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Messages - Borque

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31
Atrocity Tales / Re: Hiding your Voice
« on: November 16, 2013, 03:58:43 pm »
Garet - I didn't think to check for posts until after I had posted the quote. I'm apparently quite self-absorbed.

It seems that the 3 Gnostic schools that would have learned about this from the Nonman Tutelage were all wiped out in the First Apocalypse.  The Mangaecca moved to the Incû-Holoinas, and the Mihtrul and the Sohonc were destroyed. 

Tirtiga, who IMO would be the only one who achieved hiding his voice in this manner, "died" almost 1,000 years before Seswatha was born.

Seswatha founded the Mandate (the last Gnostic school of the time) after the First Apocalypse and could have possibly not known about the practice of worshiping the spaces between the gods as a method of avoiding damnation.  Either that or, worshiping the spaces between the gods only grants oblivion, and Seswatha wasn't after oblivion.
But it would seem to be quite crucial information, and not something the Sohonc likely would just forget or don't care about. And that would imply that Ses knew, too.

I see a couple of possibilities:

1) The Sohonc didn't know at the time of Seswatha. Why this would be, I can't say. Maybe they were almost obliterated at some point, and someone never returned that particular book to the Sauglish library.

2) The Sohonc (or the Mandate) knew, but at some point their elite damnation research team has proven the practice ineffective (project de-funded and merged with the Various Odd Nonman Ideas Catalog project). So Ses and the Mandate know but don't really care a lot.

3) The Sohonc knew, but Ses forgot to tell the Mandate, or more interestingly, deliberately chose not to tell the Mandate.

32
Atrocity Tales / Re: Hiding your Voice
« on: November 16, 2013, 03:34:39 pm »
Here is the full quote:

Quote from: The False Sun
“Do you not fear damnation?“

A careful look from the Hero-Mage.

“The Nonmen…” he said evenly. “They have taught us how to hide our Voices. How to bypass the Outside, find Oblivion.”

Eyes like bladders of ink, each reflecting the tripods across their shining curve. The fluting of gill-tissues along the neck. “You worship the spaces between the Gods…”

“Yes.”

A rasp like the screams of faraway children tangled in the wind. Inchoroi laughter. “You are already damned. All of you are already damned.“

“So say you.”

A deep chested rumble. Popping mucous. “So says the Inverse Fire.”

33
Atrocity Tales / Hiding your Voice
« on: November 16, 2013, 02:37:06 pm »
Titirga seems to believe that it's possible to avoid damnation by "hiding his Voice". This is supposedly accomplished by "worshipping the spaces between the Gods". Or at least it's connected. This was taught to Men by the Siqu.

Why has this belief, from what we have seen so far, disappeared? Maybe it was never known among the Anagogics, but at least Mandate Sorcerers should know about - and grasp desperately for - this possible way to avoid damnation.

Theories, please...

34
General Earwa / Re: Sorcery
« on: November 16, 2013, 02:31:55 pm »
I think the "purity" of the Cishaurim work is a different sort of purity than the "purity of meaning" that I seem to recall is used somewhere to describe some Gnostic and or Quyan cants.

I like the "singing in tune" simile. The Cish are aware of and in tune with creation. Gnosis users don't listen at all, they just sing whatever they want, not giving a damn about even what kind of music is playing.

35
General Misc. / About that other forum
« on: November 16, 2013, 11:15:16 am »
Some stuff that I believe is worth discussing, copied from my introduction thread:

Perhaps - I've been very much debating in past weeks never posting there again.
Another westeros tangent:
Quote
Honestly the main reason I abstain from going there is because... well then I wouldn't be here. I selfishly think of the Bakker threads there as parasitic. No one new, or with a new budding interest, will seek out Westeros  to learn about Bakker. Or, worse, they will find that as the only place... And then give up since its far too complicated to jump into the middle of "WLW mega-thread XXVII". If the most active Bakker forum is ASOIAF sub thread... what kind of message does that send? To me, that RSB is just a mid-list author with a less than active fanbase thats content with hipster-esque obscurity.

