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The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever #1
Lord Foul's Bane
The first book in one of the most remarkable epic fantasies ever written, the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, Unbeliever.
He called himself Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever because he dared not believe in the strange alternate world in which he suddenly found himself. Yet he was tempted to believe, to fight for the Land, to be the reincarnation of its greatest hero....
THE CHRONICLES OF THOMAS COVENANT THE UNBELIEVER
Book LORD FOUL'S BANE
Book THE ILLEARTH WAR
Book THE POWER THAT PRESERVES
He called himself Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever because he dared not believe in the strange alternate world in which he suddenly found himself. Yet he was tempted to believe, to fight for the Land, to be the reincarnation of its greatest hero....
THE CHRONICLES OF THOMAS COVENANT THE UNBELIEVER
Book LORD FOUL'S BANE
Book THE ILLEARTH WAR
Book THE POWER THAT PRESERVES
494 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 1977
About the author
Stephen R. Donaldson
141 books2,648 followersStephen Reeder Donaldson is an American fantasy, science fiction, and mystery novelist; in the United Kingdom he is usually called "Stephen Donaldson" (without the "R"). He has also written non-fiction under the pen name Reed Stephens.
EARLY LIFE AND EDUCATION:
Stephen R. Donaldson was born May 13, 1947 in Cleveland, Ohio. His father, James, was a medical missionary and his mother, Ruth, a prosthetist (a person skilled in making or fitting prosthetic devices). Donaldson spent the years between the ages of 3 and 16 living in India, where his father was working as an orthopaedic surgeon. Donaldson earned his bachelor's degree from The College of Wooster and master's degree from Kent State University.
INSPIRATIONS:
Donaldson's work is heavily influenced by other fantasy authors such as J.R.R. Tolkien, Roger Zelazny, Joseph Conrad, Henry James, and William Faulkner. The writers he most admires are Patricia A. McKillip, Steven Erikson, and Tim Powers.
It is believed that a speech his father made on leprosy (whilst working with lepers in India) led to Donaldson's creation of Thomas Covenant, the anti-hero of his most famous work (Thomas Covenant). The first book in that series, Lord Foul's Bane, received 47 rejections before a publisher agreed to publish it.
PROMINENT WORK:
Stephen Donaldson came to prominence in 1977 with the The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, which is centred around a leper shunned by society and his trials and tribulations as his destiny unfolds. These books established Donaldson as one of the most important figures in modern fantasy fiction.
PERSONAL LIFE:
He currently resides in New Mexico.
THE GRADUAL INTERVIEW
EARLY LIFE AND EDUCATION:
Stephen R. Donaldson was born May 13, 1947 in Cleveland, Ohio. His father, James, was a medical missionary and his mother, Ruth, a prosthetist (a person skilled in making or fitting prosthetic devices). Donaldson spent the years between the ages of 3 and 16 living in India, where his father was working as an orthopaedic surgeon. Donaldson earned his bachelor's degree from The College of Wooster and master's degree from Kent State University.
INSPIRATIONS:
Donaldson's work is heavily influenced by other fantasy authors such as J.R.R. Tolkien, Roger Zelazny, Joseph Conrad, Henry James, and William Faulkner. The writers he most admires are Patricia A. McKillip, Steven Erikson, and Tim Powers.
It is believed that a speech his father made on leprosy (whilst working with lepers in India) led to Donaldson's creation of Thomas Covenant, the anti-hero of his most famous work (Thomas Covenant). The first book in that series, Lord Foul's Bane, received 47 rejections before a publisher agreed to publish it.
PROMINENT WORK:
Stephen Donaldson came to prominence in 1977 with the The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, which is centred around a leper shunned by society and his trials and tribulations as his destiny unfolds. These books established Donaldson as one of the most important figures in modern fantasy fiction.
PERSONAL LIFE:
He currently resides in New Mexico.
THE GRADUAL INTERVIEW
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 2,123 reviews
November 19, 2008
I've often lamented that five-star rating systems, such as the one used by GoodReads, don't allow for ratings lower than one star. Were it possible, I'd give this book negative stars; I think it actually sucks the quality away from books shelved near it, and generally makes the world a less joyful, less intelligent place to be.
You might assume from the previous statements that I dislike this book. Given that "dislike" is a pretty mild, milquetoast term on the sliding scale of affection, you would be wrong. I loathe this book. This is one of the very few novels I've ever literally thrown across a room once I'd finished it, and if I had the chance, I'd cheerfully do so again... preferably at Donaldson himself, were he within range.
Why? Let's start with the protagonist -- and please, don't even try to sell me on the notion that he's an anti-hero. Thomas Covenant is one of the most loathsome, self-involved creations ever to emerge from a writer's psyche, and the fact that he himself would agree with that assessment alleviates his repulsiveness not one bit. Covenant is whiny to the point of self-parody, self-pitying to the point of ego collapse, and constantly uses his (admittedly real) hardships as justification for not accepting responsibility for anything... including a heinous act of sexual violence which Donaldson thoughtfully sketches out for us just enough to make sure we don't miss the point: yes, Covenant really does rape a character after she's just healed him of his leprosy.
Ladies and gentlemen, Our Hero.
Of course, that's merely the most glaring flaw in a book chock full of awful. Donaldson's writing style gives new depth and nuance to the concept of "purple prose," and his "epic" story reads like an overcooked pastiche of Tolkien with some cheery "realism" (for which read "late 20th-century self-involvement") stirred in for flavor. I'd go on further, but honestly, there's only so long I can stomach kicking this dog of a novel before I feel the need to wash the taste of Donaldson's florid writing and his "hero" out of my brain.
I regret ever reading this book, and I am absolutely flabbergasted that it has enough readers and fans to have led to seven-count-'em-seven sequels as of this writing. I mean, sure, I know there's no accounting for taste, but damn.
You might assume from the previous statements that I dislike this book. Given that "dislike" is a pretty mild, milquetoast term on the sliding scale of affection, you would be wrong. I loathe this book. This is one of the very few novels I've ever literally thrown across a room once I'd finished it, and if I had the chance, I'd cheerfully do so again... preferably at Donaldson himself, were he within range.
Why? Let's start with the protagonist -- and please, don't even try to sell me on the notion that he's an anti-hero. Thomas Covenant is one of the most loathsome, self-involved creations ever to emerge from a writer's psyche, and the fact that he himself would agree with that assessment alleviates his repulsiveness not one bit. Covenant is whiny to the point of self-parody, self-pitying to the point of ego collapse, and constantly uses his (admittedly real) hardships as justification for not accepting responsibility for anything... including a heinous act of sexual violence which Donaldson thoughtfully sketches out for us just enough to make sure we don't miss the point: yes, Covenant really does rape a character after she's just healed him of his leprosy.
Ladies and gentlemen, Our Hero.
Of course, that's merely the most glaring flaw in a book chock full of awful. Donaldson's writing style gives new depth and nuance to the concept of "purple prose," and his "epic" story reads like an overcooked pastiche of Tolkien with some cheery "realism" (for which read "late 20th-century self-involvement") stirred in for flavor. I'd go on further, but honestly, there's only so long I can stomach kicking this dog of a novel before I feel the need to wash the taste of Donaldson's florid writing and his "hero" out of my brain.
I regret ever reading this book, and I am absolutely flabbergasted that it has enough readers and fans to have led to seven-count-'em-seven sequels as of this writing. I mean, sure, I know there's no accounting for taste, but damn.
November 6, 2011
*Soul-saddened SIGH*.....Damn, damn, DAMN...life can really be full of suck.
This book really torched my hopes and dreams. NOT because it was nightmarishly horrible (which it wasn’t) but because I wanted it to be so brimming with steaming chunks of mouth-watering awesome that I could write a stinging, snark-filled “anti-anti-Thomas Covenant” review...my rant against the ranters.
I suspected I had a excellent chance of really liking this story because most of the criticism of the series revolves around how douchy and unlikeable Thomas Covenant (the main character) is. Not a problem for this reader as I have no problem hating a protagonist as long they are interesting, well drawn and compelling. I don’t generally care if I like them. In fact, some of the most memorable characters I have come across have been ones that made me cringe like a baby before broccoli. I despised Patrick Bateman in American Psycho, Lou Ford in The Killer Inside Me, Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights, and even, at first, Tyrion Lannister** from A Game of Thrones).
** I must point out that my dislike for Tyrion didn’t last past the second book and I now want him to be my BFF because his awesomeness is off the charts.
So I didn’t forsee that an unlikeable main character was going to be much of an obstacle for me. Plus, having already enjoyed the first two installments of Donaldson’s “Gap” series, I knew the man could write so I figured I might be in for a real treat (and then I would show all those Thomas Covenant haters out there)........*cue sinister music*
........*end sinister music*
Well for the first 70 to 75 pages my plan was working perfectly and I was sitting squarely in 5 star territory and starting to brainstorm what insults I would hurl at the “insult hurlers” in my defense of what I was sure must be “THE MOST MISUNDERSTOOD FANTASY CLASSIC OF ALL TIME.” Ah, if only someone would have warned me how wrong I was....
I even flew right through the infamous rape scene and had my explanations/defenses already germinating in my caustic little brain. I was thinking ‘granted there is NO justification for rape, but we have seen similar events in other novels (e.g. The Outlander series that so many people seem to fawn over). Also, Covenant did express lingering guilt over this senseless and brutal act and his remorse is something that continues to play an important part in the narrative. Thus, I think his deep regret and loathing of himself for what he did and the “uncontrollable impulse” aspect of the initial crime makes Covenant’s behavior despicable while still holding out the possibility of his redemption. OOOOOOOHHHH take that all you haters!!!!
.
.
.
[BRIEF INTERLUDE]
Those of you “Covenant haters” out there that are reading this and know the almost Shakespearean tragedy that was soon to befall me as my initial positive feelings for the book were horribly ripped away from me by the oncoming train wreck of its narrative problems, I can only hope that you can forgive my earlier arrogance in wanting to prove you wrong.
[END INTERLUDE]
.
.
.
Unfortunately, shortly after the rape scene when I thought the story was really going to ramp up into uncharted bastions of EPICness, inconsistencies in the narrative structure began to really, really get in my way. Before I can explain, I need to give a brief thumbnail description of the basic plot.
Thomas Covenant is a leper....yes LEPER. How cool is that. The man has leprosy. He was a best-selling writer before he got the big “L” and lost two of the fingers on his right hand. He also lost his wife and child who packed up and moved on the greener pastures that had a little less leprosy in them. So Tommy boy has been going through the “mother of all” rough patches when we first meet him. Oh, Oh I almost forgot. The leprosy has also made him impotent....nice bonus!!!
So at the beginning of the story, TC is living alone in a perpetual pissed off mood and is being shunned by his entire community due to the whole “leprosy is icky” vibe he is putting out there. Well TC, as a not so subtle FU to the townsfolk, decides to walk down to the power company to pay his bill in person. During this excursion, he has an accident, loses consciousness and wakes up in “the Land” which is the fantasy world in which the series takes place. So far, so good.
Well Thomas doesn’t believe he is in a strange new world. He thinks he is unconscious or dreaming or in a coma, etc...He is afraid to take any of the new world seriously because he thinks it will indicate his final break with reality. TC’s grip on reality is all the more important to him due to his leprosy (trust me on this, no time to explain). Anyway, all of this sounds great to me. A fantasy character who doubts the world around him. Bring it on!!!!!
WAIT....WHAT IS THAT?......
DANGER.........
FLASHING RED LIGHTS...........
PROBLEM AHEAD....................
STEVE’S REVIEW (AND HIS WHOLE PLAN) IS HEADED FOR TROUBLE.......
NO, NO, NO, NO!!!!!!!!!..................
FULL STOP....TRAIN WRECK AHEAD.
Note: you will have to imagine the sight of my murdered dreams as I could not find a picture that truly showed the horror of my disappointment.....
.
.
.
Here is where Donaldson completely lost me and I lost all of my hopes of turning the "hate against the haters." Instead, the read became a waking nightmare that haunted me and began slowly crushing my will to live.
You see, Thomas Covenant the “Unbeliever” is only partially and occasionally an unbeliever and only when his unbelief can be used to some kind of dramatic effect. Otherwise, he seems to take the world very, very seriously. This is THE central plot device of the entire series and it is more inconsistent than a politician during campaign season. In fact, I could probably open the book up anywhere during the last 300 pages and find an example of this inconsistency, but I will at least mention a few so you know what I mean.
At one critical point in the story, TC vows to stop eating because he believes that by starving he will “force the illusion of the world” to be revealed. Sounds good, but do you know what ole TC is doing when he makes the vow to ignore food?.....he’s grabbing the freaking wine skin and taking a swig!!!! HUH??? Food is illusion but I might as well “believe” in the wine.....I need some help on this one.
Once I started looking for this, I found it everywhere. I asked myself whenever Covenant did anything...“if you are dreaming and you know it why are you bothering to do X Y and Z.” I NEVER got a good answer. AND HERE IS THE BIG ONE. Covenant doesn’t believe in the world and tells this to everyone who will listen AND YET he continues to follow the course laid out for him by Lord Foul at the beginning of his “dream” throughout the entire time he is there. Again, HUH????
Despite his complete lack of belief in the reality of this fantasy world, TC goes through extreme hardship and turmoil to travel the length of the Land because he “conveniently” tells himself that continuing to move forward is the key. No, No, No, Mr. Donaldson, that makes no sense. The truth is it is just too inherently difficult to have a main character in a fantasy world not “participate” in the story.
You got yourself stuck!!
Bottom-line, if TC doesn’t believe where he is than he should ACT like it. Don’t just tell us and then occasionally say I won’t do such and such because none of this is real. Be true to your lack of convictions TC because otherwise you just come across as a failed literary experiment, which, unfortunately, is what I think you are.
Anyway, that is where the story lost me. I would add to the above major grievance that the narrative was also too disjointed and Donaldson was never able to really make the world come alive, despite the fact that some of the world-building elements were pretty interesting. Thus, while I liked the idea of the Land and some of the secondary characters (especially the giants) they came across too much like set pieces given the rather undefined nature of the world.
Overall, I think that Donaldson had a very interesting idea for a story but it just suffered from the fundamental flaw of being almost impossible to pull off in the context of a coherent narrative.
2.0 stars. *heavy sigh*
This book really torched my hopes and dreams. NOT because it was nightmarishly horrible (which it wasn’t) but because I wanted it to be so brimming with steaming chunks of mouth-watering awesome that I could write a stinging, snark-filled “anti-anti-Thomas Covenant” review...my rant against the ranters.
I suspected I had a excellent chance of really liking this story because most of the criticism of the series revolves around how douchy and unlikeable Thomas Covenant (the main character) is. Not a problem for this reader as I have no problem hating a protagonist as long they are interesting, well drawn and compelling. I don’t generally care if I like them. In fact, some of the most memorable characters I have come across have been ones that made me cringe like a baby before broccoli. I despised Patrick Bateman in American Psycho, Lou Ford in The Killer Inside Me, Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights, and even, at first, Tyrion Lannister** from A Game of Thrones).
** I must point out that my dislike for Tyrion didn’t last past the second book and I now want him to be my BFF because his awesomeness is off the charts.
So I didn’t forsee that an unlikeable main character was going to be much of an obstacle for me. Plus, having already enjoyed the first two installments of Donaldson’s “Gap” series, I knew the man could write so I figured I might be in for a real treat (and then I would show all those Thomas Covenant haters out there)........*cue sinister music*
........*end sinister music*
Well for the first 70 to 75 pages my plan was working perfectly and I was sitting squarely in 5 star territory and starting to brainstorm what insults I would hurl at the “insult hurlers” in my defense of what I was sure must be “THE MOST MISUNDERSTOOD FANTASY CLASSIC OF ALL TIME.” Ah, if only someone would have warned me how wrong I was....
I even flew right through the infamous rape scene and had my explanations/defenses already germinating in my caustic little brain. I was thinking ‘granted there is NO justification for rape, but we have seen similar events in other novels (e.g. The Outlander series that so many people seem to fawn over). Also, Covenant did express lingering guilt over this senseless and brutal act and his remorse is something that continues to play an important part in the narrative. Thus, I think his deep regret and loathing of himself for what he did and the “uncontrollable impulse” aspect of the initial crime makes Covenant’s behavior despicable while still holding out the possibility of his redemption. OOOOOOOHHHH take that all you haters!!!!
.
.
.
