[Pearls]

This has probably been discussed before (looked, couldn't find it) , and as a preface, I have completed exactly one (1) readthrough of the entire series, but I was just about to start again and I noticed something.

GotM opens with a poem from Call to Shadow, by Felisin that seems to be discussing the Emperor's (and Dancer's) death. Or something very much resembling that. "7 years this warmth has bled.." etc etc. But the date is funny. I don't have the book right in front of me, because I'm at work, but it's quite a few years before the prologue, which is before Kellenved has been tossed off a tower or whatever, which implies a couple things.

1) Straight up typo.

2) Felesin is a seer and sort of predicted the future.

3) Felesin was writing a poem about some other Emporer some people might know about. Like in some other Empire. That we might know about. In not this book.

4) Felesin was writing a bunch of trite bullshit that sounded pretty cool and just happened to line up with events from the future and How Poetic!, Emperors die.

5) I'm missing something completely.

[Khellendros]

The date underneath the poem is the date of Felisin's birth, not the year in which it was written.


The "seven years" is, I would suggest, how much time has passed since the Emperor's 'assassination'. That is, it's written in 1161, the year in which the book proper following the prologue begins.


As to how Felisin apparently knew at this point that the Emperor and Dancer didn't really die...that might be a GOTMism.

[Pearls]

Khellendros, on 31 March 2014 - 06:42 PM, said:

The date underneath the poem is the date of Felisin's birth, not the year in which it was written.


The "seven years" is, I would suggest, how much time has passed since the Emperor's 'assassination'. That is, it's written in 1161, the year in which the book proper following the prologue begins.


As to how Felisin apparently knew at this point that the Emperor and Dancer didn't really die...that might be a GOTMism.

That does make more sense.

For some reason I associate the B with "Burn" more than "Born."

Appreciate it.

[D'rek]

Pearls, on 31 March 2014 - 05:07 PM, said:

2) Felesin is a seer and sort of predicted the future.

minor spoilers for HoC:

Spoiler

They say Felisin's mother did have some seer-like visions, and then Felisin says that she might be having some of them, too. Though the whole thing is very vague - I don't think even she knows whether the visions are supposed to be true prophecy or just particularly vivid dreams.

[Inane Babble]

Spoilers, RAFO or open and spoil yourself

Spoiler

Felisin the first was a recognized seer, Felisin the second was shown only the visions of the goddesses fear.

Quote

"Her mother had been gifted with visions. This was well known. A respected truth.And that mother's youngest daughter had dreamed that one day she too would findthat talent within her. But that gift only came with the goddess, with this spiteful, horrific creature whosesoul was far more parched and withered than any desert. And the visions that assailedSha'ik were murky, fraught things. They were, she had come to realize, not born ofany talent or gift. They were the conjurings of fear."

This post has been edited by Inane Babble: 01 April 2014 - 09:22 AM

[Puck]

I'd take that 'respected truth' thing with a grain of salt, personally.

Anyway, I always thought that the supposed prophecy written by Felisin was not a prophesy but a poem she wrote retroactively. It's said in HoC that she takes to writing poetry, and she does have moments where she sees herself more like the Felisin she once was instead of the Sha'ik she has become. I see this more as something written after the fact to sound like it was written before it. The prove, to me personally, was the hint that she starts writing poetry in the Whirlwind camp.

Seven's also a pretty mythic number, if we're gonna take the whole thing apart. It's an important number in the books and a good stand in for any other. Just substitute it with any onthe one and see if it sounds as epic. It probably won't. And it goes on from there..

Just my two cents..

[Pearls]

Spoiler mode engage!



(in the mean time, someone tell me how to do the spoiler tag)


##############################################################
So just to get some clarity in here.

I was under the impression that Call to Shadow was written by Felisin Sha'ik's mom (who I presumed she shared a name with), not Felisin Sha'ik. I guess that's less perfectly clear now that the B stands for "Born" and not "Burn". The date of the birth seems to imply that it was the mom judging by Felisin of DG's suspected age. This still doesn't clarify when Call to Shadow was written, respective to the events it's talking about.

I suppose it could've been after the fact. That doesn't answer, as mentioned somewhere above, how the heck she would know. I'm pretty sure who exactly Shadowthrone is was kept a pretty big secret among most people. Seems like she (Felisin Sha'ik's mom) could've been a seer in truth after all.

I'm not sure if any of this really matters.

[Puck]

1. You did not say so in your OP, as far as I can tell. Thus, most will assume Felisin means, well, Felisin Paran, Ganoes' youngest sister.

2. I wonder where that idea comes from. I mean, yeah, it's hinter at, not by an exactly reliable source, that Lady Paran [lets call her that for clarity's sake] clamed to have been gifted with visions. Nonetheless, I'm pretty sure that in that case the poem would not have been 'signed' by someone named Felisin and born in 1146 of Burn's Sleep, which is, you know, exactly 14 years prior to the first chapter of GotM where Paran goes to visit his home and to see how his sisters are doing - one of whom just so happens to be named Felisin and be 14 years old..

What I'm saying is: the poem was written by Felisin Paran, sister to Ganoes Paran, and there's no doubt about it.

Oh yeah, and as for spoiler tags: [ spoiler ]Text[/ spoiler ], but minus the spaces.

This post has been edited by Puck: 01 April 2014 - 08:34 PM

[Pearls]

This has been rather illuminating, despite the subject matter.

Appreciate it, Puck, and all.

