Who the heck is Delwin? *spoilers*
Michael DiBernardo
time, and the ending of Prince of Chaos confounded me a little. Were we
supposed to be able to connect that Delwin guy with someone, or was he
truly a completely new character that was thrown at us in the last 20
pages of the book?
Also, it seems like the Prince of Chaos really rushed to climax, and thus
it didn't feel like the series had come to any sort of satisfying end. Did
Zelazny intend to write a third series, or was that gonna be it with him
and Amber?
Anyways, the Amber series is the best thing I've read in a while, so I'm
hoping I'll be able to have some conversations with you folks about it
around here.
Cheers!
-M.D.
Michael Magliocca
intended to write a third series. Rumor has it it was from Flora's
point of view. There are also several short stories set after the
Merlin series.
I am sure others will provide more detailed answers than I can provide,
but I hope this helps.
Glad to hear from another Zelazny convert.
Patrick Hulman
effect
vowing not to have anything to do with Amber again
patrick
In article <3F009922...@twcny.rr.com>, cth...@twcny.rr.com says...
udre...@mts.net
would like to write about 2 books to clear up all the loose ends. I
really wish he had been able to.
Ollie
DworkinBarimen
>Delwin and Sand were both mentioned in Blood of Amber page 115 something to
>the
>effect
>vowing not to have anything to do with Amber again
IIRC, after their mother, Harla's death, they didn't get along really well with
Oberon, and disagreed with him over some of his policies towards their mother's
homeland.
They must have been pretty upset, because they vowed to have nothing to do with
Amber again.
Does anybody know where they fit in the birth order?
DB
Terry
order is recited by Corwin to Ganelon in the third book of the first
series **.
--Terry
** The book is not handy for me to look up a page number.
dworkin...@aol.com.auspam (DworkinBarimen) wrote in message news:<20030701222320...@mb-m19.aol.com>...
Michael DiBernardo
OK, question number two. In the second-last book, what *was* that
weird place that Merlin was wandering through, the place where he had to
guard the two suits of armor? Was the dwarf that stashed the Order armor
on him Dworkin? And, speaking of Dworkin, was it ever explained (in the
books or otherwise) as to why he replaced Coral's eye with the Jewel of
Judgment?
I wish I had written some of these down as I went along. Thanks for all
the responses so far, they've been helpful!
-M.D.
DworkinBarimen
>OK, question number two. In the second-last book, what *was* that
>weird place that Merlin was wandering through, the place where he had to
>guard the two suits of armor?
Undershadow. Merlin is told that it is a place which underlies the rest of
shadow, and that the Powers have very little access here, and only at great
cost.
As such, it makes an excellent place to send the person whom they have decided
will choose which of them wins the next round in their cosmic game of King of
the Castle. He can't escape until he makes his choices, and he can't be
tinkered with - except by the Logrus and Pattern ghosts.
>Was the dwarf that stashed the Order armor
>on him Dworkin?
No. In fact, it was a Chaos dagger that was stashed on him. The dwarf was, in
all probability, a Logrus ghost.
> And, speaking of Dworkin, was it ever >explained (in the
>books or otherwise) as to why he replaced Coral's eye with the Jewel of
>Judgment?
The answers here aren't explicitly stated in the text, but are merely my
inferences. Nevertheless, I believe they are pretty straightforward.
Dworkin may or may not imply that it is to make it safe. I can't recall the
sickbed scene all that clearly.
If he does, well, personally, I can see what he's talking about. The Powers
have clearly decided that the latest round of King of the Castle is *on*, and
Chaos had just lost a round big-time (a whole Broken Pattern shadow added to
the Pattern's fuel).
Plus, there's Ghostwheel banging around. He's attuned to the Jewel. Dworkin
doesn't know Ghostwheel from HAL, or Deep Thought - only (perhaps) that Merlin
made him - at least that he is Merlin's ally.
