Elvish stuff

From: Peter Metcalfe <metcalph_at_bigfoot.com>
Date: Sun, 18 Mar 2001 15:52:32 +1200


Chris Lemens:

>Me>I don't think there are any "sorcerous" Aldryami. That there are
> >sorcerous plants is a given (just as there are sorcerous animals)
> >but they are not in the Song.

>I'd have said the same about theistic trees before Greg said they exist
>within the song. If theistic plants can be inside it, why can't sorcerous
>ones?

Well for starters, Greg hasn't said that sorcerous plants exist within the Song (as opposed to explicitly listing animistic and theistic plants). To me, it's a question of look-n-feel: arguing the Song includes Sorcery is like arguing that the World Machine has animist and theist elements.

If you prefer a cosmological argument, then I hazard the Song does not contain sorcery because that is the ethos of the Mostali (cue: the Grower/Maker duality).

> >That said a mystic tree is a solecism
> >as all worldviews have some measure of transcendent consciousness.

>Hey, no fair using your degree in philosophy.

Don't have one. Haven't even taken a philosophy paper.

>What does this mean in smaller words? All trees are mystics?

All aldryami trees have some degree of transcendent identity through their participation in the Song.

> >I think [Elves and Trolls] do [suffer Alien World penalty in the God
> >World] _if_ they are attuned to the animist path.

>Fair point. Greg said that they worship using spiritual practices.

Except for the few that use theistic practices (wild guess: Ernalda, Babeester, Yelorna)...

>So, there are (a) no alien world penalty in the Spirit and Under worlds
>and (b) alien world penalties in the God and Sorcery worlds?

For animist elves, yes.

> >>If so, I wonder if there are areas in which neither Elves nor
> Orlanthi >>suffer Alien World penalties - a kind of border region of overlap.

> >The Land of the Dead.

>Hmm. I kinda thought (after reading GRoY too many times) that Underworld =
>Land of the Dead. That is, if you are in the Underworld, you're dead by
>definition. Simon Hibbs (see below) thought so also. If so, why would
>Aldrya stay in the underworld after the world returns to life?

I think Aldrya lives in this world and that the Aldryami otherworld is the world of the Taker. Things that live here appear dead there and vice versa.

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