Similarities with WOT and Sword of Truth (SOT) Series

[Nolder]

Recall from the start we said it's not about generic fantasy tropes.

Recall what I said about the vast majority of similarities being generic tropes.

 

"Male wizards are derided/looked upon with fear/need to be controlled. (&)There are no organized male institutions in the modern day." How many have devices like the a'dam and gender specific type magic that use woven flows of elements?

What you're asking for is too specific. I can find series where magic users are looked down on I'm sure but I don't know if they will be male. It may be that only RJ and Goodkind chose to spin the trope that way. I'll also note that iirc male magic users are NOT looked down on universally in Goodkinds series. The Midlands was friendly to Wizards.

 

We are talking about incredibly specific things. And it's not just one or two, but many things that go beyond generic.

That's what I'm trying to say. It IS just a few things.

[Mr Ares]

 

Recall from the start we said it's not about generic fantasy tropes.

Recall what I said about the vast majority of similarities being generic tropes.

 

Care to back that up?

 

"Male wizards are derided/looked upon with fear/need to be controlled. (&)There are no organized male institutions in the modern day." How many have devices like the a'dam and gender specific type magic that use woven flows of elements?

What you're asking for is too specific. I can find series where magic users are looked down on I'm sure but I don't know if they will be male. It may be that only RJ and Goodkind chose to spin the trope that way. I'll also note that iirc male magic users are NOT looked down on universally in Goodkinds series. The Midlands was friendly to Wizards.

 

The whole point is that the similarities are very specific - therefore  the more specific, the better. And the more generic your counters, the more evident it is that you don't have an argument.

 

We are talking about incredibly specific things. And it's not just one or two, but many things that go beyond generic.

That's what I'm trying to say. It IS just a few things.

 

Not really.

[Nolder]

Why would uniqueness matter?

Because if they are not unique then it follows no one is ripping off anyone, or rather everyone is "ripping off" each other.

It means SoT and WoT don't share 9999999 similarities it means SoT, WoT, and 999999 other series share those same similarities.

 

The Worst Witch? Harry Potter? Straying outside epic fantasy, here - same genre, different subgenre.

Please. Are you really arguing that Harry Potter and WoT are too different to compare?

 

And Harry Potter doesn't even have an all-female school.

Beauxbatons Academy of Magic.

 

The argument people are using is that WoT and SoT have a higher than usual number of very specific similarities - not just things that are generic within the fantasy genre, not just one or two very similar things but a lot of very similar, non-generic things.

Yes and I keep asking what those things are and then just get referred to old threads or ignored.

 

More likely is that Goodkind copied from RJ. Plagiarism is, by its nature, difficult to define the parameters of, but there's no need to make it harder. There are similarities that go beyond the generic, and they are quite numerous. This is enough for us to be suspicious.

You're suspicious so he's guilty is the reasoning you're using here. I hope you can see how unfair that is.

[Nolder]

Care to back that up?

I'm not going to spend hours thinking about tropes and different series and how they are used when I'm sure someone will just come back and accuse me of cherry picking anyway. Instead of me providing some comprehensive list of tropes for both series and other series those tropes are used in why don't you give me JUST ONE similarity that you think is unique to just the wheel of time and sword of truth series.

 

The whole point is that the similarities are very specific - therefore  the more specific, the better. And the more generic your counters, the more evident it is that you don't have an argument.

They are needlessly overspecific. No I'm not going to be able to find another series that has "male only magic controlling devices". Not many series even have gendered magic in the first place. I could probably find a device that controls a magic user, but men only? Probably not. And that's being needlessly overspecific because the trope is "magic hero getting too powerful, needs to be taken down a peg or two" and it's accomplished with "a device". I'm not going to find exact matches because other series are not telling the exact same stories.

[Agitel]

 

The argument people are using is that WoT and SoT have a higher than usual number of very specific similarities - not just things that are generic within the fantasy genre, not just one or two very similar things but a lot of very similar, non-generic things.

Yes and I keep asking what those things are and then just get referred to old threads or ignored.

 

 

I posted quite a few on the previous page.

