Monday, December 20, 2010

Old Elvish Nursery Rhyme





The trees that once lived form a black ring. 
There in the dark comes the black thing. 
From far, far away, without any light, 
nothing can stop it from bringing the night. 
Stay out of the Weald. Stay out of the Weald.




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Monday, November 29, 2010

Gillalliath

Chapter Nine of The Archer From Kipleth is finished and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.

In this chapter we visit the capital of The Green Hills of Reia, Gillalliath.

I originally called the city Gilead, because I just liked the sound of the word. I knew it was Biblical, but thought it would work. But Gilead just has too many other meanings; it's a title of a rather popular book; it's in a popular song; part of the title of a popular play; and it's the name of a new HIV anti-viral drug. All good things, but too over used for me.

So I came up with Gillalliath.

As the capital of Reia, it's an old city in a part of Wealdland which has had no molestation by the invading garonds. So, it's completely intact from hundreds of years of development. But there is a surprise in store for Halldora when she visits, and a secret lurking beneath the adjacent Lake of Hapaun. A secret which will reveal a larger and more horrific conspiracy.

I had a lot of fun dreaming up this city. It's completely visualized in my mind. And I can tell you, it's a beautiful place to visit. I hope you get to visit there soon, too.

cheers,


Kurt



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Thursday, November 18, 2010

Some names with pronunciation key

This is a non comprehensive list of phonetic pronunciations of some of the people and places in The Last Elf of Lanis.


* Arnwylf/Arnwelf - Ahrn WILF
Haergill - HIGHER gil
Frea - FRAY uh
Haerreth - HIGHER reth
Bittel - Bit TEL
Rogar Li - RO gar  LEE
Rion Ta - REE on  TAH
Deifol Hroth - DIE full ROTH
Lanis Rhyl Landemiriam - LAN is   RILL   land uh MIR ee um
Iounelle - EYE uhn ell
Mattear Gram - MAT ee ur GRAM
Jofod Kagir - JOE fod kah GEAR
Yulenth - YOO lenth
Alrhett - ALL rett
Halldora - HALL dor uh
Kellabald - KELL uh bald
Wynnfrith - WIN frith
Alfhich - all FICH
Tyny - tin NEE
Rhyd Bwr - RED bower
Madrun - mad RUN
Plymonley - plim mon LEE
Kennethley - Ken eth LEE
Harvestley - har vest LEE
Burnie - burn NEE
Kipleth - KIP leth
Reia - RAY uh
Ethgeow - ETH gee ow
Glafemen - GLAF uh men
Solienth - SOL lee enth
Ronenth - RO nenth
Apghilis - ap GILL is
Ratskenner - RATS ken ner
Byland - BY land
Weald - WEE uhld
Gawry - GOW ree
garond - GAIR ond
Ravensdred - RAVE uns DREAD
Caerlund - KAY ur LUND
Jaefa Smiota - JI fa SMEE oh ta
Sehen - SAY hen

and a real tongue twister

Summeninquis - sum in INK kwis


* The two spellings for Arnwylf: I originally spelled his name 'Arnwylf' but then a did a deeper search and discovered the use of the 'y' made his name feminine. His name literally meant 'she-wolf of the mountain'. Well, I didn't like the spelling for the masculine which is 'wulf' Arnwulf just sounded strange to me. So in the first release of The Last Elf of Lanis, I spelled his name 'Arnwelf'. Which was okay, except that he was always 'Arnwylf' in my mind. As I began the sequel, The Archer from Kipleth, the original spelling just came back to me. It's just the way his name should be spelt.

cheers,



Kurt



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Thursday, November 4, 2010

Deifol Hroth

I've just finished chapter 6 of The Archer From Kipleth. I'm hoping to finish the entire novel by Dec. 25th as a Christmas present for any readers.

Chapter 6 is mostly about the Dark Lord of All Evil Magic. what a title, eh?

Unlike Sauron or Valdemorte, Deifol Hroth is very active and involved with the characters in the story.

He is not content to sit in the background and move his pawns from the shadows.
In chapter 6 Lord Stavolebe, who you'll remember from the chapter Rogar Li in The Last Elf of Lanis, has come to The Lord of Lightning to report his espionage and also to learn the arcane arts. He gets a little more than he bargained for.

