[Daeg]

Thinking back....it seems the lesson of the book was this....it took 2 upstart human ascendants to undo all the damage done by hundreds of thousands of years of superior races and gods.

However tavore got her knowledge...it was not completely on her own but as the story claims...power attracts power....if you accept that premise then they all HAD to come together at the end....

[Hellmo]

I have to throw in that while there's an explanation for everything, it still feels like it would have been nice to have a few things spelled out a bit more clearly. In particular, some more information about Tavore would be nice. I understand that she's meant to be enigmatic, but knowing just a little bit more would have made what we didn't know that much more compelling. Specifically, some information (anything at all) about T'Amber would have been nice. I'm in the middle of a reread of the series, and maybe I missed something, but as I recall we don't ever find out a goddamn thing about her.

Overall I really appreciate Erikson making us work to understand what's happening, but this is a case where he may have gone slightly too far.

I also agree with the complaints about Icarium - it's kind of anticlimactic to have him out of the game for the whole book, and given that Calm never draws on his power Erikson could have completely cut Icarium and Mappo out of the book and it wouldn't have changed a damn thing. I think the main reason it bothers me is that if Icarium doesn't matter at all, then Mappo's death is utterly pointless.

On the other hand, there's so much shit going on with the ending that it'd be hard to fit Icarium in there.

[Daeg]

Yeah...maybe the most tragic point of all...mappo's entire life seemed to be for nothing...protecting a super power who turns out to be completely unimportant...

[worry]

Agreed. He should have been in an office somewhere doing something productive instead of spending all those millennia traveling the world with his best friend.

[Daeg]

 worry, on 18 October 2013 - 02:36 AM, said:

Agreed. He should have been in an office somewhere doing something productive instead of spending all those millennia traveling the world with his best friend.

Hmmmm, i'm not sure if this is a snide remark or meant to be humor.

If it is snide I'm not sure if its directed towards me or someone else.

Also, if it is snide I don't understand the need for it.

Regardless, I will answer in all sincerity.

As a father of 4, I find it very tragic that mappo has sacrificed his entire life to follow this man who it seems, is nothing more than a puppet.

I believe, knowing what icarium has gone through to try to free his own father, that he would agree. The possibility of family and the legacy that comes from it would far outweigh the reward of wandering aimlessly with a "best friend" for who knows how long.

It was a cruel prank treating mappo this way. Just when he really began to see the role as more than just a duty, it was taken from him. He spent his last months in self-imposed misery. He surrendered the last of his humanity so that he could die at the feet of his "best friend". He died alone...thinking he failed....

The tragedy here is layers deep and I have come to expect nothing less from this author.

[worry]

It's neither snide nor humorous. I just don't understand the judgment being made. Mappo's life was a sacrifice, so it was nothing. Mappo's death wasn't a sacrifice, so it was pointless. If Mappo's death is pointless, whose death isn't? Soldiers in combat? If Mappo's life is nothing, whose life is something? Fathers? Why theirs and not his? I don't understand.

[Daeg]

I see.

The FA mentions that Mappo really wasn't needed as guardian. He was tricked into being a guardian to keep him unimportant.

If this is true, Mappo's potential for his own life was lost. He gained a friendship with a man that often forgot who mappo was. Mappo followed this man around on ambiguous quests to find something unknown.

Somehow, in my own mind, I don't think mappo (or icarium) would have chosen this life for mappo.

If the word "nothing" carries too much judgement...I offer this...unfulfilled.

[worry]

At point A, if one could see all the point Zs and pluck the happiest route, I'm sure most would. But at point Z looking back, I'm not sure who would give up everything they've lived through for a drastically different path full of different people. Some would, I'm sure, but Mappo? He loved Icarium. I think it goes both ways. If Mappo never got to know the love that millions of mortal fathers have for their spouses and offspring, those millions of fathers/spouses likewise never knew the love Mappo shared with Icarium for a vast stretch of time. That's everyone's story, more or less. You're just you, the one time. Pretty tragic all in all, I agree with you there.

[Khazduk]

 worry, on 18 October 2013 - 07:24 AM, said:

You're just you, the one time. Pretty tragic all in all, I agree with you there.

Tragic and terrifying, and still amazing. Life in general and every-just-one in particular. Mappo fell but I would never consider him fallen.

[Hellmo]

Worry, there's pointless and there's pointless.

Mappo set out on a lengthy journey spanning the course of several books to retrieve his friend, and ultimately failed and died. That makes his death pointless in the sense that it accomplished nothing, but I have no problem with that. It's tragic and stuff. Perfectly suitable ending to his character arc.

My problem is that whether or not he succeeded, that entire storyline of him retrieving Icarium has absolutely no bearing on anything that happens in the main storyline (the whole Crippled God thing), meaning that it is pointless in the sense that the whole thing could have simply not been in the books and it wouldn't have made a difference.

