Where is the proof that the Land is real?

[Lambolt]

Hi everyone, been a while since i posted, really thrilled to hear about the 3rd chronicles!

I was wondering, since I've seen this in some posts, what is the proof that the Land is real. I really reject this idea. For me, the whole thing loses a huge amount of its value without the premise that we don't know for sure if the Land is real or not. I don't buy the stuff just because we have chapters from Hile Troy or Linden as 1st person, I mean, to me that could all be in TCs mind anyway.

I am very big on the allegorical side, for example, the Land represents TCs creative dreams (his writing too), Lord Foul is his leprosy, and his despair at his condition as it destroys his writing and imagination etc etc, I'm sure we got into a big thread about this once, with the Land suffering in parallel with TCs progress of his leprosy
I also quite like the link to the evil characters in the books possibly being an image of technology in the modern world, how it controls everything and tends to cause the destruction of what is natural and beautiful in the real world.

I suppose the beauty of reading is that you can make your own mind up about things, well, for me, the Land may or may not be real and I will be very disappointed if that's ever explicitly taken away from me as a viewpoint.

[[Syl]]

I'm with you, lee, but I think we are by far in the minority. My view is that the Land is obviously not real (in that we're reading fiction), so it's the only tenable position.

The most frequently given evidence that the Land is real, however are:

Spoiler

TC is cured of his allergic reaction to antivenin
The local yokels kidnap Joan and burn their arms for Foul who appears in the flame
Linden Avery, a person Covenant knows in the "real" world, shares Covenant's experiences
Linden has the ring at the end of WGW

[Blue_Spawn]

The proof is that Land is real stands 1000000000000000 to 1 that it is not.

Firstly, you must know something about narration, and I will tell you that when a narration is being told in First person, it MEANS that the story is told in first person. Not that its being told FP through somebody else's mind. That just doesn't work in literature. And LFB goes into numerous perspectives outside of Covenant.

Another thing disproving Land being Covenant's dream is that....well, in a dream it is simply impossible to posses soooooo much detailed information. The part of the brain that produced dream is simply not capable of such a thing. It is also not able to reproduce those small events so many times. And we see that some names and wierd foreign words tend to repeat themselves exactly. It is due to this why I feel it was unrealistic for Thomas Covenant to have so strongly believed that he was dreaming.

On the other hand, looking at TC chronicles as allagories and finding parallel meanings is not really wrong. You can do that with any well written book. I just disagree with you on rejected the Land on being real.

[Lambolt]

Well I'm not really wrong because it's just my opinion, and more
importantly, what I really said was in my mind, the whole series loses quite
a considerable amount of weight without the tension of whether the Land is
real, or even if the whole thing is some kind of solipsist fantasy (I think
that's the right word). In any case, I don't think you can say that you can
or can't do something in a fictional story, although I hear what you are
saying. I think SRD is just too clever not to realise that the is it/isn't
it is not only one of the best threads in the series but is in fact a
central issue in almost all of the deeper philosophical questions that arise
throughout the story.

I wish I could have got this question to SRD at one of those conferences. I
really want him to tell me that he didn't mean to prove the existence of the
land was real.

[Loredoctor]

I'm with you, lee, but I think we are by far in the minority. My view is that the Land is obviously not real (in that we're reading fiction), so it's the only tenable position.

The most frequently given evidence that the Land is real, however are:

Spoiler

TC is cured of his allergic reaction to antivenin
The local yokels kidnap Joan and burn their arms for Foul who appears in the flame
Linden Avery, a person Covenant knows in the "real" world, shares Covenant's experiences
Linden has the ring at the end of WGW

Spoiler

Didn't Linden take the ring off Covenant's body at the end?

[[Syl]]

Nowhere in the Chronicles is the narration in first person. Third person limited, mainly. There's a big difference between the story being told from a character's point of view and being told by that character. In the Chronicles, any use of the pronoun I will only be found in dialogue.

