[WinterPhoenix]

So it's been way over a month since I last posted on here (busy, life stuff, all sucks lol) in that time I have finished TBH and RG and I'm now some way into RotCG, I figured now was as good a time as any to ask some niggling questions about RG (and TBH to some extent) and to ask for some veteran commentary on Karsa as a character - and yes I am afraid that at least 1 of these questions will be a timeline issue, just shoring up whether I've made a mistake or not.

Anyways, question 1. Are we supposed to conclude that the Seguleh in the champion's corral is the 2nd? This actually connects to my Karsa issues I'll discuss below but I just wanted to start out without the most simple question. My reasons for thinking this. Firstly, K'rul's discussion with Envy at Callows in MoI, he explicitly states that he is surprised at the punitive force the Seguleh send, but also mentions that the '2nd' is 'mysteriously abroad', and I don't believe he ever mentions a gender. We have no idea about when the Edur slaughter at Callows may have taken place, but it seems to have been at least somewhat recently, meaning the Edur fleet could have been in the area for some time, certainly a representative of the Seguleh fits the definition of a champion. Secondly, when Fiddler and Cuttle thank there lucky stars they are still alive after encountering her leaving Letheras, Fiddler claims (in his head) that she is high-ranked, no indication of how high, but it seems imore than a throwaway line to me, seeing as almost nothing in these novels is not deliberate and we are specifically told about an errant high ranking Seguleh in a prior novel, i.e the 2nd.

Question 2. Timeline query (lol). The 'modern day' section of the MT prologue is dated '1159th year of Burn's Sleep, 3 years prior to the Letherii Seventh Closure'. Thus simple mathematics tells us that the Seventh Closure occurs in 1162 and the entire story of MT takes place over the year leading up to this event. It follows logically that we can safely assume the 'modern day' section of the RG prologue, occurring as it does in 'the last days of King Diskanar' is happening in 1162, the year of the Seventh Closure and Diskanar's death. It is heavily hinted, even as early as the prologue, that the war canoes Preda Biavatt discovers are those of the White Face Barghast, we are not disavowed of this notion as the novel proceeds, this is eventually confirmed when they show up after the last battle between the Letherii and the Awl towards the novels end. Certainly there's no reason to believe those canoes belonged to anyone else. So my question is this, if Preda Bivatt is discovering the evidence of the White Face Barghast upon the shores of Lether in 1162, how can Gruntle be contemplating the fallen bridge outside Darujhistan in 1164? That is to say if the events of MoI don't occur till 1164, it's impossible for the Barghast to be on the continent of Lether so early, I mean in 1162 Tool might not even be working with Lorn yet, according to GotM :/ If the answer to this is simply, the timeline doesn't matter, I will accept that straight away, I just want to make sure I haven't missed anything screamingly obvious which answers my query in some other manner.

Question 3. The Nascent! Can someone here provide a succinct description of this place? It is a broken fragment of Kurald Emurlahn, that much is confirmed by Trull in HoC. If this is all it is, however, can someone explain to me how Karsa enters it somewhere in the ocean to the west of Genebackis, and then leaves it on the far east coast of Seven Cities. Paran enters it from the shores of Raraku, via the Jaghut Bridge of death; Hedge left behind, wanders across it, encountering first the Jaghut Throne of Ice, then the dream pocket of Tellann and finally marches to the gates of Starvald Demelain, without ever encountering anything like a portal out of the Nascent (unless I missed it, I did read some sections of RG very tired) until he leaves with QB to the city of Letheras. And that's not even mentioning how Quick Ben, Trull and Onrack end up at the same location as Hedge from the wandering lake in Cotillion and Shadowthrone's realm. Honestly I love these novels no end, and I find that they are, in general, not nearly as hard to follow as is often made out to be the case, but Warrens/Holds are the exception, and especially travel through them I find. And I feel as though these sections in particular will benefit from a re-read, or ya know three. I am actually following through the Tor re-read with Amanda and Bill now as well, to help order my thoughts on the series as whole, finished reading through all their comments and chapter reviews up to the end of MT as of now, will be very interesting to see what is said about TBH and RG for sure.

I was going to mention Karsa and my deep seated issues with him, as well as my appreciation for how great a character he is in terms of pure creation, and also ask a veteran's opinion of him as of RG, if they can remember how they felt about him that far back. However, this is already an essay looking back at it. So I can always edit the post with my ideas/discussion'questions about Karsa if people think it aint already waffley enough, or just post them in a later comment I guess. Lets just see how these questions go so far, would be good to get an answer on the Seguleh query before I order my Karsa thoughts anyhow.

[worry]

1. Nope.
2. Yah, it's a timeline is not important moment.
3. Shadow wanders.

Spoiler

I hate essay questions.

[WinterPhoenix]

Oponn Relationship, on 27 March 2016 - 11:50 PM, said:

1. Nope.
2. Yah, it's a timeline is not important moment.
3. Shadow wanders.

Spoiler

I hate essay questions.