Obviously that's an exaggeration, and I'm certainly not saying it shouldn't have been in there, but hopefully you can see why I find it a somewhat unsatisfying conclusion to that storyline. I think everyone expected it to merge into the main storyline, and while blah blah blah SE defies cliche and subverts expectations blah blah blah, when I'm finishing a 10-book million page epic I've spent months reading I'm pretty okay with having a few of my expectations satisfied.

[Spoilsport Stonny]

There can be no doubt that The Nameless ones used Mappo and were never truthful with him. especially considering THEY were the ones who destroyed the Trell viallge he was from, and not Icarium as he was told. Mappo's story ends up very tragic, but is that because he wasted his life or because he developed a love for Icarium? That love, doubtless, was given back to Mappo, and we're shown this as Icarium attempts to reassemble the blue pottery shards that Mappo was consumed with. And hows that for symbolism? And failure? I dont know about that either. Icarium unleashed at the Spire would could have ruined everything. He was the one uncontrollable factor and he was kept out of it. So failure is relative. Yes Mappo died, but he found Icarium, and in the end, Icarium got his memories back.

[Daeg]

As I posted in another thread, I'm sure mappo wanted no more out of his life than he received. I'm sure he was more than happy for the chance to die defending his friend one last time.

The tragedy is from my point of view, not his. And obviously not yours, worry.

I sense that you want to defend something here...some choice or perspective...or maybe you just really feel a connection to mappo...but there is really nothing to defend against...everyone loves mappo...everyone wishes he didn't die...especially the way he did...

Oh, by the way..I don't think there was a lot of office jobs where he came from... =)

[Rictus]

Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't the spider goddess have some influence over Mappo? Those webs of hers? I just feel like I'm missing something here; I should do a full re-read.

[amphibian]

 Spoilsport Stonny, on 18 October 2013 - 05:24 PM, said:

in the end, Icarium got his memories back.

Did he? Last I remember, he was memory-less and wandering off with Ublala Pung, who was wearing the Dralk Eleint gear.

[Spoilsport Stonny]

Perhaps I should have been more specific. But at the end of that scene with Ubalala, after Icarium looks at the pottery shard that Ubalala picked up, he looks back at the burial mound and says ‘Friend, I have remembered something.’ Its the last line of the book before the epilogues. So he didn't quite get all his memories back, but he did remember something.

[Daeg]

I don't think he had total recall...some sort of feeling? I am glad that those two ended up together... It seems a good match.

[Daeg]

 Rictus, on 18 October 2013 - 06:29 PM, said:

Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't the spider goddess have some influence over Mappo? Those webs of hers? I just feel like I'm missing something here; I should do a full re-read.

I do remember the webs that healed/saved him and how they prevented him from traveling in the temple...not sure how this effected the story other than forcing mappo to travel with the guild

[jb1000000]

 Shal-morzinn, on 01 July 2013 - 12:25 PM, said:

<br /><font size="3">I was slightly disappointed as well with tCG. One of my main complaints is all the romantic reunion of couples in the end (lets see Korlat and Whiskeyjack, ... ... I think such a and-then-they-lived-happily-ever-after ending is completely at odds with endings of all the other books in the series. <br /> </font><br />

<br /><br /><br />

I'm sorry, but on the Korlat-Whiskeyjack front we must have read very different versions. A brief reunion between woman and ghost accompanied by a song from Fiddler is more like 'pining forever after' than 'happily ever after'. Sure it was beautiful and romantic but in a tragic ultimate for(ever)bearance kind of way.
As for a few couples finding love being 'at odds' with the other endings, I can't say I'm surprised that it wasn't more of the same. The whole series was tragic from beginning right up to (and still in part including) the end. The fact that they had somehow pulled it off and at last had some kind of end to their monumental struggle leaves me in no surprise that a few of them fell naturally towards a 'lets put our feet up and have some cuddle time(or in most cases more like a 'ravage each other black and blue time'. Let's face it - they deserve it

When you balance out all the deaths and tragedies and losses along the way with the successes of the final moments, I'd say happily ever after is some way off the mark when you look back at what they've been though and compare it to what they now have.

For me, they could have all won the lottery, been cured of cancer and rode into the sunset on unicorns to the theme of the A-Team and it still wouldn't go a handful of dirt towards filling the hole left in my heart from Beak's uber-sacrifice for his 'new friends' - let alone all the others along the way.

Tavore eat your heart out... I could cry all over again ! ! !

In my mind tCG and tMBotF was a truly epic and skilfully managed masterpiece with (for me) near perfect measures of closure/open-endedings, success/failure and love/loss - Erikson - you da man ! ! !

