help with elena in TPTP

[floydgig_43]

hi everyone... i'm new to this board and i hope i'm doing everything right. but to get to the point, i was hoping if someone could go into detail about how Elena ended up serving the despiser. i know about the "apocolypse" in her stare and how she made the mistake of summoning kevin. but after that i'm confused... i can't even remember and can't find my book, but does she still have feelings for covenant in TPTP? any help, especially info from TPTP would be much appreciated. thanks guys.
-mike

[I'm Murrin]

The idea is that Elena broke the Law of Death by summoning Kevin. She was then killed. Lord Foul was now able to summon up ghosts of the dead because of the broken Law, and the dead do not have the strength to resist Lord Foul when he uses the Illearth Stone. Thus, Elena's ghost is totally under Foul's control in TPTP.

[Kevin_Landwaster]

As far as I can tell in being driven to the point of breaking The Law of Death via Earthblood to bring back Landwaster Elena was infact falling into despair. This put her actions into the indirect hands of Lord Foul since any action made in despair can ultimately do no good and serves only despair itself.

Since she also broke The Law of Death by summoning Kevin Foul was able command her spirit into his service after she was killed. He did this so as to have control over The Staff of Law which is essentially useless in his hands but in the hands of a Lord he controls gives him that edge over the Lords he needed.

[variol son]

This raises the question; could the Despiser control any person he summoned from the dead? Like Berek, or Damelon? Or could he control Kevin and Elena because of their despair?

Sum sui generis
Vs

[Akasri]

I think with the Illearth Stone, he could control any of them. That's always the impression I had anyway. You could be right about the despair part though.

[floydgig_43]

thanks guys, i appreciate the help. i couldn't remember because i thought it was really sad how she was separated from covenant, especially since i give her credit for bringing covenant around (although i do find it a little disturbing about the whole incest situation). but i couldn't remember if she made the decision to follow foul or not, although through despair i guess she did. still a sad tale. i liked her.

[Fist and Faith]

Good point, vs. As far as we know, Berek and Damelon were relatively free of the emotions the Despiser embodies when they died. hmmmmmmm

[Lament]

I'll add my voice to the well read and wise sages whom have already done so here.

Ah Elena! She is beautiful and after her life's end she becomes a servant of corruption. How Indeed? It's easy for anyone to lose sight of how a High Lord of the land, equipped with a Staff of Law, an artifact that was lost since the time of Desecration, could be undone. For that we must search the recesses of lore.

To look and understand the servant we must first delve into the master. What do we know about Lord Foul the Despiser and his methods? We know that he manipulates others and makes servants of the land destroy what they once loved. There are precidents for this:

In "Lords Foul's Bane" for example:

Covenant needed time to comprehend what had been done to Llaura. Her plight numbed him.

First she had been given knowledge which might have saved the Lords--and then she had ben made unable to communicate that knowledge. And her struggles to give the warning only ensured her failure by guaranteeing that the Lords would attempt to understand her rather than ride away. Yet what had been done to her had been unnecessary, gratuitous; the trap would have succeeded without it. In every facet of her misery, Covenant could hear Lord Foul laughing.

Ch 17: "End in Fire"

In "the Illearth War" we read:

"It is the Despisers way. In the battle of Soaring Woodhelven-we are told-he damaged the Heer Llaura and the child Pietten so that they would help destroy what they loved."

Ch 14: "Runnik's Tale"

In "The Power That Preserves" We read how the Giants were also turned. The three giant sons that had been given by birth to Wavenhair Haleall and Sparlimb Keelsetter had been the Giants hope.

"They saw the portent of their hope of Home--the three brothers--changed from fidelity to the most potent ill by one small stroke of the Despiser's evil. Who in the Land could hope to stand against a Giant-Raver? Thus the Unhomed became the means to destroy that to which they had held themselves true."

Ch 17: "The Spoiled Plains"

I'll mention also an important theme which is spoken by Foamfollower in LFB (and IMHO true in real life as well.)

"But hate, hate corrupts. I have been too quick to hate. I become like what I abhor."

Ch 21: "Treacher's Gorge"

This late quote is the crux of how Elena was turned. You mentioned

i know about the "apocolypse" in her stare

but perhaps you did not realize the significance.

Though the gaze was not not directed at him it bored through him like an auger. When it was gone it left a bloody weal across him.
It was the look of an apocalypse.
He could not think of any other namde for it but hate .

TIW Ch 22: ""Anundivian Yajna"

By the act of hate any person can become open to the forces they abhor and risk becoming the very thing they hate or seek to destroy.

