Foul's message in LFB, he ain't no seer? How does he know!

[Mega Fauna Blitzkrieg]

From what I remember of the series, rereading now, the unfortunately named Lord Foul, while he is some sort of deity, can't really access his full powers or potential while trapped inside time, the most important aspect of which would be that he can't travel back and forth in time, can he? He is also neither seer nor oracle?

So how the hell does he know that Elena will break the law of death? Or even be born?! That is in his original message to the lords, before X&X(I think it was 46 years?) I will have control over life and death.

His message puts the control of life and death before the rest of the general doom in his prophecy too, so he really seems to be talking about Elena breaking the law in book two. Elena isn't even born, Lena is still a virgin, when he gives that message to TC. If he can't see or visit the future, how the heck can he know that a crazed rape baby will be born, mistake a message from the Ranhyn, and do some crazy quest based on her love of a long dead anti-hero?!

I mean if his goal is to have the law broken by then that is one thing, but he sure seems to have a specific knowledge of when and how it happens. I mean Maybe instead of trying to summon Kevin with earthblood Elena will...try to summon the creator, or grant herself power beyond mortal comprehension or make herself the equal of Kevin, or any of a trillion other possible things an unborn crazy girl might come up with?

To me this screams that, he had all of or enough of the second book planned out, when writing the first one, which I love. That is how he makes 500 page magnificent and efficient books, rather than 1400 pages of rambling crap about troop movements and 14 chapters in a row about some asshole camping in the woods, that ultimately go nowhere. But I am unable to reconcile this with any in-world explanation.

Help?

[Cameraman Jenn]

Ok, I'll give a serious answer instead of my usual motif. Foul is trapped in the arch of time. As such he can see all of the arch of time as events are unfolding. Past, present & future. The arch of time is such that it shows the past as rigid, the present as unfolding and the future as ever changing depending on how the present unfolds. Foul can not directly control the future but he can influence events in the present so that when the future is looking in his favor he can help to keep it in that current flow. At the time of his prediction he can see that if events continue in the manner laid out he will have control over life and death and therefore tries to influence the present so that it will come to pass. It's not a guarantee, it's a threat based on what the arch of time is currently showing as the future. Does that make sense?

[Akasri]

My impression has always been that Foul didn't see the future so much as he was shaping events to try and produce the future outcome that he wanted.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

It was a bluff, nothing more. Trying to scare the wits out of the New Lords--given their lack of lore they had no way of knowing whether such things were possible.

[Krilly]

True. He probably didn't know. Just said the right things. Foul is just a masterful chess player with one blind spot inherent to being "despite" personfied.

[Vraith]

I always just assumed, being what he is, LF had some visionary power, but not perfect for the same reason as everyone else's also isn't: the future it not written in Permanent Sharpie...so he manipulates and threatens to make the one he wants more likely.

I suppose it could...NVM, I can't say that here, it's Last Chrons.

[wayfriend]

From the perspective of Covenant’s Dead looking forward in the story, there are a variety of conceivable scenarios. Hope doesn’t lie in predicting and planning exactly what Covenant and Linden are going to do: it lies in understanding who Covenant and Linden are. Another way to say the same thing: Covenant’s Dead supply the “raw materials” for a solution to the Land’s plight--and then step back, trusting Covenant and Linden to figure *something* out.

Lord Foul’s position is similar. He’s more of a control-freak, and more directly manipulative; but he still needs to do what Covenant’s Dead must do: understand who he’s dealing with, grasp what must happen *within* those characters to make them do what he wants, and then supply the “raw materials” (venom, etc.) which will make his desired outcome both possible and likely. The more scenarios he can imagine, the more “apt” his raw materials can be; but he really doesn’t have to plan or predict everything that’s going to happen, he simply needs to use his imagination and supply as many catalysts as he can.

In other words, I’m arguing that Lord Foul, like Covenant’s Dead, like King Joyse, like Warden Dios, does not engage in insanely meticulous plotting: rather he engages in a highly creative kind of open-ended thinking; thinking that revolves around the manipulation of characters rather than the manipulation of events.

I hope this helps.

(02/14/2005) [link]

[Hashi Lebwohl]

This dovetails with the notion from The Gap that if person A somehow controls person B and their actions, then person B is actually person A in proxy--the tool is an extension of its wielder. As such, the tool cannot do anything the wielder could not do--Foul can't have a Raver posess Covenant and make him destroy the Arch or through any other direct manipulation/control force anyone to do what he wants, especially if that is something he cannot do for himself.

All Foul can ever do is set up the situation where your choices are limited to the ones he wants you to make in the first place, based on a careful analysis of your personality, something he is really good at doing.

