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Loki's sensible nonsense of nonsensical sense

Posts tagged with "Eddings"

Rest in peace and happiness, Mr. Eddings

Thursday, 4. June 2009, 00:37:50

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David Eddings has passed away. His books never failed to amuse me, and reading - and loving - the Belgariad was a huge part of my childhood and my still on-going fascination with fantasy both. Thank you, Mr. Eddings. For all those moments where your words made others happy, I hope that somewhere, you're now happy and with your wife again.

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The Tamuil

Monday, 8. May 2006, 00:10:58

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I've read it. It was okay. Like with the Elenium, it grew better as the series progressed. Like with the Elenium, only one of the villains (okay, this time two, but the other one was minor) was interesting. Like with the Elenium, most of the plot was horribly predictable. Like with everything else Eddings has written (that I have read), the dialogue is very repetitive and so is the humour, but it's still funny in the typical Eddings-manner, which, after all, is 90% of why I read his work.


So. Well worth the read, but not on par with the Belgariad, and certainly not a brilliant piece of literature by any means. It does do what I expect from Eddings, though - it is funny.

Quoted by memory:

"So why did you drag me and a hundred thousand knights a thousand miles in the dead of winter where a quarter of us died, when all that's left to do when we arrive is some of the administrative cleaning-up after the battle?"
"The exercise was probably good for you."



It's lines like that that make it worth the bother. XD

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Reading List

Monday, 1. May 2006, 12:37:39

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I'm posting this more to have a easily available list somewhere than to inform you readers, so I apologize if this seems dreadfully boring.



1. Finish "The Hidden City", book 3 of the Tamuil-trilogy by David Eddings, last of the Sparhawk-books.
2. Read "Exiles Return", last book (at this point, at least) of the "Conclave of Shadows"-series by Raymond E. Feist
3. Read "The Malazan Book of the Fallen"-series by Steven Erikson, which has, like, six books brick-thick at this point or something, so this is going to be taking a while. Looking forward to it, though.
4. Read "Jimmy the Hand", last book (again, at this point, at least) of the "Legends of the Riftwar"-series of stand-alone books by Raymond E. Feist. Thanks to Rafe for this piece of information. Whoever you are, dude, I owe you. :D
5. Read "The Complete Sherlock Holmes Collection", at least a few more stories in it, I've been standing in the first fourth of the gigantic book for over a year now.
6. The "Labyrinth of Evil"-"Revenge of the Sith"-"Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader"-trilogy, which I've been post-poning for quite some months now.
7. Read "Knife of Dreams", latest book in the "Wheel of Time"-series by that Robert Jordan-fellow everybody keeps going on and on about.
8. Catch up on "Artemis Fowl".
9. At this point I should probably try something of Robin Hobb.
10. "American Gods" by Neil Gaiman.
11. Getting back into the Deverry-books by Katherine Kerr, I've only read the very first series, and that one in Norwegian, no less.
12. Reading "Flight of the Nighthawks" and whatever more Feist may have published in his Darkwar-saga at this point in time.
13. Sigh. Reading book 4-> of "Harry Potter", I guess...
14. Assorted "Discworld"-books.
15. Now, I'm sure this list will be obsolete before I get this far due to new interests, new publications and the like, but at this point I'd rather fancy reading Milton's "Paradise Lost" or Dante's "Divine Comedy". I should probably also give "Don Quijote" a chance, and I've been wanting to re-read some Jules Verne, haven't read him since the eight or ninth grade.

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In all seriousness

Tuesday, 4. April 2006, 17:31:27

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WARNING. This post might actually convey an opinion. (It might also not, I'm certainly not going to put me in a position where I can be held accountable for anything I write in this post) Some people might find this concept offensive. (I certainly do.) You have been warned.


The concept of "Human Rights" bugs me. It bugs me that people, usually secular such, walks merrily around proclaiming they have "a right" to this and "a right" to that.


On what grounds? Because your grandfather's grandmother's third cousin knew one of the guys writing your consitution, and you're still living in the same general geographical area as they made their laws for? Okay, then, maybe you've got "a right" to this and that as a citizen, as a member of the nation following this constitution.

