(Untitled)

[brighthibiscus]

i just finished "Fire and Hemlock", and it was amazing, but i'm sort of confused.
at the end, it's hard for me to follow her logic (she's too smart for me ;_;)

Comments

[bopeepsheep]

Tam Lin resource. Under 'related tales' you'll find Thomas the Rhymer.

I would have to go back to my copy to answer your text questions properly but give me 24 hours and I will - I wrote critical essays on this at university so if I can find those it will be sooner. :)

[ingridiana]

Thanks for the link. The first time I read F&H I'd read Tam Lin in some other form, some fairy tale collection or something, a while before, it was only half-remembered and I was getting flashes of deja vu throughout the book until the link between the story & the ballards clicked. I think I was distracted by the fact that I hadn't heard of Thomas the Rhymer before, and didn't link it in until Polly explained it.

[brighthibiscus]

her endings are usually hard to understand, because she doesn't outline every single step in them. you have to do that yourself. i like that, but it confuses me a lot.
i think there's a lot of steps in logic that she leaves out, in all of her books. i get this feeling that you're supposed to be clever enough to fill in the missing bits.

[smellen_of_troy]

That ending was really confusing!
I think the whole holding onto someone thing is fairy magic law or something. It might be a referance to celtic mythology/folklore.
It's been too long since I've read that one to answer anthing else, but this is what I used to understand the ballad of Tam Lin a bit better. I think I found the ballad of Thomas the Rhymer there too, but I'm not positive.

[bopeepsheep]

The identifying/holding on to things motif turns up again in other DWJ books - it's how Christopher wins Tacroy from the Dright, for a start. It's a very common part of folk tales in the TL/TtR vein.

[smellen_of_troy]

Gah! What book is Tacroy and the Dright from? I can't remember (this will annoy me).

[musicallaneous]

The Lives of Christopher Chant. Chrestomanci #2. XD

[bopeepsheep]

This article might be a good starting place in trying to find your own interpretation of the ending. I can't say that I agree wholly with everything in it, and I think a lot of the Golden Bough's evidence (on the Renewal of Kings etc) has been skipped/forgotten, but it's not a bad jumping-off point.

[brighthibiscus]

oh, god. thanks.
"In Laurel's exhortation, she informs Thomas that in the combat he may use anything which is truly his. She then assures Leroy of his right to use the exact equivalent to whatever Thomas uses in return."
i missed the whole equivalency bit when i was reading the book.
although i don't really like how that article's main point was that polly and tom were doomed from the ending onward.

[lady_schrapnell]

Just to throw my later-at-night than useful 2 cents

[brighthibiscus]

so how can nowhere be a dead end? that part confused me a bit.
thanks, though. your explanation of the whole nowhere concept helped.