The Official Stephen R. Donaldson Site is Now Open

[wayfriend]

Can anyone indicate which Structured Interviews are the new ones?

[Savor Dam]

I think the one with the most recent date is the sole new add.

[Seareach]

And lookee there, a nice shout-out to Seareach and Romeo!

I'm glad you're paying attention. If you hadn't commented I never would have known. My bad!

[Avatar]

I just posted a new "Structured Interview" on the official site.

Can anyone indicate which Structured Interviews are the new ones?

Damnit Romeo, don't you know how the internet works? Links man, links.

It's fascinating to me that he wrote several versions of her before sticking with this one.

Now I had to go and find it without a link. (And there wasn't really more info than Ali gave there on that topic.)

--A

[Seareach]

It's fascinating to me that he wrote several versions of her before sticking with this one.

Now I had to go and find it without a link. (And there wasn't really more info than Ali gave there on that topic.)

--A

I'm sure I read somewhere about who Linden originally was and all that jazz...or did I make that up...and, no I can't remember the details (except for a few vague ones) but I'm sure he said something about it somewhere.

[wayfriend]

I think the one with the most recent date is the sole new add.

Turns out I needed to refresh the page to see the new pick. Stupid Chrome.

March 2012 (SF Signal) seems to be the newest Structured Interview.

[aliantha]

Yup, WF, that's the one.

[Romeo]

Oops. Sorry.

"New" is usually the one on the top of the list (most recent chronologically). I think I've mentioned in the past when "new" ones were actually older ones that somehow surfaced. But I'll make sure to add links to these announcements next time.

[wayfriend]

The official website is alive, I tell you. Alive!

(I didn't realize how badly this refresher was needed until I tried to buy the audiobooks myself....*sigh*)

"The Runes of the Earth," Penguin Audio, currently available as CDs and downloads from Amazon.com, or as downloads only from Audible.com.
"Fatal Revenant," Scott Brick Presents, currently available as CDs and downloads from www.brickbybrickaudiobooks.com
"Against All Things Ending," Audible.com, available only as a download from both Audible.com and Amazon.com
"The Last Dark," Dreamscape Media, available as CDs from www.dreamscapeab.com and as downloads from Amazon.com and Audible.com

All are unabridged.

11/18/14

[dlbpharmd]

I'm still hoping and wishing for an audio version of 2nd Chronicles.

[Vraith]

I'm still hoping and wishing for an audio version of 2nd Chronicles.

The news immediately before the above was that Scott Brick was back to work, and doing Last Dark, and his goal was still to do ALL the SRD that exists. Perhaps he's recording as we speak...

[wayfriend]

I'm still hoping and wishing for an audio version of 2nd Chronicles.

I will read a chapter...

[wayfriend]

More official news from the official website.

An essay that I wrote recently called "Epic Fantasy: Necessary Literature" has been accepted for publication by the New York Review of Science Fiction. Publication may be next month. Or perhaps not. Much of what I have to say is not new: it will be easily recognizable from "Epic Fantasy in the Modern World" (available for download from this site). But I've extended my argument considerably. The new essay covers more ground and draws bigger conclusions.

1/21/15

As a person who follows scholarly articles written about Donaldson, or by Donaldson, I am very pleased to hear this. I found "Epic Fantasy in the Modern World" to be very illuminating. It's subtitled "A Few Observations". Here's to hoping that "Necessary Literature" has quite a few more.

(Issues of NYRSF are sold by Weightless Books in e-book form for $2.99 US.)

[aliantha]

Thanks for the info, WF! Sounds interesting...

[wayfriend]

New Content: Scholarly

An essay titled, "Violations as Profound as Any Rape: Feminism and Sexed Violence in Stephen R. Donaldson," first published by EXTRAPOLATION earlier in 2019, is now available here (look under "commentary/analyses"). The author is Dennis Wilson Wise PhD, who is on the English department faculty at the University of Arizona. I like his intellectual rigor as well as his determination to treat what I do fairly. He presents a fascinating argument.

9/19/19

Here's a direct link to the essay (PDF): link.

This is short, and generally worth reading. The parts about Angus are far more enlightening than the parts about Covenant.

[...] As we have seen, violence in Donaldson often functions as a reaction to individual powerlessness, a brutal demand for recognition amidst apathy, marginalization, or social ostracism. Yet Donaldson, always attuned to contradiction, also accentuates the core paradox behind such violence. A victimizer may desire recognition, but violence fails to elicit recognition in any satisfying form. [...] Objects might be safe, but they can never acknowledge one's mastery. Hence, as deeply as Angus attempts to objectify Morn, both physically and emotionally, he also paradoxically needs to reaffirm her essential subjectivity and independence from his will.

