Total word count for books 1-11?

[Marvin]

Does anyone know the combined word count for WOT books 1-11? Can you point me to a source for it? For what I'm working on I need more than a blog/thread in which someone just makes a guesstimate.

 

I haven't had any luck with google searches nor searching dragonmount. Any help will be appreciated.

 

Thanks,

 

Marvin

[Digbe]

[move]716432 :o :o :o[/move]

 

 

        [move]14712 commas ,  ;D ;D ;D[/move]

 

                                           

                    [move]28744 sentences  :o :o :o[/move]

 

                                 

                              [move]38636 prepositional phrases  ;D ;D[/move]

[Ealdur Tinuviel]

What did you do to calculate that number, Dig?

 

And why do you need to know the number?

[Moiraine_Damodred]

Um....I'm not sure that a number that big even exsists o_O!

[Digbe]

Sorry 'bout the edit guys.

 

And for Marvin,  ...  start countin buddy!!

[Charlz Guybon]

What I want to know is how many copies of each book have been sold. My google-fu skills have failed me on this issue.

[Charlz Guybon]

Also, how do you make those words move Digbe? ???

[Vemynal]

[move]like this?[/move]

 

You see the things above where you type? one of them is a M with an arrow infront of it and its moving

 

highlight the text and click it

 

or use [move] [/move ]

 

but remove the space I added at the end of it

[Ealdur Tinuviel]

When you do a reply by clicking the reply button, there is a marquee option along with the other buttons on top of the entry part. Just highlight what you want to be marquee, and it will move.

 

By the way guys, I can help you out with the numbers of words.

 

Click Here (scroll down for exact numbers)

 

It makes a total of 9,685 pages (including New Spring and Knife of Dreams), and 3,115,919 words (including New Spring, but not Knife of Dreams).

[Cadsuane]

So what you could do to find out about how many more words KoD is, is to count the number of words on a full page in that book, then multiply it by the number of full pages in the book. THEN, count the number of partial pages left over. If they are all about half a page, then multiply that number times half of the number of words per page you used in the first part. It's not exact, but it'll get you closer than the count without KoD.

[Marvin]

Thanks, Ealdur. I should have known to check Wikipedia.

 

I'm working on a movie review of "Stardust" and, to make a point about the movie's pacing, note that Neil Gaiman wrote that novel longhand purposely to avoid having the story bloat ... and to also capture the feel of the faerie stories that were written pre-word processor era. I contrast Stardust's 50,000 words (and pacing of the movie) with the 3.2 million words of the king of contemporary fantasy, WOT.

 

I interviewed Gaiman when the book was released and, though he expressed respect for those who, like Tolkien or Jordan, spent decades crafting every aspect of a fantasy world, he was itching for an old-school faerie tale. After plotting 75 issues of Sandman, I didn't blame the guy.

 

And before everyone hurriedly defends WOT (I know the impulse) for fear of a slam, you'd be preaching to a fan who discovered the series when The Great Hunt was the newest installment. As someone who has mistakenly bought multiple copies of books in WOT, The Song of Ice and Fire (Martin) and The Swan's War (Russel) series because of the long wait between books (not to mention the fact that titles always sound the same), I do appreciate the rare one-volume fantasy story. This isn't being included as a judgement, just a fact.

 

 

[Ealdur Tinuviel]

I understand. Sometimes the Wheel of Time series gets bogged down in the details.

 

Not to take away from how greay a series it is, though...

[bcxanth]

And then of course, when the re-released EotW as two different books, didn't they add more to the beginning about the boys' childhood?  That adds to the word count. :P

[Ealdur Tinuviel]

I think he was more thinking of the regular Wheel of Time books than the kid ones. ;)

[loki redfern]

the thing about one volume books, especially if there absolutly brilliant is they always end so soon and leave you with that unforfilled ' but they need to do that and go there and ..whaaaaaaah i wannna see more' feeling, but perhaps thats just me. i suppose what it comes down to is wheather your the kind of person who like to be reading anything if you can or are fine not (i find my self getting frantic when im eating with out a book and start reading all the pakaging labels :-[  ). however that said one volumers are usually very high quality :)

[Ealdur Tinuviel]

That is certainly true, and I do agree that most one-volume tales end too quickly. However I think most people don't have the amount of time to devote to reading that I do, and so they would much prefer the one-volume books.

[Destrus]

Certain things about this series take far too long, IMHO...and certain things don't happen the way that I expected them to and are over far too quickly.

 

There are lots of things that I think could have almost been stand alone novels. (ie. Adventures In Snaky/Foxy Land, The War of The Tower, The Borderland Wars, etc)

 

Stuff that took too long...like the Bowl Of The Winds Saga...kinda adds a feeling of fluff to the series.

