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Bakker XXXV: Tyrant of Rat Nation, Worshipped as Rat of Rats


Madness

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Bakker gives pronunciations in the glossary of the first book for the main characters names.

I don't have it handy, but it's made clear that it's basically "Nay-Ur."

What's funny is that he explains Akka's name with a "kay" second syllable, but in an interview he said it with a "kah" second syllable.

Fun fact - the glossaries actually spell Akka's name differently in different books.

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I understand the association, but I’m honestly curious about what the umlaut does in your mind? How does it make the words sound more aggressive? My puzzlement stems from the fact that what the umlaut actually does is to make the sound more feminine and softer. (This is called the i-mutation: it moves the vowel sound towards the vowel /i/.)

For instance, the umlaut is used to form diminutive forms. Hase -> Häschen, so to a German, umlauts make words smaller, softer, cuter.

What I’d like to understand is what function the umlaut has, other than (say) writing the same word in a blackletter typeface.

I assure you, the way I pronounce "Cnaür" sounds very grimdark and not diminutive in the least. I'll be sure to upload a sound clip next time I'm drunk.

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Nah, what's really weird is that a Bakker fan has a girlfriend at all.

Which reminds me... I couldn't help but notice that this is like the fourth or fifth Bakker thread that not one woman has posted in. If I'm not mistaken, that is.

Madness also said that he was left with a lot more questions than he expected.

That's because, like most of us, Madness missed a lot of the 'foreshadowing' and the clues that Bakker left in the books, so the answers basically seemed to come out of nowhere and left him with a lot of questions like "huh?", "da fuk?!", and "okay, where is the real manuscript?"

And we're all going to have the same reaction. Unless we act very soon. If Men are to survive the dark years to come, they must all act of one accord. So long as there are Kellhusites and Moenghusites, this will not be possible. We must all yield before a new delusion, a new Breath that is Ground -- namely, that Leweth is behind it all. All Bakkerites must be rewritten ... There is no other way.

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That's difficult to reconcile with the line "Where is Gandalf for I much wish to see him."

Does not Teleporno see much and more from his perch in Lothlorien?

Funny with Gandalf, by Tolkien's own rules on -f at the end of words, it should be pronounced Gan-DALV (which no-one one does), not -DALFF. Which is a good thing, as Gan-DALV sounds stupid.

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Which reminds me... I couldn't help but notice that this is like the fourth or fifth Bakker thread that not one woman has posted in. If I'm not mistaken, that is.

That's because, like most of us, Madness missed a lot of the 'foreshadowing' and the clues that Bakker left in the books, so the answers basically seemed to come out of nowhere and left him with a lot of questions like "huh?", "da fuk?!", and "okay, where is the real manuscript?"

And we're all going to have the same reaction. Unless we act very soon. If Men are to survive the dark years to come, they must all act of one accord. So long as there are Kellhusites and Moenghusites, this will not be possible. We must all yield before a new delusion, a new Breath that is Ground -- namely, that Leweth is behind it all. All Bakkerites must be rewritten ... There is no other way.

I think it's pretty much just Karradin and Tears of Lys that have posted here in the last 3 years. I know more posted here pre JE from going back through the old threads. I'm just assuming it had something to do with the Bakker and women threads / Bakker posting here.

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Funny with Gandalf, by Tolkien's own rules on -f at the end of words, it should be pronounced Gan-DALV (which no-one one does), not -DALFF. Which is a good thing, as Gan-DALV sounds stupid.

Interesting. What are those rule you refer to?

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Funny with Gandalf, by Tolkien's own rules on -f at the end of words, it should be pronounced Gan-DALV (which no-one one does), not -DALFF. Which is a good thing, as Gan-DALV sounds stupid.

Gandalf is an Old Norse name (meaning 'wand elf'), not one of Tolkien's own devising, so Old Norse pronunciation applies.

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Gandalf is an Old Norse name (meaning 'wand elf'), not one of Tolkien's own devising, so Old Norse pronunciation applies.

Yeah, I guess that's like the same way that Óðinn is pronounced Odin in English.

Back on topic though, here is something I dug up about Iëva (WARNING: spoilers from the TUC sample chapter.)

“My wife,” he groaned, testing the mettle of his chains for the first time. “Iëva!”

“Has committed...” one of the ancient mouths warbled.

“Such crimes...”

“What was her price...” he coughed. “Tell me!”

“She sheeks only...” the bloody one bubbled.

“To save her soul...”

This is a quote from Chapter 1 of TUC. Indeed, it had me thinking of why did Iëva betray? After reading that part, I thought she traded Nau-Cayûti for "salvation" but then I stumbled back upon one of Akka's dreams:

Through closed eyes he watched her, Ieva, his wife of seven years, scurry naked to the cabinet across their spare room and produce a philtre, which she considered with an expression hung between terror and gloating. She turned to him, her face thin and cruel.

"How she will weep," she growled, "the filthy whore... And I will see it, and savour it, the breaking of her heart when she learns her beloved Prince has died in his wife's arms!"

He tried to call out as she leaned above him, holding the black tube with medicinal care. But he was sleeping and could not move.

"But you will not die, my heroic husband. Oh no! For I will fall upon your corpse, and I will wail-wail-wail, claiming to the Bull Heavens that you demanded to be buried rather than burned—like a Nonman!"

He tried to spit the foul liquid she poured between his teeth. He tried to reach up and out, seize her pale neck...