[BRIEF INTERLUDE]
Those of you “Covenant haters” out there that are reading this and know the almost Shakespearean tragedy that was soon to befall me as my initial positive feelings for the book were horribly ripped away from me by the oncoming train wreck of its narrative problems, I can only hope that you can forgive my earlier arrogance in wanting to prove you wrong.
[END INTERLUDE]
.
.
.
Unfortunately, shortly after the rape scene when I thought the story was really going to ramp up into uncharted bastions of EPICness, inconsistencies in the narrative structure began to really, really get in my way. Before I can explain, I need to give a brief thumbnail description of the basic plot.
Thomas Covenant is a leper....yes LEPER. How cool is that. The man has leprosy. He was a best-selling writer before he got the big “L” and lost two of the fingers on his right hand. He also lost his wife and child who packed up and moved on the greener pastures that had a little less leprosy in them. So Tommy boy has been going through the “mother of all” rough patches when we first meet him. Oh, Oh I almost forgot. The leprosy has also made him impotent....nice bonus!!!
So at the beginning of the story, TC is living alone in a perpetual pissed off mood and is being shunned by his entire community due to the whole “leprosy is icky” vibe he is putting out there. Well TC, as a not so subtle FU to the townsfolk, decides to walk down to the power company to pay his bill in person. During this excursion, he has an accident, loses consciousness and wakes up in “the Land” which is the fantasy world in which the series takes place. So far, so good.
Well Thomas doesn’t believe he is in a strange new world. He thinks he is unconscious or dreaming or in a coma, etc...He is afraid to take any of the new world seriously because he thinks it will indicate his final break with reality. TC’s grip on reality is all the more important to him due to his leprosy (trust me on this, no time to explain). Anyway, all of this sounds great to me. A fantasy character who doubts the world around him. Bring it on!!!!!
WAIT....WHAT IS THAT?......
DANGER.........
FLASHING RED LIGHTS...........
PROBLEM AHEAD....................
STEVE’S REVIEW (AND HIS WHOLE PLAN) IS HEADED FOR TROUBLE.......
NO, NO, NO, NO!!!!!!!!!..................
FULL STOP....TRAIN WRECK AHEAD.
Note: you will have to imagine the sight of my murdered dreams as I could not find a picture that truly showed the horror of my disappointment.....
.
.
.
Here is where Donaldson completely lost me and I lost all of my hopes of turning the "hate against the haters." Instead, the read became a waking nightmare that haunted me and began slowly crushing my will to live.
You see, Thomas Covenant the “Unbeliever” is only partially and occasionally an unbeliever and only when his unbelief can be used to some kind of dramatic effect. Otherwise, he seems to take the world very, very seriously. This is THE central plot device of the entire series and it is more inconsistent than a politician during campaign season. In fact, I could probably open the book up anywhere during the last 300 pages and find an example of this inconsistency, but I will at least mention a few so you know what I mean.
At one critical point in the story, TC vows to stop eating because he believes that by starving he will “force the illusion of the world” to be revealed. Sounds good, but do you know what ole TC is doing when he makes the vow to ignore food?.....he’s grabbing the freaking wine skin and taking a swig!!!! HUH??? Food is illusion but I might as well “believe” in the wine.....I need some help on this one.
Once I started looking for this, I found it everywhere. I asked myself whenever Covenant did anything...“if you are dreaming and you know it why are you bothering to do X Y and Z.” I NEVER got a good answer. AND HERE IS THE BIG ONE. Covenant doesn’t believe in the world and tells this to everyone who will listen AND YET he continues to follow the course laid out for him by Lord Foul at the beginning of his “dream” throughout the entire time he is there. Again, HUH????
Despite his complete lack of belief in the reality of this fantasy world, TC goes through extreme hardship and turmoil to travel the length of the Land because he “conveniently” tells himself that continuing to move forward is the key. No, No, No, Mr. Donaldson, that makes no sense. The truth is it is just too inherently difficult to have a main character in a fantasy world not “participate” in the story.
You got yourself stuck!!
Bottom-line, if TC doesn’t believe where he is than he should ACT like it. Don’t just tell us and then occasionally say I won’t do such and such because none of this is real. Be true to your lack of convictions TC because otherwise you just come across as a failed literary experiment, which, unfortunately, is what I think you are.
Anyway, that is where the story lost me. I would add to the above major grievance that the narrative was also too disjointed and Donaldson was never able to really make the world come alive, despite the fact that some of the world-building elements were pretty interesting. Thus, while I liked the idea of the Land and some of the secondary characters (especially the giants) they came across too much like set pieces given the rather undefined nature of the world.
Overall, I think that Donaldson had a very interesting idea for a story but it just suffered from the fundamental flaw of being almost impossible to pull off in the context of a coherent narrative.
2.0 stars. *heavy sigh*
November 3, 2024
Lord Foul lives. He's Going for Control. And the woke world THRIVES beneath his Shadow. Houston, we have a problem.
THIS is a book for folks who often find life Tough. Maybe you’re one of em? That has been My life for sure! And now, there's no goof like an Old Goof.
When I was 20, I started swimming against the Tide. I had discovered Value in my life!
I was gonna hang on to it for dear life...
The only other available option was sheer outrage.
So, naturally I made new friends - the pleasers. They sought to lull me with their nice, pleasant lullabies, and dropped pleasant leading gambits...
Whenever in a weak moment in this woke Canadian world I consented to listen, the soporific would be gently administered and I’d drift off to Lala Land for what seemed ages.
But then I’d remember to Remember myself and throw off my shackles.
Time then for my opposition to use the heavy artillery?
You got it!
So back and forth went my life, just so, for interminable aeons of slumber - interspersed with jarringly wide-awake cauchemars with all their Soul-splitting bright noonday torment.
Awakening from history’s nightmare is no picnic.
Pride was always my stumbling block - EXACTLY as it is for Thomas Covenant in the Strange and Savage Real-Life Dreamworld he’s been catapulted into. Much like ours now.
We’re all proud naturally, because of our inborn need for transcendence. A real ‘radix malorum,’ as it turns out, cause humans are dangerous goofs.
So then the woke world turns to us and says: “You’re no one special. So why not just jump on the eternal bandwagon of endless 24/7 Desire?”
Because it’s precisely the road of fools, is why - “the way to dusty death.”
Death isn’t real to a little kid. And it’s only real to us because of our illimitable desires. We have to make perfect our will, no easy task.
But Thomas knows nothing of this. So in his vividly Real parallel universe to his daily disbarred-from-humanity drudgery of incurable leprosy he is fighting perceived evil.
Don’t all we outsiders do that?
Just like me, so Thomas - a leper, one set apart and enchained in a Magic Circle of Exclusion from “polite” society!
A figurative leper, like the rest of us plodders who strive with every fibre of our sinews to be reconnected and justified to our erstwhile peers.
As Kafka says, “give it up!”
Kafka and Thomas win out. Inclusion is not the point. Our, and their, splintered life is. Brokenness wins! That’s where we start. We are fallen.
As the Nobel laureate Lagerkvist states, Endurance is everything, for only in that can there be Glory.
We are ALL clinging to that accursed rock upon which, we, like Prometheus - who saw THROUGH Lord Foul’s mind games - are impaled, sentenced to submit to the gnawing of the gods upon our liver.
So resistance, as the film cliché says, is futile!
And submission is key. Calling it a Cross is OK, folks.
The books in the immortal Thomas Covenant sword-n-sorcery series seem endless, and a too-daunting task for a feeble septuagenarian like me to attempt.
But I HIGHLY recommend them to folks who - like I do - find the struggle for Goodness Herculean.
And this First one of the saga is Great.
For Thomas’ Struggle is Really Endless. No getting around it.
It gets better, you know, if we make ourselves really LITTLE. Then we’re only chaff spinning on the Hurricane of Life.
And chaff is just peanuts at the Destroyer’s orgiastic feast.
Some day we will all be able to do just that... ALL of us Victims.
Once the strength of the battle subsides, we will find we have been MOLDED into a vital tiny truculence that can endure ALL the outrageous Forces of Circumstance.
On that blessed day we’ll drop our guard...
And take up the eternal cloak of Humility -
Which will lead us to a Far Better Land than the one so ruinously despoiled by Lord Foul!
For chaff always finds a quiet, Happy Landing.
THIS is a book for folks who often find life Tough. Maybe you’re one of em? That has been My life for sure! And now, there's no goof like an Old Goof.
When I was 20, I started swimming against the Tide. I had discovered Value in my life!
I was gonna hang on to it for dear life...
The only other available option was sheer outrage.
So, naturally I made new friends - the pleasers. They sought to lull me with their nice, pleasant lullabies, and dropped pleasant leading gambits...
Whenever in a weak moment in this woke Canadian world I consented to listen, the soporific would be gently administered and I’d drift off to Lala Land for what seemed ages.
But then I’d remember to Remember myself and throw off my shackles.
Time then for my opposition to use the heavy artillery?
You got it!
So back and forth went my life, just so, for interminable aeons of slumber - interspersed with jarringly wide-awake cauchemars with all their Soul-splitting bright noonday torment.
Awakening from history’s nightmare is no picnic.
Pride was always my stumbling block - EXACTLY as it is for Thomas Covenant in the Strange and Savage Real-Life Dreamworld he’s been catapulted into. Much like ours now.
We’re all proud naturally, because of our inborn need for transcendence. A real ‘radix malorum,’ as it turns out, cause humans are dangerous goofs.
So then the woke world turns to us and says: “You’re no one special. So why not just jump on the eternal bandwagon of endless 24/7 Desire?”
Because it’s precisely the road of fools, is why - “the way to dusty death.”
Death isn’t real to a little kid. And it’s only real to us because of our illimitable desires. We have to make perfect our will, no easy task.
But Thomas knows nothing of this. So in his vividly Real parallel universe to his daily disbarred-from-humanity drudgery of incurable leprosy he is fighting perceived evil.
Don’t all we outsiders do that?
Just like me, so Thomas - a leper, one set apart and enchained in a Magic Circle of Exclusion from “polite” society!
A figurative leper, like the rest of us plodders who strive with every fibre of our sinews to be reconnected and justified to our erstwhile peers.
As Kafka says, “give it up!”
Kafka and Thomas win out. Inclusion is not the point. Our, and their, splintered life is. Brokenness wins! That’s where we start. We are fallen.
As the Nobel laureate Lagerkvist states, Endurance is everything, for only in that can there be Glory.
We are ALL clinging to that accursed rock upon which, we, like Prometheus - who saw THROUGH Lord Foul’s mind games - are impaled, sentenced to submit to the gnawing of the gods upon our liver.
So resistance, as the film cliché says, is futile!
And submission is key. Calling it a Cross is OK, folks.
The books in the immortal Thomas Covenant sword-n-sorcery series seem endless, and a too-daunting task for a feeble septuagenarian like me to attempt.
But I HIGHLY recommend them to folks who - like I do - find the struggle for Goodness Herculean.
And this First one of the saga is Great.
For Thomas’ Struggle is Really Endless. No getting around it.
It gets better, you know, if we make ourselves really LITTLE. Then we’re only chaff spinning on the Hurricane of Life.
And chaff is just peanuts at the Destroyer’s orgiastic feast.
Some day we will all be able to do just that... ALL of us Victims.
Once the strength of the battle subsides, we will find we have been MOLDED into a vital tiny truculence that can endure ALL the outrageous Forces of Circumstance.
On that blessed day we’ll drop our guard...
And take up the eternal cloak of Humility -
Which will lead us to a Far Better Land than the one so ruinously despoiled by Lord Foul!
For chaff always finds a quiet, Happy Landing.
February 18, 2011
I read Lord Foul’s Bane once in grade seven (the same year I first read Macbeth and Lady Chatterly’s Lover, and The Lord of the Rings for a second time). It was a good year for me and reading. And an important year for who I would become. But I didn’t know until now how important Lord Foul’s Bane was to all of that.
This story has stuck with me in the most amazing ways. After nearly three decades, I recalled an amazing amount of detail in the pages I reread. I remembered minute details about Thomas Covenant’s attitude towards his leprosy, especially when it came to the VSE (Visual Surveillance of Extremities) rituals that sustained him in our world and the new rituals he developed during his time in the Land. I remembered Atiaran’s stone knife and the way Covenant tempted the fate of his leprosy with its keen edge – the edge that never dulled. I remembered the way Covenant – hero? anti-hero? villain? weakling? coward? simply flawed? – raped Atiaran’s daughter Lena. I remembered the diamond draught of Stoneheart Foamfollower and the image of the impaled Waynhim in the Waymeet and the death of the Unfettered One trying to save the beautiful wraiths of the Andelainian Hills and the wedge formation of the ur-Viles. I remembered it all with the sort of clarity one has when they read a book dozens of times or reread a book very shortly after having put it down, but I didn’t expect to have anywhere near the clarity I had all these years later.
Thomas Covenant himself has stuck with me. He is frustrating, spiteful, ugly, tormented, cynical, dark, brooding, and infuriatingly self-pitying. He is every bit the Unbeliever he names himself. And Stephen R. Donaldson wants him to be that way. He needs him to be that way. Covenant has to fight his belief in the Land at every turn because the Land is impossible, and as a rational man suffering from leprosy in 20th century North America, all that allows him to cling to his life is his rationality and sanity – no matter how tenuous both are.
But the Land –- at least in this first book of the Chronicles –- is unbelievable. It has to be one of the strangest, most frightening, and surrealistic fantasy worlds ever created. Donaldson describes it with achingly beautiful prose (and sometimes that beautiful prose is dense and slow and plodding, mirroring the motion of Covenant through the Land itself) to reveal wonders that are just slightly different from everything we’ve seen before in every high fantasy that Tolkien gave birth to, but Donaldson’s slight shift in perspective, his offering of the place through the decaying lens of a leper, his constant overturning of expectations, makes his fantasy world unique. His giants are not what we’d expect, nor are his wraiths, nor his Cavewights, nor his landscape, nor his weather, nor his incarnadine corrupted moon, nor his magic.
And the most disconcerting difference between Donaldson’s Land and the other fantasy realms we know is that his Land feels entirely unpopulated. Covenant never stops travelling as he tries to escape his “dream,” yet his contact with the Land’s denizens is minimal. He passes through four centers of population -- Mithil Stonedown (a town of Gravelingas who are rich in stone lore), Soaring Woodhelvin (a tree town of Lillianrill who are rich in wood lore), Revelstone (the seat of the High Lords), and the Plains of Ra (where the nomadic Ramen serve the Ranyhyn, a kind of uber-horse). He sees great sights, bizarre rituals and happenings, and he interacts with a person here or there, but the first two towns seem home to mere dozens of people, Revelstone seems empty, and the Ramen are so hidden in their poisonous plains that we never get a sense of how many there are. And even those people and races Covenant spends much time with, such as the Haruchai Bloodguards and his Giant friend, are isolated from their vital populations. Two score set out to fight Lord Foul’s desecration. Where is everyone else?! The Land feels empty, and this is another disconcerting moment in an already disconcerting novel.
But that’s why I love Lord Foul’s Bane. It isn’t easy. Donaldson challenges us whenever and however he can. And he does it with transcendent prose and unflinching devotion to his problematic protagonist.
I’d much rather read Mordant’s Need. It is more hopeful, more lively, more real, but I don’t know if that makes it better. In fact, it probably isn't.
If you've read both, I ask you this (especially you Jon): “Is Mordant's Need better?”
I really don't know. But I do know this: Stephen R Donaldson is my unsung hero of fantasy greatness. He is up there with the best. But damn is he a lot of work.
This story has stuck with me in the most amazing ways. After nearly three decades, I recalled an amazing amount of detail in the pages I reread. I remembered minute details about Thomas Covenant’s attitude towards his leprosy, especially when it came to the VSE (Visual Surveillance of Extremities) rituals that sustained him in our world and the new rituals he developed during his time in the Land. I remembered Atiaran’s stone knife and the way Covenant tempted the fate of his leprosy with its keen edge – the edge that never dulled. I remembered the way Covenant – hero? anti-hero? villain? weakling? coward? simply flawed? – raped Atiaran’s daughter Lena. I remembered the diamond draught of Stoneheart Foamfollower and the image of the impaled Waynhim in the Waymeet and the death of the Unfettered One trying to save the beautiful wraiths of the Andelainian Hills and the wedge formation of the ur-Viles. I remembered it all with the sort of clarity one has when they read a book dozens of times or reread a book very shortly after having put it down, but I didn’t expect to have anywhere near the clarity I had all these years later.
