Kevin's Watch

Helo all, this is my first post to this forum. I have tried to find the answer to this question without success, though I can't believe that I am the first person to ask it. Unless I am being particularly dopey, which is entirely possible.
In RotE, it seems to me that Anele exists in the present because he wandered off to investigate the 'wrong' that turned out to be a caesure. But that was over three and a half thousand years ago, and caesures have only existed for the last hundred years or so.
Now caesures don't travel in time themselves, they are just the mechanism that enables other things or beings to do so.
Unless one caesure entered another, how did one exist in Aneles' lifetime?
Obviously I'm missing something - please put me out of my misery!
Or point me to the thread that will...
Steve

Ceasures began to ORIGINATE appear in the recorded history of the land in the last 100 years (in the period when Joan was injuring herself in the home in the "real" world)... where the ceasures WENT was as fluid as time itself and could appear anywhere. Hence appearing where Anele had been, where fragments (revenants) of the illearth stone had been, etc. Don't mix up origin and destination, my good man.

btw, welcome to the watch!

Welcome to the Watch.

Yeah, this has been debated a lot here. Someone will probably find the specific topics for you.

Personally, I still think this is a oversight or inconsistancy on SRD's behalf.-jay

Caesures are created at a particular time, and in a sense exist in the present, but they are present in every moment once created.
The endpoint of the caesure, the Fall that wanders around in the Land's present dropping out things from the past, is what was created within the last 100 years.
But the caesure is a flaw in time. The caesure is projected back in time through every moment from its present--but the Laws were intact in earlier times, and so the caesure cannot affect the Land as much then. So, the caesures can be accessed at any time in history, but they are easier to find after the Laws of Life and Death are broken.

Anele was sensitive to these things, being a person of Earthpower, and so he found the caesure in his own time.
The Vile- and demondim-spawn have enough Lore to locate the caesures, in their case even before the Laws are broken.

Ranyhyn?

Any ability of the Ranyhyn concerning time is sufficiently explained in the relevant section of Runes. No need to bring it into this discussion, since the Ranyhyn are not among those who have travelled by caesure from the past to appear in Runes.

Sorry but I disagree. Caesures are not able to wherever they so please - it was specifically stated that they could only travel forward through time from the point of origin. Linden Avery had to force one to reverse against its nature into the past by the deliberate use of wild magic.
If caesures had been appearing in Aneles lifetime then the Haruchai would be aware of it. Again, it was stated that they had only been around for a century or so in the Land – since Joan was given the ring by Linden in the hospital. When he went to investigate the wrong that was the caesure or fall then clearly it existed in his lifetime.
How is it that Linden Avery or Stave did not at least ask how this happened when it (apparently) did? It seems so obvious…
And I have no idea what you mean about the Illearth Stone fragments, as the only thing that appears to link the two things are the Demondim, who were simply swallowed by the caesure that Linden created and took the power from the stone with them.
The Ranyhyn have nothing to do with the creation of the caesure as far as we know – though they are clearly quite handy to have around when you’re stuck in one!
Still looking for a reasonable explanation my good man…
Steve

Here's what SRD says about it: perhaps this will reasonable enough.

In the Gradual Interview wrote:I believe I see the problem you're talking about. OK, so the caesures were first created 90-100 years ago, but their effects run backward in time (*way* backward). So why didn't the Masters (just to pick a number) 500 years ago observe any caesures? If a caesure could affect someone as far in the past as Anele, why haven't they been a known feature of the Land all this time (thus making the statement that they were first created 90-100 years ago appear absurd)?

Messing around with time always creates enormous narrative problems (at least in storytelling: I haven't tried it in real life <grin>). The contradiction you've pointed out will be addressed in some detail in "Fatal Revenant"--and in as many of the subsequent books as necessary. For now I'll just say that each caesure, terrible as it is, represents a miniscule and temporary rupture in the broad structure of time. If you aren't in the right place at the right time, you'll never see one--but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

(03/09/2005)

Thanks Wayfriend, that was just what I was hoping for. So SRD knows about the apparent contradiction, he just hasn't explained it yet...
It does seem a little strange that none of the main characters have spotted the rather obvious anomaly - I wonder if "Messing around with time always creates enormous narrative problems (at least in storytelling: I haven't tried it in real life <grin>). The contradiction you've pointed out will be addressed in some detail in "Fatal Revenant" is another way of saying "Oops..."
Steve

Here's another bit on caesures (and stuff in hadn't seen before, so interesting to me as well). This looks like the reason why they appear at odd bits in the past, and not at every moment:

