Freda's home is burned and her family killed. She says:
"'Broken is the tree whose branches sheltered the land, and wind blows cold across fields gone barren -'" (p. 79)
Leea warns Skafloc against Freda:
"'There is doom in her; I can feel it, like chill in my marrow.'" (p. 80)
- but Leea does not know the reason. Freda is Skafolc's sister.
I admit to not remembering what happens next despite several previous readings. Maybe the plot of The Broken Sword will stay with me longer this time.
I also admit to preferring Poul Anderson's fantasies to Tolkien's. Anderson deserves as much recognition.
2 comments:
Tolkiein's fantasies are deeply (but in a non-obvious way) influenced by his Christianity. Poul's are closer to the pagan roots. They're both great, but in different ways. I think JRRT's are more popular because Christianity is an underlying bedrock beneath Western Civ's moral discoruse.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling and Paul!
Correct, Tolkien did not want to insert his Christian faith too obviously into his Middle-earth legendarium. Yes, even now, despite the disastrous nonsense of Political Correctness and anti-Christian prejudice among our "elites," Christianity is still a bedrock of Western civilization.
But I still wish Anderson had paid more attention to the elves seen in THE SILMARILLION. He might then have avoided the mistake he made in both "Awakening the Elves" and the Foreword to the revised version of THE BROKEN SWORD, believing Tolkien was glorifying the elves. He was not- we see the elves as they were at different stages of their history. All too imperfect in THE SILMARILLION and more chastened and wiser in later Ages of Middle-earth and in THE LORD OF THE RINGS.
And even Gandalf and the Lady Galadriel had to wrestle with a deadly temptation at two points in LOTR.
Paul: While I would not minimize Tolkien's works too far, I completely agree Anderson's fantasies deserve to be far better known than they are these days.
Ad astra! Sean
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