Now, if you're Dworkin, at this point I assume that you know Merle's: running
around with the Spikard; getting all crazy with Power; and is about to enter
Round Two of "Which Power Will Merlin Choose?" Frankly, putting the Jewel
somewhere where getting it OUT of will harm someone Merlin has started to care
a good deal about seems a pretty shrewd move.
Add to that the fact that Coral is a Golden Circle resident - and is likely to
have the basic prejudice that "Human's are good, Black Road People are Bad"..
Add to that the fact that while Coral's loyalties may be shifting a bit between
Begma and Amber, she's not at all likely to think that moving to the Chaos end
of reality is a great move....
Not that I'm saying this is a great idea. We don't see Dworkin putting HIS eye
out to throw the Jewel in there, now, do we?
:-)
I think there's more to be mined from the text on the whole "Game" idea...
And wasn't it a little weird how Coral was SOUGHT OUT by the Logrus side to be
the bride of the King of Chaos?
>
>I wish I had written some of these down as I went along. Thanks for all
>the responses so far, they've been helpful!
:-) No worries, mate.
DB
Pawl MauveBib
older than Dalt, which would make them the 2nd and 3rd youngest. There's a
"family tree" in the back of _Roger_Zelazny's_Visual_Guide_to_Castle_Amber_
(Roger Zelazny & Neil Randall, Avon Books, 1988 - I can't find an ISBN, I think
it was printed for the Sci Fi Book Club only)
Another book with info on Delwin and Sand is _The_Complete_Amber_Sourcebook_
(Theodore Krulik, Avon Books, 1996, ISBN 0-380-73409-6). I think some of the
info in this book came from interviews RZ and his working notes for the 2
series.
In article <20030701222320...@mb-m19.aol.com>,
dworkin...@aol.com.auspam says...
Pawl MauveBib
death, he said he wanted to write a book or two to clear up loose ends from
the 2nd series and that he had a plot and notes for a 3rd 4 or 5 book series.
Maybe he left enough notes for Betancourt to finish.
In article <rcr2gvcv8q1mt2sv5...@4ax.com>, udre...@mts.net
says...
DworkinBarimen
>
>Maybe he left enough notes for Betancourt to finish.
>
Point of information:
Zelazny had no notes on Amber. There are no notes. Full stop.
What follows is mere elaboration on the above point.
Zelazny was practically famous amongst the SF / Fantasy crowd for basically
writing as it came out of his head.
He's said he doesn't make plans.
Lindskold, (his live-in of RZ's last few years) said he wrote no notes on
Amber.
Betancourt has said on this list that the Amber Corporation had no notes.
There are no notes written by Roger on Amber waiting to be found in boxes at
the Zelazny estate, or anywhere else.
If **interviewers** took notes when they were lucky enough to pin him down for
an interview and some of the content of them is unknown to the Amber community,
then I would hope they would at least pass copies on to the Zelazny Estate.
DB
Pawl MauveBib
Quoted from the introduction to _Visual_Guide_to_Castle_Amber_:
We invaded his house. It's as simple as that.
For four days we occupied the peak hours of Roger Zelazny's day.
...
But he put up with us, all four of us. Todd Hamilton and Jim Clouse peppered
him with question after interminable question about Castle Amber itself, and
later about the art of the Trumps. Bill Fawcett who organized it all,
extracted even more information. I sat in the corner, reading the
as-yet-unreleased _Sign_of_Chaos_. It was an honor, and I won't easily forget
it.
And with each new question Roger Zelazny would stop, raise his hands, an them
put them back down and let the words pour forth. Often he would close his eyes
as he talked, recalling every last detail about the world he created - or
perhaps discovered - over the course of either extremely popular novels.
Sometimes he would hesitate, as if unwilling to tell us some Amberian secret,
but in the end he would relent, and let us know what he was thinking about.
Those thoughts - always - confirmed his belief in his world. Then we all began
writing and drawing.
To read the artist's words is an unqualified privilege. But to watch an
artist's mind at work - now there's something worth being alive to see.