Stephen R Donaldson wrote:The place where you and I appear to part company has to do with, well, let's call it the "starting point" for a "caesure's" disruption of time. Your position is logical: Joan got her ring back 90 Land-years ago, so since "caesures" run forward no "caesure" could have existed prior to 90 years ago. But I'm thinking in more symbolic terms. And (this may sound self-contradictory) on a symbolic level I'm thinking very literally. So: the crucial information is in the chapter where Linden passes through one of Joan's "caesures". There Joan stands amid the rubble of a shattered cliff. Each of those broken pieces of stone represents a moment or moments of the Land's past. (How was the cliff shattered in the first place? Presumably by the breaking of the Laws of Death and Life.) They do NOT represent moments in Joan's present. So when she destroys one of those pieces of rubble, she is creating a "ceasure" in that specific moment of the Land's past. Could be a hundred years before her present. Could be 3500 years before her present. But--since I insist on thinking of time as linear--all of them *must* represent moments prior to her present rather than after her present: she hasn't destroyed *herself* with wild magic; hasn't sent *herself* gyring chaotically into her own future.

When Joan feels compelled to let out a blast of power, she has, in essence, all of the past 3500 or so Land-years to pick from as a starting point for her "caesure".

Clear, no? No, of course not. We're talking about time paradoxes here: they *can't* be clear. <grin> But I'm doing the best I can with what I have.

This answer, interestingly, also seems to suggest that if a caesure is travelled backwards, as Linden did, then only a certain number of points in time would be reachable, depending on the target of Joan's outbursts--and the number of available moments would increase as Joan destroyed more of it.
(Another answer in the GI contradicts what I said earlier--apparently only moments in time after the breaking of the Law of Life are available to Joan to destroy. Which leaves me confused about the Demondim.)

Hmm...
still not convinced by the 'symbolic' reasoning from SRD. And if Joan had any of the 3500 years or so to pick from, then there would have been less of a concentratoin of caesures in the past century. If they had been scattered all over the place, then the Haruchai would have surely been aware of them
And it just doesn't make sense that Linden (Doctor, fairly bright), Stave (Haruchai - the Vulan of the Land) or anyone else haven't noticed and discussed the apparent contradiction. I reckon if it had been a deliberate plot line then SRD would have planted a seed or two for further explanation in volume 2!
But symbolics to it - all will be revealed in the next instalment!
Steve

And I am definately NOT a 'Servant of the Land'. I just liked the books.
How do I get rid of that?

Past and present are absolute. When Joan creates a caesure, she does so in the present. The flaw in time exists in the present, and continues in the future. But the way it exists is as a connection to moments in the past. The flaw in time affects the present, cannot significantly affect the past (as a significant alteration would break the Law of Time), and the future is unwritten. The caesures are a feature of the present, not the past.

They are scattered thinly across brief moments of time before their creation, but they exist at every point in time after their creation (imagine: an object is created, and from that point onward it exists. But through some paradox in its creation it is also able to exist, briefly, at a point before it was created). Hence: they appear to roam the Land during the last 100 years, because it is only during this time that they are cons(is)tant.

and if Joan travelled back in time thru a caesure herself?

If she did so, she'd be under the same constraints as Linden: any significant change to histroy would break the Law of Time. Linden managed to get away with creating a caesure; there's a chance Joan might also, but it would be a much much greater risk to the Arch of Time than her doing so in the present.

any reason Covenant himself may not have created some "unintentional" caesures? in the past? or Linden even?

I think the most important thing, IMO, is this: don't start applying "physics" to the situation. In other words, don't start wondering what the implications of time travel are as implicated by the laws of physics - or as explored in a myriad number of SF time travel stories. This is covered, I believe, under the practice that Donaldson only world-builds what he needs to tell a story.

One more Gradualinterviewism:

OK. Let's start by admitting that the whole idea of "caesures" doesn't make sense. Not rational, literal, linear sense. As caesures are described in "Runes," just one of them really ought to be enough to destroy everything. But I'm writing fantasy novels: ideas don't have to make rational, literal, linear sense. What they *do* have to do is "play fair": they have to be internally consistent, both in themselves and in the larger context of their fantasy "reality". And they have to, well, "feel" right: they have to convey the (non-rational) sense that they *fit* the story.

Well, I think I do "play fair". And I think what I'm doing "feels" right. Others may disagree.

Nonetheless, rational, literal, linear questions are worth asking. (E.g. "Why do they not exist at all times in The Land’s history?") God willing, and the creek don't rise, subsequent installments in "The Last Chronicles" will address those questions, both in theory and in practice.