[Ealdur Tinuviel]

Stuff like Elaybe having a bath. RJ could have said "Elayne sunk into the tub, rinsed off, and hopped out."

 

Instead, we get this: "Elayne unlaced her satin breeches slowly, anticipating a relaxing bath. Birgitte Silverbow, her warder, stood at the door, ready to defend her with her life. What will Egwene Elayne thought. She was still having a hard time with the idea of a woman warder. Among Aes Sedai, it was an unwritten rule that a woman could not be a warder. After all, warders were sought out for their prowess in battle. No one would prefer a woman over a man in that area. Dismissing the thoughts from her head, she slipped her shirt over her head, and slowly climbed into the copper tub. She sighed in relief. Tranquility washed over her immediately. Her handmaidens took her clothes, and left. She closed her eyes, so relaxed she was, and drifted off to sleep."

 

Well, you get the point. I made that up, actually.

[Destrus]

Stuff like Elaybe having a bath. RJ could have said "Elayne sunk into the tub, rinsed off, and hopped out."

 

Instead, we get this: "Elayne unlaced her satin breeches slowly, anticipating a relaxing bath. Birgitte Silverbow, her warder, stood at the door, ready to defend her with her life. What will Egwene Elayne thought. She was still having a hard time with the idea of a woman warder. Among Aes Sedai, it was an unwritten rule that a woman could not be a warder. After all, warders were sought out for their prowess in battle. No one would prefer a woman over a man in that area. Dismissing the thoughts from her head, she slipped her shirt over her head, and slowly climbed into the copper tub. She sighed in relief. Tranquility washed over her immediately. Her handmaidens took her clothes, and left. She closed her eyes, so relaxed she was, and drifted off to sleep."

 

Well, you get the point. I made that up, actually.

 

Yup.  Exactly what I'm talking about.  And I think between the hair combing and braid pulling, you've probably got at least 100 to 200 pages entirely devoted to those two activities throughout the course of the series.

[Ealdur Tinuviel]

No kidding. I wish Lan would get tired of it and say "Nynaeve, Malkieri never braid their hair" or something like that, even if it isn't true, just to get her to quit the habit.

 

Also, maybe Rand could say "Okay, Elayne, your hair looks straight enough as it is. Stop the combing."

[RobertAlexWillis]

No kidding. I wish Lan would get tired of it and say "Nynaeve, Malkieri never braid their hair" or something like that, even if it isn't true, just to get her to quit the habit.

 

Also, maybe Rand could say "Okay, Elayne, your hair looks straight enough as it is. Stop the combing."

 

So, what you're saying is, you'd like to see Lan and Rand get slapped around a bit ... ?

[lou]

did anyone ever read hemmingway? talk about word count......

[Charlz Guybon]

No kidding. I wish Lan would get tired of it and say "Nynaeve, Malkieri never braid their hair" or something like that, even if it isn't true, just to get her to quit the habit.

 

Also, maybe Rand could say "Okay, Elayne, your hair looks straight enough as it is. Stop the combing."

 

So, what you're saying is, you'd like to see Lan and Rand get slapped around a bit ... ?

In Nynaeve's third time through the Accepted ter'angreal, didn't she wear her hair long in the Makieri style?

[Ealdur Tinuviel]

I double-checked. That is correct, she is quoted as having "sapphires and moonstones in her hair, hanging loose about her shoulders."

 

So, it's something to look forward to, at least for Lan.

[jaldy]

Stuff like Elaybe having a bath. RJ could have said "Elayne sunk into the tub, rinsed off, and hopped out."

 

Instead, we get this: "Elayne unlaced her satin breeches slowly, anticipating a relaxing bath. Birgitte Silverbow, her warder, stood at the door, ready to defend her with her life. What will Egwene Elayne thought. She was still having a hard time with the idea of a woman warder. Among Aes Sedai, it was an unwritten rule that a woman could not be a warder. After all, warders were sought out for their prowess in battle. No one would prefer a woman over a man in that area. Dismissing the thoughts from her head, she slipped her shirt over her head, and slowly climbed into the copper tub. She sighed in relief. Tranquility washed over her immediately. Her handmaidens took her clothes, and left. She closed her eyes, so relaxed she was, and drifted off to sleep."

 

Well, you get the point. I made that up, actually.

 

Yup.  Exactly what I'm talking about.  And I think between the hair combing and braid pulling, you've probably got at least 100 to 200 pages entirely devoted to those two activities throughout the course of the series.

 

Not to mention all the times the various palaces or other structure are rendered in detail whenever someone is entering said structure.

 

I firmly believe if most of the redundant descriptions were eliminated the series would be shorter by 2 maybe 3 volumes.

 

Sure a description of the Sun Palace a couple time per volume as a refresher would be fine. but 50 is over kill.