Gradual Interview
(answers from February 2008, as of Jan 11 2026, 11:27:41 PM)
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© 2004 by Stephen R.Donaldson

Kamal 

Mr. Donaldson,
   Every time I explain the premise of the Thomas Covenant books to someone who has never read them, I invariable come around to using the "Fundamental Question of Ethics" (which may or may not have been what that paper the ochre robed man gives Covenant is actually called). The question posed in the paper, to the effect of "Do our actions in dreams lend any testament to our character or have any significance to us in reality?". That question has continued to fascinate me throughout the years, but my question now is this: It appears that less and less from the first series to the second and now in third, that Fundamental Question has less and less stature, have you concluded that it has been answered and agreed upon by the concerned characters? Or do you feel it still has a role to play?

I've tried to explain things like this before, but apparently I can't make myself clear.  I'm a very linear thinker.  I couldn't get to where I am now in "The Chronicles" if I hadn't first been to the previous places in the story.  For me, what has gone before (in the full sense of the story, not in the artificial sense of the synopsis) is a "given":  everything that comes after it is predicated on it.

Look at it this way.  The first trilogy, and more particularly "Lord Foul's Bane," and even more particularly the "Fundamental Question of Ethics," is the foundation upon which the entire rest of the edifice is being constructed.  When all of the people who comprise my imagination are hard at work on the 5th or 8th floor of the building, they don't spend their time *talking* about the foundation:  their attention is focused on what they're doing *now*.  Which is very different than what they were doing when they were laying the foundation.  But that doesn't make the foundation irrelevant or unimportant.  In fact, the *meaning* (if you'll allow me to confuse my imagery in this fashion) of what the workers are doing on the 5th or 8th floor is entirely dependent on the foundation.  Nonetheless the attention of the story *now" is not on the foundation:  it's on what can be built from that foundation.

As far as I'm concerned, neither the story nor the characters have "outgrown" the Fundamental Question.  Nor have they resolved it, moved beyond it, or simply forgotten about it.  No, they are STANDING on it.  Take it away, and everything else collapses.

Or so it seems to me.

(02/06/2008)

Michael from Santa Fe

OK, this question is kinda strange but I'm positive it hasn't been asked yet.  In most fantasy/sf bodily functions are ignored as part of the story (actually in most fiction they are ignored).  Now, I certainly understand WHY they are not put in the story.  I mean Covenant's mad dash to Revelstone in The Wounded Land just wouldn't have had the same impact if we had a bunch of "After he stopped to take a piss...".  Etc.  I think most readers can assume this "stuff" is done without having the author provide details (thank you).  BUT, one thing that does bother me, or at least suspends my belief sometimes in the story, is when they are ignored, when they possibly should be an issue.  For example, if someone is tied up for days in a dungeon or something and no mention is made that that character should now smell like...something unpleasant.  So, my question, do most authors just choose to ignore this completely because it's not necessary for the story or just an unpleasant topic to put into their story?

As usual, every case is different.  First, every individual writer has his/her personal sense of, well, decorum.  Second, every story has its specific needs and requirements:  needs and requirements which the writer ignores at his/her peril.  (That peril, as you've indicated, is that the necessary "suspension of disbelief" is weakened.)  One less, well, let's call it one less squeamish example:  some critics ridiculed "Lord Foul's Bane" because they felt the book didn't pay enough attention to the practical details of living in the Land (e.g. where and how do people get their food? water? clothes?).  Well, to the extent that I'm guilty of that mistake, it *is* a mistake:  it undermines the credibility of what I'm trying to make real.  The same reasoning applies to the example you're curious about.  Writers who, consciously or unconsciously, *sanitize* the cruder, bloodier, or simply more unpleasant aspects of their story pay a price for doing so--but IF, and only IF, those aspects are necessary to the story.

In practice, on a case by case basis, you can arrive at your own conclusions.

(02/06/2008)

A.J. Hines

Dear Mr. Donaldson,

I’ve been reading the GI for a few weeks now, and have finally caught up on most of it.  I have been a fan of yours since my father found my first copy of LFB for me in seventh grade.  (Being my first “mature” fantasy novel, I nearly put it down at the start, but am very glad I didn’t.)