Besides, it's fantasy. I've read fantasy narrated in first person by characters who are dead. I've even read mainstream fiction where the first person narrator frequently refers to himself in the third person (Fight Club).

As far as mental processes, I'd say if one could read the books in a completely immersed state, absorbing all the info presented as most of us certainly have, then at least that same level of information would be available to a person having a semi-lucid, synesthesia inducing experience. To attribute anything more than that actually going on would only prove my point that our minds can ascribe more reality to a work of fiction than is actually there. The mind's natural ability to fill in the blanks with what it expects could account for the feeling of complete reality, just as most of us don't question the reality of our own dreams while experiencing them.

[Fist and Faith]

No, Ur-Vile, not that we are shown. Though some have chosen to believe that she did it "off screen."


Regarding the topic, I have posted several times about the unreality of the Land. But I suppose I could argue the other way if I had to. But it's all in fun for me, because I agree with SRD and Covenant that it doesn't matter. While Covenant is in the Land, whether he's really there or just dreaming it, it seems real to him - as real as the world he normally lives in. His unbelief is for intellectual reasons, not perceptual or emotional. He finally decides that he must base his decisions on what feels real, not on the possibility that he might "wake up" at some point and find a way to justify his inaction.

[Worm of Despite]

Hey everyone, here's a new poem by me:

The
Land
Isn't
Real.

[Furls Fire]

oh, don't be such a party pooper LF . I like to think it might be, of course we don't know, it's fun to "pretend" it is anyway.

The Second Chrons make it hard not to believe it's real tho, for the reasons Syl pointed out. But, like Fist said, it doesn't really matter anymore if it is or not, SRD himself said by the beginning of the Second Chrons it was no longer an issue. Covenant gives up on his "unbelief" and just does what needs to be done.

And personally, I don't care either. It's real while we are there and that's enough for me

[TRC]

"The Land" is as real, as the world is, that we think we are living in today.

[matrixman]

edit

[Worm of Despite]

And then the Third Chronicles comes and destroys the Land and you won't be able to point at anything.

[matrixman]

edit

[TRC]

But are we real? Or are we all just sharing A dream like TC did with everyone in the Land.

[Baradakas]

I guess I think the whole real/unreal point to the land is based on the premise of the eye of the paradox. We can NEVER know if the land is real or not, for if we did, there would be no paradox, and the whole point of Covenant's sojourn into the land would be moot.


IMHO, I don't ever want to know whether or not the Land is real, as it would ruin my whole reading experience.

[amanibhavam]

What did Mhoram say? Something like "maybe Gods have such dreams".

[Lambolt]

my point exactly. I don't want it to be either real or not real, but with clear doubt either way

[dlbpharmd]

I'm with you, lee, but I think we are by far in the minority. My view is that the Land is obviously not real (in that we're reading fiction), so it's the only tenable position.

The most frequently given evidence that the Land is real, however are:

Spoiler

TC is cured of his allergic reaction to antivenin
The local yokels kidnap Joan and burn their arms for Foul who appears in the flame
Linden Avery, a person Covenant knows in the "real" world, shares Covenant's experiences
Linden has the ring at the end of WGW

Spoiler

Didn't Linden take the ring off Covenant's body at the end?

[/quote

Fist and Faith wrote:

No, Ur-Vile, not that we are shown. Though some have chosen to believe that she did it "off screen."

Spoiler

TC gave LF the ring at the in Kiril Threndor - when LF expended his energy attacking TC's ghost, he dissipated and the ring fell to the dais. LA picked it up.

Spoiler

So the real question becomes - how did the ring leave TC's dead body in the "real" world and find itself in LA's hand at the end of WGW? As I see it (and we've discussed in other threads, there are two possibilities:
1. LA physically removed the ring from TC's dead finger; therefore the Land is not real
2. LA awoke and the ring was in her hand; therefore the Land is real.

[amanibhavam]

I think Fist meant

Spoiler

at the very end when Berensford finds Linden beside TC's dead body.

[Fist and Faith]

Yes, thank you, mon ami.