History Headscratchers / TheBelgariad

* Isn't Polgara's treatment of Garion in ''The Queen of Sorcery'' firmly in {{Abusive Parents}} territory? After her ward kills a man in a pretty terrible way and is traumatised by it, Polgara starts pretending that his given name isn't really his name with no further explanation. Then she starts to telepathically deliver smug advice to him and tamper with his mind (making him write "Belgarion" instead of his real name when Ce'Nedra is teaching him to write). Not to mention that previously when Durnik, a grown-ass man, had a similar incident of killing a man for the first time and was very distraught by it, Polgara behaved very differently.
** Not to say Polgara's behavior around Garion at this time is correct, but there are several things wrong with this statement and several points to consider. First, Polgara's (and the others') main concern is that Garion does not want to learn how to control his magic, which is ''extremely'' dangerous--many sorcerers in this series have accidentally unmade themselves because they didn't know any better. And these concerns are shared with Garion, by the way. Telepathically invading his mind and calling him "Belgarion" are her trying getting him to accept his destiny and learn to control his magic after his refusal to do so (again, not saying it was right of her). Second, Asharak murdered Garion's parents, who Polgara had also watched over, so [[ItsPersonal she would naturally feel pretty righteous and unsympathetic about his death]], versus the {{Mook}} Durnik killed. Overall, the situation is both a highly personal one to Polgara and one where her nephew is unnecessarily endangering himself and everyone around him, [[ParentsAsPeople and those are the things she focuses on more than his trauma from burning Asharak alive]].
*** She is still going beyond tough love and beyond harsh and into pure abusive. We've a sixteen year old boy, still more boyish than man, who she kept ignorant his entire life, who was raised in sensible Sendarian mannerisms and she treats him like a five year old sometimes and a manchild other times. It had not been more than a few hours after he first killed a man that she's already berating him and pestering him for being melancholy over it. She controls every aspect of his life, regardless what he wanted. Items that did not depend on the supposed prophecy, such as shaving his own face, she immediately decides for him without any discussion. She is the very definition of a helicopter parent who doesn't allow their child to do anything without them being present. I honestly was surprised she let him wipe himself.

* If one assumed to have read ''Polgara the Sorceress'', as maybe this is discussed there, but something that's always gets in ''Pawn of Prophecy'' is how, in Val Alorn, Polgara just destroys Martje's ability to see the future so casually and in such a high-handed manner. It's a serious case of her being arrogant. Suppose it's a good example of a character flaw, which most good characters need, but... We wish we had seen the consequences, or something, anything that resulted from that. Besides further establishing Polgara as incredibly arrogant, the act seems worthless.

*** The above. Remember, Martje isn't just harassing Barak about his "doom", she's twice now directly addressed Garion as if he were a king and is standing in a literal public square in front of anyone listening (and we JUST got rid of Chereks who were directly working with the enemy, so it's not like it's guaranteed to be friendly ears only) blabbing about his "inheritance.' For all Polgara's kept him under wraps, it doesn't take much for people familiar with the prophecy to put two and two together--Anheg, remember, just did and makes it clear to Polgara and Belgarath that he knows who Garion is. Even if there isn't a Murgo spy for a hundred miles in any direction, Cherek are sailors and sailors talk. Ever yammering about Barak's "doom" could be dangerous to the wrong ears, since he's singled out in the Prophecies as the Dreadful Bear. It wasn't nice, but since they couldn't force Martje to keep her mouth shut, it was necessary.
* One thing that's confusing in Pawn of Prophecy specifically and to a lesser extent in the others extent is how Polgara is on a first name relationship with the queens. She'd been undercover for nearly fifteen years raising Garion. Would she have even had a chance to even meet some of them?

* In Polgara the Sorceress, Polgara mentions early on that she had to hide her signature white lock of hair with a bow so no one could recognize her. So why didn't she do that throughout the whole time hiding the heirs. It can't have been difficult to just put a bow in her hair every time she had to go outside

** Further on that lots of white ribbons hairstyle: for most of her stint raising/bodyguarding the Rivan line, Polgara was usually in villages or small towns. Ribbon is a ''luxury'' item in such places, especially in a colour like white, and so is the time needed to make elaborate hairstyles like that. Constantly walking around with a hairstyle like that would be considered grand-level showing off; exactly the sort of thing that breeds dangerous resentment, or gets you noticed and remembered. Polgara spent all those several thousand years being as ''inconspicuous'' as possible.

