I watch the ripples change their size
But never leave the stream
Of warm impermanence
And so the days float through my eyes
But still the days seem the same
And these children that you spit on
As they try to change their worlds
Are immune to your consultations
They're quite aware of what they're goin' through
Monday, September 17, 2007
Passing of the Giants
Per Making Light Robert Jordon (James Rigney), after a struggle with a terrible illness, has passed on. Here is a statement.
We stand on their shoulders to see farther and walk through paths made clear by their presence.
I'm sorry to say it, since you seem to care about this guy, but I neither know who he was nor understand the statement. It sounds relentlessly garbly to me...or maybe I've just had a really long day.
Greeny, no worries. Robert Jordon was a really big named author in the fantasy genre. He wrote mainly high fantasy under that name (which is a pseudonym) incluidng new Conan stories and his own "Wheel of Time" series. People will debate the quality of his writing, and who he ripped off and how, but his influence on the genre really was amazing. In some publishing gripe areas you'll hear the argument about how a few authors make the money that floats many mid-range authors. Robert Jordon was one of those authors that could float a whole flotilla of mid-range authors. His WoT series was epic, to put it nicely, and is left unfinished (unless he was able to write three books, I think it was 3, in his last year while he battled a dibilitating blood disease). He introduced women into being main characters in high fantasy.
I never met him, but I've been told he was also a really nice guy.
So, while many may have reviled his style as too convoluted, been lost in his extended fantasy series, which I have to admit here that after book 7 or 8 and I realized that nothing had happened I stopped reading, pointed out where he got ideas and how his writing was facile (I personally don't think that), he changed the genre and cut a wide swath. Terry Brooks may have made it okay to write high fantasy again, but Robert Jordon gave everybody the green light.
3 comments:
I'm sorry to say it, since you seem to care about this guy, but I neither know who he was nor understand the statement. It sounds relentlessly garbly to me...or maybe I've just had a really long day.
Greeny, no worries. Robert Jordon was a really big named author in the fantasy genre. He wrote mainly high fantasy under that name (which is a pseudonym) incluidng new Conan stories and his own "Wheel of Time" series. People will debate the quality of his writing, and who he ripped off and how, but his influence on the genre really was amazing. In some publishing gripe areas you'll hear the argument about how a few authors make the money that floats many mid-range authors. Robert Jordon was one of those authors that could float a whole flotilla of mid-range authors. His WoT series was epic, to put it nicely, and is left unfinished (unless he was able to write three books, I think it was 3, in his last year while he battled a dibilitating blood disease). He introduced women into being main characters in high fantasy.
I never met him, but I've been told he was also a really nice guy.
So, while many may have reviled his style as too convoluted, been lost in his extended fantasy series, which I have to admit here that after book 7 or 8 and I realized that nothing had happened I stopped reading, pointed out where he got ideas and how his writing was facile (I personally don't think that), he changed the genre and cut a wide swath. Terry Brooks may have made it okay to write high fantasy again, but Robert Jordon gave everybody the green light.
Thank you for the edification! There is so much I don't know and it always makes my brain happy to learn something new.
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