Also, just what did Paopao mean by 'cardus weed'? As far as I can tell there's no such plant as 'cardus', but carduus is Latin for 'thistle' and is the official name of a whole genus of thistles. Did he actually mean that Brom was smoking thistles?
I'm not sure if there are any thistles IRL that you can smoke which if any, Pao based them off, but perhaps he named them based on the thistles' appearance?
We all know mage spells draw on INT for determining effectiveness, and not STR. This is not a new concept. It is, however, new to the IC, where magic directly and explicitly requires STR and (depending on Paolini's mood) even occasionally draws on HP.
I'm expecting an exhilirating, edge-of-your-seat type of battle of intelligence here where it's not clear who's going to win and if anyone involved in the entanglement makes a slight mistake, it's all snoozing with the fishies for them, like the Sherlock vs Moriarty cat and mouse game. But turns out that you still rely on magical prowess to win apparently. *disappointed grunt*
Do not become so attached to any one belief that you cannot see past it to another possibility
Ironically, I think it's good advice which CP needs to take note of
This is a common thing with shitty writers: they don't actually think about what they're writing, so they end up with the impression that they've written something far better than they did. Stephenie Meyer genuinely thinks her books are feminist, and Christopher Paolini genuinely thinks he wrote an epic tale on par with The Lord of the Rings which culminated in a stunning battle of wits.
I suspect that these authors can't read beyond the surface of any works, really. Why else would they be so unable to spot the implications of their own?
I feel like this “reveal” falls flat because we haven’t seen Brom act all that fatherly towards Eragon. From what I remember of Eragon Brom was quite rough towards Eragon, showing little love for his son outside of the required Sue praise (which doesn’t count). And when Eragon talks to Brom about names for Saphira, he acts as if this is his first time talking to Brom. You’d think that Brom would try to talk with and engage with his son, even if he can’t let Eragon know that he’s the father.
This is true, and raises a couple of questions... namely, did Paolini do that because he doesn't know how to write a character being fatherly, or did he write it like that because that's how his father treated him?
"The second is that the lichen on the trees is described as “chartreuse”. Oddly enough, this isn’t completely inaccurate; some lichens are pretty damn colorful. However, using the word “chartreuse” to describe it is anachronistic and clashes with the setting. The color chartreuse was named after a French liqueur introduced in the 1700’s. Most of Alaglag appears to be stuck in the dark ages, or the High Medieval era at the latest, and there is no France. They should not be describing things as “chartreuse”."In my eyes the fact that Chartreuse was only created after the middle ages or is French inspired isn't a problem. All of our words on Earth come from some form of Earth like origin and it's reasonable that everything should be viewed through a lens of translation. That is to say, a words meaning is more important than the word itself. If they actually spoke accurate medieval English it would basically be incomprehensible. Like, I don't see any problem using the word lime to describe something even if the setting wouldn't
( ... )
I'm not arguing for them to be speaking medieval English, but they should definitely leave out words like chartreuse. Also, the "lime" bit is a little subjective; I might be able to accept it in narration, but if a character said it, I would probably take issue.
Apparently the perfect recall pensieve ability of dragons is unique to Saphira.
Of course it is. It's not a dragon ability, it's a plot convenience ability.
I disagree. Chartreuse is a lousy word to use because it's a live metaphor which quite specifically references France, and monasteries, and the concept of after-dinner / cocktail-type bitter liqueurs in general. I can't recall if anybody in Alaglaglag drinks hard (i.e. distilled) liquor. There's no special reason why they shouldn't have (it did come into use in late medieval Europe - for the very rich - for occasional ordinary drinking as opposed to medicinal use), but I just can't see them sitting around mixing cocktails or having digestifs.
Orange is a different case altogether. Yes, it is the name of a south Asian fruit: but it has been used as an standard colour word in English - in fact the only word we have for that specific colour - for half a millennium, and using it doesn't normally even make the reader think of actual citrus fruit, let alone jerk them out of a medieval-style AU.
I would expect Eragon to say something like “yes, I need an explanation now” or “no, I need to process things first”; something that indicates
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WAZZZAAAAA!!!
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I'm expecting an exhilirating, edge-of-your-seat type of battle of intelligence here where it's not clear who's going to win and if anyone involved in the entanglement makes a slight mistake, it's all snoozing with the fishies for them, like the Sherlock vs Moriarty cat and mouse game. But turns out that you still rely on magical prowess to win apparently. *disappointed grunt*
Do not become so attached to any one belief that you cannot see past it to another possibility
( ... )
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This is a common thing with shitty writers: they don't actually think about what they're writing, so they end up with the impression that they've written something far better than they did. Stephenie Meyer genuinely thinks her books are feminist, and Christopher Paolini genuinely thinks he wrote an epic tale on par with The Lord of the Rings which culminated in a stunning battle of wits.
I suspect that these authors can't read beyond the surface of any works, really. Why else would they be so unable to spot the implications of their own?
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- The anon you replied to
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Apparently the perfect recall pensieve ability of dragons is unique to Saphira.
Of course it is. It's not a dragon ability, it's a plot convenience ability.
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Orange is a different case altogether. Yes, it is the name of a south Asian fruit: but it has been used as an standard colour word in English - in fact the only word we have for that specific colour - for half a millennium, and using it doesn't normally even make the reader think of actual citrus fruit, let alone jerk them out of a medieval-style AU.
I would expect Eragon to say something like “yes, I need an explanation now” or “no, I need to process things first”; something that indicates ( ... )
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