Date: 1994-01-01
Type: Paraphrased
Reporter: Carolyn F.
(small report)
He said he writes as the ideas come and he has no clue as to how long the series will be! So that throws out 8, 10, or 16 books out the window. He also gave heights for the characters. As for Rand being unusually tall, how about 6’6”. Aviendha is 5’10”. You can deduce from there.
October 19, 1994
Does RJ religiously read the WOT newsletter?
Absolutely. At least when I get it.
What’s the story with the limited editions?
So far there have been only limited edition of The Shadow Rising, The Fires of Heaven , and Lord of Chaos , however the publisher will be soon going back to the first three novels and will produce limited editions of those as well. According to the blurbs in the limited editions, RJ gets 25 of the less than 200 published but RJ refuted that saying he only signs them and then the publisher hands them out to important types. The publisher’s 25 editions are lettered from A to Z (minus I) whereas the public editions are numbered. RJ expressed his disappointment in never getting limited editions to hand out and also his astonishment that people are willing to dole out the greenbacks it takes to purchase one.
Did the map come before you established the travels of the Randlanders or the other way around?
RJ had drawn a rough map of Randland before he started writing the series.
Have you heard the audio tape abridgments? What are your feelings toward them?
This brought a mighty harrumph from RJ. He then explained that he had not heard them but expressed his strong disapproval of the project. Apparently the publisher had acquired a portion of the rights to the series of which he was unaware, and those rights enabled them to go ahead with the project without informing or asking him. However, RJ is planning his own audio tape project which will record the books unabridged. When RJ was asked whether the voice man would be American or English, RJ expressed no opinion either way.
(question about series genesis)
RJ responded that the crux of the series was based on a disbelieving boy being told he was the savior of mankind, then that youth reluctantly realizing the truth of the matter but unwilling to admit it, and finally the boy assenting to the savior role and that only left puzzling out what he would do as the savior. When asked why RJ had chosen to go into so much depth and detail so as to confuse and overburden the reader, RJ responded, “It’s all right there in front of you. Surely, something I’ve thought about for fifteen years and written about for nine is something you can work out over a weekend.”
(small report)
I asked him what we had picked up on that he thought we wouldn’t, and he wouldn’t tell me. Did say that the two ways of looking at the Rand/Lews Therin thing (Lews Therin causing Rand’s madness/Lews Therin a manifestation of Rand’s madness) was intentional. Wouldn’t tell me which one it was though….
(small report)
Robert Jordan is supposed to be Guest of Honor on a Fantasy congress, called ‘Easterly to the Sun’, that is held in Stockholm…on June 16-18. If someone is interest of place, cost, booking and if Robert Jordan really shows up…then [write to Daniel through e-mail].
This was ‘ East of the Sun ‘ Con, the name of which is probably taken from Tolkien poetry .
RJ was very patient and enthusiastic. He looked different than the picture mostly due to the dark tint in his glasses.
RJ also mentioned being unable to attend West Point due to poor vision in his left eye. Shannon Faulkner and the Citadel…he feels she should not be allowed to attend the Citadel because she lied on her application by not revealing her gender. He also feels that single sex education is beneficial for both men and women. He said men tend to be more successful in a competitive environment while women tend to excel in cooperative environments (e.g., studies have shown that girls that go to all girl colleges have less math fear, stress, etc. than coeds). He also mentioned that he personally feels that the physical standards suffer at military institutions when women attend. He talked about himself being shot down in a helicopter and having to run twenty-five miles literally and anyone who would have been unable to do that would not have survived.
Like you, John, I discussed *P and said that I was one of probably dozens who had sent him one of those free subscription packets (I have no idea if *P still does it). Turned out it was a revelation to him.
“I was wondering why I kept getting subscriptions in the mail occasionally!” And we had a whole discussion on the net, which boils down to that he wasn’t really crazy about getting onto the nets (Compuserve, *P, etc.) because he saw how addicting it is for a friend of his, but that occasionally he gets copies of stuff from the various nets…All in all, a REAL nice guy.
*P is probably supposed to be P*, an abbreviation for Prodigy, which was a competitor of Compuserve, the main Internet Service Provider in the US at the time (before AOL).
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