Lol, love the spoiler tags. I do apologise, honestly I have tried in the past to limit my questions/responses/posts on other forums and the like, and it basically seems to be a loosing battle, I seem to be patently incapable of not rambling.

I'm glad question 1 is a no, I had jumped to that conclusion and as a result it just fueled my dislike of Karsa, based as it is on his beating everything too damn easily. I will elaborate on that, but perhaps in another comment.

Yeah I figured it was a timeline issue, they don't affect my enjoyment of the series, when I know I haven't made a mistake. This one was fairly obvious, still figured I would double check to make sure I hadn't missed anything glaringly obvious, I still don't trust myself not to miss giant clues in front of my face lol

I am aware that the shadow realm moves, and I already had this down as the probable reason for Karsa's staggered entry and exit points, as well as QB, Trull and Onrack's sojourn, Cotillion himself I believe talks with QB about Shadow moving. I'm still baffled as to why the Jaghut bridge of death would lead to a fragment of Kurald Emurlahn, however.

A little query, should I be making anything of the number on instances of relation between the Jaghut, the Hold of Ice and realm of Death. I say relation but maybe I mean, a series of a perhaps tenuous clues, is there anything to make of this going forward?

This post has been edited by WinterPhoenix: 28 March 2016 - 12:02 AM

[worry]

I was kidding about the essay question thing. Mostly.

1 is a "no" as far as I remember, and given the fact that at least one more book deals with the Seguleh, you may find a better answer then.

2 I'm the most certain about.

3 Yeah that's a mind-bender. But shadow apparently borders every other realm, and constants are few and far between anyway.

No direct spoilers but a note on the prequels for your last query -- enter at your own risk:

Spoiler

The Jaghut War on Death is set to feature prominently in Fall of Light, so answers may be forthcoming on this issue. As far as knowing why/how any of this is connected at your point, being mostly clueless after Reaper's Gale seems pretty darn right to me.

[WinterPhoenix]

Oponn Relationship, on 28 March 2016 - 12:13 AM, said:

I was kidding about the essay question thing. Mostly.

1 is a "no" as far as I remember, and given the fact that at least one more book deals with the Seguleh, you may find a better answer then.

2 I'm the most certain about.

3 Yeah that's a mind-bender. But shadow apparently borders every other realm, and constants are few and far between anyway.

No direct spoilers but a note on the prequels for your last query -- enter at your own risk:

Spoiler

The Jaghut War on Death is set to feature prominently in Fall of Light, so answers may be forthcoming on this issue. As far as knowing why/how any of this is connected at your point, being mostly clueless after Reaper's Gale seems pretty darn right to me.

Ah so there's a possibility that she is the 2nd, hmm, well I hope I find out this isn't the case. Based on Mok's performance in MoI, I would hope his superior would put up more of a fight, even against Karsa, honestly if she is the 2nd that entire scene reads like another Deragoth encounter ala the denouement of HoC - I can't begin to describe how much it annoyed me that they were built up to be so fearsome (the K'Chain scene in the Raraku's Memories/L'oric time travels bit) and then taken down without significant difficulty by the one character who I most want to see slapped down a little. Sure they gnawed on his arm a little, but he never seemed significantly put out, in fact he never has, with the exception of his capture in HoC I guess.

I mentioned in my OP that I had started reading the Tor 're-read of the fallen' (and excellent resource I would recommend to anyone really), and there is a particularly excellent post by Erikson himself about Karsa in the comments on one of the early chapters of HoC, after Amanda makes a point about her strong dislike of Karsa. In the post (again recommended reading for anyone that hasn't) Erikson basically writes an essay about what he was attempting with the character of Karsa Orlong. It is a truly enlightening piece, and I was most impressed by the fact that the narrative had already impressed upon me many of the ideas and philosophies Erikson was claiming the character represents. That is to say, anyone can explain the deep philosophical discussion of civilization and barbarianism that their character is supposed to provoke in a wordy essay, yet it takes a true genius to so subtly implant those ideas through characterization alone. I have an extreme appreciation for Karsa as a character, I honestly believe he might be Erikson's crowning achievement, in terms of the sheer magnitude of what that character represents, both in terms of the authors own views, and the foils he lays to waste. And all that being said, I still hate him, I grow increasingly frustrated with idea that he will never meet his match, that Erikson will see him overcome all hurdles, I wished, I truly wished for Icarium to teach him some humility, I was denied :/

[Puck]

1. You've met the Seguleh Second in tBH already, though he's not directly called that, just.. ya know, the appropriately adorned mask.

2. By the end of RG, a connection between the Jaghut and Death should be jumping in your face and trying to eat it.

[WinterPhoenix]

Puck, on 28 March 2016 - 12:47 AM, said:

1. You've met the Seguleh Second in tBH already, though he's not directly called that, just.. ya know, the appropriately adorned mask.