But at what point does this "right" the collective you're dwelling in has decided to grant you become universal for all humans? What the hell gives you the right to say "this is a human right"? "The UN says so"? What the hell gives the UN the right to say what counts as human rights and, more importantly, what don't? Last I checked, not even one hundreth of a percentile of the humans supposedly covered by the "human rights" have a vote in the UN. If they're lucky, they might share one with a few million others.

In Norway, I think, and in Sweden, owning a television set is considered part of the bare minimum of what a person should have. If you don't have a job, if you don't have an income, if you don't have any money, the government finances, among other things, your television set. It is, basically, considered a right to have a television set. Oooookay? So, in Norway, we have more human rights than they do in, say, Kenya? Then it isn't human rights, people, then it isn't a right you have just for being a human. Then it's Norwegian rights. Rights you have for being a Norwegian human. And that's another matter entirely.

But even people making this distinction keeps nagging about human rights as if they were universal. The right not to be discriminated against. The right not to be abused. The right of "free speech", oh, that one's maybe the worst one.

What a load of bullocks that one is.

Where do these people who made these rights get them? Did they just have a gut instinct "this is something everybody should have a right to"? If they did, why is these people's gut instincts guidelines for international ethics? Or did they look to their culture, what was considered right and wrong, and pick out what was generally considered the essenatials? If so, why does these rules claim to be universal, and not British or French or American or at least Western? Because they sure as hell didn't get it written down by God.

And therein lies the heart of the matter. (Those who want to read the last sentence as "Which brings us to tonight's wørd" may feel free to do so.) Justification.

Secular Humanists are awfully fond of pointing to the "Human Rights". It's their only claim to universal authority, because they, as opposed to most other religious people, have no holy bidding granting them and their opinions this authority. And yet these "Rights" they love so much come from nowhere at all - if from anywhere, they're from societies shaped in centuries by Christian ethics.

And then, there's conflict. Of course, there's always conflict, so that's not new, but there you go anyway.
Doesn't everyone stand a right not to have his or her beliefs insulted? To be treated with respect? According to these "Human Rights" that is. But everyone also has the so-called right to say whatever the Gorm they please. Including lies. Including insults. No matter what you want to do, no matter how many other people's rights you violate, there's always one right or another which gives you the right, the justification, to do it.
And that's just the tip of the ice-berg.

Now, the reason I'm writing this post is that we (barely) touched the topic on a seminar earlier today, and my lecturer used a word I've never really thought about in this context before, but which seems obvious now.

Duty.

The point of the Human Rights, regardless of their justufications, is that they try to grant every human a certain amount of certainity, happyness and security in their lives. Doing that by giving people rights don't work (well). People like having rights. People like being able to scream about their rights being neglected. People, in general, like screaming, it seems. It's probably a universal character flaw, but there you go. We love each other nonetheless. We have the right to be loved, you see.

Nonsense.
We have the duty to love. We have the duty not to insult others. We have the duty to let others say what they mean. We have the duty not to steal stuff. And we have the duty not to shoot our hunting-comrade in the face.

Human Duty. Not Human Right. Bugger the Rights. Rights are for imbeciles. Duties are for people. The only justification, a collective wish for everyone to feel as good as possible at all times, is not for rights, it's a justification for duty.


And that's the wørd.

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Forced inspiration

Monday, 20. March 2006, 01:21:09

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I wanted to make a post. I can't think of anything to post about. Thus, I search my mind. What do I come up with?



Please, as if you don't know it'll be Whedon-related. :D




Well, it won't. Not per se.


It'll be LISTS! LISTS! LIIIIIIISTS!



Ehrm. I'm calm now. Really, I'm calm.




LIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIISTS!


TOP FIFTEEN VILLAINS OF ALL BOOKS, TV-SERIES, MOVIES AND COMICS I CAN THINK OF.
Many of these characters have lots of different incarnations, and I list only those I am both familiar with and like.