Thomas Covenant himself has stuck with me. He is frustrating, spiteful, ugly, tormented, cynical, dark, brooding, and infuriatingly self-pitying. He is every bit the Unbeliever he names himself. And Stephen R. Donaldson wants him to be that way. He needs him to be that way. Covenant has to fight his belief in the Land at every turn because the Land is impossible, and as a rational man suffering from leprosy in 20th century North America, all that allows him to cling to his life is his rationality and sanity – no matter how tenuous both are.
But the Land –- at least in this first book of the Chronicles –- is unbelievable. It has to be one of the strangest, most frightening, and surrealistic fantasy worlds ever created. Donaldson describes it with achingly beautiful prose (and sometimes that beautiful prose is dense and slow and plodding, mirroring the motion of Covenant through the Land itself) to reveal wonders that are just slightly different from everything we’ve seen before in every high fantasy that Tolkien gave birth to, but Donaldson’s slight shift in perspective, his offering of the place through the decaying lens of a leper, his constant overturning of expectations, makes his fantasy world unique. His giants are not what we’d expect, nor are his wraiths, nor his Cavewights, nor his landscape, nor his weather, nor his incarnadine corrupted moon, nor his magic.
And the most disconcerting difference between Donaldson’s Land and the other fantasy realms we know is that his Land feels entirely unpopulated. Covenant never stops travelling as he tries to escape his “dream,” yet his contact with the Land’s denizens is minimal. He passes through four centers of population -- Mithil Stonedown (a town of Gravelingas who are rich in stone lore), Soaring Woodhelvin (a tree town of Lillianrill who are rich in wood lore), Revelstone (the seat of the High Lords), and the Plains of Ra (where the nomadic Ramen serve the Ranyhyn, a kind of uber-horse). He sees great sights, bizarre rituals and happenings, and he interacts with a person here or there, but the first two towns seem home to mere dozens of people, Revelstone seems empty, and the Ramen are so hidden in their poisonous plains that we never get a sense of how many there are. And even those people and races Covenant spends much time with, such as the Haruchai Bloodguards and his Giant friend, are isolated from their vital populations. Two score set out to fight Lord Foul’s desecration. Where is everyone else?! The Land feels empty, and this is another disconcerting moment in an already disconcerting novel.
But that’s why I love Lord Foul’s Bane. It isn’t easy. Donaldson challenges us whenever and however he can. And he does it with transcendent prose and unflinching devotion to his problematic protagonist.
I’d much rather read Mordant’s Need. It is more hopeful, more lively, more real, but I don’t know if that makes it better. In fact, it probably isn't.
If you've read both, I ask you this (especially you Jon): “Is Mordant's Need better?”
I really don't know. But I do know this: Stephen R Donaldson is my unsung hero of fantasy greatness. He is up there with the best. But damn is he a lot of work.
February 6, 2020
**** 2020 re-read
I first read this 1977 publication early in HS, so probably in the neighborhood of 1982 or 1983. I blazed through the books and then had to wait for the sixth novel, White Gold Wielder, to come out and I bought that book in hard back, a rare extravagance for me back then. I recall being so caught up in the world building, it was fantastic but also very different from Tolkien or the Narnia tales.
My first thoughts now is how dark the story was. Donaldson has crafted a magnificent fantasy and then placed at its center a thoroughly unlikeable protagonist in Thomas Covenant, so much so that it seems the author went out of his way to make Covenant ugly. Covenant somehow contracted leprosy and Donaldson draws on all of the ancient fears and prejudices against that affliction. Covenant’s wife leaves him, taking with her their infant son and this, coupled with his rigid self-preservation training from the leprosarium, makes him an abrasive, selfish and self-loathing person. He is magically transported to a fantastic setting and is immediately fighting for his life and in mortal danger.
LEPER! OUTCAST! UNCLEAN!
Finally, as if that was not enough, Donaldson describes a very sad, horrific rape scene. Speaking with other readers, and many reviews here on Goodreads, this was the final straw and they either put the book down or, learning about this scene, never picked it up. The betrayal of a beautiful young girl in a healthy land, was a further stinging rebuke against an already troubling narrative.
So why did Donaldson write his fantasy in this way?
I understand now that my younger self did not have the emotional maturity to fully grasp the ramifications of the crime. I knew then that it was a terrible act – and then I just went on with the rest of the story, mesmerized by the imaginative vision Donaldson had conjured. But I see now that this ugliness, this repugnance was exactly what Donaldson was striving for; he wanted an explosive contrast between this healthy, utopian society and a sickly, egocentric, paranoid and mistrustful anti-hero.
Can an anti-hero become heroic?
To be clear, Thomas Covenant was not the charismatic anti-hero of the 50s or 60s, this is not Marlon Brando looking cool and confident on a motorcycle. Covenant is damaged, physically and emotionally, and his leprosy, his identity as a leper, outcast from society, is a central imperative in Donaldson’s story. Donaldson notes that leprosy is not the kind of disease that can be romanticized and likewise, he does not glamorize Covenant but describes him in less than complementary ways throughout the book. He wakes up in a wholesome, bountiful land with a magical history and he names himself “Unbeliever” thinking he is dreaming or has gone insane. A magical element found in the land cures him of his disease and the re-awakening of his nerve cells, of his ability to feel, touch and have sensations, leads him to act in an abhorrent fashion, rather than being thankful for this unexpected blessing.
Most notably, when describing the critical scene, and one that has certainly polarized readers since publication, Donaldson shifts the perspective from Covenant to the victim, Lena, and we experience her thoughts and fears about what has happened to her, and by a man she not only trusted, but that she believed had a prophetic power to provide some benefit to the Land.
When I read Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita, I like every reader who gets through the outrageous subject, must come to terms with the experience. It is foremost an exceptionally written book, with masterful prose and from a writer gifted in the ability to make language do what he wants, with color and wit. It’s also about a child molester. How are Humbert and Thomas Covenant different, and how do the authors of each use this highly unorthodox protagonist?
Donaldson, talented as he is, is not Nabokov the literary giant; he’s telling a very good fantasy story with some exceptional nuances. Truth be told, in this second reading, I thought of a comparison with Gene Wolf, with its dark tone and intricate magic rules. While Humbert Humbert is an unrepentant sex offender, Covenant is a confused tragic hero, coming to terms with the contrast between the harsh reality of his severe illness and the fantastic healthfulness of the land. In his struggle to understand what has happened to him, he acts as a monster, but there is good in him. I’ll leave it to the reader to decide if Covenant is fundamentally good or bad, but he is drawn by Donaldson to be a decidedly complicated person. Similarly, Nabokov described Delores in a dynamic, complex light, so the victim in both stories is provided a sympathetic, humanistic portrayal. In this way, Donaldson’s literary ambition, to tell more than just another sword and sorcery fantasy is, at least in part, realized.
The Land.
Donaldson’s world building is what drew me to this story decades ago and it is still impressive in its scope and design. Most noteworthy is the intrinsic health of the land, from its strong people who do not know disease, to the magical dichotomy between the ecological well-being of the land and of the Satanic-like antagonist. Donaldson has crafted a world where the vigor of the land is tied to the people and vice versa. There is an intricate system of laws and oaths and pledges, and all is well in the land as long as its people uphold their lawfulness.
There is a history of desecration, where the land was destroyed, literally but also metaphorically, by desperation, hopelessness, and lawlessness. Covenant, the outworlder, the Leper, is starkly contrasted with this health, and part of Donaldson’s story is how Covenant struggles for acceptance of the Land and of his reluctant heroism. Covenant’s wedding ring is of white gold and this alloy is given special significance in the land, “wild magic”, and Covenant, as the wielder of this wild magic, seems to be at chaotic variance with the liturgical observance of the many laws of the land.
The Unfettered.
In the world building, residents of the Land can go to a place of learning called the Loresraat, where they can study ancient rites and magic and may someday become a Lord, a leader and steward of the land and a member of the Council of Lords. A student who graduates and does not want to become a Lord and Earthfriend, can take the Rites of the Unfettered to be allowed to independently continue to devote themselves to a single mystery of the Land without the responsibility of being a Lord. When I first read this, the concept was attractive, and I thought about the Unfettered since. Re-reading now, I still see this as an appealing idea, but now also see this as an important element in Donaldson’s narrative. Just as Covenant is a kind of bottom of the barrel anti-hero, being rejected and in turn rejecting much of the law and order of society (both from his world and the Land’s), the Unfettered serve as a metaphor for 60s and 70s counter-culture: they drop out and live off the grid for their own purposes. While, like Covenant, they can be seen as self-centered and contrary to collective society, they are also a demonstration of individuality and self-determinism. Donaldson may also have been signifying a rejection of collectivist, conservationist mores for a more classically liberal, libertarian ethos.
Tolkien, Narnia and Game of Thrones.
Stephen R. Donaldson very deliberately created a fantasy that was NOT in the Tolkien / Lewis mold. Like Narnia, we have a real-world protagonist who is transported to a fantasy world. Unlike Narnia, this brings the real-world ugly to the fantasy. It’s like if Edmund got his own fantasy series. While LOTR was like GOT in that they are both self-contained epic fantasies, Covenant may have anticipated GOT with its focus on mature subjects and by not shying away from ugly scenes.
Tolkien and Narnia, with a few exceptions, also stick to fairly easily defined characters. While there may be some complexities: Narnia’s Edmund again stands out, and also Thorin Oakenshield and maybe even Gollem from Tolkien; for the most part we have either good or bad. While most in the Land as Donaldson has drawn them are either good or bad, our main protagonist, Thomas Covenant is morally ambiguous with many disagreeable, even despicable qualities. Not until the Game of Thrones characters do we see such a wealth and diversity of good, bad and ugly – sometimes showing up in the same character. In this way Donaldson, and Martin after him, leads fantasy writers away from an ethically or idealistically binary alignment system, to one where the lines are blurred, and the concept of unreliable narrator takes a bold new course.
In a Dungeons and Dragons alignment, is Covenant Chaotic Good, Neutral Good, Neutral, or even Neutral Evil? I’ll leave that to each reader to ponder on.
Druids, Immunization and Kung Fu Panda
The people and the Land live together in synergistic harmony and Donaldson has described both land and people in terms of health, vitality and power. The trees and forests are vibrant, the animals are strong, and the people are charged with vitality. Covenant can sense the health of the land, even as a stranger, and the people live in close connection to the natural properties of the land and not from it. Wood gives off light but does not burn, pottery and stone can be shaped with earth magic. It’s as though we are reading about an entire society of druids, who safeguard and steward the land in all aspects and the land in turn provides for the people. There is an etiquette of communal protocols and hospitality and mutual respect among the people.
And then this asshole Covenant shows up.
Thomas Covenant is like immunization. He is the small but powerful sample of disease and illness, from an unhealthy and corrupt place, that the land needs to properly deal with the corruption and waste personified by Lord Foul and his minions. In several scenes the people lack even a word to understand disease in their tongue and experience.
The 2008 animated film Kung Fu Panda features a rotund panda named Po who is voiced by Jack Black. Po wants to be a hero, but his meager abilities are overshadowed by other animals with greater fighting talents. Yet he is chosen as the “Dragon Warrior” mainly because he can take a punch and keep going. He’s not the best fighter, but he is the one most likely to survive. Thomas Covenant, likewise, for all his failings (and they are many) is a survivor. His training and status as a leper have made him that, from his rigid system of self-examination to detect injury to his frequently hostile attitude aimed at keeping others at bay, he has made himself to keep moving and to survive, which stands in contrast with the civil, polite society he discovers in the land.
A difficult book in many ways and Stephen R. Donaldson asks much of his readers; this is also, to me at least, one of the best fantasies in the past 75 years and well worth the effort.
I first read this 1977 publication early in HS, so probably in the neighborhood of 1982 or 1983. I blazed through the books and then had to wait for the sixth novel, White Gold Wielder, to come out and I bought that book in hard back, a rare extravagance for me back then. I recall being so caught up in the world building, it was fantastic but also very different from Tolkien or the Narnia tales.
My first thoughts now is how dark the story was. Donaldson has crafted a magnificent fantasy and then placed at its center a thoroughly unlikeable protagonist in Thomas Covenant, so much so that it seems the author went out of his way to make Covenant ugly. Covenant somehow contracted leprosy and Donaldson draws on all of the ancient fears and prejudices against that affliction. Covenant’s wife leaves him, taking with her their infant son and this, coupled with his rigid self-preservation training from the leprosarium, makes him an abrasive, selfish and self-loathing person. He is magically transported to a fantastic setting and is immediately fighting for his life and in mortal danger.
LEPER! OUTCAST! UNCLEAN!
Finally, as if that was not enough, Donaldson describes a very sad, horrific rape scene. Speaking with other readers, and many reviews here on Goodreads, this was the final straw and they either put the book down or, learning about this scene, never picked it up. The betrayal of a beautiful young girl in a healthy land, was a further stinging rebuke against an already troubling narrative.
So why did Donaldson write his fantasy in this way?
I understand now that my younger self did not have the emotional maturity to fully grasp the ramifications of the crime. I knew then that it was a terrible act – and then I just went on with the rest of the story, mesmerized by the imaginative vision Donaldson had conjured. But I see now that this ugliness, this repugnance was exactly what Donaldson was striving for; he wanted an explosive contrast between this healthy, utopian society and a sickly, egocentric, paranoid and mistrustful anti-hero.
Can an anti-hero become heroic?
To be clear, Thomas Covenant was not the charismatic anti-hero of the 50s or 60s, this is not Marlon Brando looking cool and confident on a motorcycle. Covenant is damaged, physically and emotionally, and his leprosy, his identity as a leper, outcast from society, is a central imperative in Donaldson’s story. Donaldson notes that leprosy is not the kind of disease that can be romanticized and likewise, he does not glamorize Covenant but describes him in less than complementary ways throughout the book. He wakes up in a wholesome, bountiful land with a magical history and he names himself “Unbeliever” thinking he is dreaming or has gone insane. A magical element found in the land cures him of his disease and the re-awakening of his nerve cells, of his ability to feel, touch and have sensations, leads him to act in an abhorrent fashion, rather than being thankful for this unexpected blessing.
Most notably, when describing the critical scene, and one that has certainly polarized readers since publication, Donaldson shifts the perspective from Covenant to the victim, Lena, and we experience her thoughts and fears about what has happened to her, and by a man she not only trusted, but that she believed had a prophetic power to provide some benefit to the Land.
When I read Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita, I like every reader who gets through the outrageous subject, must come to terms with the experience. It is foremost an exceptionally written book, with masterful prose and from a writer gifted in the ability to make language do what he wants, with color and wit. It’s also about a child molester. How are Humbert and Thomas Covenant different, and how do the authors of each use this highly unorthodox protagonist?
Donaldson, talented as he is, is not Nabokov the literary giant; he’s telling a very good fantasy story with some exceptional nuances. Truth be told, in this second reading, I thought of a comparison with Gene Wolf, with its dark tone and intricate magic rules. While Humbert Humbert is an unrepentant sex offender, Covenant is a confused tragic hero, coming to terms with the contrast between the harsh reality of his severe illness and the fantastic healthfulness of the land. In his struggle to understand what has happened to him, he acts as a monster, but there is good in him. I’ll leave it to the reader to decide if Covenant is fundamentally good or bad, but he is drawn by Donaldson to be a decidedly complicated person. Similarly, Nabokov described Delores in a dynamic, complex light, so the victim in both stories is provided a sympathetic, humanistic portrayal. In this way, Donaldson’s literary ambition, to tell more than just another sword and sorcery fantasy is, at least in part, realized.
The Land.
Donaldson’s world building is what drew me to this story decades ago and it is still impressive in its scope and design. Most noteworthy is the intrinsic health of the land, from its strong people who do not know disease, to the magical dichotomy between the ecological well-being of the land and of the Satanic-like antagonist. Donaldson has crafted a world where the vigor of the land is tied to the people and vice versa. There is an intricate system of laws and oaths and pledges, and all is well in the land as long as its people uphold their lawfulness.
There is a history of desecration, where the land was destroyed, literally but also metaphorically, by desperation, hopelessness, and lawlessness. Covenant, the outworlder, the Leper, is starkly contrasted with this health, and part of Donaldson’s story is how Covenant struggles for acceptance of the Land and of his reluctant heroism. Covenant’s wedding ring is of white gold and this alloy is given special significance in the land, “wild magic”, and Covenant, as the wielder of this wild magic, seems to be at chaotic variance with the liturgical observance of the many laws of the land.
