Lena's infatuation with Covenant was as undeniable as it was fatal - the violence in Covenant's act betrayed his intentions though, and his inner monologue depicts a man in a frenzy of emotional upheaval.DrPaul wrote:I'm a little nonplussed by the references to "statutory rape" in some posts. We are not told what the norms of the people of the Land are in relation to consensual sex between girls of Lena's age and men of Covenant's age.
What we are told is that "Something that her people thought of as a gift had been torn from her." That is the heart of the matter in terms of the story. If Covenant had received Lena's intimacy as a freely given gift, rather than tearing it from her, the situation would have been completely different morally.
We are not told anything in the text that allows us to conclude that the fact that Lena is below the statutory age of consent in some US States (but not in others, not in Canada, and not in most Australian jurisdictions, to give just some examples) would have any bearing on the moral status of her, or Covenant's, freely chosen actions in the Land.
There's little doubt that his act is a heinous one, SRD manages to evoke a visceral reaction with very few words in this instance.
The problematic issue of integrating the foul rape of Lena into any type of adaptation is a vexed one and not easily addressed.
On top of that; the first novel is a tricky adaptation in other ways; Lord Foul's Bane starts brilliantly; disorienting and intriguing - but once Covenant delivers his message to the Lords things would need some tightening, imo, to maintain the type of momentum needed for a tv series.
