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Messages - TheCulminatingApe

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256
The Unholy Consult / Re: TUC - Moments that cut to the visceral quick
« on: July 28, 2017, 08:26:00 pm »
The last chapter, and in particular the final line of the book left me numb.  Seriously, it took me about an hour and a half to get over it. :(

257
Koringhus finally gets this, at the end.  "Everything I taught you is a lie." The Judging Eye does not look kindly upon competence and mastery, only ignorance and innocence.  The Dunyain have labored for generations to damn themselves utterly.

The final Koringhus chapter in TGO is fairly clear as to the wrongness of the Dunyain philosophy.  It is implied that the Dunyain path is a straight line, but Koringhus realises that 'the world possesses directions that the Dunyain could not fathom'.  The Dunyain are following 'step bound to step' and are slavishly yoked to this - something which corresponds quite closely with Akka's dreams of prisoners being fed to the No-God.  I think Koringhus also thinks about taking a 'sideways step'

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The Unholy Consult / Re: [TUC SPOILERS] The Carapace & The No-God
« on: July 26, 2017, 07:44:15 pm »
Well, I'm not sure why the Dunyain would be discussing the No-god in terms of sentence structure?

Edit: perhaps it has to do with the way you are trying to apply first order logic here?
Remember that Bakker is a philosopher rather than a computer programmer.
Perhaps like the shared use of semantic logic by philosophers and programmers might be creating allegorical confusion because the No-god et al are supposed to resemble Turing machines?


I'd say that use of language is how we express our internal thoughts externally (we can also express things through music, art etc, but I would says this tends to be emotional rather than intellectual).  We convey language through either speech or writing.  Grammar provides structure for this, and hence plays a considerable role in defining meaning.  As such, grammar and sentence structure is important in understanding what a speaker, and especially a writer is putting across. 

Use of capitals for Subject and Object, tells us that they are proper nouns, i.e. named things, rather than more general concepts - in fact the Mutilated do actually tell us that the Sarcophagus is the Object.

In terms of understanding meaning I would say this of great importance, in trying to grasp the story Bakker is telling.  The Sarcophagus is the physical component of the No-God.  A sarcophagus, is a stone coffin.  A literal translation of sarcophagus from Greek is flesh-eater or eater of flesh, i.e. a cannibal. This can than relate to Kelmomas eating people when hiding in the palace in Momemn, and also to the Ordealmen eating their fallen comrades.  As to what the significance of this relationship is, I don't know.

There are plenty of other examples of words with more than meaning being used in the books, and I suspect used so deliberately in most if not all circumstances.  Also, as I recall, in Earwa sorcery revolves around meaning.  Grammar, as a word, comes from the same root as grammarie (other spellings are also available) (a medieval term for magic), grimoire and glamour. 

Semantics is important, as is semiotics.

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The Unholy Consult / Re: [TUC Spoilers] Music for TUC
« on: July 25, 2017, 07:59:24 pm »

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The Unholy Consult / Re: [TUC Spoilers] The Survivors
« on: July 24, 2017, 08:11:20 pm »
Serwa could be dead, but I bet that she is going to be more "hunger" than "fodder".
Remember that Mimara saw her like a ciphrang.

Serwa was mortally wounded (according to Kayutas) by a laser weapon, then had one of her hands/ arms salted off, and was then buried by collapsing debris.  Even if she somehow teleported out, I don't see how she can have lived

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The Unholy Consult / Re: [TUC SPOILERS] The Carapace & The No-God
« on: July 23, 2017, 06:25:33 pm »
My take on this was that it dispels the theory that Seswatha was Nau-Cayuti's father.

The only way to square the circle, is that the kid at Ishual that Kellhus et al are descended from was not actually Ganrelka's bastard at all, but was in fact the son of Nau-Cayuti with his concubine, and then raised as Ganrelka's to protect the boy from Ieva (the wife who poisoned Nau-Cayuti).  This would mean that Seswatha can still be Nau-Cayuti's father, and that the various Dunyain can all be descended from Nau-Cayuti - but ironically none of them would not biologically be Anasurimbor.

I'm not saying this is what happened, though.  The dreams being a red herring seems more likely

262
so I feel fucked as the ordealmen are.

I think the head-fucking scenes can be read as a message from author to reader.  Mr Bakker is fucking with our heads

The first thing I will do is reading it again to grasp the absolute of it.

