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THE CHRONICLES OF THOMAS COVENANT

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Lidless
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Posted: Sun 13 Feb , 2005 7:08 pm
Als u het leven te ernstig neemt, mist u de betekenis.
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Balrogs? Wings?

I thought the movie had finally put this debate to rest.

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Sassafras
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Posted: Sun 13 Feb , 2005 7:19 pm
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TheLidlessEyes wrote:
Balrogs? Wings?
I thought the movie had finally put this debate to rest.
*pokes* Lidless.

Go back and read the posts again, duckie.

You missed something.

:poke:

and don't tell me you were only being facetious. i already know that.

:P


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Jnyusa
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Posted: Sun 13 Feb , 2005 7:27 pm
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Well I can't tell if PJ's balrog had wings or not because of the glare off Leggy's BLONDE HAIR. :suspicious:

Jn

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Sassafras
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Posted: Sun 13 Feb , 2005 8:03 pm
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Now Jn, you know you're just avoiding any conflict by using Leggy's shiny mane. (it was pretty though, wasn't it? Wish I had hair like that!

:mrgreen:

Of course it had wings!
Didn't you see them?

Er, do Balrogs have gender or are they .... asexual? hermaphrodites? or have they no need for gender identity .... being lesser Maia and all that?


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Lidless
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Posted: Sun 13 Feb , 2005 8:13 pm
Als u het leven te ernstig neemt, mist u de betekenis.
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I guess the test would be to offer the balrog chocolate. If it calms down, it's female.

But make it M&Ms, because, as the old advertising slogan said, 'they melt in your mouth, not in your hand'.

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Jnyusa
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Posted: Mon 14 Feb , 2005 2:33 am
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Just trying to see how many old debates we can resurrect at one time. ;)

Well, I skidded over to the bookstore this afternoon and picked up the first three volumes. Read the first three chapters of Lord Foul's Bane.

I will say that he uses too many worn adjectives, but the premise is intriguing enough, and a couple of paragraphs gave a glimpse into greater depth. So I'm going to stick with it and read the first three books ... probably a little bit at a time given my work load right now.

Maybe we could start a Donaldson discussion thread in book ... especially if it's going to be nine years before the movie comes out, lol!

Jn

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Sassafras
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Posted: Mon 14 Feb , 2005 3:08 am
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I should have warned you, Jn, that the first few chapters are a bit laborious. As Covenant descends from Kevin's Watch into the Land you will begin to be caught up and I can almost promise that by the time you read another 3 or 4 chapters, you'll be hooked.

You're right. We should move this to books. Can the admins move an entire thread from one fora to another?

If not, either Holby or I will start one.
Okay Holby?

Areanor should be reading by the end of the week as well. :)


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Impenitent
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Posted: Tue 15 Feb , 2005 12:07 am
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Not sure whether this is an open thread, but if the conversation is closed, just shove me off. :D

I haven't picked up the books in about 10 years, I think - and I've only read the first Chronicles - I think I re-read it 5-6 times. Covenant is such a complex character - impossible to feel comfortable with him; he is so flawed, so tormented, and his behaviour, even to the end, is just not likeable.

I can't remember much of the detail any more - though reading the references in your posts has resurrected many memories. I recall that the first few chapters were lacking a feeling of depth - it wasn't until I was half-way through the first book that I felt any substance but by the end I was pondering alot of metaphysical stuff. I shall have to re-read before I can participate at any useful level - but I need to finish the Fionavar Tapestry first, which Enchie has me reading. Won't take long.

Perhaps I'll be back?

and...balrog's don't have wings. Nope. They don't. PJ's balrog had wings, but PJ got so much wrong that it's not surprising. :D

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Holbytla
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Posted: Tue 15 Feb , 2005 12:52 am
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Imp stop being silly. The more the merrier. :)
I am going to ask that this thread be moved to the books forum.
Originally I started it to discuss the movie, but it seems the movie is a long way off. They don't have a studio yet. :roll:

Anyway, we can pick up the discussion there.
And Imp, read the 2nd Chronicles when you get the chance. Not as good as the 1st, imo, but still very good.

