Covenant is Lord Foul

[finn]

I've not followed this one right through yet, but like Bill Gates happy to allow others to refine the product

TC evolves into Lord Foul and to engineer a particular end-stategy, he guides and manipulates the players, including himself, to do what he needs them to do to further the stategy.

OK so how can he do battle with himself? He battles his future/past self via the time-shifts of Caesures...the whole TC Chronicles and Lord Foul persona so far, could just be to engineer Joan to the position where the caesures could created, allowing him to fulfill some other destiny involving the Creator and who knows who else, maybe to re-create himself in the real world by changing time there?

Wooooaaahhhh! I hear you say way out there....yes but its been one of those days!

[alanm]

not so far fetched I think.
In WGW at the end does not covenant say that foul is just the part of himself that hates lepers!!!


cheers

[Buckarama]

Not a bad statement. Could explain why TC knows Foul so well and if WG can go through time,...

Neat idea!

[Tjol]

The part of Joan's psyche that divorced Thomas Covenant is Lord Foul.

The land is actually a landscape within Joan's mind.

I think it could be made to work

[dlbpharmd]

The part of Joan's psyche that divorced Thomas Covenant is Lord Foul.

The land is actually a landscape within Joan's mind.

I think it could be made to work

We've talked about that theory before. That would explain Joan's craving for blood in TWL, and the formation of ceasures.

[Gil galad]

This revelation is disturbing, mostly because to me it seems to make absolute sense.

[Variol Farseer]

Too simple. If SRD doesn't have something a good deal more subtle and interesting in mind, I shall be disappointed. Covenant has already advanced this theory, and Foul's retort was irrefutable:

The special gleam of his gaze reached Linden like a gift. He was irremediably insane — or utterly indomitable. "You're just another part of me. Just one side of what it means to be human. The side that hates lepers. The poisonous side." His certainty did not waver at all. "We are one."

His assertion made Linden gape at what he had become. But it only drew another laugh from the Despiser — a short, gruff bark of dismissal. "Do not seek to bandy truth and falsehood with me," he replied. "You are too inane for the task. Lies would better serve the trivial yearning which you style love. The truth damns you here. For three and a half millennia I have mustered my will against the Earth in your absence, groveler. I am the truth. And I have no use for the sophistry of your Unbelief."

Besides, if Foul and Covenant were the same all along — or if Covenant becomes Foul and then goes back in time to wreak Despite on the past — why can't Foul break the Arch of Time? For if Covenant is Foul, and Covenant is the white gold, then Foul is the white gold, too.

I'm sure there's a disturbingly organic relationship between the two of them, but I'm positive that we are missing vital information. Nothing involving Lord Foul (or Thomas Covenant, for that matter) is ever that simple.

[wayfriend]

This seems like the most apropos place for this.

Donaldson spoke about this a bit at Elohimfest '07. Watch for the video when it comes out.

Lacking his exact words, I do recall that he promised that there would not be a 'trick ending' where the Creator turns out to be Covenant or Lord Foul turns out to be Covenant.

It was, to me, just about the most important thing he said that night.

[dlbpharmd]

I agree. I turned to Romeo and asked "Did he just say what I think he said?"

[Avatar]

Glad to hear it. I wouldn't have liked that I think.

Hey, haven't seen FarSeer around for ages...

--A

[Cail]

I've just accepted the fact that I'm probably not going to be happy with the way the series ends, not because of any fault of SRD's, just because there are very few series (TV, movie, or books) that end well.

[emotional leper]

I've just accepted the fact that I'm probably not going to be happy with the way the series ends, not because of any fault of SRD's, just because there are very few series (TV, movie, or books) that end well.

When I was first given Lord Foul's Bane, my friend, Nat, gave me one piece of advice about the series: "Don't love anything." I think there was another part to that, and the full version is, "Don't love anything. Covenant will just screw it up."

Since I learned about the Last Chronicles, I've tried to expand that advice to the series itself. So far, I love everything about the series. Every sick, disturbed little moment. It's a story, just like life, and I want to see how it ends. I don't think I could possibly be disappointed, however it ends, because atleast then I'll have some bloody closure. Unlike the Song of Ice and Fire series, which I'm pretty sure will never be finished, or the Wheel of Time series, which can never be finished because it makes too much money.

[Cail]

The problem is that I was perfectly content with the way the series ended for the last 20-odd years. No, I wasn't thrilled with the way WGW ended, but it made sense within the context of the story. Given my feelings towards Runes, I don't have a whole lot of hope for the next three books. I hope I'm wrong. I hope I'm amazed. I hope I'm reduced to tears.

But I'm not going to hold my breath. For some reason, I think that the ending of the Chronicles is going to end up being very similar to the ending of St. Elsewhere.

And that would really suck.

[emotional leper]

I had to hit Wikipedia for that. Now I can fake being older than I am even better than with my Twin Peaks references.

The problem I see with pulling an ending like that is that the Land cannot exist solely in someone's head. Unless it's in Joan's, and she's been crazy the whole time, ever since she left Covenant.

That, or the Land is real, and our world isn't. Which would be quite a shock to TC and LA.

[Cail]

I think there's a very high probability that the Land does exist in either Joan's or TC's head. I think that'd be an enormous cheat.

[emotional leper]

If it exists solely in Joan or TC's head, how did Linden get there? The fact that Linden, in the Real World, remembers being in the Land implies that it cannot exist solely in one mind. Unless it does exist solely in Joan's mind, but others can 'visit' it,

Spoiler

similar to how Linden glimpses bits of Joan's mind whilst in the Falls

[Cail]

Well, it certainly wouldn't be the first logical break in the series.

We're assuming that Linden is real and not just a construct. We're assuming that her POV chapters are taking place in TC's real world.

Or maybe I'm just taking this leap since I recently re-watched Identity. I dunno, but after the introduction of time travel, I don't hold out a lot of hope.

[wayfriend]

Hope?

"It's all a mistake. Donaldson's playing tricks on us."

"Then are you so surprised to learn that I have been thinking about hope? My heart tells me that it is the fate of the fans to put faith in Donaldson, for good or ill."

[High Lord Tolkien]

Lacking his exact words, I do recall that he promised that there would not be a 'trick ending' where the Creator turns out to be Covenant or Lord Foul turns out to be Covenant.

Good!
I would hate to have that type of ending.
But did SRD only dismissed that possible ending?
Do you think that there still could be a trick ending but just not what he went on to describe?
I've heard it said many times that's he's a tricky one.

I never thought that TC was Foul or the Creator.
Said in that way it makes one cease to exist.
If the whole Land-verse is within TC's head, (although I've said before that it all being in Joan's head would make sense too since she's been the only one that has been in all three series) and it's all about growth and acceptance of who TC is as a person then none of the 3 will be dominant over the others.
It will be more of a merge.

However it goes, I have high hopes that it's going to rock me good.

[dlbpharmd]

What I recall him saying (as close to verbatim as memory allows) - "I think one would have a hard time arguing that Covenant is Lord Foul."