I feel like I need to re-read all seven books.  Twice.  And make notes

263
Introduce Yourself / Re: Hello
« on: July 23, 2017, 05:41:18 pm »
Thanks, everybody

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The Unholy Consult / Re: [TUC Spoilers] (or maybe not) - The Daimos
« on: July 21, 2017, 08:42:16 pm »
The Daimos is not simply about summoning Ciphrang, perhaps we should look more closely at it's metaphysical attributes.

Something I noted from the glossary

"elhusioli The daimos of excess.  As per standard Kiunnat metaphysics, souls directly move other souls, impart the imprint of daimos upon another daimos.  Some, such as terror or enthusiasm, are set apart for the dramatic nature of their effect."

It seems that there is both Daimos as sorcery, and daimos as a concept.  The Ordeal seems to experience extremes of excess, terror and enthusiasm at various times.  Does the intense emotional experiences of thousands and thousands of Ordealmen provide momentum for Kellhus or Ajokli?

Also I note the contrast with the extreme dispassion of the Dunyain, who seek to become self-moving souls

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The Unholy Consult / Re: [TUC Spoilers] About the glossary...
« on: July 21, 2017, 08:09:48 pm »
I've been wondering, is there any reason why some characters who died in TTT (Conphas, for instance) don't have their death date listed in the TUC glossary? It made sense for TTT, so that those looking at the glossary before reading the book could avoid spoilers, but these characters have been dead for 4 books now.

I'd suggest they've probably just been copied over from the TTT glossary without any updates

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The Unholy Consult / Re: [TUC Spoilers] The Loose Ends
« on: July 18, 2017, 07:02:17 pm »
Meppa...

And the Psuhke. And the Fanim more generally.  We've only ever seen them at second hand, yet they seem a very significant, and different, player, that has not yet been explored.  We've had no POV and no real exploration of what they are all about.  In PoN they were just an 'enemy' group, but always positioned as a kind of side-show to the Consult as the actual real evil.  In TAE, they were 'mundane' rebels, again a side-show, hijacked by Yatwer and only ever seen through the eyes of Malowebi.

267
The Unholy Consult / Re: [TUC Spoilers] Sorweel
« on: July 17, 2017, 08:33:09 pm »
I agree.  He was relatable.  I think he was a subversion of a stock fantasy character - teenage doofus from the back of beyond, gets swept up into vast events, is chosen by a god, goes on a journey to a hidden magical place, learns ancient secrets, gets stuck into a beautiful princess.  But in the end this all turns out to be relatively pointless

I'd bet you are probably correct, and you left out, defeats evil, lives happily ever after.

That's because it didn't happen. Instead he gets killed by Stewie Griffin ;)

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The Unholy Consult / Re: [TUC Spoilers] Sorweel
« on: July 17, 2017, 08:06:50 pm »
I really liked Sorweel, it was so enjoyable to have a new character around that we could sort of relate to (not to his personal circumstances, but in the way he was a regular human among Dûnyain, half-Dûnyain, sorcerers, witches and people with unique supernatural powers). I remember thinking "oh no" when his POV started switching to White-Luck Warrior mode, and sure enough, that did not end well (so sad, especially after his reunion with poor, also-doomed Zsoronga, which was another character I liked).

I agree.  He was relatable.  I think he was a subversion of a stock fantasy character - teenage doofus from the back of beyond, gets swept up into vast events, is chosen by a god, goes on a journey to a hidden magical place, learns ancient secrets, gets stuck into a beautiful princess.  But in the end this all turns out to be relatively pointless

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The Unholy Consult / Re: [TUC Spoilers] Ishual
« on: July 17, 2017, 07:58:16 pm »
Then why have the entry for Engus?  It is unbelievably obscure, and doesn't seem to relate to anything else at all.  It has no bearing on the wider history of the North or the build-up to the First Apocalypse.

We don't know how secret Ishual was - the Dunyain managed to find it, and must surely have gone looking for it.  I would suggest that the people who did know either died in the Apocalypse, or died of plague afterwards.

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The Unholy Consult / [TUC Spoilers] Ishual
« on: July 16, 2017, 07:58:16 pm »
Has anybody read the Glossary entry for Engus?  The mention of a cursed valley in the Demua Mountains, and piles of Sranc bones, seems to suggest that there was something 'wrong' with Ishual, long before the Dunyain got there. 

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