[jb1000000]

 amphibian, on 18 October 2013 - 06:59 PM, said:

<br />

 Spoilsport Stonny, on 18 October 2013 - 05:24 PM, said:

in the end, Icarium got his memories back.<br />

<br />Did he? Last I remember, he was memory-less and wandering off with Ublala Pung, who was wearing the Dralk Eleint gear.<br />

<br /><br /><br />

My personal take is that yes - Mappo's death was one of the totally heart-wrenching tragedies of the series - but this in no way makes it empty or pointless in the grand scheme of things. The fact that Icarium 'remembered something' I believe is a sign to point towards a gradual (if perhaps not total) eventual recovery. I would suggest that this recovery would perhaps never have come around or at least begun if not for the near eternal love poured into him through his relationship with Mappo, thus making his journey with him, if perhaps not his death, vital in allowing the recovery and potential disarming of the most unstable and powerful entity that the world has been threatened by. With this new development and a landscape now free from his would-be 'users' (sadly also including the last tool in their machinations - Mappo) there is not only a sense of closure but one of new beginnings for him.
The fact the we didn't see him go all chaos and destroy everything I also take as a good thing - it might've been cool to see maybe, but surely him NOT destroying everything has got to be a win, right?

I will miss Mappo but really I think the meaningful sacrifice he made with his life was far more valuable than the tragic nature of his death was senseless.

[Luperci]

 Defiance, on 14 September 2012 - 04:12 AM, said:

Tavore got her knowledge offscreen from Shadowthrone and Cotillion. We don't know exactly when and where they met, but this is revealed during The Crippled God. I don't remember quite when the scene takes place, but I believe Lostara Yil is in Tavore's tent and finds a Talon necklace. She's a child of the emperor. Some people might try to refute this given Paran and Shadowthrone's conversation at the beginning of The Crippled God (something along the lines of "did you two plan this shit?!?!"), but this does not refute the idea that Tavore has contact with the rulers of the Shadow Realm. Instead, it just further shows just how closed off Tavore is. She has the necessary information from Shadowthrone and Cotillion, but in terms of how she's going to handle things no one, not even the gods themselves, know exactly what's on her mind.

We know Heboric has been very important for awhile. Recall his role during The Bonehunters and what he learned of the Jade Strangers during House of Chains. Granted, this didn't fully lay out what his power was going to be used for in the end, but personally I feel that it laid out enough groundwork for it.

I can understand the complaint about Icarium. I was surprised that he was never unleashed during the climax. I didn't feel cheated for it, though. I thought his arc was resolved beautifully (although it was damn tragic, Mappo dying right as he finds Icarium was heartbreaking). Deadhouse Gates begins with Icarium and Mappo as companions. Icarium knows nothing of himself yet Mappo knows everything. The Crippled God ends with Icarium and Ublala as companions. Icarium is finally starting to remember things about himself and this time it's his companion that knows nothing about him. I found that to be really poetic. Also, it is explained how Icarium is basically a walking time bomb at least once during the series - he attempted to free his father, Gothos, from an Azath. He nearly killed the Azath and caused the sundering of Kurald Emurhlan (well, to be fair, it was already fucked up before Icarium, if I recall correctly he was just the catalyst that pushed the realm over the edge). Doing this caused a fragment of chaos to be lodged within him. As chaos is anethma to order, any time Icarium's rage was awakened (the thing that caused him to nearly kill an Azath), all of his memories are washed away.

What comes to my mind is the telling of how Tavore came to be such a good field general and scholar of previous wars and battles. House Paran was a wealthly house who provided horses to the empire all the way back to Kellenvad. Paran talks of previous generals and leaders squaring off against the young Tavore at the earnest of her father who bet the men to try to beat her, playing with the toys and such that were representing a battlefield and re creating those battles to see if she could win or reverse previous defeats. I like to think that a young Kellenvad and/or Dancer met Young Tavore there at one point and kept an eye on her since. They don't explain why Surly chose Tavore for the position of Adjunct but I like to imagine that it was planned by Shadowthrone and Dancer, the Empress fearing political enemies knew of the relationship btw Tavore and Kellenvad and chose to keep her close to keep an eye on her (or perhaps hope she would be killed in the rebellion or one of the other impossible battles the Empress sent her to knowing she couldn't win since she was given a very inexperienced army). Another theory is that Tavore knowing the Empress would be wary of her trust after Paran went rogue offered up her younger sister Feslin as a show of loyalty and commitment to the Empire, this would explain why she sent a Claw (one of Dancers, hint, hint) Baudin with Feslin to keep her safe. When Tavore was never able to find her sister or know of her outcome this set on her shoulders like a mountain of grief, explaining at least one the great burdens that she carries with her without anyone seeing (this is mentioned by Lostara and a couple others when they get a peak of the hurt behind her eyes when she lets her guard slip a couple times throughout the armies travels).