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Estel
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Posted: Tue 15 Feb , 2005 4:32 pm
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Moved, as per request of the most courteous, modest and most wonderful of posters, Holby.


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Areanor
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Posted: Wed 16 Feb , 2005 4:20 am
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Got the book today, had a look at the first chapter, but laid it back, because I want to finish Lidless' book first ;) .

But I'll be back, I promise.....

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Jnyusa
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Posted: Wed 16 Feb , 2005 5:20 am
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Is Lidless' book still available online? I want to read that, too.

Well, I'm up to Chapter 13 ... Donaldson has created a daringly unsympathetic character. Covenant carries the whole story though - what will fate make of a man like this - the rest of the characters have no real dimensions so far.

I have to confess to deep bias against adjectives. My sophomore year in High School I had a writing teacher who would have us create a first draft, then remove all the adjectives. We would write the second draft using more specific nouns and verbs to eliminate the need for adjectives. Ever since then I have disliked adjectives and Donaldson uses more of them than anyone I've read recently. His writing does bog me down, and I find myself skimming whole pages. His use of language does not entice me.

But you guys have really tempted me with the metaphysical potential of the book so I'm going to plow through it and then take stock. Where I am right now, they've just left the river and headed towards the Lord's Council thingie on horseback.

Jn

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Areanor
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Posted: Wed 16 Feb , 2005 5:42 am
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Jn, go to the RP-Forum

The Retirement Plan

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Lidless
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Posted: Wed 16 Feb , 2005 6:34 am
Als u het leven te ernstig neemt, mist u de betekenis.
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No adjectives, huh?

Oops.

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Jnyusa
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Posted: Wed 16 Feb , 2005 6:08 pm
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Lidless! The whole book is there! Great!

Get Prim to read it, too. She's a professional editor. I'll offer comments since they've been invited, but I'm just an avid reader. It will take me a few days to get through it, though.

Adjectives ... Donaldson is profligate with them. I'm spoiled by Tolkien who says nearly all of what he needs to say in dialogue - very much my preferred method of character revelation.

Remember the line where Eowyn rebukes Aragorn -- paraphrase -- 'that is only to say I am a woman, and I have leave to be burned with the house when the men no longer need it '

Donaldson would follow that with - 'her raw anger clenched across her maidenly shoulders and her heart pounded with livid despair'

totally unnecessary goop, see? There's hardly a sentence where the hero does not clench, choke, strangle, twitch ... and these are all used adjectively. Clenching pain, choking anger, twitching fatigue etc. and the very same words used over and over and over. If all that were removed the book would be about 50 pages long.

The question I ask myself is how that stuff gets through editors? It's really awful, imo. The language obscures the story. I am clinging to the idea behind the book, because I don't believe Sass and Holby would like it so much if there were nothing in it.

Jn

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Primula_Baggins
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Posted: Wed 16 Feb , 2005 8:44 pm
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Jn, the writing is the problem I had with my attempt at reading these books years ago, and I suspect it would only be worse now--certainly when I'm editing my own fiction writing I spend much of the time rooting words out. But what's been said in this thread makes me think I must have missed something.

I'm also (this is unworthy, but I have to be honest) put off them because 20-odd years ago I attended a panel discussion in which Donaldson participated. He came across as a pompous, self-absorbed windbag--he hardly let anyone else speak. And there were other panel members I would have loved to hear from.

As for Lidless's book, if he would like me to look at it, I'd be glad to--I probably will anyway, out of curiosity! But if he wants feedback, I'd need to know what kind. Professionally, I'm rather blunt.


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Holbytla
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Posted: Wed 16 Feb , 2005 9:27 pm
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I think that maybe you need to put aside writing style and "critiquing" the books by Donaldson. Enjoy the adventure and escapism of it all.
In other words, this isn't gonna win any literary awards. Well actually that may not be true, but don't analyze it too closely. The story is excellent even if the writing isn't top notch.
Donaldson does come across as a pompous ass from what I've read of his interviews. I still really like the story.