The Unfettered.
In the world building, residents of the Land can go to a place of learning called the Loresraat, where they can study ancient rites and magic and may someday become a Lord, a leader and steward of the land and a member of the Council of Lords. A student who graduates and does not want to become a Lord and Earthfriend, can take the Rites of the Unfettered to be allowed to independently continue to devote themselves to a single mystery of the Land without the responsibility of being a Lord. When I first read this, the concept was attractive, and I thought about the Unfettered since. Re-reading now, I still see this as an appealing idea, but now also see this as an important element in Donaldson’s narrative. Just as Covenant is a kind of bottom of the barrel anti-hero, being rejected and in turn rejecting much of the law and order of society (both from his world and the Land’s), the Unfettered serve as a metaphor for 60s and 70s counter-culture: they drop out and live off the grid for their own purposes. While, like Covenant, they can be seen as self-centered and contrary to collective society, they are also a demonstration of individuality and self-determinism. Donaldson may also have been signifying a rejection of collectivist, conservationist mores for a more classically liberal, libertarian ethos.
Tolkien, Narnia and Game of Thrones.
Stephen R. Donaldson very deliberately created a fantasy that was NOT in the Tolkien / Lewis mold. Like Narnia, we have a real-world protagonist who is transported to a fantasy world. Unlike Narnia, this brings the real-world ugly to the fantasy. It’s like if Edmund got his own fantasy series. While LOTR was like GOT in that they are both self-contained epic fantasies, Covenant may have anticipated GOT with its focus on mature subjects and by not shying away from ugly scenes.
Tolkien and Narnia, with a few exceptions, also stick to fairly easily defined characters. While there may be some complexities: Narnia’s Edmund again stands out, and also Thorin Oakenshield and maybe even Gollem from Tolkien; for the most part we have either good or bad. While most in the Land as Donaldson has drawn them are either good or bad, our main protagonist, Thomas Covenant is morally ambiguous with many disagreeable, even despicable qualities. Not until the Game of Thrones characters do we see such a wealth and diversity of good, bad and ugly – sometimes showing up in the same character. In this way Donaldson, and Martin after him, leads fantasy writers away from an ethically or idealistically binary alignment system, to one where the lines are blurred, and the concept of unreliable narrator takes a bold new course.
In a Dungeons and Dragons alignment, is Covenant Chaotic Good, Neutral Good, Neutral, or even Neutral Evil? I’ll leave that to each reader to ponder on.
Druids, Immunization and Kung Fu Panda
The people and the Land live together in synergistic harmony and Donaldson has described both land and people in terms of health, vitality and power. The trees and forests are vibrant, the animals are strong, and the people are charged with vitality. Covenant can sense the health of the land, even as a stranger, and the people live in close connection to the natural properties of the land and not from it. Wood gives off light but does not burn, pottery and stone can be shaped with earth magic. It’s as though we are reading about an entire society of druids, who safeguard and steward the land in all aspects and the land in turn provides for the people. There is an etiquette of communal protocols and hospitality and mutual respect among the people.
And then this asshole Covenant shows up.
Thomas Covenant is like immunization. He is the small but powerful sample of disease and illness, from an unhealthy and corrupt place, that the land needs to properly deal with the corruption and waste personified by Lord Foul and his minions. In several scenes the people lack even a word to understand disease in their tongue and experience.
The 2008 animated film Kung Fu Panda features a rotund panda named Po who is voiced by Jack Black. Po wants to be a hero, but his meager abilities are overshadowed by other animals with greater fighting talents. Yet he is chosen as the “Dragon Warrior” mainly because he can take a punch and keep going. He’s not the best fighter, but he is the one most likely to survive. Thomas Covenant, likewise, for all his failings (and they are many) is a survivor. His training and status as a leper have made him that, from his rigid system of self-examination to detect injury to his frequently hostile attitude aimed at keeping others at bay, he has made himself to keep moving and to survive, which stands in contrast with the civil, polite society he discovers in the land.
A difficult book in many ways and Stephen R. Donaldson asks much of his readers; this is also, to me at least, one of the best fantasies in the past 75 years and well worth the effort.
December 27, 2010
Wow. I really didn't like this book.
I think it was in large part due to the fact that I found the main character so utterly unlikable. Heck, he's even despicable.
Some people can read and enjoy a book despite not being able to empathize with the characters; I'm not one of those people. I actually like to care about my fictional characters.
It's pretty hard to give a flying fickle about some cranky jerk who rapes a woman in the first book. I didn't bother reading more to find out if things improved from there.
I think it was in large part due to the fact that I found the main character so utterly unlikable. Heck, he's even despicable.
Some people can read and enjoy a book despite not being able to empathize with the characters; I'm not one of those people. I actually like to care about my fictional characters.
It's pretty hard to give a flying fickle about some cranky jerk who rapes a woman in the first book. I didn't bother reading more to find out if things improved from there.
November 15, 2009
I live in a smallish room with roughly a couple of thousand books. They are everywhere. I love the books, but I also hate the books. I'd have space if it wasn't for them, when I moved it would be easy if it didn't involve carrying what feels like an endless amount of heavy boxes packed with them. They are everywhere. The bookshelves are all double stacked. There are books on top of the normally shelved books. There are piles of them everywhere. They fall over. They are in the way. Mooncheese likes to knock them over sometimes, even though falling books scare her.
Like Juliana Hatfield felt about her sister, I have the same love/hate relationship with my significant others.
Lately I've been in the mindset to cull some of the books. Be all JC on them and remove the wheat from the chaff. I've been a little successful, I've gotten rid of about sixty or seventy books in the last couple of months, but there is a problem.
I feel wrong about getting rid of books that I have not yet read. This wouldn't be a problem except that a) like a geologist I can go through my shelves and re-create the history of 'fleeting' ideas and interests I had that happened to correspond to fortuitous trips to used bookstores and b) I sometimes buy a lot of crap. An amendment to b) is that I also acquire a lot of crap for free (ie., I Love You, Beth Cooper).
In some cases a and b come together.
Lord Foul's Bane is one of those books. A few years ago I went through a brief moment where I thought, maybe I should become familiar with fantasy. Then I bought up some fantasy books for about a quarter a piece on a trip to the always wonderful bookstore(I love this cat, he likes to sometimes sit on my back while I'm crouched down looking for books,) in Schuylerville (turning point of the Revolutionary War, and home of the most disgusting home I ever stepped foot in, but that is another story, I'll try to fit into some other review where dog shit plays a promiment role.).
This long and uninteresting story has no real point, except that I want to get rid of books, but I feel I need to read them before getting rid of them.
Lately that has been making me read books I have no interest in. I'll look at a book that I think I will enjoy and say to myself, when I finish this I think I'll want to keep it. So instead of reading something I may potentially enjoy I'll see something like Lord Foul's Bane sitting in a pile, and I'll grab this instead.
I didn't finish this book. I made it a little more than halfway through it. If I spent another couple of hours reading I'd be able to finish it, but I just don't care to.
The book is bad. It's written in very formal and stilted style, kind of like something you hear from some drama nerd who tries to bring a little more Shakespeare into their daily life.
The story is uninteresting. It is difficult to accomplish this for me. I find nothing wrong with reading a novel about a man laying in pig shit, and doing nothing but thinking. I can find that engaging. There is nothing engaging in this book. By the time I stopped reading it there was some kind of quest to bring a message to someone, but I didn't give a fuck.
Why didn't I care? Well, one I hated the language. I hated the characters. The main character is a one-dimensional leper with rage issues that make little sense except that they spring up when the author needs to create dialog. The only meaningful thing he did in 252 pages was rape a girl. All of the other characters are bullshit cookie-cutter caricatures. The whole world he created seems like just a series of seperate little communities that each have some New Age Hippy thing going on. There are the people who like the rocks, the people who like the tree's, the people who like the water, but besides liking something they don't seem to do too much.....
"I'm Treeman of the timberpeople (my made up names are only a tad dumber then the names Donaldson comes up with), and we live in the trees."
"What else do you do?"
"Do? We live in trees."
"Yeah but besides living in trees what do you do? I live in an apartment, but I also do other things."
"No man, you don't get it, we live in trees. We like trees. Just like Granitehead of the Rock-collectors digs rocks, we dig trees."
"I get it you like trees, they like rocks, but you live in a world and you have to do something besides just 'like trees'..."
"No man, you don't get it, we like! trees. Are you retarded?"
What baffles me about this book is that it is highly regarded. It was up for a bunch of big awards. Lists on Amazon place it as a great fantasy book, and maybe it is. My fantasy knowledge being kind of weak.
Besides my other misgivings, the thing I hated most (ok not besides, I hated this the most), was the motherfucking bullshit weakasfuck Dungeon Master shit that the author pulled constantly. Any possible conflict could be resolved by some lame ass 'addition' into the powers of a character or thing. Maybe it's fun when you're (ok Me, when I was) 13 and overweight and playing Dungeons and Dragons with your friend to throw all logic out the window and just let your characters kill, and do anything they would like; but as a novelists you can't just add bullshit constantly because you can't think of any other way out of the problems you have made your characters face (you may do this if your name is Joss and your protagonist is a teenage girl who kills vampires, I don't know why he gets a pass, but he does, no one else does though).
I'm done with this book and this review. I'm going to give this book away, and maybe learn my lesson that if I don't think I'd enjoy a book I own it may be ok to just get rid of it without torturing myself for past mistakes in book buying.
Like Juliana Hatfield felt about her sister, I have the same love/hate relationship with my significant others.
Lately I've been in the mindset to cull some of the books. Be all JC on them and remove the wheat from the chaff. I've been a little successful, I've gotten rid of about sixty or seventy books in the last couple of months, but there is a problem.
I feel wrong about getting rid of books that I have not yet read. This wouldn't be a problem except that a) like a geologist I can go through my shelves and re-create the history of 'fleeting' ideas and interests I had that happened to correspond to fortuitous trips to used bookstores and b) I sometimes buy a lot of crap. An amendment to b) is that I also acquire a lot of crap for free (ie., I Love You, Beth Cooper).
In some cases a and b come together.
Lord Foul's Bane is one of those books. A few years ago I went through a brief moment where I thought, maybe I should become familiar with fantasy. Then I bought up some fantasy books for about a quarter a piece on a trip to the always wonderful bookstore(I love this cat, he likes to sometimes sit on my back while I'm crouched down looking for books,) in Schuylerville (turning point of the Revolutionary War, and home of the most disgusting home I ever stepped foot in, but that is another story, I'll try to fit into some other review where dog shit plays a promiment role.).
This long and uninteresting story has no real point, except that I want to get rid of books, but I feel I need to read them before getting rid of them.
Lately that has been making me read books I have no interest in. I'll look at a book that I think I will enjoy and say to myself, when I finish this I think I'll want to keep it. So instead of reading something I may potentially enjoy I'll see something like Lord Foul's Bane sitting in a pile, and I'll grab this instead.
I didn't finish this book. I made it a little more than halfway through it. If I spent another couple of hours reading I'd be able to finish it, but I just don't care to.
The book is bad. It's written in very formal and stilted style, kind of like something you hear from some drama nerd who tries to bring a little more Shakespeare into their daily life.
The story is uninteresting. It is difficult to accomplish this for me. I find nothing wrong with reading a novel about a man laying in pig shit, and doing nothing but thinking. I can find that engaging. There is nothing engaging in this book. By the time I stopped reading it there was some kind of quest to bring a message to someone, but I didn't give a fuck.
Why didn't I care? Well, one I hated the language. I hated the characters. The main character is a one-dimensional leper with rage issues that make little sense except that they spring up when the author needs to create dialog. The only meaningful thing he did in 252 pages was rape a girl. All of the other characters are bullshit cookie-cutter caricatures. The whole world he created seems like just a series of seperate little communities that each have some New Age Hippy thing going on. There are the people who like the rocks, the people who like the tree's, the people who like the water, but besides liking something they don't seem to do too much.....
"I'm Treeman of the timberpeople (my made up names are only a tad dumber then the names Donaldson comes up with), and we live in the trees."
"What else do you do?"
"Do? We live in trees."
"Yeah but besides living in trees what do you do? I live in an apartment, but I also do other things."
"No man, you don't get it, we live in trees. We like trees. Just like Granitehead of the Rock-collectors digs rocks, we dig trees."
"I get it you like trees, they like rocks, but you live in a world and you have to do something besides just 'like trees'..."
"No man, you don't get it, we like! trees. Are you retarded?"
What baffles me about this book is that it is highly regarded. It was up for a bunch of big awards. Lists on Amazon place it as a great fantasy book, and maybe it is. My fantasy knowledge being kind of weak.
Besides my other misgivings, the thing I hated most (ok not besides, I hated this the most), was the motherfucking bullshit weakasfuck Dungeon Master shit that the author pulled constantly. Any possible conflict could be resolved by some lame ass 'addition' into the powers of a character or thing. Maybe it's fun when you're (ok Me, when I was) 13 and overweight and playing Dungeons and Dragons with your friend to throw all logic out the window and just let your characters kill, and do anything they would like; but as a novelists you can't just add bullshit constantly because you can't think of any other way out of the problems you have made your characters face (you may do this if your name is Joss and your protagonist is a teenage girl who kills vampires, I don't know why he gets a pass, but he does, no one else does though).
I'm done with this book and this review. I'm going to give this book away, and maybe learn my lesson that if I don't think I'd enjoy a book I own it may be ok to just get rid of it without torturing myself for past mistakes in book buying.
October 7, 2015
OMG that was a rather difficult book to get into. I mean, most of the time I had keep re-shifting the gears in my head to see what might be valuable and good about this book, and for a great 200 pages I was wondering if I had stumbled into another Eddings slogfest full of completely predictable situations and heroes, with only the main character being a bit out of the ordinary.
And then I had to remind myself that this came out in 1977 and the cult fantasy favourite (as opposed to the mainstream fantasy favourite) was LOTR. We've been inundated with Lewis and Beagle and who knows what else in the fantasy field. The time was ripe for a change, and all the big fantasy fans have all declared this fantasy cycle as a major turning point with a textual breakaway into new territory that has stuck with us all the way to modern fantasy, (which I have to say, I now adore).
But did I really get into this book? Is it even possible? The answer is yes, with a pretty huge caveat.
It's pretty obvious that the entire book is an exploration of a quote by John Milton in Paradise Lost: "The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven."
Putting that firmly in mind, now read our self-hating Thomas Covenant in his American home being treated as a Leper, because he is one, and see America as Mordor. He's in hell. And then he gets sent to heaven.
The magical land is just that. It's magical, people CAN live on beauty, alone, and there are honourable seafaring giants reminiscent of the Ents, horse riders with much more magic in the horses, just like Rohan, only more like Valdemar, and the Council, who are mages who have lost much lore over the centuries.
Covenant is skeptical of everything he sees, now, for although he used to be a best-selling author, he's now given up on all things imaginative in the wake of the hell of being diagnosed as a Leper and to learn he has no hope whatsoever. So when he is miraculously cured, and the wedding ring of his divorced wife has turned into the receptacle of the mystical Wild Magic that could either restore or destroy this wonderful fantasy world, he just Can Not Believe any of it. He's hallucinating. He's dreaming.
Too bad for him, it's all too real to his senses, and even his nerves have regenerated, which he knows is impossible. Oh Dear.
Honestly, the ideas come across as much more interesting than the execution. Like I said, it was a slogfest.
It's also too bad, because he's rather an asshole.
After reading so much modern fantasy, I ALMOST wish he'd done something other than rape the wide-eyed girl that was doing her damnedest to help him, like murder a cute puppy or an innocent child. Maybe he'd have had an easier time making me believe he really did regret the act later, or even right after the passion had been spent. Jesus. What a fucking prick.
Okay. Moving along. And that's another thing. It was just a very, very long travelogue. At least LOTR had it in service of excellent secondary or tertiary goals. The most we can say about Covenant is his gradual slide into belief and eventual realization that he's been a major asshole.
At least there was lots of dancing! And the initial metaphor and how it changed each time was not lost upon me. That was one of the nicer aspects of the novel, other than the realizations of Covenant, himself.