[Mr Ares]

 

Why would uniqueness matter?

Because if they are not unique then it follows no one is ripping off anyone, or rather everyone is "ripping off" each other.

It means SoT and WoT don't share 9999999 similarities it means SoT, WoT, and 999999 other series share those same similarities.

That doesn't follow. The idea of a magic sword, for example, isn't unique, but magic swords can take many forms, fulfil many roles - two different authors could use the same idea in very different ways. The problem is, people are seeing the Goodkind is using the same ideas in very similar ways.

 

The Worst Witch? Harry Potter? Straying outside epic fantasy, here - same genre, different subgenre.

Please. Are you really arguing that Harry Potter and WoT are too different to compare?

No, they can be compared, but the trappings of the two sub-genres are not the same. The common tropes of one genre or sub-genre are not necessarily common in another. So if you are straying outside the epic fantasy sub-genre for your examples, that indicates a tacit acceptance that this is not a common epic fantasy trope - one author using it is original, another? Could be, or could be derivative of the earlier one to use it.

 

And Harry Potter doesn't even have an all-female school.

Beauxbatons Academy of Magic.

Which has male pupils. Which, by definition, means it isn't all-female. (The film may not show any male pupils, but the books refer to them explicitly.)

 

The argument people are using is that WoT and SoT have a higher than usual number of very specific similarities - not just things that are generic within the fantasy genre, not just one or two very similar things but a lot of very similar, non-generic things.

Yes and I keep asking what those things are and then just get referred to old threads or ignored.

Well, given you ignore the examples that are given to you, and don't address the points that are put to you, then why should people put in any effort when debating with you?

 

More likely is that Goodkind copied from RJ. Plagiarism is, by its nature, difficult to define the parameters of, but there's no need to make it harder. There are similarities that go beyond the generic, and they are quite numerous. This is enough for us to be suspicious.

You're suspicious so he's guilty is the reasoning you're using here. I hope you can see how unfair that is.

It would be unfair if it was my point, but it isn't, so it's hardly relevant.

[Suttree]

 They are needlessly overspecific. No I'm not going to be able to find another series that has "male only magic controlling devices". Not many series even have gendered magic in the first place. I could probably find a device that controls a magic user, but men only? Probably not.  

 So you agree with our point that beyond generic tropes SoT/WoT share these very specific similarities and uses them in the same ways in the plot. That is our argument. It's not just a female order that dominates magic and the males being feared/controlled, gendered magic, magic controlling devices, but additionally many other things Agitel has listed. Now stop with the genric tropes and show us other series that have all these things and use them in the same way.  

 

 

Suttree: If you're using the same tropes it would follow that they are used generally in the same ways at the same times in a story.

 

 

If that even has the slightest shred of truth it should be very easy for you to do. It goes far beyond "generic tropes" and the more specific we get the more generic leaning your argument seems to become.

Edited May 2, 2013 by Suttree

[Nightstrike]

I haven't read any SoT books, but maybe some hate the books because the author is ... not in the same corner politically?  He is right leaning (I've heard so, anyway), and many DMers are left leaning. Love Marx, hate Rand - Ayn Rand, that is. Heh.

Edited May 5, 2013 by Nightstrike

[EmperorAllspice]

I just can't stand straw men in any way. I don't think RJ is immune to this concept (coughTheProphetcough) but it's what killed any interest I had in the SoT series before I even picked it up. The descriptions my friends gave of it near enough made me sick

[Mr Ares]

I haven't read any SoT books, but maybe some hate the books because the author is ... not in the same corner politically?  He is right leaning (I've heard so, anyway), and many DMers are left leaning. Love Marx, hate Rand - Ayn Rand, that is. Heh.

Wrong again. Still impressive how you refuse to allow anything from outside your own world-view to impact upon it. It's not that Goodkind favours Rand's philosophies, it's that he bludgeons people around the head with political strawmen that favour Rand's philosophies and condemn those who oppose her. And he's a bad writer, and he reuses his own plotlines, and he shamelessly rips off WoT, and his own obnoxious personality in the interviews he has given.