Clearly Elena did hate the Despiser. Her methods though were flawed (much like she was), perhaps even insane. For example she admired High Lord Kevin to the point of idol worship.

"Thomas Covenant, I believe that there is immeasurable strength in the consummation of despair-strength beyond all conceiving by an unholocausted soul. I believe that if High Lord kevin could speak from beyond the grave, he would utter a word which would unmarrow the very bones of Lord Foul's Despite."
"That's madness!" Covenant gasped thickly.

Ch 21: "Lena's Daughter"

Here she spoke her true intentions as to how she would, if she could, destroy Lord Foul with the power of the Seventh Ward.

Then when she found, through Amok and the unwitting Bloodguard "The Power of Command" also known ans the Seventh Ward she bent down to drink deep of "The blood of the earth" and called dead High Lord Kevin Landwaster to do her bidding. Here was her ultimate folly and mistake.

Kevin's ghost left as he was commanded to do by Elena's compulsion to fight with Lord Foul. he returned however defeated and mastered.

"Fool!" he cried in a paroxysm of anguish. "Damned betrayer! You have broken the Law of Death to summon me-you have unleashed measureless opportunities or evil upon the earth-and the Despiser mastered me as easily as if I were a child! The Illearth stone consumes. Fight Fool! I am Commanded to destroy you!"

Ch 25: "The Seventh Ward"

Ah Elena.....
Eventually she was destroyed by Kevin and made to serve the Despiser after she died, as a spectre or ghost if you will, mastered like Kevin was, by the Illearth Stone.

but does she still have feelings for covenant in TPTP? any help, especially info from TPTP would be much appreciated. thanks guys.

This sounds to me like something of a spoiler perhaps I don't know but i'll let someone else tend to that part of your question.

[Fist and Faith]

Nice job, Lament!!!

By the act of hate any person can become open to the forces they abhor and risk becoming the very thing they hate or seek to destroy.

Yes! This would go well in the thread of long ago: kevinswatch.ihugny.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=2174

Clearly Elena did hate the Despiser. Her methods though were flawed (much like she was), perhaps even insane. For example she admired High Lord Kevin to the point of idol worship.

"Thomas Covenant, I believe that there is immeasurable strength in the consummation of despair-strength beyond all conceiving by an unholocausted soul. I believe that if High Lord kevin could speak from beyond the grave, he would utter a word which would unmarrow the very bones of Lord Foul's Despite."

"That's madness!" Covenant gasped thickly.

Ch 21: "Lena's Daughter"

Amen, Thomas! (Have I ever mentioned that I don't think highly of Elena? heh)

but does she still have feelings for covenant in TPTP? any help, especially info from TPTP would be much appreciated. thanks guys.

This sounds to me like something of a spoiler perhaps I don't know but i'll let someone else tend to that part of your question.

Spoilers aren't a worry in this forum. Some people put certain things in spoilers, which is fine. But, basically, you shouldn't be reading in this forum if you don't want to read about stuff you haven't read in the books yet. And so I'll answer:

"Behold her, Thomas Covenant! She is unchanged. Within her still lives the spirit of the daughter of Lena. Even as she readies herself for this destruction, she remembers what she was and hates what she is." His chest heaved as if he were strangling on bitterness. "That is the master's way. She is resurrected so that she may participate in the ruin of the Land--the Land she loves!"

Elena still felt as she did when we last saw her in TIW. She just couldn't stop herself from doing what she was forced to do. (Not unlike Picard when he was Locutus.)

[floydgig_43]

i can't thank you guys enough!!! i really appreciate all this. i knew that elena is a pretty sensitive subject in that some people like her and others don't. i saw it discussed in previous topics so this idea did not come from me, but i agree with that Elena's despite originated from the Ranyhyn's ceremony she beheld as a kid. i cannot hold her responsible for the hate in her. but i do hold her responsible for changing covenant's attitudes by the end of the illearth war, especially the part where covenant gives her the knife to shave his beard.

[Lament]

Thank you Fist my friend. I'll know better about spoilers now being a newb.

kevinswatch.ihugny.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=2174 is very informative. I wonder if there will be some sort of library forum opened with the specific purpose of preserving important threads since they cannot all be stickied?

Floydgig_43 it was a pleasure. When you love TCTC it's an honor to enjoy and discuss with like minded folks.

[theDespiser]

man, watching you guys quote passages from the book makes me feel like im in sunday school!!!!







only much cooler, cuz its the gospel of SRD



heheh