have envisioned that from the outset?). It's funny how you as a usual critic, come to SRD's defense, whereas I, as more of an apologist, am the critic. But it's only one facet of the writer's approach we are talking about here, and I just felt something amiss from a human standpoint. I need to be around people, we need to be around people, that's what we are made for. And so when there's such a gaping absence of people like in these last books, it just feels a little lonely. A bit like a stage play, where all the main characters are on stage, and everything else is happening off stage. Okay, fine, but at lease talk about it!