The Grand Illusion
Mr. Modesitt, I very much enjoyed Last of the First. Seeing early Cyador is always interesting! It made me think of a few questions: what happened to the parks of the First by Lorn or Nylan’s eras? Do you think that there are any surviving descendants of Alyiakal or Lorn by the time of Lerris? On a different note, I was curious whether you plan on donating your writing works/drafts to a university when you decide you have finished writing, as some authors have done (hopefully not for a long while!) I’m very much looking forward to Premiere later this year, and hope you return to Recluse again soon, whether we visit Cyador, Hamor, Fairhaven or somewhere else! Best wishes!
As with all cities, especially capitol cities, over time monuments tend to get removed or simply buried by later emperors. Consider Nero’s “Domus Aurea,” which was buried. As for descendants of Alyiakal and Lorn, there are certainly some, most likely through the matrilineal line, though.
As for donation of my draft/notes/and associated writings, two universities have expressed interest, but that decision will be made by my heirs.
I received my copy of Last of the First yesterday. I just finished it at 10:31 NL time. I will reread it many times over (as I have with all of your books). My question isn’t really about this book itself, but I am wondering if you will ever write a story based on when they came from the Rational Stars? I love the detail in this book about the two books of poetry and knowing from whence they came. I’d love to know more about how those from the Rational Stars ended up in this world. Thank you for all of your writings.
If you haven’t read Recluce Tales, there are two stories which add more details about the poetry.
For questions like these (Why are X or Y not mentioned in earlier books when they seem so significant) the question becomes does one want a Doylist or Watsonian answer?
The Doylist answer would seem to be “It wasn’t relevant, so the author hadn’t written it yet.”
Those answer are often understandable but don’t always help scratch the Itch. (I still have a very early copy of The Magic of Recluce that refers to Magaera’s portrait as having Silver hair and calls the Order Forged Iron “Black Steel”. The answer is obviously the world develops as it goes, but it does still stick to my brain every time despite that.)
The Watsonian answer, then, becomes the one you want to find. In this case I chalk it up to upbringing. Alyiakal was raised relatively poor and far outside of Cyad, so when he finally gets to the city the Art, the things that are unique, the inflated prices, these all stand out.
Compare that to Lorn who was raised in Cyad and thus takes all that for granted, never noting specific art, not blinking or caring about the prices of things.
We even see this deliberately raised in earlier books. The way Lerris doesn’t even seem to recognize magic or how well off he or Recluce as a whole is. Meanwhile when Dorrin’s people get to Land’s End in that book they are utterly amazed left and right with how rich Recluce clearly is.