I’ve read most of your books, with the exception of the mysteries, which I hope to get to soon.  Though I loved the Covenant books and the Gap series, Mordant’s Need is still my favorite.  When I read it in my early twenties, I identified greatly with Geraden.  (Thankfully in the past ten years I’ve outgrown most of my clumsiness!)  My fiancée is currently finishing up A Man Rides Through, and managed to find me near-pristine first editions of both books for Christmas.  (They will be a perfect place for the bookplates that you sent me a few weeks ago.  Thank you very much!)

Rather than submit another question about the nature of The Land’s Creator or bug you to hurry up and finish the Last Chronicles, (*grin*) I thought that I would repeat a question that I saw in a long message from 2004 that you didn’t get to.  I know that you yourself don’t play computer or video games, but what is your opinion of them as a storytelling medium?

Thank you again for writing such wonderful, entertaining and thought-provoking stories.

Sincerely,
A.J. Hines

Since I don't play computer or video or role-playing games, I'm not qualified to evaluate their potential as vehicles for storytelling.  But my hunch is that their possibilities are pretty limited.  Not because the storytelling mechanisms themselves are limited in their functionality (although they are, at least at present), but because the imagination of the creator is (I think) fundamentally hampered by the need to allow the *player* to determine the outcome and meaning of the story.  I suspect (just my opinion) that the game creator's need to accommodate a multiplicity of story-paths precludes real emotional depth.

(02/06/2008)

Todd

Stephen,
   I really enjoyed watching the streaming videos of your Elohimfest appearance, and on Fantasy Bed-time Hour.  Simply put,  I found you to be a surprisingly funny guy. I loved (about the ring), "I needed it more than HE did!".

Anyway, I had a few writer-ish questions.  

1) When you think back on a scene from one of your books, does an image of the scene pop into your mind's eye?  Do you have fuzzy kind of not-too-concrete ideas of what each character looks like or do you see an exact image of them as they are to you?  Or does a little reality set in (many times as I think back on books I have read I also subconsciously think of things that were going on in my life when I was reading that particular book or series).
I bet nobody else has told you that they picture either Bruce Dern or Harry Dean-Stanton as Covenant, but that's the picture that keeps popping into my head.

2) Do you remember the first time you were in a bookstore and you saw your books on the shelf?  I bet that was a big rush.  Kind of a big "I HAVE MADE IT!" feeling.

Thanks again and hope you have some happy holidays!

1) I've spent so much time in the GI discussing the fact that I'm a verbal rather than a visual person (and writer), I really don't have the heart to repeat it all.  Suffice it to say that I usually remember *how* something was described rather than *what* was described.

2) After 47 rejections for "Lord Foul's Bane," seeing my books in bookstores was a shattering experience:  in a good way, but shattering nonetheless.  My entire reality was torn apart and made into something new; and I spent years adjusting to the change.

(02/09/2008)

Petar Belic

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(02/09/2008)

Michael Babylon

Hi Mr. Donaldson,

I adore your books and have since I read Lord Foul's Bane in ninth grade, about 1979--had to get that out of the way.

I am an English teacher.  Some of my students have been reading LFB for a book report, part of which requires them to find vocabulary.  We have found a word that defies all attempts to find it in any dictionary:  runnulet, about 2/3 down page 15.

It is easy to tell from context that it is a synonym of rivulet or runnel, but I am dying to know where you found such a word, or did you coin it yourself?

It's a simplistic question, but I'm on a quest here.

Thanks for your time--and MUST we wait SIX years for the end of your latest series???  I'm dying here!

MB

<sigh>  Well, I always *thought* "runnulet" was a real word.  But like you, I can't find any evidence that it exists anywhere outside my imagination.  Sometimes writers do such things.  And sometimes it's a good idea.  (Other times not.)  In this case, since the neologism is not an impediment to communication....

(02/09/2008)

Steven Barnhart

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(02/10/2008)

Andrew Calverley

Hi!

Firstly, a quick question about the quote from the Washington Post on the back of most of your books - "Comparable with Tolkein at his best".

Are you comparable to Tolkein when Tolkein was at his best? Or at your best, are you comparable to Tolkein? Whose best are we talking about here? It's a bit ambiguous.

I am a communications officer for a government department. While it would not entirely be accurate to say that "I write for a living" (I'm also involved in events management etc), a large part of my job is writing, specifically converting complex ideas and messages into plain English. Therefore, I assume that my vocabularly is at worst "average".

