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Bakker: The Great Ordeal SPOILER THREAD pt. II


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13 hours ago, Kalbear said:

Well, he also saw Kellhus die as the broken sword plunged into his heart, and he also saw Kellhus die as the sword went into his neck. I don't think he ever saw himself sitting there with his ears bleeding and randomly spasming. The WLW vision appears by evidence to not be authoritative.

I assumed they were authoritative until Ajokelis started mucking about with The Mother goddess. I was going to say that in the book WLW his visions change, but they don't (thinking back. I didn't go back and re-read).

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IIRC people did notice Ajokli, as well as his Trickster archetype and how this might challenge the power of the WLW.

I think what's disappointing, assuming there isn't more to this, is that Kellhus comes all the way back to Momemn then says some cryptic words before Coyote Wiley-ing Psatma and defeating Fate....somehow.

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2 minutes ago, Triskan said:

What I find potentially disappointing is that this arc could just be over in which case it wasn't all that interesting in the grand scheme of the story.  We'll have to wait for the next book to see, I suppose. 

Even some conjectures regarding the nature of Time by Kellhus, Esmi, *someone* on how Fate can be effectively cheated to keep Kellhus alive would've been great.

In fact such a discussion would've been great for Esmi....instead of the reflections of whoring we got. So much for her supposedly great intellect which comes across as a random detail worth nothing at this point in the narrative.

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the ease of AK's disruption of the fayanal/meppa/psatma/malowebi axis suggests that he left it in place until the time of its dissolution intentionally.

what advantage gained for the ordeal by its existence?  why does the nuke terminate that advantage?

ETA--

to go with the troy stuff, supra, AK is plainly hektor as he should have been in that moment.

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2 hours ago, sologdin said:

we know from burkert's greek religion (136 ff.) that poseidon is not only the god of the sea, but also of earthquakes, both as poseidon gaieoches, the earth-shaker, but also as poseidon asphaleios, the god of steadfastness in the quake.

Don't forget that Momemn is named for Momas, their god of the sea as well.  I noticed the earthquake -> poseidon -> momas -> momemn thing, but I wasn't certain if it was intentional.

 

@Hello World re:Mimara-Mariam, Bakker says he's not sure if it's intentional >_<.

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1 hour ago, redjako said:

I assumed they were authoritative until Ajokelis started mucking about with The Mother goddess. I was going to say that in the book WLW his visions change, but they don't (thinking back. I didn't go back and re-read).

I guess you have me on ignore. 

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1 hour ago, sologdin said:

the ease of AK's disruption of the fayanal/meppa/psatma/malowebi axis suggests that he left it in place until the time of its dissolution intentionally.

what advantage gained for the ordeal by its existence?  why does the nuke terminate that advantage?

I'm of the opinion that AK's teleportating back to Mommen doesn't "make sense" yet, and hopefully is explained a bit in the next novel. The Nuke disrupts the food supply of Sranc (for now, until they eat men). I think its Kellhus and his emotions, to make him go back, which is a weird switch to make after 20 years of being engulfed in the TTT. While Kellhus see's "the deepest", it did make the most logical sense from the dead Maithanet: that it was impossible to hold, and was destined to fail, and (my own theory), that his children/the Three Seas Kellhus Empire was a shield to protect Kellhus back against the Gods rising.

AK's "ease" of disruption shows his immense power, and while I loved seeing that, him coming back to Mommen was very, very strange. I don't think coming back to get Zeum up to the North makes sense. Their country, perhaps they can field a "close" to Great Ordeal level, but you'd need another 10 or so years to re-establish supply lines, and, it is VERY doubtful the Great Ordeal had less sorcerers / witches then Zeum.

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2 hours ago, Sci-2 said:

IIRC people did notice Ajokli, as well as his Trickster archetype and how this might challenge the power of the WLW.

I think what's disappointing, assuming there isn't more to this, is that Kellhus comes all the way back to Momemn then says some cryptic words before Coyote Wiley-ing Psatma and defeating Fate....somehow.

Well, I brought it up and you said, "I hope we don't get a bunch of God's interfering in things in TGO.". In the same convo I talked about Akka being connected to Anagke. 

So we've been talking about these things, they're not just coming out of the blue...

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4 minutes ago, Michael Seswatha Jordan said:

Well, I brought it up and you said, "I hope we don't get a bunch of God's interfering in things in TGO.". In the same convo I talked about Akka being connected to Anagke. 

So we've been talking about these things, they're not just coming out of the blue...

We have been talking about them, but I don't think anyone thought that gods were going to cause massive earthquakes or just be able to stop the WLW because reasons. The God powers have been very squishy and, well, deus ex machina so far.

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3 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

We have been talking about them, but I don't think anyone thought that gods were going to cause massive earthquakes or just be able to stop the WLW because reasons. The God powers have been very squishy and, well, deus ex machina so far.

No we wasn't. I don't think anyone could've predicted how it went down. Just since TJE it's become increasingly evident the Gods have a hand in most of the storylines.

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Ok.

In one part due to having nothing to read and another curiosity, I went ahead and got the book despite Kal's advice to wait.

I'm still processing and definitely need a reread before I decide if I'll jump inthread, but I just want to get this off my chest:

First, I posted on the ezboard iteration about my long labor of love way back in like 2001 or 2002 about a people that came from a stars and crashed into the world wherein the story was taking place. Their ship was later referred to as the Chariot and it's crash site was relatively important to the main drive of the story.