[Zerv]

While I might be remembering this incorrectly, I believe it's stated in HoC that Felisin is in fact working on a poem named Call to Shadow at the time. Even so, this still doesn't explain how she knew about Shadowthrone's identity unless Dryjhna showed it to her (and I'm not sure why she would).

[Puck]

Actually, we might have us a thread twist here.. you know, like a plot twist, but forum style, because I just went and looked it up in HoC and this is what it says.. Unspoilered, because, well, anyone reading this thread should know by now it contains spoilers..

Quote

'Scrolls,' the girl replied. 'From Mother. She has, it seems, rediscovered her hunger for writing poetry.'
The tattooed ex-priest grunted, 'I thought it was a love, not a hunger.'
'You are not a poet,' she said. 'In any case, to speak plainly is a true talent; to bury beneath obfuscation is a poet's calling these days.'
'You are a brutal critic, lass,' Heboric observed.
'Call to Shadow, she has called it. Or, rather, she continues a poem her own mother began.'
'Ah, well, Shadow is a murky realm. Clearly she has chosen a style to match the subject, perhaps to match that of her own mother.’

There is, also, another fragment of the poem to be found in HoC..

Quote

There are folds in this shadow...
hiding entire worlds.
Call to Shadow
Felisin

..which is also signed by Felisin, but missing the date of birth AND has a different feel/tone to it.

So, then, I decided to accept the challenge and did some more digging and found this:

Quote

With the coming of the Moranth
the tide turned.
And like ships in a harbour
the Free Cities were swept under
Imperial seas.
The war entered its twelfth year,
the Year of the Shattered Moon
and its sudden spawn
of deathly rain
and black-winged promise.
Two cities remained to contest
the Malazan onslaught.
One stalwart, proud banners
beneath Dark's powerful wing.
The other divided –
- without an army,
bereft of allies –
The strong city fell first.
Call to Shadow
Felisin (b.1146)

And this..

Quote

It was said
she turned the blade on herself then
to steal the magic
of life.
Call to Shadow (IX. ii)
Felisin (b.1146)

So, assuming her mother was named Felisin as well, I - and that's just my opinion, of course - still think we can extrapolate from what we have that the poem at the beginning of GotM was written my Felisin, sister to Ganoes, because..

1. the date of birth attached to all but one of the fragments
2. the tone of the one fragment without a date attached is different from the others.. most of the fragments speak of the past, of things that have happened, while the other one is.. different.. assuming her mother did have visions, the tone of the lone fragment is much more fitting to that than to her daughter, who wrote about events that had happened

As to how she could have known about Shadowthrone and Cots.. well, the goddess did share knowledge with her, and besides, I always got the impression that anyone with half a working brain and some basic knowledge of the recent history of the empire could put the clues togetehr and arrive at the proper conclusion..



And yeah, before anyone asks, I AM jumping at any excuse not to work on uni stuff

[Pearls]

Maybe this is why I had a latent confusion. Thanks for digging this up but now I'm going to speculate.


Nifty that Felesin the sister, calls her own poems (if that's indeed what they are, and you've made a strong case) Call to Shadow, considering based upon what you've posted, her grandma started the tradition. Feels more, eh, poetic to not just copy your mom's titles, but to continue a tradition beyond one generation. I like it.

Can you give some context by which she comes by these scrolls? The conversation makes it sound like Felisin the sister's mother is still alive. "Rediscovered."

[Inane Babble]

Felisin the seer died sometime after her husband but before the cull.

The scrolls of the previous quote are being carried by Orphan Felisin the waif who is talking to Heboric, who are discussing Felisin the poet/used

The relationship is Felisin the Seer, mother of: Felisin the poet/used, adopted mother of Felisin Younger, a waif (oprhan)

There is no genetic link between three generations, and while it sounds like Felisin the Waif MAY BE a poet from her dialogue, she is very disdainful of it, and does not seem to be actively involved in "Call to Shadow"

This post has been edited by Inane Babble: 02 April 2014 - 04:32 PM

[Pearls]

Man, I'm embarrassingly bad at this.

I should really just do my homework and look up the context of quotes before I try to comment on them, but my HoC is out with a friend at the moment.

Either way, it's still neat that Felisin the Daughter tried to be like her mother in more ways than one. Not only did she hope for her gift of Seeing, but attempted to tap this connection in some ephemeral sense by continuing a poem her mother wrote. There's something about that that's significantly more emotional than I had originally noticed. You have this (effectively) child who has been given a position of incredible importance at an age where wisdom hasn't particularly had time to mature, with so much riding on her, and we get glimpses on how much she is depending on guidance, and how little she really gets that. She never outright talks about it, but I think Erikson, even in this subtlety lent a level of depth concerning how afraid and alone Felisin is. She lost her mom and she could really really use her (or some anchor of sanity) right now, and her poetry might be one of those ways she's trying to acquire that.

Even if this is completely wrong, it suggests something I hadn't previously considered about the character. Such a simple question has blossomed into something I truly appreciate. Thanks.

[worry]

Spoiler

It's worth noting that Raraku pretty much definitely has a relationship with one of the fragments of broken Emurlahn, so Felisin's presence there along with the sorcery engulfing her is probably enough to strike up visions that have nothing to do with the intentions of Dryjhna or Sha'ik or the Whirlwind Goddess. Shadow will do as it sees fit.

Maybe the thread needs a move to the General forum, since OP has completed the series anyway?