2. By the end of RG, a connection between the Jaghut and Death should be jumping in your face and trying to eat it.

Really, in The Bonehunters? Hmm, desperately scrambling to think who this might be now, been over a month since I finished the book, and somehow sections are already bleeding into one, bleh will have to come back to this. So long as this means that the Seguleh, Karsa so easily defeats is not the 2nd, I'm immensely pleased on that part, even if his actual identity has seemingly passed right by my face.

Yeah I wouldn't say it was trying to eat my face so much, but there were certainly enough hints of a connection, that I had started to give considerable thought to where it might go down the line. Really not sure how this connection will play out as of yet. It's not as simple as Hood being a Jaghut is it? Now that I think about it, we've been given no concrete evidence of Hood's race I don't think, unless I'm being utterly clueless here (a distinct possibility I suppose.)

[Puck]

I wanted to make sure I'm not misremembering and looked it up. Chapter 4 of tBH.

It's first hinted at in DG, though only vaguely, but RG has a lot of talk about ice and death and Jaghut. Emroth tells Hedge how the Jaghut stopped believing in souls and after creating their own death realm, never actually populated it, and so on. The passage is murky in my memory, but it's full of interesting stuff. Then they (or was it Hedge alone?) find that corpse on a throne in the Jaghut underworld.. Many readers came to a certain conclusion re Hood after that.

Spoiler

And yeah, Hood is a Jaghut.

Although there's more to that story than just a frozen corpse on a throne. But that's stuff for later books.

This post has been edited by Puck: 28 March 2016 - 01:20 AM

[WinterPhoenix]

Puck, on 28 March 2016 - 01:17 AM, said:

I wanted to make sure I'm not misremembering and looked it up. Chapter 4 of tBH.

It's first hinted at in DG, though only vaguely, but RG has a lot of talk about ice and death and Jaghut. Emroth tells Hedge how the Jaghut stopped believing in souls and after creating their own death realm, never actually populated it, and so on. The passage is murky in my memory, but it's full of interesting stuff. Then they (or was it Hedge alone?) find that corpse on a throne in the Jaghut underworld.. Many readers came to a certain conclusion re Hood after that.

Spoiler

And yeah, Hood is a Jaghut.

Although there's more to that story than just a frozen corpse on a throne. But that's stuff for later books.

Yes, it was specifically the Emroth and Hedge conversations, corpse on a throne scene I had in mind when I inquired about whether there was a connection going forward. It only occurred to me about the possibility of Hood being a Jaghut when I was posting the last comment and realised we'd never been told his race specifically. Thinking about it, doesn't Raest make comments about Hood back in GotM?

I'ma have to re-read chapter 4 I guess lol

EDIT: So I re-read chapter 4, the relevant section anyhow, and I have to say that the importance of the single red mark on the enamel mask went completely and utterly over my head at the time! Not only that, but I'd forgotten that it was even a Seguleh in that scene, really highlights the importance of re-reads. They call him the Soldier of High House Death and in my head I'd completely mixed this up with the Knight, thus I was under the impression it was Baudin, literally forgotten all about the fact that Cutter recognises him for a Seguleh!

Well at least it weren't the one Karsa beat lol

This post has been edited by WinterPhoenix: 28 March 2016 - 02:09 AM

[MecnunK]

The 2nd is kind of dead and working for lord of death now, at-least that's what I can recall.. Remember the temple scene with croaker whilst they are traveling through 7 cities (heboric, scillara, and felisin) ..I think it's in TBH but again my memory is dim. Its been theorised that he is the missing 2nd.

Don't start me on Karsa..I dislike super-characters that just beat everyone and everything.. Icarium to a degree has an excuse..but Karsa needed an ass whooping

[WinterPhoenix]

MecnunK, on 25 May 2016 - 10:36 PM, said:

The 2nd is kind of dead and working for lord of death now, at-least that's what I can recall.. Remember the temple scene with croaker whilst they are traveling through 7 cities (heboric, scillara, and felisin) ..I think it's in TBH but again my memory is dim. Its been theorised that he is the missing 2nd.

Don't start me on Karsa..I dislike super-characters that just beat everyone and everything.. Icarium to a degree has an excuse..but Karsa needed an ass whooping

I still feel exactly this way about Karsa Orlong, an intense and abiding hatred, made all the murkier by my appreciation of the character from the point of view of Erikson and what he was trying to achieve with him. He may very well be Erikson's best written character, nuanced and complete with oodles and oodles of social commentary hidden beneath his actions and explicitly stated in his words. That I literally can't stand him and want to see him humbled and brought low is continually disappointing for me.My issues just got worse after TtH, I won't say anything specific in this thread obviously, but it just seems that every time he meets someone who might be able to do just what I want, they come away without fighting, or even as damn friends!