With the utmost respect, I find it difficult to comprehend some of the words you use, and I'm stunned that your characters have no problems with this. Near the beginning of FR, I think it is Stave who uses the word "opprobrium" in an answer to Linden. Yet Linden doesn't ask what it means. In a single paragraph on page 607, you use the words crepuscular, rill, risible, louring and plash. Of those, most people would understand "rill" trough its context and assume that plash is a typo for splash (though it is not). But *most* people have no idea of the other words you used. In addition, there were five or six other words in FR that I had never heard before and had to look up (I wish I had have recorded them now...). Is there a reason that you choose to write this way? I ask this with absolute respect, I think you are a master wordsmith and a fantastic storyteller. But if you write in a way that is difficult for your audience to understand, how does that help you or your story?

Thanks, Andrew

(I have no idea what the Washington Post meant.  Personally, I've always suspected that the quote was intended to be ambiguous.)

I've discussed the "Covenant" vocabulary elsewhere in this interview, but it's been a while.  If you've read any of my other books, you know that this kind of language is a stylistic choice, not a personal compulsion:  I'm perfectly capable of writing what Judy Blume once called "low diction fiction".  In the broadest possible terms, and not referring to any specific example, what I'm trying to communicate is, well, let's call it a sense of the exotic.  I want this world to feel beautiful and strange, inherently magical; and since language is my life, it's my best tool to convey what I intend.  Familiar words lose their mystery through sheer, well, familiarity.

But of course, as you've observed, there's an unavoidable problem.  The more unfamiliar the words, and the more crucial the context in which I use them, the more "difficult" my prose becomes.  What is intended as an enhancement to communication becomes an impediment instead.  So in practice my use (any use) of language is a complex balancing act.  And what constitutes an effective balance shifts from moment to moment, situation to situation, character to character.

Your reaction, like that of many other readers, demonstrates that I don't always succeed at finding the "right" balance (an impossible challenge, since the "right" balance shifts with the reader as well as with the story, but an important challenge nonetheless).  But please be assured that I *do* try.  The fact that "crepuscular, rill, risible, louring and plash" are all familiar to *me* only makes the task of finding the right balance for the reader harder.

As for why Linden (and Covenant) always understand the rhetoric of the people they encounter in the Land <sigh>:  that gets us into the whole question of the fundamental relationship between "mind" and "reality"; and I've struggled to explain my views on that subject so often that I don't have the heart to try again today.

(02/13/2008)

Curt from Ft Worth

A few things to consider and either address or ignore, as you wish.  Although I'm obvously hoping for the former.

1.  The Elohim (or Insequent) can easily prevent an attack on Time by going back even further before.  Think of Marty McFly returning to 1955 for the second time to take back the sports book from Biff.  Or the Starship Enterprise going back to the 21st Century to stop The Borg from interfering with First Contact.  If Roger was to attempt the life of young Damelon, who's to say he wouldn't arrive to find him well-guarded ?

2.  When writing Mordant's Need, did you ever give any thought to an Imager creating a mirror that showed The Land ? Like maybe Gilbur translating Ur-Viles or Kresh ?  While that may sound corny at first, we'd have loved it.

1) Your idea fails the Occam's razor test.  In other words, it's too complicated.  As a people, the Elohim exist at every (known) moment of the Land's history.  Therefore they already exist prior to any malign (or benign) adventure backward in time.  And they would always act to preserve the Arch of Time.  So they don't need to go leaping around through the ages:  they are already present (as a people:  not necessarily as specific individuals) wherever the danger might occur.

2) Absolutely not.  I feel an active abhorrence for the idea of mingling the realities of my stories.  I'm not sure I can explain why; but it probably has something to do with the sheer scale of the *explanations* I would be forced to devise.  Or maybe it involves the obvious fact that Covenant and Linden and the Land could never exist in the "reality" of Terisa Morgan's mind.  Just as she and mirrors and Imagers could never exist for Covenant and Linden.

(02/13/2008)

Alan

Hello Mr. Donaldson,
I have the following issue with the last series.

I think the biggest issue is that after re-reading TWl and TC discovers how LF did not die at the end of the first chrons was because the staff had been destroyed. LF was able to shelter at the only power able to preserve him, earthpower. TC pays for this knowledge with his own blood. At the end of WGW we have a new living staff of law (provided by the wisdom of the dead in andelain). TC even says to linden that she has to heal the land otherwise the sunbane will bring LF back. So we have a new living staff of law, remember what vain said to the elohim (together we will redeem the earth) and no sunbane. To my mind the only 2 powers that LF could hope to save him are gone. 