...
Neil Randall
March 10th, 1988
<end quote>
Obviously, at least four people have some notes on Amber that probably haven't
been published (or that have surfaced).
But it certainly confirms dworkinbariman's statement that he wrote off the top
of his head.
I don't know if Theodore Krulik actually interviewed RZ as he was compiling the
Sourcebook or not. I haven't seen anything in the book itself either way.
Personally, if I had interviewed him and had some notes on the Amber universe
that I had not used, I might actually be tempted to keep them to myself.
Partly out of selfishness, and partly because it was something imparted to me
and no one else, making it somewhat personal.
<begin slightly offended rant>
BTW, dworkin... Simply saying that he didn't use notes and that his Estate had
said so would have been sufficient. You didn't have to give such an exhaustive
list in such a condescending manner. If it's been stated here before that he
didn't leave notes and you're tired of repeating yourself, well, maybe you need
to keep in mind that not everyone has read every article ever posted here. I
don't read it regularly, so I've certainly missed a great deal of (probably
very interesting) information.
Perhaps what I vaguely remember being mentioned as "notes" were simply ideas
that he hadn't expanded upon. The keyword there is "vaguely"... I didn't say I
was quoting nor that I remembered it like I heard it yesterday.
<end rant>
I apologize for the rant.
Pawl
In article <20030703213132...@mb-m03.aol.com>,
dworkin...@aol.com.auspam says...
udre...@mts.net
quite often. I'm positive he did not use notes. He discussed writing
styles at a panel at the con I mentioned in previous post. He said he
hated even doing an outline for proposed books to send to the
publisher. He said that when he started a book, he sat down 3 times a
day and wrote at least 3 sentences, no matter how hard it was. Once
the story or character took shape in his head, the story almost wrote
itself.
He was and still is my favorite author. Maybe that's why I remember
his words like it was last week. It was my first convention. The
Guests were RZ, Fred Saberhagen, and Poul Anderson. They were all on
the writing styles panel along with Joel Rosenberg.
On 04 Jul 2003 01:31:32 GMT, dworkin...@aol.com.auspam
Michael DiBernardo
explain the frenzied pace of the plot throughout the series...
Thanks for all of the info, guys!
-M.D.
DworkinBarimen
their publications, this is an intriguing possibilty.
Does anyone know the authors of either the Complete VGtCA, or the CAS?
IOW does anybody know
Todd Hamilton
Jim Clouse
Neil Randall
Bill Fawcett
Neill Randall
Ted Krulik?
On-Topic material ends. Qualified Apology begins.
Mr Mauve Dib wrote:
<begin slightly offended rant>
>
>BTW, dworkin... Simply saying that he didn't use notes and that his Estate
>had
>said so would have been sufficient.
Yep. My bad. My last post certainly wasn't an example of *good* etiquette.
It was, let's face it - a rant. Worse, it was a **poorly aimed** rant.
Y'see, my problem's not with people like yourself at all - it's with the echoes
I anticipated you would inspire.
>You didn't have to give such an
>exhaustive
>list in such a condescending manner. If it's been stated here before that he
>
>didn't leave notes and you're tired of repeating yourself, well, maybe you
>need
>to keep in mind that not everyone has read every article ever posted here. I
>
Actually, I do keep that in mind. In fact, that wasn't my beef at all. I'm
not down on people like yourself at all. Infrequent posters and readers are a
vital part of any online community. Go you. :-)
What's actually frustrating is when *other* posters - quite a few of them
seemingly **regular** posters - respond to innocently misinformed suggestions
like yours as though such misinformation was gospel. *Regular* posters
(again, to be clear - not you) should simply know better.
I guess I wanted to supress the echoes and head them off at the pass - so to
speak.
(IIRC, that would be about the fourth time in the last year when there had been
a huge string of messages - some of them going for over a week - which argued
the point in "umms" and "but, maybe such and such has 'em" on one side, and
other people quoting various friends of Zelazny on the other. "But maybe's" as
a substantiation of a previously held assertion is neither sensible discourse,
nor even reasonable argument - it's just noise.)
