www.ditl.org

Like that guy I read Wizard's First Rule and have read about some of his other books. Although I'm not a great fantasy reader, I found it kind of dull and plodding. It's an awful lot of Protagonist goes here, does this, goes there, does that, yadda yadda.

And yeah... there's a whole big section in the middle of the book where women in leather show up and kidnap the hero, and there's a big old bunch of BDSM Femdom stuff. Which doesn't have a whole lot to do with the story.

From what I've read about the others, things get really odd in the series. The protagonist is always treated as right. And I don't mean Goodkind always takes care to make him the one in the right... rather, anything the hero does or says is treated as right by fiat. If you disagree with him you are wrong, and Goodkind is pretty clear that if you're wrong you deserve to die.

Also amusingly, in the later books the hero declares himself an atheist. People pointed out to Goodkind that not only had he established that the afterlife exists in this series, the hero had already been there and returned. So what gives? Goodkind retconned it so that of course the afterlife DID exist... but it was destroyed. So you have to be an atheist now.

The man's an idiot.

Graham Kennedy wrote:Like that guy I read Wizard's First Rule and have read about some of his other books. Although I'm not a great fantasy reader, I found it kind of dull and plodding. It's an awful lot of Protagonist goes here, does this, goes there, does that, yadda yadda.

And yeah... there's a whole big section in the middle of the book where women in leather show up and kidnap the hero, and there's a big old bunch of BDSM Femdom stuff. Which doesn't have a whole lot to do with the story.

From what I've read about the others, things get really odd in the series. The protagonist is always treated as right. And I don't mean Goodkind always takes care to make him the one in the right... rather, anything the hero does or says is treated as right by fiat. If you disagree with him you are wrong, and Goodkind is pretty clear that if you're wrong you deserve to die.

Also amusingly, in the later books the hero declares himself an atheist. People pointed out to Goodkind that not only had he established that the afterlife exists in this series, the hero had already been there and returned. So what gives? Goodkind retconned it so that of course the afterlife DID exist... but it was destroyed. So you have to be an atheist now.

The man's an idiot.

Oh my gawwwdd!

Another thing about him is that he loves the "hero gives speech endorsing the author's political views as obviously right". And as he's a fan of Ayn Rand, these tend to go on a bit. I'm told that one spans several chapters.

There's a book where the hero encounters a civilisation of pacifists. He gives them a series of lengthy speeches about how stupid and wrong pacifism is... and they all change their minds and become warriors. Yeah.

So this guy is just fan-wanking his own creation, for the love of Ayn Rand?

Pretty much. Basically the early books are heavily plagiarised, the later ones are political screeds.

Graham Kennedy wrote:Pretty much. Basically the early books are heavily plagiarised, the later ones are political screeds.

He's a 71 year old edge-lord. Like a teenage Libertarian, he read Ayn rand and decided to make fiction but, not "fantasy," based on it.

Here's something more wholesome and worthwhile:

They had qualities we consider to be "human." Caring for their sick well enough that they died elderly, while still being hunter-gatherers.

The third century Persian prophet Mani described the four greatest powers of his time: Rome, Persia, China, and Aksum. Of the four, Aksum is by far the least remembered today. The History Guy remembers the forgotten empire of Ethiopia.

Glad to see somebody else who likes History Guy videos! He has such passion for his stuff, no matter what he's talking about.

I wonder, though... is there such a thing as history that isn't worth remembering?

Nutso wrote:https://www.youtube.com/embed/TKAd9IaMDIg

The third century Persian prophet Mani described the four greatest powers of his time: Rome, Persia, China, and Aksum. Of the four, Aksum is by far the least remembered today. The History Guy remembers the forgotten empire of Ethiopia.

And the only reason I know about this empire was from the Belisarius series of books

Graham Kennedy wrote:Glad to see somebody else who likes History Guy videos! He has such passion for his stuff, no matter what he's talking about.

I wonder, though... is there such a thing as history that isn't worth remembering?

I only discovered him today. That video above in fact. I like learning about things I never knew. Ethiopia was an Empire? WTF?!

History that isn't worth remembering? Star Trek: Discovery Season 2?

I was ona history kick that's to that brilliant orator Irving Finkel, of the British Museum.


Which led to the epic of Gilgamesh discussion posted earlier above.

Which led to this one:

In which the orator attempts to explain how old the phrase "Be my baby" truly is.

The History Guy makes for an enjoyable afternoon. I have to reserve some love for Irv, I really enjoyed his take on the Ark story.