*** But given even in the REAL world, taking dark hair white/gray/blond is incredibly difficult, why wouldn't the same restrictions apply to trying to turn black hair platinum? Polgara would still have to change every strand, and focus on keeping it pale. Throw in that Aldur himself apparently changed her in the womb from being an identical blonde twin to Beldaran, meaning her dark hair is a literal act of god, trying to change it may have taken more energy than she could spare.

*** She is still going beyond tough love and beyond harsh and into pure abusive. We've a sixteen year old boy, still more boyish than man, who she kept ignorant his entire life, who was raised in sensible Sendarian mannerisms and she treats him like a five year old sometimes and a manchild other times. It had not been more than a few hours after he first killed a man that she's already berating him and pestering him for being melancholy over it. She controls every aspect of his life, regardless what he wanted. Items that did not depend on the supposed prophecy, such as shaving his own face, she immediately decides for him without any discussion. She is the very definition of a helicopter parent who doesn't allow their child to do anythin without them being present. I honestly was surprised she let him wipe himself.

*** ''Belgarath the Sorcerer'' gives a great deal of context to the entire backstory with Aldur's disciples, and spells out just why Zedar's actions were so inexcusable. Belgarath never claims to be a saint but he ''does'' deeply regret that whole situation and wishes he could have stopped it from ever escalating that far (he even goes so far as to admit he probably shouldn't blame Zedar for his actions, BecauseDestinySaysSo, though plain old human weakness gets to him). That said, where these [[RonTheDeathEater Belgarath the Death-Eater]] arguments fall flat is that Aldur's disciples live almost in an ''entirely different world'' because of their roles as the {{Chosen One}}s. They really are [[CompletelyMissingThePoint the Center of the World]], as instruments of the Light Prophecy--right along with the Dark Prophecy's RoguesGallery. That's the one of the major points of the series, the whole story revolves around their dueling, eons-long {{plan}}s. Belgarath freely cops to his {{Jerkass}} tendencies all throughout the books, and says point blank that GoodIsNotNice because it can't ''afford'' to be; being driven by Necessity inherently means being somewhat of a MagnificentBastard at times, and you have to harden yourself on some level to be able to do your job properly (those who still lambaste Polgara for refusing to coddle Garion, take note.). Not only that, sorcerers' immortality means they relate to each other on a far deeper level than ordinary people do, particularly Aldur's disciples. They'd been a family for thousands of years, and lived through all kinds of traumas, including their Master's grief over being betrayed by His brother, countless wars (the original cracking of the world foremost among them), and so on. They'd already lost two brothers to suicide, and it's heavily implied that Belmakor caught onto Zedar's [[TheMole Mole turn]] before the rest of them, contributing to the depression that ultimately killed him. Given all of this, it becomes much clearer just how deeply Zedar's betrayal affected them all, but none so great as Belgarath, who was the eldest of them all and who clearly was still carrying several eons worth of survivor's guilt with him despite appearances. Belgarath himself notes the intensity of their bonds in his book, when he discusses the aftermath of Belsambar's suicide. Combine that with the above point about people having a tendency to go nuts during [=EVENTs=] and it starts to become blindingly obvious what Belgarath was going through during that final confrontation.

** Not to say Polgara's behavior around Garion at this time is correct, but there are several things wrong with this statement and several points to consider. First, Polgara's (and the others') main concern is that Garion does not want to learn how to control his magic, which is ''extremely'' dangerous--many sorcerers in this series have accidentally unmade themselves because they didn't know any better. And these concerns are shared with Garion, by the way. Telepathically invading his mind and calling him "Belgarion" are her trying getting him to accept his destiny and learn to control his magic after his refusal to do so (again, not saying it was right of her). Second, Asharak murdered Garion's parents, who Polgara had also watched over, so [[ItsPersonal she would naturally feel pretty righteous and unsympathetic about his death]], versus the {{Mook}} Durnik killed. Overall, the situation is both a highly personal one to Polgara and one where her nephew is unnecessarily endgaring himself and everyone around him, [[ParentsAsPeople and those are the things she focuses on more than his trauma from burning Asharak alive]].