Okay, now here's my biggest nut and bolt complaint: Lord Foul is both a pretty damn interesting strategist and uber-powerful magical villain. I wish it hadn't taken so damn long for us as readers to GET THAT POINT. Practically anything else would have been a better introduction to Drool and Foul. They came across as an actual snivelling idiot and a minor house lord, and not the wielder of a staff fashioned by the Creator, himself, to right the corruption being spread throughout the fabric of reality, or the source of that corruption, itself: Lord Foul. It was all properly epic and I loved the ideas once I was finally INTRODUCED to them.
I saw the influence of Zelazny's Amber series right away, and I've always loved it when authors did that. You know. Uber Reality and the lesser realms, with Earth being one of many minor realms. It was a nice addition to the book.
And oddly enough, I got a lot more out of the novel's spoken-aloud tales, campfire style, than I did with the entire "let's go get that damn Staff" storyline.
It's not a bad novel. Don't get me wrong. I'm not jumping off the deep end and slamming this as I would with a modern fantasy that tried to pull this off. I'm trying to respect it as a product of it's time and place, and as such, I'd probably give it a 5 star rating, too, or perhaps a 4 because Zelazny's was better. Or at least I remember it more fondly, and since I haven't read the other Covenant novels, I really shouldn't judge just yet.
But the language in this novel wasn't up to Tolkien's high standards, and the worldbuilding didn't leave all that much impression on me, either. Maybe that's a personal failing, and the fact that I couldn't get into the groove and kept falling out of whatever groove I eventually got... well, it certainly didn't help.
I'll keep going, because once I invest in a thing, I like to maintain the investment, especially when others tell me it only gets a lot better, but as of right this moment, I'm a bit weary. Maybe a few novels before I sink into the next might be best.
*sigh*
And then I had to remind myself that this came out in 1977 and the cult fantasy favourite (as opposed to the mainstream fantasy favourite) was LOTR. We've been inundated with Lewis and Beagle and who knows what else in the fantasy field. The time was ripe for a change, and all the big fantasy fans have all declared this fantasy cycle as a major turning point with a textual breakaway into new territory that has stuck with us all the way to modern fantasy, (which I have to say, I now adore).
But did I really get into this book? Is it even possible? The answer is yes, with a pretty huge caveat.
It's pretty obvious that the entire book is an exploration of a quote by John Milton in Paradise Lost: "The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven."
Putting that firmly in mind, now read our self-hating Thomas Covenant in his American home being treated as a Leper, because he is one, and see America as Mordor. He's in hell. And then he gets sent to heaven.
The magical land is just that. It's magical, people CAN live on beauty, alone, and there are honourable seafaring giants reminiscent of the Ents, horse riders with much more magic in the horses, just like Rohan, only more like Valdemar, and the Council, who are mages who have lost much lore over the centuries.
Covenant is skeptical of everything he sees, now, for although he used to be a best-selling author, he's now given up on all things imaginative in the wake of the hell of being diagnosed as a Leper and to learn he has no hope whatsoever. So when he is miraculously cured, and the wedding ring of his divorced wife has turned into the receptacle of the mystical Wild Magic that could either restore or destroy this wonderful fantasy world, he just Can Not Believe any of it. He's hallucinating. He's dreaming.
Too bad for him, it's all too real to his senses, and even his nerves have regenerated, which he knows is impossible. Oh Dear.
Honestly, the ideas come across as much more interesting than the execution. Like I said, it was a slogfest.
It's also too bad, because he's rather an asshole.
After reading so much modern fantasy, I ALMOST wish he'd done something other than rape the wide-eyed girl that was doing her damnedest to help him, like murder a cute puppy or an innocent child. Maybe he'd have had an easier time making me believe he really did regret the act later, or even right after the passion had been spent. Jesus. What a fucking prick.
Okay. Moving along. And that's another thing. It was just a very, very long travelogue. At least LOTR had it in service of excellent secondary or tertiary goals. The most we can say about Covenant is his gradual slide into belief and eventual realization that he's been a major asshole.
At least there was lots of dancing! And the initial metaphor and how it changed each time was not lost upon me. That was one of the nicer aspects of the novel, other than the realizations of Covenant, himself.
Okay, now here's my biggest nut and bolt complaint: Lord Foul is both a pretty damn interesting strategist and uber-powerful magical villain. I wish it hadn't taken so damn long for us as readers to GET THAT POINT. Practically anything else would have been a better introduction to Drool and Foul. They came across as an actual snivelling idiot and a minor house lord, and not the wielder of a staff fashioned by the Creator, himself, to right the corruption being spread throughout the fabric of reality, or the source of that corruption, itself: Lord Foul. It was all properly epic and I loved the ideas once I was finally INTRODUCED to them.
I saw the influence of Zelazny's Amber series right away, and I've always loved it when authors did that. You know. Uber Reality and the lesser realms, with Earth being one of many minor realms. It was a nice addition to the book.
And oddly enough, I got a lot more out of the novel's spoken-aloud tales, campfire style, than I did with the entire "let's go get that damn Staff" storyline.
It's not a bad novel. Don't get me wrong. I'm not jumping off the deep end and slamming this as I would with a modern fantasy that tried to pull this off. I'm trying to respect it as a product of it's time and place, and as such, I'd probably give it a 5 star rating, too, or perhaps a 4 because Zelazny's was better. Or at least I remember it more fondly, and since I haven't read the other Covenant novels, I really shouldn't judge just yet.
But the language in this novel wasn't up to Tolkien's high standards, and the worldbuilding didn't leave all that much impression on me, either. Maybe that's a personal failing, and the fact that I couldn't get into the groove and kept falling out of whatever groove I eventually got... well, it certainly didn't help.
I'll keep going, because once I invest in a thing, I like to maintain the investment, especially when others tell me it only gets a lot better, but as of right this moment, I'm a bit weary. Maybe a few novels before I sink into the next might be best.
*sigh*
February 4, 2020
SPOILERS BELOW
This book was in it's own way "well written" or at least "fairly well written". It's well written in that it dragged me in, sort of. Often I wished it hadn't. Thomas Covenant is one of the universe's great whiners. You see, Thomas is a leper...and while I can't imagine how awful this would be (wife leaves and takes child, loses fingers before realizing condition, etc.,etc., etc.)he manages to drive any sympathy out of the readers, or he did me. Upon being healed in "THE LAND" he's afraid to believe as it might cause him not to take his leprosy seriously and end up with more lost limbs etc. His frantic dis-belief is so emphatically strong he . Thomas Covenant is a real prince.
He meets Lord Foul early on and in-spite of what you will realize about it all, Thomas will fail to realize those things and go right on....for 3 books.
Having refused to believe he is healed and that the land is even real, he tags himself "the unbeliever".
So, put on your white gold ring, gird up your loins and charge ahead. Thomas will entertain you with his continual "Woe is me, ohhh woe is me" for a long, long time to come. Now that I think of it, I DISLIKE these books.
I reviewed this a while back, but I want to update it. I want to include a quote from Dorothy Parker I've used before: "This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
This book was in it's own way "well written" or at least "fairly well written". It's well written in that it dragged me in, sort of. Often I wished it hadn't. Thomas Covenant is one of the universe's great whiners. You see, Thomas is a leper...and while I can't imagine how awful this would be (wife leaves and takes child, loses fingers before realizing condition, etc.,etc., etc.)he manages to drive any sympathy out of the readers, or he did me. Upon being healed in "THE LAND" he's afraid to believe as it might cause him not to take his leprosy seriously and end up with more lost limbs etc. His frantic dis-belief is so emphatically strong he . Thomas Covenant is a real prince.
He meets Lord Foul early on and in-spite of what you will realize about it all, Thomas will fail to realize those things and go right on....for 3 books.
Having refused to believe he is healed and that the land is even real, he tags himself "the unbeliever".
So, put on your white gold ring, gird up your loins and charge ahead. Thomas will entertain you with his continual "Woe is me, ohhh woe is me" for a long, long time to come. Now that I think of it, I DISLIKE these books.
I reviewed this a while back, but I want to update it. I want to include a quote from Dorothy Parker I've used before: "This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force."
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 8, 2022
Secondary Character Shocker! 'Bait and Switch,' of the Main Character Revealed!: "When I signed up for the role of Lena in 'Lord Foul's Bane,' I had no idea that the role of Thomas Covenant was secretly being played by Jeffrey Epstein." - Lena - Journal of the Harvey Weinstein School of Publishing.
I find myself in the position of re-reading this book (and possibly the series) in an attempt to validate my own memory... a quixotic enterprise, but one I'm undertaking because I have a particular bee in my bonnet about understanding the success of these books.
Of course, reading this book makes me think deeply about rapists, psychopaths, aggressive narcissism, and the concepts of restitution, redemption and the comparison of deontological and consequentialist ethics.... neither yours' nor my typical entertainment.
When I first read these books I was fresh off a farm, a youngster for whom rape was an abstraction that I'd fortunately never come across. When Covenant raped Lena I was shocked, horrified and perplexed - like - WTF? But I was also a naïve nerd who continued reading because book, fantasy, epic, might be as good as LoTR... and I read the whole series.
So, why read this again? I'm giving this another go. I'm non-plussed that a character as thoroughly unlikeable as Thomas Covenant could capture people's imagination and sympathy and I'd like to understand why.
I have a hypothesis (in multiple parts)... which is unlikely to be popular, but here it is.
[PART 1: Situational Psychopathy]: Thomas Covenant 'the unbeliever,' is situationally positioned as a psychopath, a creature driven by aggressive narcissism whose 'disbelief,' of the Land and its inhabitants renders him into the grandiose position of 'the one real thing,' relative to everyone else in the Land.
This is precisely the pose of psychopaths everywhere who envision themselves the narcissistic center of their own universe surrounded by human 'nothings,' that only have value in terms of their utility to the psychopath.
Our culture has substantial psychopathic and narcissistic traits embedded within it, especially the closer you get to the top of society.
Thomas Covenant's disbelief in the Land invites us all to position ourselves in 'his position,' as 'the one real thing,' in a dream world without real repercussions and accountability, and then to sympathize with Covenant within that positioning.
HOOK #1: Invite the reader to sympathise with vicarious psychopathy by proxy.
[PART 2: Normalisation of Sexual Predation]: Throughout the first 20% of the book, Covenant obsessively sexualises every female he comes across with special attention given to anyone who is a teenager. I.e. positioned between a child and a woman.
Covenant is the Jeffrey Epstein of fantasy literature.
The character of Lena, 16 yo and a virgin, is precisely his obsessive sexual target. Lena saves his life, heals him, feeds him, shelters him, and offers him nothing but compassion and kindness and so - he hits her (violence) then rapes (aggravated rape) her because it satisfies his immediate personal needs to do so.
The absence of justice for Lena is a tacit endorsement of sexual violence. In our culture and society, especially amongst the ruling elements, sexual violence is an accepted part of life. I posit that part of this book's success comes from its tacit endorsement of one of the worst features of our culture and society.
The subtext of this story is that rape is ok, and that any evil act committed in an environment without accountability (in this case, a dream world) is allowed. The key message is that 'it is only the presence/absence of accountability that makes an act right or wrong.'
In other words, 'Anything you want to do and can get away with is good!'
HOOK #2: Invite the reader to normalise Sexual Predation.
[PART 3: Myth of Universal Redemption*]: The idea that any evil act can be redeemed by a sufficiently impactful good act. This is a comforting belief that many people like to believe in. One day, one special day, we'll all be redeemed from our sins.
However, I believe that redemption rests on a foundation of restitution, of making the subject of the original harm whole, as if the harm had never been inflicted. If restitution can not be made then redemption can not be achieved.
Thievery (you can return stolen goods) can be redeemed. Lying (you could tell the truth) can be redeemed. But, Rape, like Murder, can not be undone. A murdered victim cannot be restored to life and filled with health. A raped soul can not be un-raped.
Thomas Covenant has no path to redemption, but this story will tell you he does - which overlays his act of evil in raping Lena with a soothing (and justice denying) blanket of 'somehow it's all right...'
*This is a corollary of the Myth of the Moral Ledger ... next part.
HOOK #3: Invite the reader to validate the soothing myth of universal redemption for any evil.
[PART 4: Myth of the Moral Ledger]:
This is the dominant ethical idea informing our culture. It is often framed as underpinning actions that are 'for the greater good,' but always ends up as 'the end justifies the means.'
I.e. Any act no matter how evil can be morally balanced, and even overwhelmed, if it results in a greater good.**
If Thomas Covenant saves the Land from Lord Foul, how many times can he rape Lena before his rapes outweigh his heroic act of saving the Land? One, ten, a hundred ... a million?
But if rape can not be restituted, Covenant can never un-rape Lena, he can never make her whole. No action of his can ever be measured against his rape of Lena and found capable of restoring her.
One day, she may forgive Covenant, but that would be her heroism - not his.
**In our world, 'For the greater good,' exists within a justification framework that is often abused to enable/commit acts of evil for 'expected goods,' that are never realised. All we are left with are the acts of evil and no 'greater goods.' This is normal human society.
HOOK #4: Invite the reader to validate the idea that the end justifies the means.
[SUMMARY]: This book has two stories within it.
[1] The superficial story: We are invited to journey with a leper through a world that could be (and is implied to be) real, but which he believes is a figment of his imagination. In his journey, he commits an atrocious evil deed, and then proceeds to the seat of local power where he admits to the local rulers that they are a dream. They assume he is a saviour and proceed on that basis to the end of the book, where he does indeed bring about a victory for the people of the Land. In the process, he attempts redemption for his evil deed by sending intelligent horses to 'pay homage,' to the victim of his evil deed.
On this level, the story appears to be a redemption arc from disbelief to belief. On the very last page, Covenant finally cares about what happens in the Land.
[2] Then there's the deeper story: Covenant obsessively sexualises every teenaged girl he meets. He is summoned to the Land, and meets Lena (16yo, virgin). She treats him with complete kindness and compassion to which he responds with violent Rape. Covenant luxuriates in the aftermath of the Rape, until he is struck by a fear of retribution and flees. He meets Lena's mother who becomes (awkwardly) his guide. He is confronted by Lena's angry boyfriend and is saved by 'The Oath of Peace.' Covenant then forgets about the rape and engages in a false dilemma while he struggles to adjust to the reality of the 'Land.' Setting up for the final act, Covenant suddenly remembers the 'Rape of Lena,' at Manhome and feels bad about it (indicating engagement with the Land as real (there was much preceding internal monologue where Covenant vacillates b/w the Land is real/dream as both impossible - an irreconcilable false dilemma leading up to this...)). Covenant commands the 'free spirits,' of the terrified Ranyhyn, and sends them 'as a redemptive gesture,' to Lena.*** The human guardians of the Ranyhyn, the Ramen, who are normally violently opposed to any harm to the sacred horses they care about, respond to this display of force through terror by literally falling at the feet of Covenant and worshiping his dominance. (Stockholm Syndrome in full display). Primed by all this, Covenant embarks into the final act, and successfully prosecutes the Quest, as he now, finally at the very end, believes enough to try, and reaches for the 'Staff of Law,' in an attempt to help.
There are two ways to read this book, [1] as a epic fantasy about a rapist leper who overcomes his doubt to save a Land filled with magic, beauty and terror, or [2] as a story validating psychopathy, rape culture, violence against women, the love of abuse, that the end justifies the means, and that any evil can be redeemed by a suitable good.
***There is also something infinitely creepy about Covenant's gesture of sending a Ranyhyn horse to Lena on an annual basis. Imagine a rapist sending their victim a single red rose on an annual basis... Covenant's behaviour turns my stomach.
It was with relief that I finished this book.
Final P.s. So, why was this book successful? Its hooks reflect dominant features of our culture and hence worked.
Not Recommended: 1 'No Justice for Lena,' stars.
I find myself in the position of re-reading this book (and possibly the series) in an attempt to validate my own memory... a quixotic enterprise, but one I'm undertaking because I have a particular bee in my bonnet about understanding the success of these books.
Of course, reading this book makes me think deeply about rapists, psychopaths, aggressive narcissism, and the concepts of restitution, redemption and the comparison of deontological and consequentialist ethics.... neither yours' nor my typical entertainment.
When I first read these books I was fresh off a farm, a youngster for whom rape was an abstraction that I'd fortunately never come across. When Covenant raped Lena I was shocked, horrified and perplexed - like - WTF? But I was also a naïve nerd who continued reading because book, fantasy, epic, might be as good as LoTR... and I read the whole series.