1. The Joker (from the comics "Batman" and the television-series "Batman the Animated Series")
2. Lex Luthor (from the modern-age comics "Superman" and television-series "Smallville" and "Lois & Clark")
3. Darken Rahl (from the book-series "the Sword of Truth")
4. Grand Admiral Thrawn (from the "Thrawn-trilogy" book-series of Star Wars)
5. Angelus (from the television-series "Angel" and "Buffy the Vampire Slayer")
6. Eric Magnus "Magneto" Lensherr (from the comics "X-men", "Ultimate X-men" and the "X-men" movies)
7. The Phantom Blot (from the "Mickey Mouse"-comics)
8. Doctor Victor von Doom (from the comics "Fantastic Four", "Ultimate Fantastic Four" and the "Fantastic Four"-movie)
9. Shere Khan (of the "Jungle Book"-book, Disney's "The Jungle Book"-movie and the "Jungle Book: Shaonen Mowgli"-television series)
10. Scar (of the "Lion King"-movie)
11. Holland Manners (of the "Angel"-television series)
12. Lionel Luthor (of the "Smallville"-television series)
13. Martel (of the "Elenium"-books)
14. Saruman (of the "Lord of the Rings"-book and ditto movies)
15. Hans Gruber (from the "Die Hard"-movie - there's probably lots of villains I like better that I'm just not trying hard enough to remember, but I just had to get Alan Rickman on the list)

(notable characters who'd probably have made the list if I had considered them true villains: The Janitor from the "Scrubs" television-series, Petyr "Littlefinger" Baelish from "A Song of Ice and Fire"-fantasy book-series and Lucifer from the "Sandman" and "Lucifer"-comics.)

Remember that this is probably highly dependent on my unreliable memory and moods.

Now, we have a list, what can we surmise from it? Well, if you dismiss characters acting out of uncontrolled insanity (The Joker), pure greed (Gruber, Saruman, Scar) or megalomaniacally based actions without further reasoning behind them than ego (Shere Khan, The Blot, Doom, Rahl), that means seven of my favourite villains can be considered, in their own ways, heroes. (That doesn't mean the eight I listed before can't, mind, it just means I'm not going to try)

- Lex Luthor
Lex is a fascinating example of what a really excellently made antagonist can be. Something that intrigues me about him especially is how he is the opposite to Superman. Superman is emotional, caring, emphatic, Lex is cool, distanced, cynical. What makes this so intriguing is that the same parallell exists between The Batman and The Joker. Batman is analytical, strategical, level-headed and surgical in his actions. The Joker is instinctive, random, unpredictable and insane. This, though of course not an exact parallell, places Batman and Lex on the same side of the scale. (And, amusingly enough, Joker and Superman on the other) This fascinates me - Superman's total antagonist have far more in common with Superman's arguably closest ally than with almost any other character in the DCU. I dunno, it just fascinates me.
To get back to the point, though, Lex is more than a mere villain who is wants to take over the world. Yes, he wants to take over the world, but he has reasons that, while questionable, are far more valid than the average super-powered warlord-wannabe's. Lex considers himself the most intelligent man on Earth - which may even be true. Thus, he considers himself best suited for leading mankind. Which, again, may be called a rational line of thought. He considers the greatest potential threath to humanity to be a Superman turned tyrant. Again, this is very probably a sound estimate, as Superman is one of, if not the, most powerful single creature in the earthly DCU, magics not taken into consideration. So, he reasons, as the world's natural leader, it falls on him to rid them of this potential threath before it is too late.
Lex, in his own eyes, is a self-sacrificing hero. His reasoning for innocents being killed as a result of his acquiring more power is "necessary casualties for the greater good". If he is to lead humanity, which he by his reasoning should do for humanity's sake, against a foe like Superman, he'll need whatever resources he can get.

- Grand Admiral Thrawn
Another "greater good" kind of person. He really just wants order, and like Lex, considers himself the best suited person to manufacture this order. In fact, putting him on the villain-list at all is something I do with doubt.

- Angelus
Is not crazy (in the sense that his actions are random and irrational), nor is he greedy or obsessed by his own ego. He's just evil. He likes it when bad things happen to other people. He may very well be the best display of a purely sadistic villain with no power-hungry main motive whatsoever I've ever seen.

- Eric Magnus "Magneto" Lensherr
He wants equality. Or, allright, not equality, he wants to practice a kind of humanitarian darwinism. Mutants are more developed than humans, ergo they should be put in better positions in society. This does not mean humans should be treated poorly, they are intelligent life, but they should ideally not be treated as as good as mutants - and under no circumstances as betters. He does, at times, go to extremes to reach his goals, and thus is considered a terrorist and a villain, but at heart, he's just a staunch defender of what he sees as his leaderless people, a people mistreated and bereft of priviligies. Sure, he thinks a hell of a lot of himself, but why shouldn't he? He is, after all, very intelligent and immensly powerful.