[Nightstrike]

I'm not convinced, especially since I've discussed Marx with several of you before. You've given me every reason to believe you love Marx and hate anything opposed to his ideas. I just ordered the first book in SoT, just so I can see what the fuss is about.

[Suttree]

I'm not convinced...

 Shocker.

 

Clearly nothing to do with the points made in thread concerning similarities or the fact that Goodkind mocked RJ when he was on his death bed. A marxist conspiracy is the obvious choice. Well done comrade.

Edited May 7, 2013 by Suttree

[shortkut]

I'm not convinced, especially since I've discussed Marx with several of you before. You've given me every reason to believe you love Marx and hate anything opposed to his ideas. I just ordered the first book in SoT, just so I can see what the fuss is about.

Of course we all love Groucho Marx. Why are you so surprised?

[Nightstrike]

Well, at least he better than Karl.

[Nightstrike]

Clearly nothing to do with the points made in thread concerning similarities or the fact that Goodkind mocked RJ when he was on his death bed. A marxist conspiracy is the obvious choice. Well done comrade.

 

What did he say? I've managed to miss that, but I haven't read Goodkind, so ...

[Suttree]

 

Clearly nothing to do with the points made in thread concerning similarities or the fact that Goodkind mocked RJ when he was on his death bed. A marxist conspiracy is the obvious choice. Well done comrade.

 

What did he say? I've managed to miss that, but I haven't read Goodkind, so ...

 

 

He mocked the health of RJ's heart compared to his own when RJ was dying. It was so bad Jordan was forced to address it in his last ever blog post.

 

I seem to feeling rather viperish today. I also hear that a certain writer, on hearing that I had heart problems, announced that his cardiologist, on holding his (the writer’s) heart in his hands said that he could have been holding the heart of a sixteen year-old or some such. My cardiologist told me much the same thing, but I made him give it back. Ahem. A question occurs. What was wrong that anyone had their filthy fingers palping his actual heat. All my heart examinations have been via catheritazation or electrocardiogram or echocardiogram or the like. Only if they saw cause would anyone be sticking fingers into my chest must less fingering my heart. Some discrepancy there, eh?

 

On, well. Down, Simba! Down, Big Boy. That’s what Harriet says when I get like this. Lets get on to something a little more pleasant.

 

Edited May 7, 2013 by Suttree

[Mr Ares]

I'm not convinced, especially since I've discussed Marx with several of you before. You've given me every reason to believe you love Marx and hate anything opposed to his ideas. I just ordered the first book in SoT, just so I can see what the fuss is about.

The first book isn't that political, most of the straw-manning comes later. The first book can be hated purely for its quality, with no need to drag Marxist conspiracy theories in.

[Agitel]

lol Night thinks I'm a Marxist.

 

I enjoyed SoT through the end of The Pillars of Creation despite its flaws (and I even felt Goodkind's prose improved a lot between the first and the second book). It jumped the shark after PoC. I felt Faith of the Fallen was even an interesting novel in the spirit of Ayn Rand that was a little overdone but definitely tolerable. The Naked Empire and the following books just became regurgitations of the same argument with long monologues, lots of contradictions, strawmen, and more than anything just plain redundant. I don't know why Goodkind felt the need for putting long-winded summaries of the same event multiple times in the same novel. It's like "dude, you can just reference it with a few sentences, maybe even a paragraph or two, I'll know what you mean, you already explained that just fifty pages ago in excessive detail." Then a couple hundred pages later he'll do it again, with the same excessiveness. Ugh . . .

 

And I read the series when I was in my Objectivist phase anyway. Goodkind doesn't deserve to be compared to Rand (I actually enjoyed The Fountainhead). The latter books are just horrid, even if you agree with the philosophy.

Edited May 9, 2013 by Agitel

[Nightstrike]

Everybody deny they are (in the D & D board), but ... Durinax, for instance, voted like a true conservative in the viable/desirable thread ... Not ...