"Oh my husband!" she cried in a whisper. "My dear-dear husband! How could you not see the grudge I hold against thee? But you will know it, soon enough. When you are delivered, when you are beaten and broken—then you will know the compass of my spite!"

She doesn't seem very concerned with her soul here. She seems very concerned with someone else, so I went back and dug up this:

Then, in 2140, Nau-Cayûti’s beloved concubine, Aulisi, was abducted by Sranc marauders and taken to Golgotterath. According to The Sagas, Seswatha was able to convince the Prince (who was once his student) that she could be rescued from the Incû-Holoinas, and the two of them embarked on an expedition that is almost certainly apocryphal. Mandate commentators dispute the account found in The Sagas, where they successfully return with both Aulisi and the Heron Spear, claiming that Aulisi was never found. Whatever happened, at least two things are certain: the Heron Spear was in fact recovered, and Nau-Cayûti died shortly after (apparently poisoned by his first wife, Iëva).

So, the Mandate are almost certainly lying. Aulisi did come back and seemingly, it drove Iëva to murder Nau-Cayûti. Or did Aulisi directly drive Iëva to it? Perhaps she was made into a sleeper agent? Is that perhaps why the Mandate pretend she was never brought back from the Ark?

Also, it is clearly premeditated that she would deliver him to the Consult, by not allowing him to be burned, so there must be more than just vengeance toward Aulisi and Nau. Perhaps the Consult offered her shelter from the damnation that would surely come from exacting such vengeance.

[crackpot]Lastly, possibly purely coincidental, but Aulisi's name is nearly an anagram of Aisralu from Four Revelations. Interestingly enough, changing a U to an I. Possibly a connection that Aulisi is part non-Man? Is this why Iëva seems to angrily put "like a Nonman!" into her admonishment of Nau?[/crackpot]

I think there is more to this, but this is where I started.

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Not that I trust anything in the books, but I don't think Aulisi needed to come back from Golgotterath to make the dream scene real. Just because Ieva talks about how Aulisi will weep doesn't mean she's around. She could still be in Golgoterath and the dream would make sense. All it would require is that Ieva not know she's dead. She could think she's missing, or visiting somewhere, or hiding.


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Hmm, yes, it seems I kind of misread it at first.

Yet, the mouth says, she has committed "crimes" implying more than one.

Another question is why do the Sagas and the Mandate disagree on if Aulisi came back or not? I admit the following seems to imply she is certainly dead:

The young man leapt forward, seized him about the shoulders. “She lives!” he hissed, his eyes bright with despair and suspicion. “You told me … You promised!”

“She lives,” Achamian lied. He even held the young man’s cheek and smiled.

(My bold.)

Is it to paint Nau-Cayûti as a hero, where we know he really wasn't much of one?

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There is definitely a lot of conflict set up between the sagas and the dreams. I think the Aulisi stuff is definitely ripe. A "fake" Aulisi coming back with them is my guess. The mandate knows the truth and spins it as "she never came back."



I'm assuming a giant reveal re Seswatha being an epic level ass in reality, and possibly a character made up out of whole cloth with the purpose of serving as a "star" in the fake history.



I'm guessing a big reveal re Mekeritrig and Nin-janjin also.



All of this assumes that "The False Sun" was objective truth.


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I find it a bit weird when that passage says that the trip is almost certainly apocryphal. Does that mean that just Aulisi not being found makes it so? Because it does seem likely that Ses and NC went in and came out with the Heron Spear.



Unless of course almost everything about Ses is bs.


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Yeah, I wouldn’t be surprised if almost everything about Seswatha turned out to be BS. I also doubt that there is anything to the Heron Spear besides that Seswatha used it to conceal info from the Mandate, usually by having someone blurt out “you know where the HS is!” in any of his fabricated dreams whenever something important was actually about to happen.



How did the No-God die? The Heron Spear.


Why did Ses go into Golgotterath? The Heron Spear.


Why was NC taken by the Consult? The Heron Spear.


Why did Mek torture Seswatha? The Heron Spear.



That out of all the Inchoroi’s weapons the HS continued to work thousands of years after the others died out is unlikely to begin with, but the idea that the No-God was killed with a laser gun and the entirety of the conflict between Seswatha and the Consult revolved around the HS is just BS.



From the False Sun we know that Nilgiccas told Titirga about the Inverse Fire, Titirga was the GM of the Sohonc, like Seswatha. We’re also told that Nilgiccas was BFF with Seswatha, so my guess is that Nil told Ses about the IF and that was the whole reason Ses went into Golgotterath. But he doesn’t want the Mandate to know that, so, of course, they went in there to find the Heron Spear.


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Also on the subject of Seswatha, in the JE there is a dream that seems a lot like foreshadowing to me. Seswatha and Celmomas are talking while the two play Benjuka,

"I have built a place," the High-King said. ... "A refuge." ... "In case the war... goes wrong."

[...]


The High-King moved a stone, a move that Seswatha had not foreseen, and the rules changed in the most disastrous way possible. What had been opportunity found itself twisted inside out, stamped into something as closed and as occluded as the future.


Celmomas literally moved a ‘stone’ on the Benjuka plate, which I think symbolizes his building of Ishuäl, a place as closed and as occluded as the future. A move that Seswatha had not foreseen. But why would such a move change the rules in the ‘most disastrous way possible’ for Seswatha?

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