So, why read this again? I'm giving this another go. I'm non-plussed that a character as thoroughly unlikeable as Thomas Covenant could capture people's imagination and sympathy and I'd like to understand why.
I have a hypothesis (in multiple parts)... which is unlikely to be popular, but here it is.
[PART 1: Situational Psychopathy]: Thomas Covenant 'the unbeliever,' is situationally positioned as a psychopath, a creature driven by aggressive narcissism whose 'disbelief,' of the Land and its inhabitants renders him into the grandiose position of 'the one real thing,' relative to everyone else in the Land.
This is precisely the pose of psychopaths everywhere who envision themselves the narcissistic center of their own universe surrounded by human 'nothings,' that only have value in terms of their utility to the psychopath.
Our culture has substantial psychopathic and narcissistic traits embedded within it, especially the closer you get to the top of society.
Thomas Covenant's disbelief in the Land invites us all to position ourselves in 'his position,' as 'the one real thing,' in a dream world without real repercussions and accountability, and then to sympathize with Covenant within that positioning.
HOOK #1: Invite the reader to sympathise with vicarious psychopathy by proxy.
[PART 2: Normalisation of Sexual Predation]: Throughout the first 20% of the book, Covenant obsessively sexualises every female he comes across with special attention given to anyone who is a teenager. I.e. positioned between a child and a woman.
Covenant is the Jeffrey Epstein of fantasy literature.
The character of Lena, 16 yo and a virgin, is precisely his obsessive sexual target. Lena saves his life, heals him, feeds him, shelters him, and offers him nothing but compassion and kindness and so - he hits her (violence) then rapes (aggravated rape) her because it satisfies his immediate personal needs to do so.
The absence of justice for Lena is a tacit endorsement of sexual violence. In our culture and society, especially amongst the ruling elements, sexual violence is an accepted part of life. I posit that part of this book's success comes from its tacit endorsement of one of the worst features of our culture and society.
The subtext of this story is that rape is ok, and that any evil act committed in an environment without accountability (in this case, a dream world) is allowed. The key message is that 'it is only the presence/absence of accountability that makes an act right or wrong.'
In other words, 'Anything you want to do and can get away with is good!'
HOOK #2: Invite the reader to normalise Sexual Predation.
[PART 3: Myth of Universal Redemption*]: The idea that any evil act can be redeemed by a sufficiently impactful good act. This is a comforting belief that many people like to believe in. One day, one special day, we'll all be redeemed from our sins.
However, I believe that redemption rests on a foundation of restitution, of making the subject of the original harm whole, as if the harm had never been inflicted. If restitution can not be made then redemption can not be achieved.
Thievery (you can return stolen goods) can be redeemed. Lying (you could tell the truth) can be redeemed. But, Rape, like Murder, can not be undone. A murdered victim cannot be restored to life and filled with health. A raped soul can not be un-raped.
Thomas Covenant has no path to redemption, but this story will tell you he does - which overlays his act of evil in raping Lena with a soothing (and justice denying) blanket of 'somehow it's all right...'
*This is a corollary of the Myth of the Moral Ledger ... next part.
HOOK #3: Invite the reader to validate the soothing myth of universal redemption for any evil.
[PART 4: Myth of the Moral Ledger]:
"Consequentialism is a class of normative, teleological ethical theories that holds that the consequences of one's conduct are the ultimate basis for judgment about the rightness or wrongness of that conduct." REF: Wiki: Consequentialism.
This is the dominant ethical idea informing our culture. It is often framed as underpinning actions that are 'for the greater good,' but always ends up as 'the end justifies the means.'
I.e. Any act no matter how evil can be morally balanced, and even overwhelmed, if it results in a greater good.**
If Thomas Covenant saves the Land from Lord Foul, how many times can he rape Lena before his rapes outweigh his heroic act of saving the Land? One, ten, a hundred ... a million?
But if rape can not be restituted, Covenant can never un-rape Lena, he can never make her whole. No action of his can ever be measured against his rape of Lena and found capable of restoring her.
One day, she may forgive Covenant, but that would be her heroism - not his.
**In our world, 'For the greater good,' exists within a justification framework that is often abused to enable/commit acts of evil for 'expected goods,' that are never realised. All we are left with are the acts of evil and no 'greater goods.' This is normal human society.
HOOK #4: Invite the reader to validate the idea that the end justifies the means.
[SUMMARY]: This book has two stories within it.
[1] The superficial story: We are invited to journey with a leper through a world that could be (and is implied to be) real, but which he believes is a figment of his imagination. In his journey, he commits an atrocious evil deed, and then proceeds to the seat of local power where he admits to the local rulers that they are a dream. They assume he is a saviour and proceed on that basis to the end of the book, where he does indeed bring about a victory for the people of the Land. In the process, he attempts redemption for his evil deed by sending intelligent horses to 'pay homage,' to the victim of his evil deed.
On this level, the story appears to be a redemption arc from disbelief to belief. On the very last page, Covenant finally cares about what happens in the Land.
[2] Then there's the deeper story: Covenant obsessively sexualises every teenaged girl he meets. He is summoned to the Land, and meets Lena (16yo, virgin). She treats him with complete kindness and compassion to which he responds with violent Rape. Covenant luxuriates in the aftermath of the Rape, until he is struck by a fear of retribution and flees. He meets Lena's mother who becomes (awkwardly) his guide. He is confronted by Lena's angry boyfriend and is saved by 'The Oath of Peace.' Covenant then forgets about the rape and engages in a false dilemma while he struggles to adjust to the reality of the 'Land.' Setting up for the final act, Covenant suddenly remembers the 'Rape of Lena,' at Manhome and feels bad about it (indicating engagement with the Land as real (there was much preceding internal monologue where Covenant vacillates b/w the Land is real/dream as both impossible - an irreconcilable false dilemma leading up to this...)). Covenant commands the 'free spirits,' of the terrified Ranyhyn, and sends them 'as a redemptive gesture,' to Lena.*** The human guardians of the Ranyhyn, the Ramen, who are normally violently opposed to any harm to the sacred horses they care about, respond to this display of force through terror by literally falling at the feet of Covenant and worshiping his dominance. (Stockholm Syndrome in full display). Primed by all this, Covenant embarks into the final act, and successfully prosecutes the Quest, as he now, finally at the very end, believes enough to try, and reaches for the 'Staff of Law,' in an attempt to help.
There are two ways to read this book, [1] as a epic fantasy about a rapist leper who overcomes his doubt to save a Land filled with magic, beauty and terror, or [2] as a story validating psychopathy, rape culture, violence against women, the love of abuse, that the end justifies the means, and that any evil can be redeemed by a suitable good.
***There is also something infinitely creepy about Covenant's gesture of sending a Ranyhyn horse to Lena on an annual basis. Imagine a rapist sending their victim a single red rose on an annual basis... Covenant's behaviour turns my stomach.
It was with relief that I finished this book.
Final P.s. So, why was this book successful? Its hooks reflect dominant features of our culture and hence worked.
Not Recommended: 1 'No Justice for Lena,' stars.
February 10, 2024
Such a dazzling fantasy series. I devoured it as a teen. Needs to be recovered and enjoyed in the 2020s. I cared for these characters so much 🧙🏻♂️🔮💫
May 10, 2022
Thomas Covenant is a character unlike most you’ll probably see in other fantasy stories. A leper, living in 20th century United States, who lives an isolated life as he is shunned by the people, he tries hard not to lose his last bit of connection to civilized life.
After an accident he wakes up in another world which is a place vibrant with life and good enough to heal his leprosy. He cannot cope and believing he is in a dream, rapes the most innocent girl who has only tried to help him.
Since he is supposed to be either the one who defeats the great evil of this land, Lord Foul, or the one who dooms it, people still try to help him. He is brought to the highest lords of the land, and there it is decided that Covenant and some others will go retrieve the powerful staff of law, which is in the hands of some vile creature. Doing so would help win time to prepare for the fight against Lord Foul.
I read this first part of the first trilogy because Steven Donaldson is an established name in the realm of fantasy. Did I like it? Yes,…no,…yes,…maybe. Thomas Covenant as a character felt different for me, and in my opinion, he is a complete dork in part one. Maybe he’ll change in the other parts of the first trilogy. One major issue I had was the rape scene. Obviously, I hated it, and it made me put the book away for a few days. The scene was only a short page long, and still is the most drastic part that I found in this book, and I still hate it. However, the scene is there to establish something that Covenant shows throughout the book, namely his inner conflict, his unbelief that he actually is in this rich and healthy fantasy world. For him, what he experiences is a sick dream that creates a false and dangerous hope in him. As a leper he has learned to be careful, to live according to the rules so that he has a chance to survive. But in the land, he is healed, healthy, can feel, and is overwhelmed by this, which is the actual reason for him committing such a crime right after his arrival in the land. So, having that scene made sense, in a sick way, and made Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever, more believable as a character.
The plot that follows is in some ways predictable in this first part of the trilogy, and I didn’t mind at all, because the world itself is rather interesting, and Donaldson has an excellent way of presenting it and the characters. What got on my nerves- occasionally- was that the inhabitants appeared naïve in a way and repeatedly used language that seemed to be so full of hidden meaning, and Covenant, as the outsider he is, could not fully understand the significance of what was being said. It was probably meant to let the detailed and rich setting appear even richer. But sometimes it would have been nicer not to have these ominous lines where you are maybe meant to be as clueless as the main character.
So, if you are interested in high fantasy stories, a colourful setting rich in magic and lore, and enjoy broken main characters, this could be a great title for you. I subtract 0.5 for some of the weirdly naïve characters. 4.5 out of 5 stars
After an accident he wakes up in another world which is a place vibrant with life and good enough to heal his leprosy. He cannot cope and believing he is in a dream, rapes the most innocent girl who has only tried to help him.
Since he is supposed to be either the one who defeats the great evil of this land, Lord Foul, or the one who dooms it, people still try to help him. He is brought to the highest lords of the land, and there it is decided that Covenant and some others will go retrieve the powerful staff of law, which is in the hands of some vile creature. Doing so would help win time to prepare for the fight against Lord Foul.
I read this first part of the first trilogy because Steven Donaldson is an established name in the realm of fantasy. Did I like it? Yes,…no,…yes,…maybe. Thomas Covenant as a character felt different for me, and in my opinion, he is a complete dork in part one. Maybe he’ll change in the other parts of the first trilogy. One major issue I had was the rape scene. Obviously, I hated it, and it made me put the book away for a few days. The scene was only a short page long, and still is the most drastic part that I found in this book, and I still hate it. However, the scene is there to establish something that Covenant shows throughout the book, namely his inner conflict, his unbelief that he actually is in this rich and healthy fantasy world. For him, what he experiences is a sick dream that creates a false and dangerous hope in him. As a leper he has learned to be careful, to live according to the rules so that he has a chance to survive. But in the land, he is healed, healthy, can feel, and is overwhelmed by this, which is the actual reason for him committing such a crime right after his arrival in the land. So, having that scene made sense, in a sick way, and made Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever, more believable as a character.
The plot that follows is in some ways predictable in this first part of the trilogy, and I didn’t mind at all, because the world itself is rather interesting, and Donaldson has an excellent way of presenting it and the characters. What got on my nerves- occasionally- was that the inhabitants appeared naïve in a way and repeatedly used language that seemed to be so full of hidden meaning, and Covenant, as the outsider he is, could not fully understand the significance of what was being said. It was probably meant to let the detailed and rich setting appear even richer. But sometimes it would have been nicer not to have these ominous lines where you are maybe meant to be as clueless as the main character.
So, if you are interested in high fantasy stories, a colourful setting rich in magic and lore, and enjoy broken main characters, this could be a great title for you. I subtract 0.5 for some of the weirdly naïve characters. 4.5 out of 5 stars
April 18, 2009
A Swedish friend told me I just had to read this series - it was like Tolkien but better. I borrowed the first three, and dutifully read them, waiting for the point to dawn. It never did. Tolkien, to me, is all about the language and the names, and Donaldson's names ranged between uninspired and downright moronic. ("Berek Halfhand". Bleah.) It just grated.
To add insult to injury, I managed to drop one volume into the bath while reading it, so I had to buy a new copy to return to him. I've not looked at Donaldson since.
To add insult to injury, I managed to drop one volume into the bath while reading it, so I had to buy a new copy to return to him. I've not looked at Donaldson since.
March 31, 2013
I am (albeit slowly) removing my reviews from goodreads since it has become Amazon. For more on why that bothers me and should bother you, please go to my profile and also here:
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
What I learned from this book.
Don’t agree to read the book Robert tells you is the best book in the whole world ever just because he invited you over to watch the best film in the whole world ever (Close Encounters) and you slept through all but the first ten minutes.
You know you are going to hate this book before you’ve even opened it. You know you can’t read it out of guilt. Robert’s fifty. He can live with you sleeping through his favourite film.
But you take it home. Non-specific Catholic guilt syndrome, as my dentist informed me when I said I thought he was God. And you open it up.
And.
and for the rest:
http://alittleteaalittlechat.wordpres...
------------------------
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
What I learned from this book.
Don’t agree to read the book Robert tells you is the best book in the whole world ever just because he invited you over to watch the best film in the whole world ever (Close Encounters) and you slept through all but the first ten minutes.
You know you are going to hate this book before you’ve even opened it. You know you can’t read it out of guilt. Robert’s fifty. He can live with you sleeping through his favourite film.
But you take it home. Non-specific Catholic guilt syndrome, as my dentist informed me when I said I thought he was God. And you open it up.
And.
and for the rest:
http://alittleteaalittlechat.wordpres...
------------------------
December 27, 2021
“He lay in darkness, like a sacrifice; he could hear the teeth of his leprosy devouring his flesh. There was a smell of contempt around him, insisting on his impotence."
Stephen R. Donaldson's Lord Foul's Bane is an intriguing, but oddly idiosyncratic and disjointed fantasy. Thomas Covenant is plagued both by dreams of another world and leprosy. Where does he belong? In one world, he can barely function and in the other he is an epic hero. However, he distrusts everything about this other world as he clings to memories of a life that is a veritable hell. There is a lot of shifting of gears here as Covenant attempts to discern whether he is in dreams, hallucinations or actually living his life. I still enjoyed this, but (because of what at times felt a near constant going back and forth) it was difficult to feel immersed in either world. 3.5 stars
Stephen R. Donaldson's Lord Foul's Bane is an intriguing, but oddly idiosyncratic and disjointed fantasy. Thomas Covenant is plagued both by dreams of another world and leprosy. Where does he belong? In one world, he can barely function and in the other he is an epic hero. However, he distrusts everything about this other world as he clings to memories of a life that is a veritable hell. There is a lot of shifting of gears here as Covenant attempts to discern whether he is in dreams, hallucinations or actually living his life. I still enjoyed this, but (because of what at times felt a near constant going back and forth) it was difficult to feel immersed in either world. 3.5 stars
August 19, 2007
So many people love this series. Not sure why. The hero is a leperous (no, not lecherous) rapist and incredibly whiny. The bad guy is named Lord Foul, ferchissakes. I hated everything about the first few chapters of this book. Once the main character forced himself on a girl, and then the author tried to make it a sympathetic moment (for the perpetrator), I hurled it at the wall in disgust and never finished reading it.
Right around the same level of arrogant sexist manhood as Piers Anthony.
Right around the same level of arrogant sexist manhood as Piers Anthony.
June 30, 2007
It's not so much the story--in itself, this is a well-crafted fantasy world, complete with noble horse-riding peoples, stern giants, and delicate elven-folk on a quest of profound importance against an enemy of world-shattering magnitude--as much as Donaldson's overwrought prose that makes this series something of a drag to read. Donaldson wants his tale to carry all the mythic import of Tolkien, but he doesn't quite have the poetic flair that makes Tolkien's characters live and breathe for us. Instead, Donaldson substitutes a needlessly ornate vocabulary and an unlikeable protagonist to challenge the reader's notions of conventional fantasy. In doing so, however, Donaldson forgets to give us any reason to care about his characters. You don't get much more earnest than naming your main character Thomas Covenant! Is this supposed to be profound? When I first read this series, I took Donaldson's verbosity as a representation of Covenant's inner turmoil, but on re-reading this book, I think it's just that Donaldson is not a very good writer.
December 26, 2021
#################################################################
This review (while in many ways pertinent) has been superseded by a new review informed by a re-read of the Kindle version of this book. The Kindle version review is at: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
Original Review of the Paperback below.