I've since, thanks to Bakker, changed their origin to interdimensional refugees of a Servile War.

Second, while they were more like the Nonmen than Inchoroi (not overtly villainous anyway, subterranean dwelling, and advanced in comparison to local peoples) they traversed the new world under the brims of wide, reed hats (a staple in all my drawings of the Hume) but I'm not changing that.

And before anyone gets wangsty, no I'm not accusing him of cribbing ideas. It's just fucking annoying being on the same creative wavelength as him.

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Bakker has described what he is doing as setting reveals rather than plot reveals. This makes me think we are in for more TUC revelations that will feel unearned in the sense that the reveal will "change the rules of the setting from what we expected." Yatwer can make earthquakes and Anjokli can do things other gods can't see are definitely Benjuka rule changers. And I fear we will get more of them. Moreover, I feel that getting more of this sort is very intentional by Bakker. Maybe it will work as a Layer of Revelation. Maybe Madness knows . . . 

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Finally finished TGO about an hour ago. First thoughts, before they get tarnished by reading through the threads. 

1. Somewhere in one of the interminable Bakker/Women threads, Serwa was cited as proof that Bakker can create a powerful female character with agency, so it seems completely inevitable that Bakker would have her chained up and gang-raped. Also, Theliopa turns out to have been raped as a child, which we find out just before a stone pillar crushes her head. Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with Bakker? 

2. Maybe it will have a deeper significance but the thing with Kelhus buggering Proyas seems like Bakker creating a weird gender equivalency excuse for compulsively raping all of his female characters. 

3. Still, he keeps me coming back because he is, in his own deeply flawed way, often genuinely awful way, a genius and there's a lot of stuff in this book I haven't thought through yet but which I found deeply fascinating. A lot of Ishterebinth. The Survivor's metaphysics.  What the Judging Eye sees, 

4. The entire Momemn sequence in the trilogy appears to have been misconceived. It has consisted of Esme wandering around her palace and the city for three books now, marveling that she who was once a whore is now an Empress, OVER AND OVER AGAIN. Also, she wants to protect her children. She really wants to protect her children. Also, she was once a whore! And now she's an empress! And she wants to protect her children! I ended up flipping through these sections; they seem totally irrelevant to the direction of the story. So I feel pretty frustrated that the book ends with Kelhus back in Momemn, intervening in Three Seas politics, dispatching vengeance and demon assassins etc, which all seems kind of below his pay grade nowadays given he's supposed to be saving the world, or ending it. 

5. Here's my reading of the Daiglaish nuke (apologies if this has already been covered). Prior to the assault Kelhus points out that he's a greater wizard that Titurga. My theory is that the consult tried the same blow-the-ground-out-from-under-him trick on Kelhus as they used with Titurga. They hid Bashrag with chorae under the ground to make Kelhus think that they were the ambush, but the nuke was the real plan. Kelhus sensed there was something down there though, so he excavated the well, found the bomb, figured out what it was, told his army to flee and then teleported out. (How'd he find it? My guess is that he had a secret device for detecting nuclear weapons concealed inside his butt.) 

6. I feel like I should end this summary the way Bakker ends all of his chapters: with some vaguely ominous pseudo-philosophical bullshit that means nothing, said the commentator, his labile fungal gaze darkening before he whispered, Or does the bullshit philosophically pseudo ominous vague? 

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I wonder if the Scylvendi hostage to the Scions, Tinnurit, was a plant by Cnaiur to hide the fact that he took over the Scylvendi from Kellhus. He's not a member of the Utemots, but rather the Akkunihor. If not a plant, then Cnaiur's unification of the tribes might have been fairly recent and occurred after Tinnurit was sent as tribute.

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10 minutes ago, danylmc said:

Finally finished TGO about an hour ago. First thoughts, before they get tarnished by reading through the threads. 

1. Somewhere in one of the interminable Bakker/Women threads, Serwa was cited as proof that Bakker can create a powerful female character with agency, so it seems completely inevitable that Bakker would have her chained up and gang-raped.

Bakker didn't really address the question of whether Serwa was raped. Sure, it would make sense for her to be, but the text was vague as to whether it was physical torture, sexual or both.

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There's no indication, afaik, that Harapior rapes her.  The only possible rape is when the other Nonmen enter her cell to take her to the king, and it just says

Quote

They did not speak, and she did not resist.

It's unclear if that means she's being raped or whether it refers to the next portion of described action:

Quote

The Nonmen threaded a pole between the crotch of her elbows and her spine and bore her thus from the Thresholds.

 

So it's a maybe, but I'd lean towards no, because immediately after that line, Moe2 begins to cry that they leave her alone, whereas I doubt he would have been silent during a gang-rape.

 

 

27 minutes ago, Cithrin's Ale said:

I wonder if the Scylvendi hostage to the Scions, Tinnurit, was a plant by Cnaiur to hide the fact that he took over the Scylvendi from Kellhus. He's not a member of the Utemots, but rather the Akkunihor. If not a plant, then Cnaiur's unification of the tribes might have been fairly recent and occurred after Tinnurit was sent as tribute.

I doubt it.  The Akkunihor are the closest tribe to the Nansurium, and I think he's there in that context rather than for the entire Scylvendi people.  Cnaiur would know it would be impossible to hide his leadership from Kellhus.

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