Well, that about wraps it up for Poughkeepsie

[mme_hardy]

I am rereading The Worm Ouroboros and savoring it. I had forgotten the long mountain-climbing section entirely; I fear teen me must have skipped it.

In any case, Ursula Le Guin once wrote an essay, "From Elfland to Poughkeepsie", essentially arguing that all fantasy protagonists should speak in an elevated, heroic style. She was particularly mean to a very recognizable Katherine Kurtz, with some side shots at Roger Zelazny. She quotes and praises Eddison as an example of what should be done.

At one point she quotes from Zelazny, "I could have told you that at Carcosa", and lays down the law that great heroes don't say "I told you so".

"Well," said Juss, "thy counsel hath been right once and saved us, for nine times that it hath been wrong, and my counsel saved thee from an evil end. If ill behap us, it shall be set down that it had from thy peevish will original."

Comments

[pameladean]

It hadn't occurred to me, but it does seem possible.

I do agree that Eddison absolutely did see those three as heroes, but I never quite cottoned to them as I did to Gro.

[mme_hardy]

Gro runs away with the novel, and I can't tell you why. Maybe it's because his emotions are much more complicated than the protagonists' ?

[pameladean]

He's a real person with real problems. I can't say that the grand trio has no problems, but they are at a different level, and at least sometimes they create them out of sheer, I don't know, exuberance, boredom, a frightening combination of the two?

P.

[mme_hardy]

I would definitely not let Brandoch Daha look after my child, or my cat.

[pameladean]

I KNOW, RIGHT? P.