It was really quite fun to delve into the  psyche of evil. And not just evil for evil's sake, or evil to be a bad ass.

Deifol Hroth, although a nine hundred year old wizard, who looks like he's twenty five, is actually deeply possessed by the king of evil spirits, who the elves know as Jofod Kagir, who we essentially know in our age as Lucifer. He is a spirit from before the foundations of the Heavens. He is filled with envy and hatred for being excluded from the big moves at the start of the cosmos.

I think somebody who was consumed with something like that for as long as he has would be far, far past insane.

It was really, really fun and gratifying as a writer to try to coherently weave my way through those tangled paths. I almost came around to his way of thinking. KIDDING!

I can't wait for you to read it.

cheers,

Kurt


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Thursday, September 2, 2010

The Towers of Lanis Rhyl Landemiriam


In old Lanis Rhyl Landemiriam are several towers called the Towers of Miriam. The tallest tower is called Bawn Hae, and you can actually see the river Miriam from it's top most window.

Unwed elf maidens are forbidden from climbing the towers for fear that their emotions will get the best of them, and they'll throw themselves out over unrequited love for some elf boy.

The towers resemble unopened flower blooms, and the slender stem-like columns sway in the wind.

The bricks of the tower, like all bricks of the city are iridescent, changing color with the movement of the sun. The bricks of the bloom-like turrets of the towers are richly colored scarlet reds, royal blues, sun yellows, and blushing purples.

New ideas for green architecture - number 5, the South Korean complex looks particularly interesting

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Silfliette

Silfliette is a young elvish girl and the central character in Jaefa Smiota, my new short story available to download for free, for a limited time. (I gotta make people pay for this stuff eventually)

I was surprised to find I had no trouble whatsoever writing the voice of a young girl. Young! She's probably around thirty years old, but would still appear to be six to us humans. (Iounelle, the central character in The Last Elf of Lanis appears to be in her early twenties and is over three hundred years old!)

Silfliette's voice was one of wonder and overwhelming emotion. I think as adults we forget how devastating everything was on a daily basis for us as children. I remember, as a kid, running late with little league practice, walking home knowing I was late for dinner, and crying thinking the world was going to come to an end.

We, as adults, don't give children enough slack. I've seen parents blow up, absolutely blow up at their whining children in the supermarket. Who was the immature one?

And yet, sometimes the child sees what we do not, sometimes cannot, see. When I was a child, some sewer workers had set up a canvas tarp around a manhole in the street. My youngest sister Koral made a comment about men's trousers and one of the workers angrily stalked over to demand what was so funny about his pants. "Look," she said, "Not you. The large canvas. It looks like a pair of pants." We all turned to look. The worker was dumbstruck. Probably having worked with the canvas tarp all his life, he never saw that it did indeed resemble a large pair of trousers! He apologized and went back to work.

Silfliette's name is a derivation of a couple of Old Norse words. 'Silf' is silver. 'Fliette' is a creek or stream. So 'Silfliette' would mean a little silver stream. Or, to the elves, a little laughing stream, as the words silver and laughter are synonmous in elvish. Elvish children aren't named for several years, not until their nature is apparent. So, clearly Silfliette was a very happy child.
Iounelle means eternal beauty, or the beauty of eternity. Morinnthe means a serious face, or a deep thought. Weylunne, or Welund (both spellings are appropriate) means the arm of god, or a divine purpose.

Silfliette is called a heid. Again Old Norse tells us that a heid is a prophetess, and worker of magic, usually an evil female. I personally think the 'evil' connotation came about when the seeress prophesied something the male didn't like.

This entry about Gullveig, a norse godess expresses it best:

This link might be easier to follow:
scroll down to the english translation, paragraph 21, instead of 'heid' they use the word 'bright'


This is a pretty good link, with an intelligent discussion

You'll find a link to my short story, Jaefa Smiota, here.

cheers,
Kurt

Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Jaefa Smiota is...

...a game played by the old elves. Jaefa Smiota is played on a board drawn like a spiders's web. In the Golden ages of the elves, the boards were colored with the colors of the family houses. As a wedding gift, the bride and groom were given a marble table made of the joined family colors.

The name, Jaefa Smiota, means Spider Battle in the old language.

