Imperfections as the lynchpin
Posted: Mon Feb 14, 2011 7:08 am
A thought occurred to me recently about the central role flaws and imperfections have in the world of the Chronicles. We all know that White Gold is powerful because it's an alloy and that the heroes have to be flawed in order to have freedom of choice. There are even explanations through analogy pointing out that steel for example is stronger than iron.
But why is the world of the Land built in such a way? How did imperfections take such a central role in its making? Well, Foul was around when this world was built so if the Creator put good, perfect things in his world and Foul put ugly, foul things in it the resulting creation would've been an alloy of the two.
Would pure gold have been the lynchpin of the Creation if the Creator built it all on his own? Is White Gold and people with freedom of choice symptoms of the fundamental problem of Foul fouling things up from the very start?
But then, in the very beginning of LFB Thomas Covenant tells us that the two books he wrote before he got ill, two books that had no evil in them, were crap. They may have been nice crap, a lot of people enjoyed reading them, but they were shallow and without meaning.
White Gold is an amalgamation as are many other fundamental components of the world of the Land. This should tell us that this world was not Created just by the Creator but in a cooperative effort of the Creator and Foul. The fight between them must have come later toward the end of the project when artistic differences got the better of them and each started doing his own thing in their Creation, the Creator making Elohim and Foul making Banes.
Covenant was right to refuse to destroy Foul. He is needed for the bigger picture, just not locked up in a Creation or in a fight to the death with the Creator.
But why is the world of the Land built in such a way? How did imperfections take such a central role in its making? Well, Foul was around when this world was built so if the Creator put good, perfect things in his world and Foul put ugly, foul things in it the resulting creation would've been an alloy of the two.
Would pure gold have been the lynchpin of the Creation if the Creator built it all on his own? Is White Gold and people with freedom of choice symptoms of the fundamental problem of Foul fouling things up from the very start?
But then, in the very beginning of LFB Thomas Covenant tells us that the two books he wrote before he got ill, two books that had no evil in them, were crap. They may have been nice crap, a lot of people enjoyed reading them, but they were shallow and without meaning.
White Gold is an amalgamation as are many other fundamental components of the world of the Land. This should tell us that this world was not Created just by the Creator but in a cooperative effort of the Creator and Foul. The fight between them must have come later toward the end of the project when artistic differences got the better of them and each started doing his own thing in their Creation, the Creator making Elohim and Foul making Banes.
Covenant was right to refuse to destroy Foul. He is needed for the bigger picture, just not locked up in a Creation or in a fight to the death with the Creator.