Polgara and Ce'Nedra are supposed to be strong, confident, powerful women who stand out in a world where women aren't generally viewed as such. OK, fine. The problem is that they come off as something quite different. Polgara comes off as strict, controlling, always certain she's in the right, unable to take any criticism and something of a bitch, and no one ever calls her out on it (OK, there was that one time in ''Queen of Sorcery'', but then she turned around and gave a Garion a TheReasonYouSuckSpeech right afterwards.) Ce'Nedra is a spoiled brat who never thinks of the consequences of her actions and puts herself above everyone else and gets called out occasionally, but otherwise, everyone pretty much does whatever they say and don't argue. That bugs almost anyone, because half the time when one reading the books, one could keep wishing that someone would stand up and give them a [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech pep talk.]]
* It makes sense that no one really talks back to Polgara considering that she's a essentially disciple of a ''god''. It would be like giving lip to Moses or something. Ce'Nedra, on the other hand, seems to receive an awful amount of tolerance from such no nonsense people. Silk is a veritable wellspring of snide remarks - you would think he would have a few for Ce'Nedra. As it is, Garion's the only one who ever really argues with her, and everyone else seems to put that down as teenage bickering.
*** It might be worth noting on that point that when Ce'Nedra initially joins the group, Silk is the only person (other than Polgara, who outright threatened her) that she is remotely intimidated by. It's explicitly stated that she consciously avoids him because she's afraid he can "read her like a book".
** Ce'Nedra's tantrum victims generally fall into three categories: Tolnedrans (who suffer in silence because she is their Imperial Princess and Tolnedra is a place where social precedence ''matters'', not to mention that her father has the power of summary execution), Rivans (who are much less subservient to authority but also come from a culture where stoicism is one of the highest virtues and thus won't give her the satisfaction of reacting, plus she's queen of the place), and her fellow protagonists (who don't hesitate to put her in her place if they think she's going too far, and just laugh it off the rest of the time because they find Ce'Nedra about as intimidating as a newborn kitten).
*** The protagonists (bar Durnik and Garion) have a ongoing need to keep her on side and on prophecy, if they start ragging her too much she may try to run away (again) and while they can catch her again while this is a minor irritation it would alienate her from The Cause
*** The most frequent victim of Ce'Nedras tantrums, usually through no fault of his own, is Garion and the problem is that this is treated as something he just has to deal with and not as horrible behavior on the part of Ce'Nedra. The worst moments come during Castle of Wizardry, when Ce'Nedra shows every intention of making Garions life miserable because he suddenly outranks her and she doesn't know how to deal with that. Let us remember that this turn of events is in no way Garions fault and he seems to be just as upset by it. The solution? The purpose of the universe advises Garion to play along with Ce'Nedras egomania by making her his equal and in the process sets him up as a HenpeckedHusband in their relationship. When this doesn't end her bitching, it is pointed out to Garion that Ce'Nedra doesn't like being forced to doing things and there is no-one else for her to take her anger out on so Garion must suffer. This is once again treated as acceptable behavior by everyone in-universe and Garion decides to solve the problem by playing into her sadism by suffering more visibly. This has some very {{Unfortunate Implications}} because it shows that Ce'Nedra is motivated more by sadistic impulses than any need to sort out her feelings. She doesn't like the situation she's in so she must make someone else suffer to make up for that and given Garions revelation that it might go by faster if he suffered more visibly, it seems obvious that her primary motivation is seeing someone else suffer, not needing time to sort out her own crap. Given that Garion has a lot on his plate, what with learning how to rule a kingdom and half a continent in addition to little things like fighting Gods, one has to wonder why the purpose of the universe chooses to punish him with an abusive marriage to a sadistic and egotistical wife.
*** Keep in mind that Garion actually finds Ce'Nedra's petulance adorable and (eventually) doesn't mind taking on the role of {{Henpecked Husband}}. As described in ''Guardians of the West'', they have a rocky start to their relationship but manage to smooth things out with a little help from their friends.
*** Except that they're both barely 16 when they get married. Teenagers can be pretty horrible to themselves and everyone around them, even without the wringer that both Garion and Ce'Nedra are put through. Both grow up, both lose their respective immaturity (we just see it better with Garion because he's more often a viewpoint character). In doing so, Ce'Nedra grows out of her more problematic aspects, and she and Garion, a bumpy patch or two aside, end up very HappilyMarried.
** Additionally, Ce'Nedra's main talent seems to be manipulating people - she's often described as devious, for example. However, this is mainly an InformedAbility. The protagonists all see through her, and someone who ''should'' know how to tell a decent lie does a woeful job when she runs away from the palace. She should know better than to keep changing her story, at least.