Often old elves would sit for days contemplating moves and strategies, without touching a single piece.

Sometimes if the players were old friends and had nothing better to do, they would play 'ransoms'. If the Prince playing piece was ever captured, the losing player could 'ransom' his Prince piece by exchanging places with another of his pieces on the board.

Players would agree ahead of time, to two, three or even four ransoms to extend the length of play.

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/23090

playing rules: The Prince piece is the only piece that can share the section with another of the players pieces. If an attacking piece lands on a section occupied by the Prince piece and another piece, the lower ranked piece is forfeited, and the Prince may either attack the invading piece or flee.

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Iounelle


Iounelle Treelaughter Wendralorn Awaruaine knelt to check the signs in the dry autumn grass. Nearby, the bodies of five garonds lay dead.
Treelaughter was her elvish nickname. Wendralorn was her family name. And Awaruaine was the name given by the priests at her birth, a secret name, only to be told to her betrothed on her first night of marriage. Now that name was irrelevant. There were no other elves to be her husband.
The garonds were part of a larger platoon she had been tracking for several weeks. They were headed westward from the Holmwy River. These five had doubled back. It didn’t matter why to the elf. She would have killed them in any case.
Iounelle plucked a handful of the meadow grass and wiped the garond blood from her long, silver, crescent shaped sword. It resembled the moon in its last phase. Along the inner edge ran old elvish runes in a dialect of elvish so ancient the words made little sense to her. She could pick out the words ‘glory’ and ‘key’, but the phrasing was too old to readily understand.
The elf looked up at the cold, blue sky. The memory of the slaughter of the last elves in all of Wealdland constantly played before her eyes. She clutched her breast with the heart break. When the garonds, their age old friends, suddenly attacked, she had been knocked unconscious by her brother, and hidden in the trees near the walls of the ancient city of the elves, called Lanis Rhyl Landemiriam.*



That's how the book begins. we know instantly a little about our last elf, why she's the last of her kind, and how and why she is consumed with single minded vengeance.

Pretty concise. I think it's ok writing, if it isn't good writing.

I found it challenging to write for Iounelle. For one thing, she's an entirely alien being to humans. Another problem is her situation is almost too overwhelming. I found it hard to even entertain the notion of what it must feel like to be the last of your kind.

Extinction is real. It happens. We toss around the concept without considering how universally horrific it must be for the last of some species. Can you image the last of the dodos? Some bird calling, for the rest of its natural born days, calling for another of its kind who will never answer.

That goes beyond loneliness. That would eventually give you some kind of zen like, super, god like awareness. Or, you would simply go mad.

In any case, I found myself leaving Iounelle mostly to herself. I found I rarely wanted to know her thoughts, or feelings. I imagined they were just too big to understand, never mind her alien nature as an elf.

As her writer, I thought it best to just let her show what she felt and thought through her actions and dialogue. The advantage of print fiction is we can know a character's innermost thoughts and feelings in great detail. Iounelle's heart just seemed too, too vulnerable to explore with anything but the greatest of reverence.

cheers,

Kurt


*excerpt from The Last Elf of Lanis copyright Kurt Hargan 2010


Sunday, January 3, 2010

Magic versus Science versus Magic


wow. Yesterday's blog was pretty scattered. I think I tried to express too many ideas too quickly. So I'll try to limit my topics to a single idea. Yesterday I said the theme would be magic versus science.

Okay. Magic and science. Both create an effect. "Hocus Pocus" or "throw the switch". What's the difference?

Science attempts to get to the verifiable source of reactions. If it can be explained and recreated in the lab, that's science.

So then magic is the opposite, right? I don't necessarily think so. If a magician sprinkles a mixture of sodium nitrate, sulphur and charcoal on an open flame, he'll get sparks. Does he understand the chemical reaction and the atomic weight of the compounds he used? Maybe not. That's gunpowder by the way. But our magician has identified compounds which will get verifiable results. He can do it again and again because he has a knowledge of powders and mixtures which get him his result. This kind of magician is more like an artisian, because his process depends on flash and patter. The guys who make their living doing this preferred to be called illusionists. Maybe because they don't hold any illusions of performing real magic.

