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Aug. 16th, 2006
"Paladin of Souls", Final Thoughts
Aug. 16th, 2006 06:06 pmI finished rereading Paladin of Souls today, and a few final items occur to me.
1) It's an interesting coincidence that Ista is about the same age - about forty - as Cordelia Vorkosigan in Shards of Honor. They are otherwise quite different, of course; Ista is alienated from the very beginning, and her romance with Illvin is part of her reconciliation with the world, while Cordelia's rupture with the Betan powers-that-be is a consequence of her romance with Aral. [Edit:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mmegaera points out that Cordelia was only 33. Oops. Scratch item 1.]
2) At the book's climax, as the Bastard consigns Joen to "the place of be-not", He refers to Joen - or Joen's soul, rather - as "it"; up to that point, all references have been to "she" or "her". I recall C. S. Lewis doing something similar in The Great Divorce.
3) More broadly - and this is true of all three books - it's interesting to consider the circumstances under which the gods intervene. A mere physical threat to Chalion, or to the Weald, does not appear to be Their concern (nor should it be; Roknar and the Empire are as much Theirs as Chalion and the Weald); what concerns Them is spiritual danger - the metaphysical backlash from the death of the Golden General, or Horseriver's long defiance, dragging so many other souls to the brink of sundering. This is nicely done, but it does somewhat cramp the possibilities for more stories in the Chalionverse.
1) It's an interesting coincidence that Ista is about the same age - about forty - as Cordelia Vorkosigan in Shards of Honor. They are otherwise quite different, of course; Ista is alienated from the very beginning, and her romance with Illvin is part of her reconciliation with the world, while Cordelia's rupture with the Betan powers-that-be is a consequence of her romance with Aral. [Edit:
mmegaera points out that Cordelia was only 33. Oops. Scratch item 1.]2) At the book's climax, as the Bastard consigns Joen to "the place of be-not", He refers to Joen - or Joen's soul, rather - as "it"; up to that point, all references have been to "she" or "her". I recall C. S. Lewis doing something similar in The Great Divorce.
3) More broadly - and this is true of all three books - it's interesting to consider the circumstances under which the gods intervene. A mere physical threat to Chalion, or to the Weald, does not appear to be Their concern (nor should it be; Roknar and the Empire are as much Theirs as Chalion and the Weald); what concerns Them is spiritual danger - the metaphysical backlash from the death of the Golden General, or Horseriver's long defiance, dragging so many other souls to the brink of sundering. This is nicely done, but it does somewhat cramp the possibilities for more stories in the Chalionverse.