Certainly its impossible to ask everyone to go from there to here. Most people there are probably more interested in GRRM than RSB anyway, which is fine. Let them stay there.  But those interested in Bakker, interested in his works' dissemination and success, who want Bakker to become the next GRRM or achieve some kind of popularity above obscurity,  should really consider trying to move the conversation here.

Are those few threads more active than all the topics on this site combined? I don't know, maybe.
Are there bigger brains and better think-tanks there then here? Probably.
But the knowledge that the few gain there is not disseminated. Its not dispersed, and its pretty much lost after a few posts except within the minds of the participants. Move them here, to a place that actually cares about what your talking about rather than wonders who you are and what these RSB super threads are doing on ASOIAF boards. (why don't they have their own forum....)

But these are just, as I said, my selfish thoughts. Maybe I like to think that some of those here are somehow better/more fanatical, which is likely not the case.

Wilshire - I changed your spoiler to a direct quote, to improve the readability.

Anyway, my take is that it isn't either/or, for me it's more a question of "one or both". We can't really do much about what is or isn't said on Westeros.

What we can do, is limited to this forum. Like, always post Bakker related questions here, in clearly labeled threads, or - even better - add to existing threads on the same theme. This greatly improves searchability for new readers. We should also be really careful about spoilers... This should be the go-to place for questions about the books.

Westeros I think is invaluable as a general SF&F resource. I have great respect for many of the posters there, and wouldn't want that place to change a lot. There will always be different opinions of Bakker there, since different people have ended up there for different reasons. Different people love different aspects of GRRMs books, not to mention the TV show.

This place will always be more Bakker friendly, since you really need to like his books to bother posting here. Westeros will always have non-fans chiming in, which I think is as it should be - no book is for everyone, and if I'm curious about a new book or author, I will always find a very wide spectrum of opinions of it on Westeros. And I know this - I need to weigh these opinions myself, and judge from my impression of the posters, etc. Most are sensible people.

I would still say that having your name on the first page there is a good thing in most cases. The only authors that are genuinely losing out on Westeros PR-wise, are the thoroughly bad ones, that are systematically made fun of (G**dkind and St*nek comes to mind). Bakker is not in this group, in my mind - I would say he has quite a good reputation there. Most of the Westerosi who love Bakker can make fun of some of his quirks though. Me too, though I don't consider myself a "proper" Westerosi - I haven't really posted a lot there. Also, there are quite a lot of authors being discussed there and I have no idea of who is "mid-list" or not (well I do know that GRRM isn't).

PR-wise, I'm thinking that we maybe should have a Bakker for beginners thread here, titled "If you consider reading Bakker, read this first" or somesuch. Preferrably stickied and prominent. Containing information like the following:
- TDTCB is a difficult read for many. However, don't give up on it until you've read at least 200 pages. Ideally, the entire book. Then you will probably know if you like the rest or not. Also, know that the books generally are considered to improve with each volume.
- The PoN trilogy is only the first third of the SA series - don't expect everything to be entirely resolved by the end.
- The names will grow on you. They are headache-inducing for many in the beginning, but you get used to them and will in some cases even love them.
- After reading the first book, consider the possibility that Kellhus is not actually a hero.
- How to find the books (can be problematic in the US, I've heard)
- Links to good (but balanced) reviews.
- Explain a little about how these fora work, what subfora are spoiler minefields, etc.



36
Introduce Yourself / Re: Hi
« on: November 16, 2013, 10:35:41 am »
Welcome to the forum. Prepare yourself, and don't ever again apologize  for your English. Its better than most, probably regularly better than mine and its the only one I speak  ;).
Thank you!

I'm copying the rest of you message into a new post on another sub forum, I think this is worth discussing. But I don't want to derail this excellent "Hi" thread further. :)

37
Introduce Yourself / Re: Hi
« on: November 15, 2013, 08:46:46 pm »
Maybe we should start a "Bakker for beginners" thread there? :)

38
Literature / Re: The Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe
« on: November 15, 2013, 09:16:42 am »
I also consciously avoided any real spoilers, so I know that there's a metric ton of subtext I'm not getting.
Yes. Yes, there is.