So what about this real magic? The force? Summoning of spirits, elementals or demons? Most any rational person you meet on the street will laugh at the notion of real magic. We all know that the impossible things we see at the movies are CGI, and in books, flights of fancy. Okay, clearly there needs to be a delineation between illusion and real magic.

We could define real magic as some effect which, through the will of the magician creates an effect contrary to the seeming laws of nature. Yeah. That'll do.

But, less than two hundred years ago, the average person on the street couldn't tell you what lightning was. Maybe they would laughingly tell you that it was Zeus trying to kill a fly. Two thousand years ago, and that person explaining lightning wouldn't be laughing. They'd be serious about Zeus and the gods of Olympus.

So, it comes down to what a person, or culture understands about the world around them and how it changes from one state to another. The freezing of the river five thousand years ago was the magic will of the gods. Today we know it's due to the changing of the earth's average local temperature due to the seasons.

What if our person five thousand years ago saw something we couldn't explain today? We would both of us, ignorant man of yesterday and enlightened man of the future, would both consider calling it magic, only because we don't understand the process by which the effect occurred.

So science and magic come down to ignorance and knowledge. Maybe. Maybe not.
Can you explain to me how your microwave cooks your pasta? How your Blu-ray plays your Hi-def movies? We enjoy a lot of commonly owned things which we, mostly, understand only on the most basic terms. Kind of like magic.

And what if our science gets to a level where we can manipulate the world around us on an atomic level? Science may get to this kind of potence before you join your ancestors in the bone yard.

So when you create that living rabbit, seemingly out of thin air, from the molecules you've generated and arraigned by your nanotechnologic matter reconstruction matrix, just before you throw the switch, maybe you should say, "Hocus Pocus".

cheers,

KJH




Saturday, January 2, 2010

The Germ of an Idea


The first inklings of an idea for my novel The Last Elf of Lanis came after rereading the Lord of the Rings for the umpteenth time.

I'm a great fan of anthropology, particularly recent history, neolithic and early bronze age. I'm fascinated by the movements of humans in prehistory and the glimpses we have of their day to day life through archeologic digs.

The glimmer of the idea first came as a "what if?" What if Tolkien's Middle Earth were real? How would that reconcile with what we know of the eras intermediary to the present day?
This is when Wealdland began to take shape in my mind.

Wealdland is the fictional world of The Last Elf of Lanis. There is still a land bridge isthmus linking the British isles to Europe. This is a geological fact which existed in the Eemian period, approximately 140,000 years ago. The earth at this time was rapidly retreating from another ice age. The earth has experienced at least six ice ages.

At this time wolves were first becoming domesticated.

Also Neanderthal humanoids were quickly dying out, unable to compete with Homo Sapiens.

These then were some of the elements percolating in my mind as I shaped the world in which the characters struggle for their very existence.

In the realm of the purely fantastical, another "what if?" struck me. In Tolkien's world, the elves were leaving, and magic was fading. Well, what if we followed the story of the last elf to leave our world. This became the spark to set Iounelle, the last elf of Lanis, the mythical land of the elves, on her journey.

Wealdland, although inspired by Tolkien's Middle Earth, is as far removed in time, heritage, and mutation of language as the philosophers of Plato's Acropolis are from the professors of UCLA. You won't find names, places or events from any of Tolkien's works in mine. My conceit is that at least 500,000 years have passed since the end of the fictional world of the Lord of the Rings.

Tolkien's Third Age ends with the Return of the King, leading to the Fourth Age of Man. My novel assumes that that Fourth Age ended with the degradation of humanity to nearly bestial levels. With the passing of an ice age, the Fifth Age begins, in my mythology, with humanity barely able to survive with stone and bronze tools.

Meanwhile, the Neaderthal humanoids, in The Last Elf of Lanis called garonds, although usually nonviolent and shy, have been organized into vicious and efficient armies by the last dark lord of magic, Deifol Hroth.

One of the major themes of my novel is the transition from the magic of incantation and summoning to the magic of science. Which is the topic of discussion of the next blog.

K. J. Hargan




cheers.

Friday, January 1, 2010

First day

This is my first blog concerning my novel The Last Elf of Lanis. Here I will chronicle my efforts to publish my novel and answer any questions.

Kurt J. Hargan