 

I'll probably get the first book of SoT tomorrow. The package had been sent a couple of days ago. I ordered some other books, too, so it wasn't just because I was curious about SoT. Seems like Goodkind did sell a lot of books, not that that has any direct relationship with how anyone in particular might enjoy reading them. Recommendations are ... what do you say in english? "Hit and miss"? When one can not tell based on the premise of the recommendation. 

 

His comment about RJ's heart problems does seem very thoughtless and ill-considered. I can see why RJ might have taken offense. I probably would have, too. Hopefully it wasn't as ill intended as it came out ...

Edited May 9, 2013 by Nightstrike

[ChristianM]

I think they are fairly different in their styles. The youth saving the world theme is all over the literary world though. It's not really a unique concept when we get right down to it. I always preferred Wot to Sot anyway. Sot books are a hit or a miss, some are good, some are bad, and most are simply meh.

[Guest redacted]

Not here to argue, but I had to sign up just to register my rueful lol @ the specious (yet determined) 'defense' of Terry bloody Goodkind.

 

Terry Goodkind is, objectively, a hack. A terrible writer, and a plainly superficial mind.

 

Obviously he stole directly from Mr. Jordan. Obviously and inarguably. 'Sword of Truth' is 'Battle Beyond the Stars' to Jordan's 'Star Wars'

 

If one has even the barest shred of intellectual honesty (not to mention reading comprehension/retention skills) one cannot deny it.

 

Yes, it is entirely relevant that he is an incredibly disgusting human being.

 

Free of the constraints of personal honor, unrestrained by universally recognized ethical boundaries, and in thrall to a philosophy that both rewards and encourages base, self-serving behavior, of course he has no problem whatsoever denying the charge.

 

Liars do not lose sleep because they've lied. They're liars.

 

No thief can be considered a reliable witness to the crimes attributed to them. In this regard, a thief as common as Goodkind should be somewhere near the very bottom of anyone's list of credible arbiters.

 

The assertion that the overwhelming number of direct similarities between WoT and SoT are nothing more than happenstance - an almost random assortment of "many common fantasy tropes" - is the definition of sophistry. It is a laughably untenable line of defense; the "similarities" are flagrant and indisputable..

 

When one ignores the preponderance of evidence in favor of a position more personally palatable to it's adherents, objectivity necessarily comes into question.

 

There is no credible defense of Goodkind's thievery.

 

Among certain publishers, it is a notorious instance of outright conceptual plagiarism. Goodkind's work (and do please add sarcastic italics around that possessive 's') is a veritable 'how to' guide for those unscrupulous publishers who want to cash in on a successful concept when they do not hold the legal rights to that concept.

 

Galt - sorry, Goodkind - is a shameless hack, and he always will be. He wanted money, possibly acclaim, and didn't give two sh-ts how he accomplished that goal. Clearly there are more than a few that share his disinterest.

 

'Sword of Truth' is a poorly realized, ham-fisted, cheap, bargain bin knock-off of Wheel of Time. It is an egregious example of literary pilferage.

 

T'was ever thus.

 

 

 

 

[Suttree]

Amen

[trench]

*Full Disclosure, I have bashed Goodkind so many times I can not count them.*

 

My friend and I were discussing genre writing in general the other day, we eventual got around to Goodkind, I immediately launched into a hate speech. But my friend had another theory which proved interesting. Here goes:

 

Terry Goodkind is a master Satirist. Stephen Colbert has nothing on him and like Andy Kauffman he refuse to break character. No person in this world could possibly be as obtuse as Terry. Goodkind established Wizards first rule in the first book, "people fear what they believe to be true" Goodkind then has each and every character repeatedly prove the rule in every book that follows. This is not an accident, it is purposeful move on Goodkind's part to see who is paying attention. Goodkind establishes very early on that "The villain never thinks he is the villain", and Richard is this stories villain. His crimes are numerable through out the entire series, he literally tells his armies to quit fighting the battle, and go to the enemies homeland and destroy the innocent people who are just trying to live their lives for crying out loud, he mass murders pacifists, kicks a little girl in the jaw, the love of his life takes over her half-sisters kingdom and then when her half-brothers asks for the kingdom to no be involved in the coming struggles she kills him and threatens to throw her half sister back into the gang rape pit if she does not get in line. 

