There are now almost ten books set in the universe of The Land. But it all started in 1977 with Lord Foul’s Bane. I just finished re-reading Lord Foul’s Bane for the first time in many years-it’s one of a handful of books that I’ve read more than once-and it seems both just as good as I remember it, and kind of silly.
We open up with a grumpy man stiffly waking two miles into town to pay his phone bill. Along the walk he thinks about how much his life sucks since he came down with leprosy. His wife left him and took their newborn son with her. No one in town wants him around. He thinks grimly about the good old days when he was a best selling author. As he crosses a street, a police car whips around a corner and heads toward him. He falls before he is hit by the car and passes out of this world.
Using the familiar Alice In Wonderland/Wizard of Oz/Narnia formula, our hero leaves the real world behind and finds himself in a magical realm where his White Gold wedding band is a token of great power. Thomas Covenant is reluctant to be a hero, he knows that he is dreaming and wants nothing to do with The Land, even though it is clearly a better place than the one he left behind.
Lord Foul’s Bane is the most straight forward of all the Covenant books. It has a clear beginning, middle, and end. It does a good job of making me sad and hopeful and ultimately downright depressed. Too many books are boring because I have no interest in what anyone or anything is doing in them. I care about The Land, The Giants, The Lords, Etc.
Stephen R Donaldson likes creating his universe from whole cloth, The Land is filled with animals and beings not found elsewhere. But we also have a lot of elements that would feel right at home in a game of Dungeons & Dragons. There’s a Griffin, Giants, and a lot of men who wear robes and use magical Staffs. There is a maze of tunnels underground. Our heroes ride horses and use swords, bows & arrows, and spears make up the bulk of the mundane weapons. White Gold is unknown in The Land and other metals seem pretty rare as well. It’s filled with good old swords and sorcery.
So what don’t I like about Lord Foul’s Bane? The names of most things, the arcane vocabulary, and an overarching flaw in the general plot. While some names are overly simple, like Giants and Lords, other verge on unpronounceable, like Haruchai and Ranyhyn. Then there are character names like Drool Rockworm, Lord Foul, and Saltheart Foamfollower which are pretty silly sounding. All the magic in the Land has obscure and arcane titles, which makes sense but can still be a bit annoying.
Then there is my one major gripe about the Thomas Covenant books, Lord Foul can’t be beaten. Having an immortal, super powerful villain that can never be defeated kind of makes everything that happens in all of the books pointless. In Lord Foul’s Bane the main villain is a cavewight who is mortal and can be defeated. In all the other books we see nothing but enemies that cannot be defeated. Imagine Lord of The Rings ending with Sauron living to fight another day, or Jaws with the shark swimming off into the sunset, or the Wicked Witch getting the Ruby Slippers and taking over Oz.
This is not really an issue with Lord Foul’s Bane, since Lord Foul only makes a cameo appearance and we only encounter one of his three servants, Ravers who also happen to be immortal, second hand. But we are told, along with countless tales of the Land’s history, that Lord Foul and the Ravers cannot die.
In the end our grumpy leper returns home, having done as little as possible to help the Land and setting into motion all kinds of evils for the future. Even though Thomas Covenant is a coward and a betrayer in all that he does, the people of Land line up to do him honor and willingly die to protect him. But this is part of his appeal, he isn’t Superman or Batman or Spiderman leaping into the face of danger and saving the day. He’s just a normal man who wants nothing more than to be left alone.
I love the names like Haruchai and Ranyhyn. Or raver names like “moksha” (no capitals). Revelstone, Woodhelven, Sarangrave, Melenkurion are more that come to mind that I like.
Saltheart Foamfollower… meh. It is like something a guy with a sailboat comes up with as a “spirit name” during a weekend New Age retreat.
Berek Halfhand… now there is a great name.
Worst name by far? The major historical figure named Kevin. Not that awe inspiring at all.
Drool was WAY too gollumy for my taste.
And what does an ur-vile look like, for that matter?
By the way, the cover presented in this post is the best one this book ever had. The first edition cover was awful, with a very muddy picture of the Droolmeister
I agree, this cover is the best.
For some reason I always thought Saltheart sounded like a villain’s name-kind of in the same mold as Satansfist. But maybe that’s just me. Yeah, Kevin is pretty lame.
An ur-vile looks like a large waynhim, of course, duh.
For another great cover, see this one for “The “Power That Preserves”
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/48/Covenant3a.jpg
The corresponding Darrel K. Sweet cover for “Power” (from the same printings/set as the red-bordered Lord Foul cover you present) isn’t near as good as either of these two good covers. The green people like like a Kryptonite accident.
Reminds me I really need to read this most recent book in the series.
I pretty much like the green glowing cover as well. I was less impressed with the covers for the Second Chronicles.
I was not overly impressed with Against All Things Ending. My review of that book is here Against All Things Ending.
In LOTR, Sauron is obviously the good guy. The ring is Sauron’s possession and for that reason alone the other characters are simply committing theft. Sauron and later Saruman represent invention, industrialization, non-conformity and the welfare of the downtrodden working classes. Similarly, Lord Foul represents honesty and the unvarnished truth. He cannot be criticized since he is merely expressing his nature such as it is. The same with the Ravers. Like Sauron, they understand that POWER is the only reality; whereas the other denizens of the Land are spineless hypocrites one and all. Or else simpletons (i.e. the Bloodguard).