Perhaps I should have said so in my rant - I have nothing against Mr Mauve Dib
for posting as he did. I wanted to state things in the clearest possible terms
before another couple of dozen people got carried away with the idea (again).
At least as Paternalistic as Patronizing,
DB
Pawl MauveBib
dworkin...@aol.com.auspam says...
>
>
>As to the idea of the interviewers having material they did not include in
>their publications, this is an intriguing possibilty.
>
>Does anyone know the authors of either the Complete VGtCA, or the CAS?
>
>IOW does anybody know
> Todd Hamilton
> Jim Clouse
> Neil Randall
He wrote _Seven_No_Trump_, a Crossroads book based in Amber (where you're the
main character and get to make decisions). I think he's written a couple other
Crossroads books and maybe one or two regular books.
> Bill Fawcett
Owns/owned Fawcett Publishing.
> Ted Krulik?
>
>
>On-Topic material ends. Qualified Apology begins.
And accepted.
The two books for the Amber Diceless RPG have RZ credited helping author
them,but I don't think he actually wrote anything for them. He did have a few
Amber shorts printed in Amberzine (published by Phage Press).
Chris Camfield
<mddi...@rees.math.uwaterloo.ca> wrote:
>Now THAT is an extraordinarily odd style of writing. Of course, it may
>explain the frenzied pace of the plot throughout the series...
I think that the preparation he did varied, though. For instance, in Frost &
Fire (I think?) there's a piece in which he describes the process which led up
to writing Eye of Cat.
Chris
Des Kavanagh
>
> In article <20030704123110...@mb-m24.aol.com>,
> dworkin...@aol.com.auspam says...
> >
> >
> >As to the idea of the interviewers having material they did not include in
> >their publications, this is an intriguing possibilty.
> >
> >Does anyone know the authors of either the Complete VGtCA, or the CAS?
> >
> >IOW does anybody know
> > Todd Hamilton
> > Jim Clouse
> > Neil Randall
>
> He wrote _Seven_No_Trump_, a Crossroads book based in Amber (where you're the
> main character and get to make decisions). I think he's written a couple other
> Crossroads books and maybe one or two regular books.
IIRC, *Black Road War* was another such Amber based book written by Neil
Randall.
Might have been a third, been a long time. I enjoyed them, but found
them
frustating at the same time.
Had forgotten what you quoted from Guide to Castle Amber, regarding
RZ session with those you mention. As Dworkin posted, you do raise
an very interesting point about RZ Amber notes, even if they were
not written in his own hand.
Uri Bruck
I think this whole "no notes" thing is being taken to a rather extreme
interpretation. It's not either strict outlines or making it up on the
spot. In "The Parts that are only Glimpsed" a Zelazny essay included
in "Unicorn Variations" Zelazny writes of some of his writing habits.
He mentions that he likes giving characters an existence beyond the
story, so sometimes characters, even minor ones, would refer to events
outside the story. Not necessarily to advance the plot, but in order
to give them substance. As for the notes question, there is a
paragraph i'd like to quote:
"In writing anything of length I always compose - either on paper and
then detroy it, or in my head and let it be - a scene or scenes
involving my protagonist (and possibly seperate ones for other
important characters) having nothng to do with the story itself - just
something that happened to him/her/it once upon a time. I accept it as
a real experience, a part of teh character's life history, and I may
even refer to it in the story itself. But I never include it. I do
this under the belief that the character should be larger than his
preset circumstance indicate, should be defined for me in terms of a
bigger picture of his life than the reader ever sees."
Afterwards he goes on to say how he broke this rule just one with
"Dismal Light"
and I guess that the prolog to Trumps of Doom was also written that
way.
So there are no hidden drawers full of lost notes - but this is a far
cry from not thinking ahead at all, and from making it up when he gets
to it.