On Mon, 10 Mar 2003, Philip Hart wrote: >Some unsystematic comments on The Paths of the Dead: > >Ro"aanac Or, Röaanac (if your mail client can properly show characters with diacritics). [snip stuff about Pel's meeting with Sethra, and the letter he wrote about it afterwards, which I agree is very cool] > >In the letter itself I found it interesting that Pel writes "The >Enchantress intends to oppose us" and not "oppose you". I think this >is extremely familiar on a linguistic level (it should be "oppose >Your Majesty and me" if anything) as well as conceptually, conflating >Pel and Skinter. I suspect the translator is unfamiliar with courtly >language conventions or Paarfi is telling us something about the >depth of Pel's ambition. > Or Pel may have been influenced by Sethra's opposition into thinking of Skinter as a mere pretender, and himself, a mere opportunist. I don't think Skinter, or even his cousin, are adept enough to notice. I wonder if Pel is thinking of trying to bail out? [editing] >Does someone understand why the Necromancer, who comes from an >entirely different world, shows up in a Dragaeran body? Well, we have seen some shape-shifting (Devera->Dragon), so that might explain it. Or possibly, the Gods might have shown her the corpses of Dragaerans that had come over the Falls, and said "Pick one". Heh. I note that Vlad has mentioned that Sethra and the Necromancer have a similar appearance. Perhaps Verra found it amusing to suggest that the Necromancer use Sethra's body (which they might have the information for from Sethra's adventure on the Paths) as a template. > And are the gods responsible for other worlds? The comments imply to me that they can and do travel to other worlds and/or dimensions. I don't think they are *responsible* for any of them. But it would be interesting to see. Some of Robert Sloane's remarks about Piarra describe a complex multiverse with travel and influences between universes, and Steve might be hinting that the Necromancer is from a universe in that multiverse. > (the World of Seven Doors [see Chapter 18, and by the way are we >getting some indicating of seven as a mystic number? In _Athyra_ >Savn browses The Book of Seven Wizards if I remember correctly.]) I thought you were satisfied that the Book of Seven Wizards was explained as a Scribblies in-joke? Hmm. Perhaps the World of Seven Doors is a similar in-joke. Seven writing styles?