he Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever

[nabraxas]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Covenant

i heard recently that a planned film that George Clooney was apparently interested in has sunk without trace & that Donaldson is no longer interested in ever releasing the rights to his novels.

That certainly brought back some long forgotten memories.

Back in the early eighties the first & second series were a must read among a certain subset ov society.

I really enjoyed them, especially how the nature ov reality is explored.

As the Wiki entry puts it:

An issue of major importance in the First Chronicles is the question of the reality of the Land. From Thomas Covenant's perspective, the Land may be only a delusion of his disturbed mind. Stephen R. Donaldson goes to great lengths to make this just as plausible as any other theory (e.g., Thomas Covenant is indeed mentally unbalanced, events in the Land seem to parallel his subconscious struggles, his physical condition upon exiting the Land is always precisely identical to his condition upon entering the Land, etc.) This raises the 'Fundamental Question of Ethics' that appears at the very start of the Chronicles, which can be rephrased as "do actions performed in dreams have any significance?" A deplorable act performed by Covenant in the first book (which will have consequences throughout the story) can be seen as an attempt to test this theory. One interpretation of the First Chronicles sees the reality of the Land eventually 'proven' to Covenant; another interprets Covenant's eventual decision to act for the Land as understanding that, be the Land real or not, it is of significance to him.

You can probably track the first 2 series down fairly cheaply from second hand book dealers.

Definitely worth a look.

[simon_marklar]

awesome series. A new entry just came out, and it ends on a cliff hanger.

[PhoenixSon]

I didn't mind it, but sometimes his whining got to me.

might have to get the newy for my old man.

[indigo264nm]

Hahaha... I remember those books. Read the first chronicals during my teenage years... by memory read most of them whilst I was over in Italy for a family holiday when I was 15.

They were the only fantasy books I could get into - really didn't like the Lord of the Rings books and was so glad after I saw the last LOR movie at the cinema because it meant I would never again have to sit through another long winded overproduced 3 hours of battle scenes.

Thats a shame though - woulda made a great movie.

Also think I read a couple of The Gap books or whatever they are called... noticed that Donaldson has a bit of a thing for rape by memory of the first Thomas Covenant and first Gap haha.

Will definately have to re-read them again soon.