*** FridgeBrilliance(?) - Tolnedrans are, generally, portrayed as not very bright, at least when it comes to things not related to money (and even then, look at what happened to Maragor). So it would make sense for her to be able to ''seem'' like a champion liar to Tolnedrans. If it helps, Mandorellen and even ''Garion'' seem to fall for it, and the latter at least had the benefit of Belgarath around to teach him how to lie, plus Jeebers got out of there pretty damn fast once they were found out, AND fell for Ce'Nedra's previous incredibly obvious lie.
* It bothers that the women always get the last word in any bickering/snarkfest. If they're trading witty barbs, the women will win. Polgara and the queens are especially bad at this. Smug little twerps.
** On the author's behalf, this was probably to make up for the fact that the women weren't usually fighters, and it would have been easy for them to come off as damsels. It's still annoying when the men are reduced to idiots for no good reason.
** What's a headscratcher is that conversation about the tree in the woods. The women said that yes, it's still a sound, which is fine ... but their answers were stupid and missing the point. There's a much ''better'' answer. If Polgara had said "Yes, because a sound is simply vibrations in the air caused by the tree hitting the ground, and those vibrations will occur whether or not there is anything to hear them. If you think it shouldn't be called a sound unless there's someone to hear it, then you are discussing semantics, not physics." One don't mind the women winning the arguments, ''so long as they earn their victories.'' In this case, they really didn't. "Trees can hear, too," ''honestly''. It's a ''hypothetical'' situation. That's got nothing to do with it.
*** Durnik had already been arguing the fact that a sound is a sound. Beldin wasn't taking any of it, so it fell on the one who talks with birds and the one who talks with trees to present the facts that small critters, birds, and trees can all hear sounds too. Also, you seem to be forgetting that the world of The Belgariad and The Mallorean is basically Medieval times. Even if the Melcenes had discovered what is now common knowledge regarding the physics of sound, it is unlikely anyone else would know or care about it, especially when you factor in most of the Kingdoms of the West lumping all of Mallorea under the same heading as the Murgos, Nadraks, and Thulls.
*** The point is that the question is hypothetical and the whole premise is that there is no-one to hear the sound. So the question is “Is sound still sound if no-one hears it?”. The oh-so-wise womenfolk answer the question by saying that trees and birds can hear too. That is not an answer to the question, they are just changing the question, making their contribution to the conversation utterly irrelevant. This should be treated as sheer idiocy, which it is, rather than an intelligent answer, which it's not.
** The books themselves were written in the late 80's/early 90's when the tropes revolving around the lady of the house always getting her way and women being wiser and the menfolk all being semi-literate apes were both common and popular comedic fodder for both sitcoms and stand-up comedy, they simply look bad now because those tropes have started falling out of favor. Compare them to the tropes they themselves supplanted of women being imbeciles who regularly needed a man to point-out and correct their silly notions even in areas they were considered to have full responsibility for and competence with.
** Doesn't help their case when Garion, Silk and Belgarath sneak out to go fight Torak, Polgara and Ce'Nedra's reaction is to start throwing things and threatening people like two year olds who were told they couldn't go to the park.
*** Polgara's infuriated and frustrated for a number of reasons, one of which is that she ''has'' to be present at the final conflict with Torak - Belgarath's move could have derailed the entire Prophecy (it didn't, obviously, but it's an understandable leap at first glance). As for Ce'Nedra, yeah, she's being a bit petulant, but she's frustrated and hot-tempered and can't really do much about it.
* Polgara the Sorceress shows the genesis of her attitude, and demonstrates that a fair amount of it is false. She's quite content with her father, her ragging on him is a sort of game they play together. Her dominant posture over everyone else stems from her knowledge of the prophecies and her own (immense) power, sure, but it derives even more from her private identification with her mother's wolfish heritage. She's the Alpha and it's important for her to assert that. When the chips are down, she doesn't stand back and let the men do all the work, she's right in there with them, and ''is'' an excellent example of a confident woman.
** Perhaps, but the protagonists ''are'' human (and so are the readers!), and by human standards she's just bossy.
*** Yes, but you wouldn't tell her so. Ce'Nedra should have been taken down a notch or three, but Polgara is really the only one who can, and for all we know, she does.
*** True, but why do ''we'' have to put up with them?
* What always bugging was that bit in ''Queen of Sorcery'' where Ce'Nedra was teaching Garion to read. Polgara sees them and tells Garion to pay attention, because knowledge was important and he should learn as much as he can. Well, uh...if she thought learning to read was so important, ''why didn't she teach him before that?''