I have read the first six books of the series in full, once, and I bought all the books in hardcover, or trade paperback - and then subsequently passed them on to 2nd hand book shops - because I knew I'd only ever read them once (EDIT: 27Dec2021 - Surprising myself - I'm reading the Kindle version as I love taking notes.)
When I first read this I was a young adult mad-keen on all things sci-fi and fantasy, devouring all the books I could get my hands on. Hence why I read the whole series, and the sequel series - this was another 'epic fantasy,' to digest... fortunately, age brings maturity and discernment and now I wince at what I once read...
This book is basically about a rapist who has to redeem himself by believing that a fantastical land that he has been transported to is "real."
This is a lot like,
[1] You discover a wardrobe that leads to a magical world with ice queens, and talking lions - the first thing you do is shoot a faun stone cold dead ... because, why not?
[2] You get transported to a magical world of elf queens, dragons, and dark lords with magic rings. You stab the elf queen stone cold dead and rape her bleeding corpse ... because, why not?
[3] You discover the world is an illusion perpetrated by a machine intelligence to keep humanity enslaved as a power source. You immediately shoot your rescuers, rape their bleeding corpses and beg the AI's to insert you back into the matrix ... because, why not?
The main character, Thomas Covenant commits a heinous crime because he believed at the time that he was living in a delusion (as if that makes it right???) who then spends the rest of the series attempting to redeem himself by realizing his destiny, instead of avoiding it.
The scary thing is - this book was popular.
I read it once, I would not read it again (EDIT: 27Dec2021 ... And yet, I have returned...)
This review (while in many ways pertinent) has been superseded by a new review informed by a re-read of the Kindle version of this book. The Kindle version review is at: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
Original Review of the Paperback below.
I have read the first six books of the series in full, once, and I bought all the books in hardcover, or trade paperback - and then subsequently passed them on to 2nd hand book shops - because I knew I'd only ever read them once (EDIT: 27Dec2021 - Surprising myself - I'm reading the Kindle version as I love taking notes.)
When I first read this I was a young adult mad-keen on all things sci-fi and fantasy, devouring all the books I could get my hands on. Hence why I read the whole series, and the sequel series - this was another 'epic fantasy,' to digest... fortunately, age brings maturity and discernment and now I wince at what I once read...
This book is basically about a rapist who has to redeem himself by believing that a fantastical land that he has been transported to is "real."
This is a lot like,
[1] You discover a wardrobe that leads to a magical world with ice queens, and talking lions - the first thing you do is shoot a faun stone cold dead ... because, why not?
[2] You get transported to a magical world of elf queens, dragons, and dark lords with magic rings. You stab the elf queen stone cold dead and rape her bleeding corpse ... because, why not?
[3] You discover the world is an illusion perpetrated by a machine intelligence to keep humanity enslaved as a power source. You immediately shoot your rescuers, rape their bleeding corpses and beg the AI's to insert you back into the matrix ... because, why not?
The main character, Thomas Covenant commits a heinous crime because he believed at the time that he was living in a delusion (as if that makes it right???) who then spends the rest of the series attempting to redeem himself by realizing his destiny, instead of avoiding it.
The scary thing is - this book was popular.
I read it once, I would not read it again (EDIT: 27Dec2021 ... And yet, I have returned...)
February 17, 2011
Two years after my run in with the fallen nun and the c-word, I had a near run in with our new vice-principal (not the man, thankfully, who'd given me the strap), Mr. G---.
Our school was trying to teach us study skills before we reached high school, so we wouldn't waste our spare periods playing video games or flirting with girls or role playing or whatever else kids did to waste time in the eighties. They gave us a course called "Study Hall" and put our VP in charge.
It was a nightmare.
And I was going to be late with my big book review. We could write a review of any book we wanted. It was supposed to be a plot summary and nothing more (at least, that's the way I remember it), just to prove we were reading, but I had procrastinated and procrastinated, and there was no way it would be done in time.
On the Sunday I was planning to write the review of Dragonflight Dragonriders of Pern, after a torturously boring morning as an altar boy (don't ask), I spent all my time fighting the evil wizard Vaxenstaff with my friends Mark and Jeff, and I never got around to it. D&D was always more important than school (and so it has proven over the course of my life since it taught me how to think, but that is another story), and I put the review out of my mind while Malachii, my half-elf fighter/magic-user, made his way through a castle full of traps and monsters.
Anyway, I was only halfway through McCaffrey, but I needed a book report by Monday before lunch, and I had no idea what to do. Then it hit me.
At the beginning of Stephen R. Donaldson's The Illearth War was an encapsulation of Lord Foul's Bane, and I copied the opening, called "What came (went?) before," word for word. I went to sleep knowing that I was covered...and covered by the words of a pro no less.
Back then, I imagined that Donaldson wrote "What came before" himself (although it was more likely a P.R. person for Del Rey); still, I was sure I was in great shape for the next day, and there was no way I'd get caught. Mr. G--- didn't read fantasy, and he certainly read nothing as contemporary and cool as Thomas Covenant, so I was looking at a great grade if I didn't get caught for cheating.
And I didn't get caught.
Nope. I got away with the cheating -- and I got 67%.
67%!
I decided right then that I would someday meet Mr. Donaldson and give him shit for my poor grade, plagiarism be damned. I'm not nearly as angry anymore, and since those probably weren't his words there is not much I can say, but I still hope to meet him and pass on my moment of cheating idiocy.
His work, or the P.R. person's work, should have been better than a 67%. At least that's what I told myself at the time. I wonder what Mr. G--- was thinking. Maybe it was that bad after all. Or maybe he guessed I was cheating and was too lazy to look into it.
I guess I'll never know.
Regardless, Lord Foul's Bane will always have a place in my pantheon of great books, if only because it is as huge a part of my personal back story as Lady Chatterly's Lover.
Our school was trying to teach us study skills before we reached high school, so we wouldn't waste our spare periods playing video games or flirting with girls or role playing or whatever else kids did to waste time in the eighties. They gave us a course called "Study Hall" and put our VP in charge.
It was a nightmare.
And I was going to be late with my big book review. We could write a review of any book we wanted. It was supposed to be a plot summary and nothing more (at least, that's the way I remember it), just to prove we were reading, but I had procrastinated and procrastinated, and there was no way it would be done in time.
On the Sunday I was planning to write the review of Dragonflight Dragonriders of Pern, after a torturously boring morning as an altar boy (don't ask), I spent all my time fighting the evil wizard Vaxenstaff with my friends Mark and Jeff, and I never got around to it. D&D was always more important than school (and so it has proven over the course of my life since it taught me how to think, but that is another story), and I put the review out of my mind while Malachii, my half-elf fighter/magic-user, made his way through a castle full of traps and monsters.
Anyway, I was only halfway through McCaffrey, but I needed a book report by Monday before lunch, and I had no idea what to do. Then it hit me.
At the beginning of Stephen R. Donaldson's The Illearth War was an encapsulation of Lord Foul's Bane, and I copied the opening, called "What came (went?) before," word for word. I went to sleep knowing that I was covered...and covered by the words of a pro no less.
Back then, I imagined that Donaldson wrote "What came before" himself (although it was more likely a P.R. person for Del Rey); still, I was sure I was in great shape for the next day, and there was no way I'd get caught. Mr. G--- didn't read fantasy, and he certainly read nothing as contemporary and cool as Thomas Covenant, so I was looking at a great grade if I didn't get caught for cheating.
And I didn't get caught.
Nope. I got away with the cheating -- and I got 67%.
67%!
I decided right then that I would someday meet Mr. Donaldson and give him shit for my poor grade, plagiarism be damned. I'm not nearly as angry anymore, and since those probably weren't his words there is not much I can say, but I still hope to meet him and pass on my moment of cheating idiocy.
His work, or the P.R. person's work, should have been better than a 67%. At least that's what I told myself at the time. I wonder what Mr. G--- was thinking. Maybe it was that bad after all. Or maybe he guessed I was cheating and was too lazy to look into it.
I guess I'll never know.
Regardless, Lord Foul's Bane will always have a place in my pantheon of great books, if only because it is as huge a part of my personal back story as Lady Chatterly's Lover.
June 9, 2008
When you dream, are you responsible for your actions?
You might as well admit it: you'd probably do it, too. When Thomas Covenant -- a writer who contracts leprosy and is abandoned by his wife, his friends, and society -- falls into a comatose state, he arrives at a land where his nerves are regenerated, his impotency reversed, his status legendary as White Gold Wielder. He's the Unbeliever for a simple reason: he thinks this is all delusion, all a dream. So, yes, he rapes the young woman -- it's all a dream, he'll wake up soon -- then is carried along with the consequences of this and a dozen other choices, just like one is carried along the current of a dream, from one vignette to the next. Covenant is an anti-hero because he is embittered by the only reality he knows, and the new reality before him is almost as comical as the one, as a writer, he had pushed on other readers.
The problem is, of course, that the other characters don't share in Covenant's solipsistic views. They will suffer and die because Covenant refuses to deal with this new reality. It's a dream, right? Donaldson doesn't pull any punches with Covenant -- and I suspect a lot of the bitterness is a reflection of Donaldson's own experience with patients of Hansen's disease. "Lord Foul's Bane" is Donaldson's VSE of the human soul faced with a new reality of a life of degeneration.
Which is why I think reviewers who don't finish the book and try to look beyond the surface are giving this series the short shrift. I do agree that the second trilogy left me less intrigued and interested than the first. And I don't agree that this story is a rival for Tolkien -- but again, I didn't find nearly as satisfactory character exploration in LoTR as I did here. They are two different tales.
Read this book at your peril, but agree to undertake the journey to the bitter end with an open mind that not all heroes wear shining armor and are ascetics on horseback.
You might as well admit it: you'd probably do it, too. When Thomas Covenant -- a writer who contracts leprosy and is abandoned by his wife, his friends, and society -- falls into a comatose state, he arrives at a land where his nerves are regenerated, his impotency reversed, his status legendary as White Gold Wielder. He's the Unbeliever for a simple reason: he thinks this is all delusion, all a dream. So, yes, he rapes the young woman -- it's all a dream, he'll wake up soon -- then is carried along with the consequences of this and a dozen other choices, just like one is carried along the current of a dream, from one vignette to the next. Covenant is an anti-hero because he is embittered by the only reality he knows, and the new reality before him is almost as comical as the one, as a writer, he had pushed on other readers.
The problem is, of course, that the other characters don't share in Covenant's solipsistic views. They will suffer and die because Covenant refuses to deal with this new reality. It's a dream, right? Donaldson doesn't pull any punches with Covenant -- and I suspect a lot of the bitterness is a reflection of Donaldson's own experience with patients of Hansen's disease. "Lord Foul's Bane" is Donaldson's VSE of the human soul faced with a new reality of a life of degeneration.
Which is why I think reviewers who don't finish the book and try to look beyond the surface are giving this series the short shrift. I do agree that the second trilogy left me less intrigued and interested than the first. And I don't agree that this story is a rival for Tolkien -- but again, I didn't find nearly as satisfactory character exploration in LoTR as I did here. They are two different tales.
Read this book at your peril, but agree to undertake the journey to the bitter end with an open mind that not all heroes wear shining armor and are ascetics on horseback.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 7, 2023
EDIT: I just finished my probably fifth read-through of the first book, having completed the Grim Oak Press reissues (which are lovely). I found myself reflecting on different aspects this time than I had before. I very much wanted to focus on Covenant's feelings over I also wanted to think about some odd memories I had about the story - like, this enormous Land with so few people in it - and the kind and compassionate people who DO populate the Land, in contrast to Covenant.
I'm glad that I still enjoy the series as much as I do.
2007 REVIEW: The Thomas Covenant books have always held a special place in my heart. I freely admit that the series is not for everyone; the singular nature of the protagonist turns a lot of readers away before the first book (this one) is halfway finished.
Compared to other heroic fantasy, I find the Covenant books to be somehow more believable, and to have more emotional impact. The theme of redemption, present throughout the series, resonated with me when I first read the books twenty years ago, and continues to resonate with me.
I'm glad that I still enjoy the series as much as I do.
2007 REVIEW: The Thomas Covenant books have always held a special place in my heart. I freely admit that the series is not for everyone; the singular nature of the protagonist turns a lot of readers away before the first book (this one) is halfway finished.
Compared to other heroic fantasy, I find the Covenant books to be somehow more believable, and to have more emotional impact. The theme of redemption, present throughout the series, resonated with me when I first read the books twenty years ago, and continues to resonate with me.
March 17, 2024
Oh, how I wish I could properly DNF a book. This was a fine candidate for consideration of this. My prime intention in reading it at all was part of a general interest in the history of fantasy publishing. This book often appears in accounts of fantasy history as the book that first established that fantasy could be suitably adult. I guess in between Lord of the Rings and 1977, fantasy novels were thought to be adolescent and immature. Fortunately, the genre has since progressed well beyond the need for a wretched book like this.
I get the whole thing where Thomas Covenant, the leper from the real world, abandoned by his wife to protect herself and their child, has had to (or felt he had to, or chose to) develop this intense mindset to protect himself from further deterioration, physical and mental. Wracked by self-pity, loathing, fear, fury at the world and everyone in it, he lashes out and refuses to accept the evidence of his senses when he is thrust into a secondary world and transformed instantly into a pawn of the titular Lord Foul. He fears being destroyed by hope of a better life if he accepts that fantasy that he finds himself in. This sets him apart for all traditional fantasy characters, but it doesn’t make his perspective or any of his interactions worth reading. His constant self-pity and internal struggle is not interesting, it simply makes for bad, frustrating scenes. He shuts down all dialogue. He ruins the reader’s experience of every other character. He fails to develop in any way. He does nothing to advance any aim, and only does what he does by compulsion or to try to get out of his predicament. His presence should rightfully be barely tolerated by other characters, who inexplicably accord him honors and offer friendship. In short, regardless of his reasons, he is an ass and a bore. It that’s who you like to read about, have at it. If you want to see how to make a detestable, self-loathing character interesting, look no further than Joe Abercrombie’s crippled torturer in The Blade Itself.
It’s not even just the character. All other aspects of the novel are terrible too. The prose is heavy-handed, burdensome, in many ways reflective of Covenant’s character which may be a literary achievement in itself, but the overall effect is dreary. It’s a drag to read. The author applies a supremely expansive vocabulary, occasionally evoking a clever or poetic description of something or other, but it all feels masturbatory. So many moments and descriptions cry out for plain language. The worldbuilding is dull. Were Covenant not even part of the book, I would have no investment with the history, geography or people of the Land. I don’t give a damn what Lord Foul plans to do or whether or not his machinations will be countered. Go ahead and kill off all of the characters, they matter not. Just let this book be over. Spend the whole dictionary describing the environments, all I took in was hills, plain, forest, mountain, get to the end already. Magic: dull. Uber-horses: dull. Immortal monks: dull. Monsters: dull. Woman who tends to all of Covenant’s things while on the grand Quest so he can spend his time feeling miserable instead of packing up his own bedroll and who is the only figure in the book to not be named and then is killed: ???
And yes, Thomas Covenant’s rape of a teenager in a moment of utterly misdirected rage and grief: unnecessary, as far as I can see. Some favorable reviewers state that it is referenced throughout the later books. I don’t care, it was still awful and pointless. Covenant expressed no regret, only fear of being caught at first, then trying to make nice with the girl’s mother who is forced to journey with her daughter's rapist by her devotion to the Land. Along the way, he appears to forget all about it. He even rages against Lord Foul's depravations at one point, speculating, “What’s next? Raping children?” Dude, that’s what YOU did! One of the only reasons I kept reading the book was because I had to see if there would be anything approaching acknowledgement of his vile act. And this did eventually come, when suddenly he deigns to remember what he had done, and then kind of sort of sends the girl a boon as penance, but not requiring any sacrifice on his own part.
Wretched on so many levels.
I get the whole thing where Thomas Covenant, the leper from the real world, abandoned by his wife to protect herself and their child, has had to (or felt he had to, or chose to) develop this intense mindset to protect himself from further deterioration, physical and mental. Wracked by self-pity, loathing, fear, fury at the world and everyone in it, he lashes out and refuses to accept the evidence of his senses when he is thrust into a secondary world and transformed instantly into a pawn of the titular Lord Foul. He fears being destroyed by hope of a better life if he accepts that fantasy that he finds himself in. This sets him apart for all traditional fantasy characters, but it doesn’t make his perspective or any of his interactions worth reading. His constant self-pity and internal struggle is not interesting, it simply makes for bad, frustrating scenes. He shuts down all dialogue. He ruins the reader’s experience of every other character. He fails to develop in any way. He does nothing to advance any aim, and only does what he does by compulsion or to try to get out of his predicament. His presence should rightfully be barely tolerated by other characters, who inexplicably accord him honors and offer friendship. In short, regardless of his reasons, he is an ass and a bore. It that’s who you like to read about, have at it. If you want to see how to make a detestable, self-loathing character interesting, look no further than Joe Abercrombie’s crippled torturer in The Blade Itself.