I wasn't too impressed with it after my first read, but will read it again, at some point. I have chosen to read some analysis and spoilers, and the amount of stuff I have missed is completely staggering. But that seems to be the way it is, nobody seems to really get it all (or even a majority of it) at the first read.



39
Introduce Yourself / Re: Hi
« on: November 15, 2013, 08:56:49 am »
Borque, kudos for trying Bakker with Westeros as your introduction. I never know how much the conversation there drives people away.
Granted, this was quite some time ago. 2006-2007, perhaps.

I still think the active conversation there is a net positive. His name is almost always on the first page through the current Bakker-specific thread, and mostly the debate is all in good fun.

Bakker is also very prominent in all the recommendation threads, and he gets a lot of, often positive, mention in other threads. Overall, I think it's a good thing.

I think the Bakker-specific threads, which I see as possibly off-turning, are very hard to get into if you are just curious (I imagine people who hasn't read the books, reading those threads and going something like "who is that Akkeönjauri bloke now again, or was it Akkseônpapri, and what did he do now again, to that... Akkpopinjûëre? Akkpronpinjêureü?? Damnit, my head hurts.". But you would get that issue here too).


40
The White-Luck Warrior / Re: Heramari Iyokus
« on: November 14, 2013, 08:00:54 pm »
Crackpot:

Iyokys has, since his blinding, researched the Psûkhe. He is now an Anagogic Titirga, with some extra Daimos on top.

Could be interesting.

41
Introduce Yourself / Re: Hi
« on: November 14, 2013, 07:55:09 pm »
Thanks Garet!  :)

I look forward to participating to. If history is any guide, I will post very irregularly, though. I have a couple of small kids and am also starting a company on the side, which together tends to absorb substantial amounts of time.

42
Introduce Yourself / Hi
« on: November 14, 2013, 06:54:04 pm »
Just wanted to say hi - don't think I ever introduced myself here or the older SA fora. Some of you might know me as "Incariol" on the ASOIAF board where I've posted occasionally over the years.

I'm Swedish and live in Sweden. English is a second language for me, so I apologize in advance for any weird language constructs, grammar spelling, etc.

Happened upon Bakker after reading about him on the Martin board, which I found after having read AGOT, which, in turn, I found after looking after similar books to the first few Wheel of Time volumes, and so on, back via Donaldson, Tolkien, Dune and others, to the Ursula LeGuin's Earthsea sequence, which is what really got me interested in Fantasy in the first place.

Many thanks to all you who run this board, reading Bakker gets even better with all the speculation, interpretation and general discussion here.

43
General Earwa / Re: Aporetic sorcery
« on: November 14, 2013, 06:29:27 pm »
And does the Aporos exist in actual spells, like the other branches of sorcery?
Aporetic sorcerers speak the utteral backwards, on inhalation.

A long time ago, on a forum far, far away (can't find the thread now) I raised the possibility that the Consult has full knowledge of the Aporos, and/or fully functional Aporetic sorcerers. So I have good hope of seeing some of this in TUC.

44
General Earwa / Re: Sorcery
« on: November 14, 2013, 06:26:26 pm »
Interesting.  I have always thought that damnation and the mark went hand in hand.  At least as far as sorcerers are concerned.
I edited my post a little while you wrote your response...

Well they would be correlated, since sorcery is a damnable offense. But sorcery plus murder seems to me more damnable than only sorcery, while murder in itself also gives damnation points.

45
General Earwa / Re: Sorcery
« on: November 14, 2013, 05:35:33 pm »
I think damnation points and Mark points are separate. Sorcery isn't the only way to be damned.

ETA: I believe that if you burn 7 tons of stone to cinders using the Fifth Quyan Whatnot, that could result in more Mark but fewer Damnation points than if you burn 3 tons of innocent people with the same Cant.

ETA2: Since the second option also involves murder of around 30-50 people, and I'm assuming murder gives Damnation point without affecting the Mark.

ETA3: If Mark and Damnation weren't counted separately, everyone of the Few would in effect have the Judging Eye.

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