Kevin's Watch

Kinslaughterer wrote in the thread I started about the SF Bookclub
omnibus of the Second Chronicles:

I bought a copy of the Second Chronicles thru SFBC and Ilium too. I have been trying to figure out just what that disk was myself. I got no idea. Linden's looking pretty good too...

That reminds me of something that struck me when I was rereading
the Second Chronicles recently.

Donaldson describes Linden in more detail than he ever described
Thomas Covenant:

Hard work and clenched emotions had not hurt the gratuitous
womanliness of her body, or dulled the essential luster of her
shoulder-length wheaten hair, or harmed the structured beauty
of her face.

And it seems to me that Teresa, the heroine of the Mordant saga also
had a lot of attention paid to her physical appearance.

I don't recall Donaldson saying much at all about Covenant's
physical appearance other than that he was tall and gaunt and
-- in the Second Chronicles-- had graying hair. I THINK his eyes
were gray, but I recall that only because it seems like Elena had
his eyes....

So what I'm getting at is ... does Donaldson only like to describe the
babes in his stories?

Hey, SRD's a GUY! He ain't gonna go into deep detail describing another guy! He's gonna articulate on the women-folk, I tell ya!

*uses best Nicholson voice*

And that ain't bad!

Heh, I just hope Linden doesn't age too much, ya know? I don't want another Lena ala The Power That Preserves on our hands, here. Then again, Donaldson might amp up the babe factor with some new female characters come Last Chronicles . . . Not much of a loss, then, even if Linden turns into "Grandma Avery".

LF wrote:Then again, Donaldson might amp up the babe factor with some new female characters

rofl!!

i cant recall now .. but i think SRD does describe TC pretty well .. and he does Foamy too .. LA's just another character .. but remembering she's going to become a love interest .. a romantic involvement for his lead character .. sure SRD is gonna sell her credibiltiy to the reader .. not just regarding her character but her physical appearance too!


personally i dont see any discrimination on SRD's part re: female characters over the male or even the scenery for that matter

Don’t see females over the male characters or anything like that? I mean, I do, description-wise. There is a change. I see a bit of a sexual view shaded/focused upon them. I mean, SRD would describe their movements--the little intricacies. Ya know, like The Beatles song Something (“Something in the way she moves”)! Heh, and he would have described further, but I felt he made a very conscious restriction--a stopping point. He knowingly didn’t want too much sexual stuff to spill out or he’d be making the Whore Chronicles, not the First Chronicles!

And hey, think of how much SRD was describing Lena when she’s with Covenant during LFB! Yeah, you may say he was merely doing that because it had to do solely with TC’s perception of Lena at the time, and because he was dealing with the whole leprosy making him impotent and such, etc. BUT, I don't think you're gonna see SRD describing a woman's perception of a man in the same way TC perceived Lena after arriving at Kevin's Watch in LFB. Just won’t happen! SRD don't swing that way! His loafers ain't light!

Well, when TC and LA finally succumb to their feelings for each other on Starfare's Gem after they all escape the Bhrathiar. Donaldson has Linden looking at Thomas, and there is alot of detail in how she sees his body. I can't think of the exact words...but it says something like...she had never looked at a male body other than in the clinical sense before. Seeing him not only with her health sense but as her lover as well.

But didn't Donaldson specifically note a time when Linden had no shirt on--heh, never mind . . .

calm down there LF! (Lady Alif and Elena were the only ones totally nekid! , that we saw!)

Yeah, folks! That reminds me! How come the naked babes to naked dudes ratio was so top-heavy in favor of the babes, eh? Well, I think we know the obvious answer.

And, heh, if a female had written the Chronicles--a Stephanie R. Donaldson, then we'd be seeing all the male Giants in speedos! *Shudders*

And a male writing in a--ahem--favorable way about females is not discrimination--IT'S GENETICS!