It’s not even just the character. All other aspects of the novel are terrible too. The prose is heavy-handed, burdensome, in many ways reflective of Covenant’s character which may be a literary achievement in itself, but the overall effect is dreary. It’s a drag to read. The author applies a supremely expansive vocabulary, occasionally evoking a clever or poetic description of something or other, but it all feels masturbatory. So many moments and descriptions cry out for plain language. The worldbuilding is dull. Were Covenant not even part of the book, I would have no investment with the history, geography or people of the Land. I don’t give a damn what Lord Foul plans to do or whether or not his machinations will be countered. Go ahead and kill off all of the characters, they matter not. Just let this book be over. Spend the whole dictionary describing the environments, all I took in was hills, plain, forest, mountain, get to the end already. Magic: dull. Uber-horses: dull. Immortal monks: dull. Monsters: dull. Woman who tends to all of Covenant’s things while on the grand Quest so he can spend his time feeling miserable instead of packing up his own bedroll and who is the only figure in the book to not be named and then is killed: ???
And yes, Thomas Covenant’s rape of a teenager in a moment of utterly misdirected rage and grief: unnecessary, as far as I can see. Some favorable reviewers state that it is referenced throughout the later books. I don’t care, it was still awful and pointless. Covenant expressed no regret, only fear of being caught at first, then trying to make nice with the girl’s mother who is forced to journey with her daughter's rapist by her devotion to the Land. Along the way, he appears to forget all about it. He even rages against Lord Foul's depravations at one point, speculating, “What’s next? Raping children?” Dude, that’s what YOU did! One of the only reasons I kept reading the book was because I had to see if there would be anything approaching acknowledgement of his vile act. And this did eventually come, when suddenly he deigns to remember what he had done, and then kind of sort of sends the girl a boon as penance, but not requiring any sacrifice on his own part.
Wretched on so many levels.
December 3, 2016
Hated it. 1.5 stars. Terrible characters, info-dumping, purple prose, gratuitous rape, and a frequently offputting word choice. I couldn't connect to any of the characters and I at no moment felt concern or anxiety for anyone's well-being. I would have loved for Covenant to die but he's the crux of the series and no other character had an iota of personality so I didn't care about them. I couldn't make myself care about the quest. Donaldson is a pale and pathetic shade of Tolkien and I'll never consider one of his books again. I'll be getting rid of my copy.
July 20, 2007
The first thing you have to know about this series, and this is the real pivotal point in whether you want to read them or not, is that Thomas Coveenant is NOT A HERO. Like, in any sense. There are a couple really fantastic heroes in this book, but all of the chapters in the 1st book, and the majority thereafter all center around covenant, the unbeliever.
The story of the book is honestly a little trite. An evil lord threatening a beautiful land. Covenenant has an important ring.
But! Thomas, oh thomas. He's jealous, bitter, frustrated, cynical -- you want to criticize him for not being all heroic and shit, but... there's good reasons for him not to be.
**spoilers (barely, almost what you get off the back cover)**
Thomas covenant is a leper. A famous author who had it all, and lost it instantly. So, he's tossed into this imaginary world where disease isn't even a concept-- so what does he do? Just believe in it? It's not like, "lucky you, you're healthy!" He figures if he does, the second he wakes back up, as a leper, outcast, unclean , and alone, he would kill himself. Put yourself in his shoes here~ So that's the premise of the story; and it's good. Just accept him as a poor, incredibly unfortunate leper, not as a hero, and you'll like it.
The story of the book is honestly a little trite. An evil lord threatening a beautiful land. Covenenant has an important ring.
But! Thomas, oh thomas. He's jealous, bitter, frustrated, cynical -- you want to criticize him for not being all heroic and shit, but... there's good reasons for him not to be.
**spoilers (barely, almost what you get off the back cover)**
Thomas covenant is a leper. A famous author who had it all, and lost it instantly. So, he's tossed into this imaginary world where disease isn't even a concept-- so what does he do? Just believe in it? It's not like, "lucky you, you're healthy!" He figures if he does, the second he wakes back up, as a leper, outcast, unclean , and alone, he would kill himself. Put yourself in his shoes here~ So that's the premise of the story; and it's good. Just accept him as a poor, incredibly unfortunate leper, not as a hero, and you'll like it.
July 2, 2019
A most repulsive main character,
Verified Purchase
This review is of the Kindle edition
Publication date: May 16, 2012
Publisher: Del Rey
Language: English
ASIN: B007WKEM9Q
This book has a large number of fans. I, however, dislike it intensely. Early in this novel the main character, Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever, rapes a young girl who has helped him and believed in him. I read on but never regained any sympathy for Covenant. Several reviewers say that readers like me don't understand the book, that we aren't supposed to like Covenant. Ok, but are we supposed to hate him, wish we could put him in prison, wish that some of the girl's family and friends would beat him within an inch of his life and then hang him? Life is too short to waste it reading unpleasant books featuring repulsive main characters. Add to this the fact that the book is not really very good or very original fantasy either. Parts of it seem to be taken from Tolkien. Why should I read a book if I am neither enjoying it nor learning from it? Readers should also note that the medical information concerning Leprosy is out of date.
Verified Purchase
This review is of the Kindle edition
Publication date: May 16, 2012
Publisher: Del Rey
Language: English
ASIN: B007WKEM9Q
This book has a large number of fans. I, however, dislike it intensely. Early in this novel the main character, Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever, rapes a young girl who has helped him and believed in him. I read on but never regained any sympathy for Covenant. Several reviewers say that readers like me don't understand the book, that we aren't supposed to like Covenant. Ok, but are we supposed to hate him, wish we could put him in prison, wish that some of the girl's family and friends would beat him within an inch of his life and then hang him? Life is too short to waste it reading unpleasant books featuring repulsive main characters. Add to this the fact that the book is not really very good or very original fantasy either. Parts of it seem to be taken from Tolkien. Why should I read a book if I am neither enjoying it nor learning from it? Readers should also note that the medical information concerning Leprosy is out of date.
February 21, 2018
I feel kind of bad because my fellow author, Michael Suttkus (who helped write I WAS A TEENAGE WEREDEER and LUCIFER'S STAR) swears by this series. I knew getting into them that they were either "love" or "hate" but I feel like the big problem for me was I didn't think they were very good. There's a lot to unpack here about the books but the majority of negative reviewers seem to focus on the INFAMOUS incident (spoilers ahead) versus the cliche setting, cardboard characters, and the fact Thomas is a person who doesn't behave in any way like a human being in the situation.
The premise is, Thomas Covenant is an author who has attracted leprosy and has been left by his wife as a result as well as being shunned by the community. This is in 1977 and feels more than a little off. However, Thomas Covenant's hatred of himself is a major part of the story as is the fact he bonks his head and lands in, well, the Land. In the Land, which is Tolkien-ish if not Tolkien, he is the Chosen One and beloved by all but also tormented by Lord Foul the Despiser who is the embodiment of Thomas' self-hatred (or all mankind's self-hatred).
And the book does nothing with this.
One key thing that annoys me with this is Thomas Covenant refuses to believe he's actually in what amounts to Narnia (a reasonable position) and he's just hallucinating or dreaming. Healed of his leprosey, Thomas proceeds to (SPOILER) rape one of his hosts. This has turned many thousands of readers off the series and with good reason. However, I tend to wonder if not for this controversy whether there'd be anything worth talking about at all. It's also an act which seems designed for controversy as the implications are never addressed.
Oh, Thomas BREAKS THE UNIVERSE because of it and it has lasting repercussions but we never really get into Thomas' head about how he should feel about doing an unforgivable act to what he believes is an explicitly fictional character. The reality of the land is never established but Thomas never seems to debate the issue or examine the ethics of any of it. He just sort of grumbles, cries, and pouts the entire time. He is a thoroughly unengaging and unbelievable personality.
Thomas whines about what he does, that he can't believe he's actually healed, and talks about what a depressing sadsack he is as well as there's no possible hope for his situation but there's no real reactions of a human being here. No, "Okay, I am losing my mind" or "This is too real to be a hallucination? Am I in a coma or am I dead?" Even simple frustration at the saccharine personalities around him or taking a moment to enjoy his hallucination (if hallucination it be). He's a forty something emo kid who has no mode but ANGST and DOOM.
I can't help but think there's a better book where a man is transported to the Land, engages in some Grand Theft Auto-esque behavior because this is all meaningless, and then comes to the horrifying conclusion that, no, he's been torturing real people. That's not the story, though, or even close to the story. I get Donaldson was trying to subvert the, "People from the real world go to a fantasy land and change everything" cliche (which was cliche even in the 1970s) but Thomas isn't a great antihero because he refuses to engage with anything unless he's dragged kicking and screaming into the plot.
The Land isn't much better as it's filled with happy, good, and shining people who seem like they're about to break into singing at any moment. There's giants and wizards as well as so much else but it's all sharply divided between the good versus the evil. There's no real other characters OTHER than Thomas Covenant, at least with personality, and that hurts the narrative considerably. I mean, this is a story where there's a major character named Drool Rockworm and we're meant to take that absolutely seriously.
So, why two stars instead of one? The book is reasonably well crafted and I appreciated what Donaldson was trying to do. He was trying to subvert a lot of the cliches which would eventually almost kill the fantasy industry and were already visible in the 70s. The Chosen Ones, the magical happy lands, the binary morality, and the fact heroes always make things better. A sort of proto-grimdark if you will. Unfortunately, I can't say it really worked since it feels like dumping a grumpy old man in the land of Oz versus something I really wanted to read.
4/10
The premise is, Thomas Covenant is an author who has attracted leprosy and has been left by his wife as a result as well as being shunned by the community. This is in 1977 and feels more than a little off. However, Thomas Covenant's hatred of himself is a major part of the story as is the fact he bonks his head and lands in, well, the Land. In the Land, which is Tolkien-ish if not Tolkien, he is the Chosen One and beloved by all but also tormented by Lord Foul the Despiser who is the embodiment of Thomas' self-hatred (or all mankind's self-hatred).
And the book does nothing with this.
One key thing that annoys me with this is Thomas Covenant refuses to believe he's actually in what amounts to Narnia (a reasonable position) and he's just hallucinating or dreaming. Healed of his leprosey, Thomas proceeds to (SPOILER) rape one of his hosts. This has turned many thousands of readers off the series and with good reason. However, I tend to wonder if not for this controversy whether there'd be anything worth talking about at all. It's also an act which seems designed for controversy as the implications are never addressed.
Oh, Thomas BREAKS THE UNIVERSE because of it and it has lasting repercussions but we never really get into Thomas' head about how he should feel about doing an unforgivable act to what he believes is an explicitly fictional character. The reality of the land is never established but Thomas never seems to debate the issue or examine the ethics of any of it. He just sort of grumbles, cries, and pouts the entire time. He is a thoroughly unengaging and unbelievable personality.
Thomas whines about what he does, that he can't believe he's actually healed, and talks about what a depressing sadsack he is as well as there's no possible hope for his situation but there's no real reactions of a human being here. No, "Okay, I am losing my mind" or "This is too real to be a hallucination? Am I in a coma or am I dead?" Even simple frustration at the saccharine personalities around him or taking a moment to enjoy his hallucination (if hallucination it be). He's a forty something emo kid who has no mode but ANGST and DOOM.
I can't help but think there's a better book where a man is transported to the Land, engages in some Grand Theft Auto-esque behavior because this is all meaningless, and then comes to the horrifying conclusion that, no, he's been torturing real people. That's not the story, though, or even close to the story. I get Donaldson was trying to subvert the, "People from the real world go to a fantasy land and change everything" cliche (which was cliche even in the 1970s) but Thomas isn't a great antihero because he refuses to engage with anything unless he's dragged kicking and screaming into the plot.
The Land isn't much better as it's filled with happy, good, and shining people who seem like they're about to break into singing at any moment. There's giants and wizards as well as so much else but it's all sharply divided between the good versus the evil. There's no real other characters OTHER than Thomas Covenant, at least with personality, and that hurts the narrative considerably. I mean, this is a story where there's a major character named Drool Rockworm and we're meant to take that absolutely seriously.
So, why two stars instead of one? The book is reasonably well crafted and I appreciated what Donaldson was trying to do. He was trying to subvert a lot of the cliches which would eventually almost kill the fantasy industry and were already visible in the 70s. The Chosen Ones, the magical happy lands, the binary morality, and the fact heroes always make things better. A sort of proto-grimdark if you will. Unfortunately, I can't say it really worked since it feels like dumping a grumpy old man in the land of Oz versus something I really wanted to read.
4/10
January 28, 2017
DNF
I'm sure there is a beautiful story arc where Tomas Covenant becomes a good person... but I didn't want to needlessly subject myself to this story at this point.
I'm sure there is a beautiful story arc where Tomas Covenant becomes a good person... but I didn't want to needlessly subject myself to this story at this point.
September 24, 2022
My recollection is that I read three Thomas Covenant books before there was a fourth one. I don't remember much about them except I enjoyed them.
September 22, 2018
I am not a true fan of epic fantasy but I’m generally not against this genre. So when I find out that this book fulfills perfectly one of my more demanding challenges, I started it with high hopes.
And everything looked nice in the beginning. Thomas, the hero suffers from leprosy and the first few chapters focus on his bleak life with the disease. This part is really good, I got attached to Thomas and generally enjoyed the story.
But then, out of sudden, you are thrown into some epic fantasy plot. Just like that, Thomas is moved to some parallel fantasy world. He doesn’t find it strange but, trust me, I did. I was definitely confused by this rapid introduction of a completely new world and the beginning of some complex plot. But I was getting over it and working it out.
The book is a pretty fast read and I was truly getting into the story. Unfortunately, at this point the story becomes somehow less interesting. It drags a bit. Then Thomas makes something so horrible and unforgiven that I completely lost my sympathy for him. I was trying to get over it but his lack of remorse is too much. I read another chapter or two, but I just couldn’t bear it anymore. The story is not getting any better and my strong negative feelings toward the hero made me to left this book unfinished.
I can only hope that Thomas’ actions will be punished at some point of the story, but I do not intend to read this book just to find out. I seriously hesitated how to rate this book. Ultimately, I decided to give it two stars because the beginning is very good and probably, if I really wanted to, I would be able to force myself to read this book to the end.
And everything looked nice in the beginning. Thomas, the hero suffers from leprosy and the first few chapters focus on his bleak life with the disease. This part is really good, I got attached to Thomas and generally enjoyed the story.
But then, out of sudden, you are thrown into some epic fantasy plot. Just like that, Thomas is moved to some parallel fantasy world. He doesn’t find it strange but, trust me, I did. I was definitely confused by this rapid introduction of a completely new world and the beginning of some complex plot. But I was getting over it and working it out.
The book is a pretty fast read and I was truly getting into the story. Unfortunately, at this point the story becomes somehow less interesting. It drags a bit. Then Thomas makes something so horrible and unforgiven that I completely lost my sympathy for him. I was trying to get over it but his lack of remorse is too much. I read another chapter or two, but I just couldn’t bear it anymore. The story is not getting any better and my strong negative feelings toward the hero made me to left this book unfinished.
I can only hope that Thomas’ actions will be punished at some point of the story, but I do not intend to read this book just to find out. I seriously hesitated how to rate this book. Ultimately, I decided to give it two stars because the beginning is very good and probably, if I really wanted to, I would be able to force myself to read this book to the end.
December 16, 2016
This book is one of my earlier fantasy novel books that I attempted to read this depressing novel. I've tried twice, but never finished it. I cannot recall much (it is a good thing actually. I am forgetting some bad moments of my life) but I like to share my opinion here: the main character is not likable based on his POV. People in the story respect him because the prophecy and he has distinctive physical traits that can prove he is The One. The depressing inner thought of character hardly entertained me, and there was no action, magic scenes, interesting secondary characters, etc that could redeemed this novel.
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