Maybe you could clear this issue up for me.

best regards

Alan

I disagree.  The "2 *obvious* powers that LF could hope to save him are gone."  But evil as a concept, a fundamental principle, can never be destroyed.  And there are other dark forces in the Earth that LF could draw on--for lack of a better term--to resuscitate him.  My point in both the first and second trilogies is that the victories over LF are *real*:  they are not (as the Elohim want Linden to believe) illusions.

(02/13/2008)

Perry Bell

Hello Stephen,
 I was wondering if you based 'the necessity of freedom' on things you learned in India growing up in regards to arranged marriages, etc. If not, was there any particular event in life you based it on?
Looking forward to 2010!
Perry Bell
Reno Nevada

I didn't learn anything that inspired "the necessity of freedom" in India per se.  The missionaries did everything possible to prevent their children from learning ANYthing about the country; and I remained effectively ignorant about India itself until I studied the subject in college (in the US).  However, "the necessity of freedom" may well be a reaction *against* the particular beliefs of my parents.  My parents were Presbyterian:  they believed in "predestination," which makes a joke out of the whole notion of free will.  I found that belief offensive as soon as I was old enough to understand it.  There can be no true morality without free will.  Indeed, "predestination" makes a joke out of religion itself.

(02/13/2008)

Bradley Smith

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(02/17/2008)

Matthew Clegg

I just finished FR and continue to scratch my head.  Is it on purpose or does it just happen that Linden has never actually made a good decision in any of the TC2 or FCOTC books?  Her only saving grace has been the inolvement of others.  If it wasn't so scary that one character could be that wrong about everything this might actually be comical.  

Any chance of back stories being printed in the future?  Each of these groups (Elohim, Giants, Bloodguard, Insiquents) could have their own books brining them to meet up where these take off.  I remember you did something similar with the Bloodguard in a short story.

Step back!  Them's fightin' words.  How do you propose to demonstrate that ANY of Linden's decisions in "The Last Chronicles" has been wrong?  I'll grant you some errors in judgment in "The Second Chronicles," but even there your assertion doesn't hold up.  Who decided to rouse Covenant from the stasis imposed by the Elohim?  In "The Last Chronicles," however:  well, let's just say that I'm looking forward to your efforts to back up your statements with hard evidence.

(02/17/2008)

Anthony Buren

In Gilden-Fire you write about the two Haruchai clans.  I have several questions about the Ho-Aru and Nimishi.  Are the two clans mentioned in any other stories beside Gilden Fire?  You let us know that the clans once fought against each other but later formed a bound.  Was this simply a truce?  Did Ho-Aru ever marry Nimishi? 20,000 years later do Stave, Chlyme and others still consider themselves either Ho-Aru or Nimishi?  Thank you and write fast.

In my view, these clan distinctions vanished a long time ago.  They were only mentioned once, in "Gilden-Fire"--which was intended to be an out-take, so I don't consider it part of the official Covenant "text".

(02/20/2008)

Guy Andrew Hall

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(02/20/2008)

Michael from Santa Fe

I don't get it - Ace has no plans to ever release a mass market paperback of Runes (and I assume then, Fatal Revenant or any of the other Last Chronicles books)?  They do realize some people ONLY by the smaller books because they are cheaper?  As for poor sales being the reason, they release MMPB of books I know didn't sell as well as Runes.  Your right, I may never understand the publishing industry!

Well, "ever"....  It isn't realistic to assume that Ace will *never* release "Runes"--or any of "The Last Chronicles"--in mass market paperback.  Ace simply has no *present* plans to do so.  As far as it goes, I don't consider this a good decision.  But it isn't my decision to make.

And speaking of books that you "know didn't sell as well as Runes," sure, vast numbers of them have appeared as MMPBs.  But how many of those titles appeared first as hardcovers and then as trade paperbacks?  I'm confident that quite a few never saw hardcover or trade paperback publication at all.  And of the remainder, a large majority went straight from hardcover to MMPB, without passing through the trade paperback format.  What Ace is doing with "The Last Chronicles" represents something of a departure from conventional publishing.  For good or ill.

(02/20/2008)

Dangerous Dave from Denver

I am still trying to forgive Stephen King for the way he ended "The Dark Tower" series. 

Can you comfort your "gentle readers" that "The Last Chronicles" will not suffer a similar fate?

This is a huge spoiler, but I can't resist.

I would rather be dead than leave my readers (and myself) feeling the way I felt when I finished "The Dark Tower".

