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[bedlamsbard]

I swear to God, this is the chapter that hates life, the universe, and ME. It is like the little chapter that would not be written!

Too. Much. Freaking. EXPOSITION. No, Tirian, we do not need to know Narnian history dating back three hundred years (about 4K of it, oh my god, there's, like, 700 words that's not Death by Exposition).

*stares at chapter* Maybe rather than rewriting the entirety of the chapter -- oh, gods, version four -- I can figure out what in the exposition doesn't have to be there and then throw in the Peter/Tirian swordfight I wanted.

I'm serious about the exposition, by the way: we have Rilian's Ban, the Calormene invasion during Absalian's time, a Tirian flashback, Bahadur of Calormen, and an exacting survey of exactly who and what is living out in the west. Maybe it's not that bad. I don't even know. I have no distance from this chapter anymore.

ETA: Hey, kids, you know what's exciting? When your references for "ultimate fantasy adventure novel" is two thousand miles away. Maybe the bookstore has a copy in paperback; I'll check after class.

Comments

[lyamainu.livejournal.com]

Maybe you need to take a break sweetie... a few days away from it should help.

*huggles*

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

I was away from it for, uh, too long, and now I'm tryiing to cobble together bits from the previous drafts of the chapter, which isn't particularly mostly because my default setting upon doing that is ADD MORE.

[caramelsilver.livejournal.com]

Rillian's Ban? I am intrigued! (And Tirian/Peter sword fight sounds too awesome for words.)

I really want to borrow your brain! Where do you come up with this stuff?

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

Rilian? Kind of a bastard, actually, although at this point at least he had cause, he wasn't just acting stupidly.

Reading way too much history and fantasy.

[caramelsilver.livejournal.com]

I imagine Jill and Eustace would be devastated to hear that about Rillian?

I think it would be really interesting to live in your brain for a day=)

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

They're a little horrified, yeah, although there are extenuating circumstances. Five years with Tirian and this is the first they've heard of the extent of the Ban, where Rilian forbid any Narnian except the marshfolk to live more than three days travel from Cair Paravel.

It is not that interesting, trust me. *grin*

[caramelsilver.livejournal.com]

He banned them from living outside a three days travel from the Cair?? Really? We can of course say that he had reason, didn't want any one else to be kidnapped. (I assume that's the reason...?) But doesn't that kinda make Narnia smaller? If nobody is living there, what keeps other countries from slowly moving into Narnian territory?

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

Bear in mind that Telmarine Narnia is significantly smaller than Peter's Narnia -- maybe less than half the size of Golden Age Narnia at its height -- and that the majority of the human Telmarines already lived in close proximity to Cair Paravel, although they'd started to move out some, but not that much. The Ban was directly aimed at native Narnians, most of whom lived outside that area, and the reason for this is that there was a lot of controversy surrounding Rilian's reappearance; a large number of people didn't believe that he was really Rilian after all, and there were some rebellions and attempted coups and assassination attempts and a lot of underground whispering until he enacted the Ban (in, I think, the second or third year of his reign); he wanted Narnia's population in close proximity so that they couldn't go off and form their own nations like some of them were claiming, or start rebellions without it being close enough to put down, that sort of thing.

The only other country that directly bordered Narnia during the Telmarine age was Archenland; all the western countries that bothered Narnia during the Golden Age had fallen apart, and the west was unclaimed for a hundred leagues until it reached the border of Greater Shoushan.

[caramelsilver.livejournal.com]

Ahh! I guess I forgot that the lands surrounding Peter's Narnia didn't excist then.

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

Yeah, my Narnian history lives to confuse people. *grin*

[katakokk.livejournal.com]

Ummm, well, MAYBE you could have Peter express his anger at Tirian babbling on and on about exposition and then have that lead to a sword fight? /badidea

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

What is the "ultimate fantasy adventure novel"?

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series and Mercedes Lackey and James Mallory's Obsidian Mountain trilogy (there's a sequel trilogy in progress which takes place a thousand years later, and it sets off my fantasy/history nerd meter, but I haven't read the second book yet!).