I am not sure what the point of this essay is, except to give Donaldson's works some sort of grade for how well they are imbued with modern feminist principles. Not that a point is necessary ... the details discussed are very informative.

[Skyweir]

I enjoyed the quote you included and am interested to read the essay.

Thanks WF

[Skyweir]

Ok wow so read the essay and it is very interesting

The feminist problem posed by Lena might have given Donaldson himself some uneasiness.

He goes on to highlight the different approach Donaldson takes in the Real Story and Mordants Need as examples here. I found this particularly compelling as it highlights this key issue with Lena, her character and role as victim, object of Covenants character development and his journey of selfhood .. in contrast she has no further real relevance or story arc as sexual assault survivor.

She unlike Morn Hyland or Teresa Morgan does not overcome or rise from those ashes. From a character perspective the harm perpetrated against Lena is of no greater importance or relevance to the story .. and more importantly Lenas character becomes invisible, silenced as a character voice.The pain her character experiences ends abruptly and unsatisfactorily.

I like that the other female characters in Covenants subsequent works complete their individual arcs. Morn gains strength and personal aptitude and successfully and fiercely overcomes all she suffered, the zone implant control, undoes Holt Fasner and takes on the amnion.

I also liked that the author identified imv quite rightly that Morn is not the most healthy of sexual assault survivors to mirror in rl. Though in many ways her self hatred and self punishment is not uncommon an experience to rape survivors.

I particularly liked the following note.

Laskar has called the first Chronicles an "existentialist epic fantasy" (409), but it may also be called an ahistorical modernist experiment in consciousness.

A very interesting read.

[wayfriend]

... in contrast [Lena] has no further real relevance or story arc as sexual assault survivor.

I sort of have some disagreements with this line of thought. First, Lena was very relevant to the story in TPTP. And, yes, SRD doesn't depict her as "rising from the ashes" -- but who says she must?

Lena was clearly destroyed when she was raped by Berek reborn. She went mad in trying to cope. Her parents were equally destroyed. Triock is probably the only one to "rise" out of it - scathed but functional.

In terms of the story, that's necessity - the consequences of Covenant's actions cannot be ameliorated. "Oh look, she turned out okay in the end" would undermine the necessity of Covenant's guilt.

But who says all rape survivors eventually flourish again? I think if we depict all rape survivors as plucky heroines who "rise from the ashes", then we are discounting the impact of rape and, in effect if not in intent, we are viewing rape as less evil than it really is. Which is counter-productive at best.

I think the author of the paper makes the mistake of thinking that Lena became unimportant because she didn't survive as well as Morn. But I think she was important because she didn't survive well. And I think SRD spent the time and the pages needed to show us this.

[Cagliostro]

I always felt very disappointed with the treatment of Lena in the story. I felt very sad when she re-emerged as something of a broken person. Who had found strength in absolving him for the better good of The Land, despite the cost on herself. For some reason, Lena's death in the story really upset me, maybe more than any other character, partly because she never really achieved much as a character, other than with her dying words, corrected a mistake she had made, that was made with good intentions. I read her death on a car trip and it depressed me for the next few days.
As the book, at this point, is serving primarily Covenant, and Donaldson is doing just that, in his "only writing what he needs" manner, I do agree that she comes off as something of a neglected character, and felt more of a device to make Covenant feel worse. I chalk it up a bit more to author experience as much as anything. I do think she was effective in the ways wayfriend described though, despite my wishing her character a better end.

[Skyweir]

And I agree with both of your perspectives ... however lol theres always a however, no?

Taking the feminist viewpoint from the author of that studys perspective ... it was not aligned with the described modern writing approach to be seen as progressive from THAT angle.

Yes survivors dont HAVE to survive ... or rise from the ashes .. but many do .. like Morn in SRDs Gap Cycle and Teresa in Mordants Need.

This change in treatment of this particular plot device seems indicative of a change in authorship approach. And clearly as SRD welcomes this study .. the author cant be far off base ... or SRD one would think .. would have corrected that point.

I read a few months back of a young girl who received rare permission to be euthanised because she had been mentally, emotionally broken by years of invest abuse ... I think it was. So yes people are broken by sexual abuses across the gamut.

But the author is bang on that you would NOT want a survivor emulating Lenas journey post violent rape.