- Holland Manners
While it is dubious, Holland appears to at one time in his life has chosen to work for evil to be able to do greater good later in his life - at least this is the lesson he tries to teach his protegè Lindsey McDonald. This means he follows a code of ethics that will always allow him to let monsterous things happen with a clear conscience - he simply convinces himself "this will make me more powerful, and thus at a later point in time able to do even greater good than stopping this right now would be"...

- Lionel Luthor
As I see this character, though this can certainly be argued, he wants power for his son, not for himself. Everything he does is aimed at molding and shaping his son to be the greatest man who ever lived - as Lionel rates these things. This is very unegositical, and thus, I think, very un-villain-like.

- Martel
He's an odd one. He seems to have betrayed his order, mentors and boyhood friends for power, but he seems to half-way regret his choice throughout the entire trilogy of books. Due to some kind of personal set of ethics, he never tries to repent his misdeeds, though, he just seems to accept that he has chosen to be the bad-guy and, somewhat melancholy, acts like the bad-guy. His last words, though, were to the mentor he betrayed and the man who killed him - saying they were the only two people he ever loved.

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"Elenium" finished

Sunday, 19. March 2006, 14:05:25

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"Men are used to the idea of dying. It's only Gods who find the thought so frightening."

When reading the first book of this trilogy, I thought I'd made a big mistake by buying all the books up front. Eddings' "Belgariad"-saga and the subsequent books in that universe are all quite good, though his style of writing is a little... simplistic, if you'd like, everything is always so clear-cut and straightforward. But as I first read them as a twelve-year-old, or something like that, they were wonderful. His "The Redemption of Althalus", though, that one disappointed. The characters were almost all rehashes of his Belgariad-cast, the personalities had simply castled, changing positions and functions in the group. The sly, sarcastic thief-persona from "Belgariad" suddenly became the main character and a wizard, etc. This wouldn't have been too bad had it not been for the plot being horribly gay and dandy - the characters were presented with a problem, but they were always powerful enough to quickly make done with it and never suffered any losses or anything like that. There were traces of this in "Belgariad" and the subsequent books of that universe as well, but at least there the characters had an ultimate enemy far outmatching them in power lurking in the horizion.

With the first book of "the Elenium", "The Diamond Throne", I thought I'd bought another "Redemption of Althalus". The humour was excellent, if a little predictable, as always in Eddings' work, but the plot, the characters... it all seemed so simple, straightforward and untroublesome, just like in "Althalus".
But the second book, "The Ruby Knight", was far, far better. The first book should have been condensed down to three chapters in the beginning of the second, or something like that, and this saga would have been much better off, in my opinion. The characters even started to look as though they were fresh and new, and not reincarnations of characters from his earlier books. The third book, "The Sapphire Rose", was as good, making me happy I bought the series after all, and I'll be sure to read the follow-up-trilogy as well. The characters - though all sharing the exact same kind of trademark Eddings humour which makes for funny, dry dialogue but seemes somewhat unrealistic (when did everyone from high clergy to lowly peasants use the same kind of sarcastic humour?) - are mostly fresh, and though most components of their personalities are easily traceable back to Eddings' earlier works, the mixtures of these components in each character seems to be new most of the time. And this is well done, considering how archetypical a cast of fantasy characters Eddings used in his first books - it is almost impossible to write in the genre and not to in at least a small extent just repeat those characters in new ways.

The plot smacks slightly of the "we're the best of the best of the heroes, so nothing that happens to us is ever really that dangerous"-syndrome I mentioned, but a few vital and well-done character-deaths really made it seem believable.

Obviously, the characters the guy decided to kill off were my two favourite characters, but that's my luck.


One thing, though - the "beautiful, young, spoiled, stubborn woman everybody adores anyway"-character, David - it is annoying. Now while Ehlana was a gargantuan improvement over Ce'Nedra, that does not make her likeable. And when characters you otherwise grow fond of seems to like such characters, that decreases one's opinion of these as well. Just so you know.


But that's nit-picking. This was good, thanks for a good read, Dave, I'll be sure to pick up your three follow-up-books as well.

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