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Sassafras
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Posted: Wed 16 Feb , 2005 10:35 pm
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Aw Shucks! I am sorry to hear that SRD was, is, or maybe a pompous windbag.

I still think that the story is worth the tortured prose of the first several chapters. IIRC it took me until about half way into the first book before I was well and truly hooked. Most of the time, if a book does not grab me by the first 100 pages I put it down.

Before you all make up your minds that the writing is excessively verbose, full of clumsy adjectives and jaw clenching sturm und drang
(which it is .... most especially in the RL passages and the first few chapters of TC in the Land), may I remind everyone that Tolkien also has many forgettable lines, and those we forgive, we overlook for the sake of the underlying themes.

So give Covenant a chance. There is great depth in the telling of the tale.
I quote from "The Encyclopedia of Fantasy", John Clute, John Grant.
Quote:
Donaldson, Stephen R, 1947- US writer of central significance as
an author of demanding and exploratory fantasy novels, beginning with the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever ....
The first sequence concentrated on Covenant's slowly waning refusal to
believe in the REALITY of the Secondary world into which he has been catapulted. This unbelief is perhaps SRD's most original single invention, for it radically transfigures every moment of the first sequence
and profoundly contradicts the reader's normal expectations between the HERO and the LAND, the QUEST and his Companions, plus the overall relationship to the decorum and moral requirements that define the condition of being a Hero. It thoroughly exposes the artifact of the normal
fantasy Secondary World as a stage-set for the deeds of protagonists whose every act is deeply patriotic, deeply land and folk-affirming.
<snip>
SRD's works move, in other words, towards their endings, and it is unsafe to attempt to understand him until he has had the last word.
As far as I am concerned, Donaldson's Covenant addresses faith/belief in a way which has not been done before or since.

As an additonal bonus there are races and peoples presented here which will take your breath away.

One further note, you will consider it derivative of LOTR. It is not. Although Donaldson will admit to being strongly influenced by Tolkien, but then so will every other author of fantasy.

Have I pled my case adequately enough?


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Impenitent
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Posted: Wed 16 Feb , 2005 11:44 pm
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The most extraordinary thing about the book IMO is that he has created a totally unsympathetic protagonist - and yet it works completely. One stays with Covenant the whole way (well, at least I stayed with Covenant through the first three books - haven't read the subsequent ones because I'm not sure they had been published at the time I picked up the book).

Actually, the very fact that Covenant cannot bring himself to believe - that he feels he must cling to a state of non-belief in order to stay safe and sane - is the most satisfying aspect of the story for me; because I felt that the Land didn't ring true (sorry :oops: ) and the anti-hero agreed with me (although I didn't like him at all); somehow the mechanism became a prism through which the sub-creation came to life.

Does that make sense to anyone?

(And I found his language a little purple and tortured also; over-written - and that's saying alot as I probably write the most purple prose you can imagine! :mrgreen: What can I say - melodrama is bread and water to me ;) )

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Sassafras
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Posted: Thu 17 Feb , 2005 12:13 am
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Quote:
the anti-hero agreed with me (although I didn't like him at all); somehow the mechanism became a prism through which the sub-creation came to life.
Does that make sense to anyone?
Makes perfect sense to me. :)

Imp, you didn't feel that The Land rang true?

How so? Rather, how not so.

You should read the second chronicles. The quest is the same (sort of) TC still grapples with unbelief but has come to an uneasy truce, but the Land ..... is changed almost beyond recognition.

For me, the first book 'The Wounded Land' of the second chronicles is the most powerful. 'The One Tree' has its moments ... the Elohim, as manifestations of absolute earthpower are contradictory, enigmatic and quite cruel in their self-belief. One of the most intriguing inventions I've ever read.

That's the thing about SDR, so many of his characters are truly multi-dimensional.

One become accustomed to the purple prose. This one even began to enjoy it. He certainly sent me to the dictionary more than once. :D


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