[Mega Fauna Blitzkrieg]

I think Mhoram or Covenant does say at one point that Foul has no seer powers, and is essence just a master manipulator but...

I am a master manipulator too, nowhere near as good i'm sure but still, you can't predict the actions of an unborn person who may never BE born. That is just too much of a stretch I think.

Like in those tv shows/movies where they write off inconsistencies by declaring their character to be a genius. You see it a lot in suspense or mystery things involving serial killers.

As if being a genius allows you to predict that exactly 5:51 april 23rd a homeless man will be walking to use the bathroom and trip over the severed head in the bushes with just enough time to summon the police and have the bodied carried back to the lab at the exact time when the main character arrives at the lab, and then the body magically knows the main character is present and explodes.

It isn't nearly as bad as all that, but I am saddened that it does appear to be in that vein.

I mean, how can he know who Elena is, before Lena has even been raped? Lena was pretty clearly infatuated with Covenant, if he didn't rape her he probably would have had consensual sex with her. Without the vast crime of her creation and her mother's continuing distress, everything about Elena would change.

Elena might not even exist if Covenant's years of our earth society and accompanying morals kept him from A) raping or B) fornicating with a minor, consensual or not.

I mean is Foul able to see OUR world? Some of our societal normalcies aren't exactly 'natural' and would be hard to predict if you weren't raised in them.

The best thing to do is set it out as a bald threat/his goal, but it is still way too specific for that

Then again, maybe he meant control of life and death in a non-literal way, like how doctors with super god complexes believe they have control of life and death, or monarchs, generals, etc.

[Orlion]

You're contributing something to Foul that Foul never said. Foul did not say that "in forty-odd years, the rape-child of the outworlder will break the Law of Death, thus giving me power over life and death! Think on that, and despair!"

He merely gloated that he would have the power over life and death... which essentially could just translate into "I'm going to control everything" and not "I will use the dead against you...like, their souls... and their corpses too, why not?"

In chess analogy, what Foul would have said would have translated to:

I'm going to win in 20 moves, but it'll be 12 moves unless you manage to take the queen's rook there. Either way, you playing against me is an exercise in futility.

[shadowbinding shoe]

The giant slaying Raver episode implied that using the Ill-Earth stone Foul and his minions could bend the Earth's forces to their will. The possession of the 3 giants itself was a breaking of some Law.

If Elena wasn't there to break the Law of Death Foul might have been more proactive in his use of his stone. Doesn't he tell Covenant in their confrontation at TPTP that nothing is beyond his control with the aid of the stone? Just because Covenant made his task easier doesn't mean he wasn't capable of wreaking these calamities by himself.

[Mega Fauna Blitzkrieg]

Yeah, i'm going with he meant control over life and death in a less literal way. Like he will be top dog and everyone will be under his power, rather than a prediction about which specific law will be broken.

As for what he can or cannot do with the ill earth stone...I kind of figure he can't directly destroy laws like that? They say at some point, third trilogy I think, that he can't directly break the arch, or wake the worm. Presumably he can't directly break laws either, or he would have broken some during the long undefended staff of lawless sunbane era?

Then again, I just assume there are other laws beyond time death and life, but they haven't directly mentioned any have they? Like the law of wind? Law of rain?

[Aiden Victore]

Lord Foul can see into the future to some degree, otherwise he could not have gotten the time frame so precise in his prophecy. But it is a constant state of flux, and nothing is certain until it happens. All he can do is choose a path he wants to set the world on, and do his best to steer events to that conclusion.

[ussusimiel]

As for what he can or cannot do with the ill earth stone...I kind of figure he can't directly destroy laws like that? They say at some point, third trilogy I think, that he can't directly break the arch, or wake the worm. Presumably he can't directly break laws either, or he would have broken some during the long undefended staff of lawless sunbane era?

There are obviously some limits to what Foul can do even with the Illearth Stone. The Law of Death was only broken by using Earthblood (which Foul would probably not be able to touch). The very nature of the Staff of Law opposed Foul as long as it was in existence.

As regards the Worm, I think it might be possible that he could have woken it up using the Illearth Stone but to survive subsequently there is strong indications that he needs to have white gold in his possession. At the very least he needs the ring to break the Arch of Time. (There's a good discussion about the Worm and the AoT in,*BEWARE: Runes of the Earth spoilers * Reading Runes: A Tale of Two Cosmologies )

u.

[Mega Fauna Blitzkrieg]

Last Chronicles Spoilers!!!

Spoiler

I think somewhere in the third trilogy they say Foul cannot wake the worm directly, otherwise he would have done so 30billion aeons ago.

Berek says something sort of similar to comfort Linden, but also not really. Something about the worm or the arch or something or other can only be done by a dick who doesn't care, not by someone who knows love but gets confused. Paraphrase.