(02/20/2008)

Perry Bell

Hello Stephen,
 I have always wondered, where did you get the idea for The Fundamental Question of Ethics in LFB?
Also, I applaud Lindens choice when she realizes she cannot meet the lands needs alone. That made me like her as a character far more.
Thanks, and anxiously awaiting 2010!
Perry Bell
Reno NV

As far as I know, "The Fundamental Question of Ethics" was something that I just made up.  It seemed to me to be a) a logical extension or expression of the story's inherent themes, and b) a necessary introduction to those themes (a way to get the ball rolling, in a manner of speaking).

(02/27/2008)

Scott

Mr Donaldson
I was very excited to see the "Runes of the Earth," and after reading it was pleasantly surprised to discover the Gap series.  After reading that I started re-reading the 1st and 2nd Covenant series, and was shocked at how much foreshadowing I missed the first time around.  Of course, it helps that I know what is coming this time around...
I have 2 questions about the Convenant series:

1. I am intrigued by the implied Eathpower / air / sun connection.  In "Ilearth War," Hile Troy's vision appears to be dependent upon the sun; clouds, rain and nightfall render him effectively blind.  In the 2nd Chronicles, Linden comes to realize that the Sunbane isn't due to the sun itself, but the corrupted Earthpower emanating up from the ground acting as a filter or catalyst that the sun interacts with.  And in the Final Chronicles so far, Kevin's Dirt is something in the air which hinders the ability to sense/use Earthpower.

Is there something I should see here about the nature of Earthpower, or am I reading too much into this?  Given the multiple levels of your books, I suspect the former, but can't rule out the latter.

2. Kastenessen (with Foul's help) was able to break free of his Appointment.  I am curious, are other Appointed aware?  For example, the Colossus of the Fall?  Or Findail - is he still self-aware, potentially able to break out of the new Staff of Law if he so chose, or is he permanently merged with Vain due to the influence of white gold/wild magic?  To what extent does being Appointed negate one's identity and existence-completely?  Or is being forever aware of oneself and the cost of the task part of the Appointment?

Thanks for the great books, and for taking the time to answer questions about them.  Even if it does potentially delay the next Covenant book.  I really enjoyed "Fatal Revenant," and can't wait to see how much more misery Linden and the Land (and I) will have to endure in the next book.

1.  Broadly speaking, I think of Earthpower as the fundamental energy of life.  It is inherent to every living aspect of the world.  (And since, in a story like this, even "inert" matter is alive in some sense....)  But, like energy in our world, its form and function vary dramatically from one context to another, one being to another, one use to another.  Of course, the sun is the most overt expression of that life:  hence its usefulness as source for Troy's sight; and as an (apparent) source for the Sunbane--although the perverse nature of the energy which the sun (in this case) reflects or boosts is defined by the malice of Lord Foul and his servants.  However, it seems safe to assume that *any* manifestation of life/energy can be perverted, given enough malice and will.  Because the energy for Kevin's Dirt is drawn from different sources for different purposes than the Sunbane, it naturally manifests itself differently.  Is any of this clear?

2.  In my view, "being forever aware" is not a necessary quality of Appointment.  Remember, first, that Kastenessen was being punished:  the other Appointed Elohim (at least the ones we know about) were not.  Requiring, say, Findail to remain "aware" when his identity has been effaced in the Staff of Law seems both unreasonable and gratuitously cruel.

(02/27/2008)

Vinny F

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(02/29/2008)

Tim Koupe

Please forgive my morbid tendency.

Since the Last Chronicles will take another 7 or so years to complete, it suddenly dawned on me that you could perish before then. And while I should be more reverent to *you*, if such a terrible thing were to happen, I think I would be more despondent about the unfinished story.  (After all, I'm emotionally attached to your art, not your self)

So, my question is, do you have a contingency plan in place so your adoring fans can get the closure we need for the story in the event of your untimely, and presumably unjust demise?  And if not, could you get that going please?  (Just kidding of course...kind of..)

This has come up before....

I'm sorry.  I'm working without a net here myself, and I'm afraid you'll have to do the same.  I really don't mean to keep my readers in suspense like this.  But if I'm going to live, I have to eat, which means I have to do things like sell books to publishers when I get them written; and once a publisher buys a book, I can't very well expect them not to publish it.  But I love life, so I pay close attention to my own well-being.  That's the only reassurance I can offer you.

(02/29/2008)