Kevin's Watch

*bump* for Joy!! And everyone else...

This was a fun one!!

i thought it was pretty obvious what it was...



what was he talkin about when he named the second book the illearth war?


you people are thinkin to hard about this..not everythings gonna have 90 billion meanings

SRD just answered this on the GI....

There is no such thing. The original title was "Lord Foul's Problem" before it got Lesterized. Lester's title, not SRDs.

on the same kinda topic...
what was the power that preserves?
was it mhoram realising that despair could be used to defend the Land, or was it covenant realising that his unbelief was a paradox and that he could still preserve the Land even if he didnt believe in it?

The power that preserves is Lysol, isn't it?

It's the Stone

I know, I know Mr. D did answer this one (It was my question btw.) But, I still say...it's the Stone and I will carry that declaration to the grave if I must.

Based on Tolkien's usage if the word "Isildur's Bane", "Durrin's Bane" - Bane seems to indicate someone or something that leads to the downfall of the object of the Bane (Durrin, Isuldur).

Based on the entire context of the TCOTC trilogy, I would say that Lord Foul's Bane must be Thomas Covenant.

<b>The Arch of Time is Lord Foul's Bane</b>

Why? You ask?

Because it binds him and he can't overcome it. It holds him prisoner. He must defeat The Arch before he can do what he really wants...and that is to destroy and corrupt everything that The Creator has made.

The Land is insignificant to Foul, all he's looking to do is break away from The Arch and The Land to wreak terror across "the cosmos."

Covenant IS the White Gold....the chosen of The Creator...indirectly making him a tool...but his freewill was the paradox.

Covenant can't be Foul's Bane, because the paradox of White Gold swings both ways...

The books tell us that Covenant could save or damn The Land...Meaning that he is just as capable of serving Despite as he is of serving The Creator.

Foul doesn't see Covenant as a Bane....Foul still saw Covenant as a vessel for delivering the key to The Arch of Time into his hands until his own defeat.

Luckily for The Land, Covenant chose to serve The Land and The Creator...

The Creator took a big risk in choosing Covenant...the paradox...An outcast in his own country and a resurrected fallen hero in The Land...

So, leaving us with the one thing that is , has, and always will be Lord Foul's Bane....The Arch of Time that binds him.

The Illearth Stone is The Land's Bane...not Foul's.

A Bane is something you can't beat, something you can't overcome...

True, Lord Foul did put banes in the earth...but The Illearth Stone wasn't a bane to him.
The Illearth Stone is simply another tool...If Foul could've used anything other than White Gold to break The Arch, don't you think he would've used it by now?

It's also true that Foul needed the SoL to be wrested from Drool so he could take The Stone. Clearly, Drool wielded more power than Foul...but The Stone was used by Foul as a weapon to destroy the beautiful Land and it's inhabitants.


Which is why Foul wanted Wild Magic...which leads us back to the paradox.

Think about The Banefire from The Second Chronicles...

It was given the name Bane because it bled the people dry of their heritage and their freedom...just like The Arch of Time does to Foul.

Covenant IS the White Gold.
The Illearth Stone was The Land's Bane.
White Gold/Wild Magic was the paradox.
The Arch of Time is Lord Foul's Bane.

one more thing...
To touch on an earlier note I made...

If Lord Foul had thought for a second in WGW. He would have simply told Covenant to leave after he reappeared after his death, and Covenant would have had to leave. Then, Foul would've had no opposing force to stand against him when he attacked the Arch of Time with Wild Magic.

Thus, bringing an end to his Bane, and freeing him to unleash his doom upon us all.

Lord Foul had the The Arch of Time in peril, he simply cheated himself out of it.

So, if not for Foul's HUGE mistake, Covenant would have been Despite's tool. Covenant took a big risk, and luckily for him , it worked out.

Whereas , The Illearth Stone was a terrible,terrible tool of Despite...it had nothing on White Gold.

Mind you, it's possible to read the phrase 'Lord Foul's Bane' in several ways —

1. Objective genitive: 'the thing which was a bane to Lord Foul'.

2. Possessive of origin: 'the bane inflicted (on someone else) by Lord Foul'.

3. Simple possessive: 'the bane belonging to Lord Foul'.

Without any context, the phrase is ambiguous — as I'm sure Lester del Rey intended. The Arch of Time was Lord Foul's bane in sense #1; the Illearth Stone became his bane in sense #3; he intended to use Covenant and the wild magic as a bane in sense #2; but in the event (two books later), Covenant turned out to be a bane in sense #1 as well. And given Foul's occasional habit of gloating 'You are mine', I suspect he thought of Covenant as a bane in sense #3, too.

No matter which way you interpret the phrase, Covenant and his wild magic fit the description. And if the expression is ambiguous, well, Covenant is a pretty ambiguous character. I don't know whether del Rey had all these different implications in mind, but if he did, his title change was a stroke of genius.

So I say it's Covenant.

I've always read it as Covenant. It's made clear pretty much immediately that Covenant is the "hero" of the story, and Foul the "villain". Of course, that's all thrown into the mixer very quickly when Covenant appears to be the object of Foul's manipulations. But as a title intended to sell the first book in a series, "Lord Foul's Bane" must be Covenant.

You make a great point <i>Variol Farseer</i>, when you take a look at the different perceptions that the title suggests.

Of course.. I'm saying that The Arch of Time is Foul's personal Bane.

In the context of what Foul's Bane was, as far as Foul himself, wielding a Bane...

I would say it has to be driving people to despair through indirect coersion.
Like Foul did to Kevin, like Foul tries like hell to do to Covenant. Like Foul did to the Haruchai. Like Hile Troy realized towards the end of The Illearth War( thank the creator for The Forestal of Garroting Deep.)

What could be worse than serving Despite when you thought you were doing the right thing?

Desecration ? Isn't serving Despite a Desecration of the soul ?

It broke Kevin Landwaster's spirit, and even in death, he carried his despair. Even despair tempted High Lord Mhoram.

If you want to compare novels, I would say the Illearth Stone is like The One Ring of Power from LotR.

It was a talisman in which it's creator poured all of his malice and hatred, but was unwieldable in his enemy's hands. It caused corruption. I see the SoL as a counterpart to The Illearth Stone.

The Illearth Stone was indeed a terrible singular Bane, but it couldn't touch what Despair could do to one's soul.

I bet the look on Foul's face when Kevin invoked The Ritual was a laughing mockery. The Illearth Stone may have destroyed and crippled people, but poor Kevin, used his own love to destroy The Land, his own love...you gotta know Lord Foul was thinking : Kevin's doing all my work for me...so what if I'm reduced, I'll come back stronger and he just weakened the very heart of the Land and it's Lore.

I love this topic by the way !!!