 

But this goes deeper, think back to Faith of the Fallen (yes I know it hurts). Richard builds a statue that embodies and represents all that is good in people, that just seeing this amazing statue will make the most evil of people see the light and become Objectivists. Except this statue has an inherent flaw in it, just like Objectivism. It may be nice to look at and think about, but if you probe deeper it falls apart like hitting it with a hammer. Goodkinds own views on Objectivism are skewed so far that many Objectivists say that Goodkind does not understand what Rand wrote, that is because he is constantly skewering it, just very subtlety. 

 

At one point our "Hero" tires to win an election against the supposed villains. He loses narrowly, nearly half the people in this country agree with him and want to follow him, but since he lost, what does he do, try to help the people on his side? Invite them to his country to live as he says is best? Nope, he abandons not only them but every person in the world, because he feels they are no longer worthy of him, One set back and our "Hero" quits on humanity.

 

There are a group of people in his world that have no magic, and can threaten the fabric of reality or something, another ancient wizard locks them away in their own land so they can not threaten creation, Richard frees them, but decides that since they are pacifists they deserve to be locked away for all time, at the end of the series, he does exactly that, anyone who does not agree with Lord Rahl, gets thrown out of Lord Rahl's world. This is our hero? 

 

But Goodkind is also a character. Everyone has heard that he says he does not write fantasy books, but his books use every fantasy trope there is, he actively ape's RJ and WOT at every turn, at the time when Goodkind made this statement RJ was the biggest name in fantasy, an author he is actively aping, who is the biggest name in fantasy, and Goodkind says he does not write fantasy? It is just impossible to be that obtuse unless you are trying to be. My friend lays it our better then I do, but it was a very compelling argument he made. 

 

So Goodkind may be the worlds biggest jerk, or he may have conned an entire genre into thinking he is a nut job and he sits at home counting his money and laughing up his sleeves.  

[Mr Ares]

Terry Goodkind is a master Satirist. Stephen Colbert has nothing on him and like Andy Kauffman he refuse to break character. No person in this world could possibly be as obtuse as Terry.

I hate to skewer your optimism, but they really, really can. And that's where your friend's theory falls apart - it could be a parody so subtle no-one realises it's a parody, or it could be the real thing, but if the parody is indistinguishable from the work of a genuine hack then on what basis is it claimed to be a parody? While Goodkind might be a popular whipping boy, he is hardly the only example of the terrible standard he is known for. Others share his every fault - are they all master satirists themselves? And who are they satirising? Well, as it stands, themselves.

 

So Goodkind may be the worlds biggest jerk, or he may have conned an entire genre into thinking he is a nut job and he sits at home counting his money and laughing up his sleeves.

So he has conned the world. To what end? He got his contract for fantasy books, they didn't require that it be a parody of the bad fantasy exemplified by Terry Goodkind, he didn't become successful as a comedian or satirist. The people who brought his books didn't do so with the understanding of him being a parodist, they did so with the understanding of him being dead straight. So he is mocking who? The people who made him rich? Seems like he still qualifies as a jerk either way.

 

Lastly, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence - what suggests that SoT is a parody of whatever it is it's meant to be parodying, as opposed to merely being the work of an unpleasant, arrogant, Swedish grandmother-hating git?

Edited May 23, 2013 by Mr Ares

[Orderofolde]

Well, in my country the first three volumes of Goodkind's SoT were translated and published before tEoTW (in late 1998). I thought that Goodkind's work is... well,... acceptable, maybe. Then I started reading WoT and although the writing was so much better, I thought that Jordan is stealing from Goodkind. Until I looked at the release dates on the first pages

The result was that I never read SoT after book 3

Didn't you know that there are paperback releases of one of the early books showing Robert Jordan as the copyright holder?  It's very rare and costs a lot because they pulled them.  Btw,  they both use the same publisher which wouldn't handle an author that was suspected of ripping off the books.  I mean, take RJ, he could references Tolkein in his interviews and admits to wanting to write something where the old wise wizard didn't have such an easy time leading some young hero off on a quest.