(09/13/2006)

The bottom line is, any assumption along the lines of, if this then that would mean this, is not true, until and unless the story says it's true ... even it it makes logical, rational, linear sense.

Wayfriend wrote:I think the most important thing, IMO, is this: don't start applying "physics" to the situation. In other words, don't start wondering what the implications of time travel are as implicated by the laws of physics - or as explored in a myriad number of SF time travel stories. This is covered, I believe, under the practice that Donaldson only world-builds what he needs to tell a story.

One more Gradualinterviewism:

OK. Let's start by admitting that the whole idea of "caesures" doesn't make sense. Not rational, literal, linear sense. As caesures are described in "Runes," just one of them really ought to be enough to destroy everything. But I'm writing fantasy novels: ideas don't have to make rational, literal, linear sense. What they *do* have to do is "play fair": they have to be internally consistent, both in themselves and in the larger context of their fantasy "reality". And they have to, well, "feel" right: they have to convey the (non-rational) sense that they *fit* the story.

Well, I think I do "play fair". And I think what I'm doing "feels" right. Others may disagree.

Nonetheless, rational, literal, linear questions are worth asking. (E.g. "Why do they not exist at all times in The Land’s history?") God willing, and the creek don't rise, subsequent installments in "The Last Chronicles" will address those questions, both in theory and in practice.

(09/13/2006)

That is a great point WF. Wild Magic that destroys peace should also renderthe laws of physics, if not useless, then malleable!

But I'm writing fantasy novels: ideas don't have to make rational, literal, linear sense.

So basically, SRD can do whatever he wants to do and if any of us see contradictions he has a fullproof rebuttal: "it doesn't have to make sense . . . because I say so." That's hilarious. I wish I could get away with that in arguments with my wife. "You're my dream girl, my fantasy girl. So therefore, this is fantasy. And everyone knows you don't have to make sense when dealing with all things fantastic."

I'm having a hard time with this distinction between "playing fair" and "making sense." Unless you're writing a post-modern novel on the meanlessness of life, the nonsensical nature of language, the problematic nature of interpreting texts . . . then "playing fair" seems like it should include "making sense."

Oh well, his books deal with paradox and existentialism. So maybe there's a bit of postmodernism in his work after all. And we are dealing with a work of fiction that has magic. Perhaps we shouldn't get too worked up about ceasures when we've got magical rings, magical staffs, a world built on a giant worm, and a demonic overlord trying to break something called The Arch of Time in order to free himself.

But if you're like me (and who isn't?) and your mind still squirms at incongruity, then imagine ceasures to be like wormholes. No, this isn't a physics explanation--think of it as an analogy. It's easier to picture spatial models than temporal ones. So, wormholes have two endpoints. One endpoint is the "place" where Joan creates it, and the other endpoint necessarily is in another place (they can't occupy the same spot; that would be a "black hole"). Okay, let's say there's something about wormholes that only allows travel in one direction, and it takes an extraordinary amount of force to reverse this direction.

Now, as for the problem of why don't more people know about them in the past (like Anele)? I think Donaldson's explanation--while a bit hokey sounding--actually has some merit. Thinking spatially again, it would be like Joan creating a bunch of wormholes here, while their endpoints are scattered about the whole universe. As objects travel through these wormholes, people are going to notice lots of stuff popping out of them here because their endpoints are all concentrated to this vicinity. But on the other end, they are so scattered that it's likely no one notices them. In fact, it's likely that Anele is the first person in history to have noticed one. While this highly unlikely event is extremely fortuitous for story telling purposes, we shouldn't think anything strange is going on . . . becuase this is fantasy.

Thanks for posting that one GI responce from SRD. I don't remember that one. But I'm content knowing that he admitted the inconsistency and said he would address it in the next book.

The flaw in time affects the present, cannot significantly affect the past

Except they've already ripped Anele from the past and brought him to the present. Heh.

But yeah, I agree with Malik. I expect more from SRD.

There can still be consistency in fantasy novels.

My main problem was that he seemed to go into extreme detail in trying to explain the caesures (when they started, how they work) and yet they still don't really make sense. Heh.-jay

kevinswatch wrote:

The flaw in time affects the present, cannot significantly affect the past

Except they've already ripped Anele from the past and brought him to the present. Heh.

In a similar way to how SRD says Linden going back and getting the staff was not a significant change (it did not contradict any of the known history of the Land), Anele's situation was not a significant change. I'm sure he would probably have spent his entire life hidden away in that cave, and the rest of the Land's history would have continued without any difference.