* In Polgara the Sorceress, Polgara mentions early on that she had to hide her signature white lock of hair with a bow so no one could recognise her. So why didn't she do that throughout the whole time hiding the heirs. It can't have been difficult to just put a bow in her hair every time she had to go outside

* Not only does Polgara seem controlling and bitchy in The Belgariad, but that her treatment of Garion in The Queen of Sorcery is firmly in {{Abusive Parents}} territory. After her ward murders a man in a pretty terrible way and is traumatised by it, Polgara starts pretending that his given name isn't really his name with no further explanation. Then she starts to telepathically deliver smug advice to him and tamper with his mind (making him write "Belgarion" instead of his real name when Ce'Nedra is teaching him to write). Not to mention that previously when Durnik, a grown-ass man, had a similar incident of killing a man for the first time and was very distraught by it, Polgara behaved very differently. Imagine all this from Garion's perspective; that's some FridgeHorror right there. No wonder Eddings retconned a lot of Polgara's character in the prequels.
** This can finally be explained as of 2020. The reason the authors blithely write Polgara as being emotionally and psychologically abusive without anyone calling her out on it is that they actually believed abusive parenting was correct in RealLife. This isn’t hyperbole, both of them were convicted of child abuse and did prison time, and this was in TheSixties when allegations of child abuse were taken far less seriously and it was far harder to get them investigated, much less for charges to be filed and convictions to result, so the abuse had to have been egregious. The authors obviously believed that children and teenagers didn’t have rights or deserve consideration and authority figures were justified in dishing out any amount of abuse for any arbitrary reason and that bled into the books they wrote.

In this as well as in other works of Eddings the brutal punishments dished out to bad guys. For example, what Belgarath did to Zedar which was implied would go on forever? that's just not cool, especially when it's never pointed out as being problematic in the text at all.

* As for Beldin, note that he was the one who guarded Torak's slumbering body against premature awakening for the entire duration between his defeat at Vo Mimbre and the start of the Belgariad. Also, Belgarath called on him for support several times, or to check things out in one part of the world while he was busy in another.

*** There a thought it was actually transforming, especially since that's the subtly stated/heavily implied answer as to why Polgara looks young while Belgarath looks old, that the sorcerers could subconsciously choose their appearances. But even if they can't actually transform and Belgarath was only using illusions, the same answer would apply to "why didn't Beldin cast an illusion of himself as a more attractive man?". Because it would have been lying, and he's too blunt and too defiant to cave to others' expectations.

Polgara and Ce'Nedra are supposed to be strong, confident, powerful women who stand out in a world where women aren't generally viewed as such. OK, fine. The problem is that they come off as something quite different. Polgara comes off as strict, controlling, always certain she's in the right, unable to take any criticism and something of a bitch, and no one ever calls her out on it (OK, there was that one time in ''Queen of Sorcery'', but then she turned around and gave a Garion a TheReasonYouSuckSpeech right afterwards.) Ce'Nedra is a spoiled brat who never thinks of the consequences of her actions and puts herself above everyone else and gets called out occasionally, but otherwise, everyone pretty much does whatever they say and don't argue. That bugs almost anyone, because half the time when one reading the books, one could keep wishing that someone would stand up and give them a [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech Reason You Suck Speech.]]

In a world where sorcerers can transmute living creatures into something else, and sometimes even create things from thin air, they spend a great deal of time pitying the only remaining dragon yet not creating a mate for her and claiming they can't do anything for. One do not recall at any point in the story the Gods forbidding another dragon from being made for her to mate with. Hell, Sorcerers can transform into other creatures. Some Grolim didn't think they could get on Torak's good side by repopulating the world with Dragons?

*** He lampshades this himself in his memoirs, but simply says that he disregarded it as unimportant, same as when he began his relationship with Poledra, and it was pretty obvious who she really was. Belgarath knew, he just didnt see fit to vocalize his thoughts.

** Did Belgarath ever actually take a human form? I'm pretty sure he used illusions to make himself look different, and Beldin did as well, but I don't think anyone ever actually transformed into another human.

*** I thought it was actually transforming, especially since that's the subtly stated/heavily implied answer as to why Polgara looks young while Belgarath looks old, that the sorcerers could subconsciously choose their appearances. But even if they can't actually transform and Belgarath was only using illusions, the same answer would apply to "why didn't Beldin cast an illusion of himself as a more attractive man?". Because it would have been lying, and he's too blunt and too defiant to cave to others' expectations.

*** ''"Asharak snarled and struck the bowman a crushing blow to the side of the head. The bowman fell twitching to the stone floor."'' Hardly evidence by itself, but it also supports the theory, one has never actually tested it, she assumes you would have to be pretty strong to do that to an armoured Cherek warrior (do they wear helmets?) and the choice in language implies the same.

*** Here's a thought: why doesn't she change the colour of the rest of her hair, instead? The lock wouldn't be nearly so suspicious when combined with white-blonde hair instead. I'm sure even Polgara would agree that the safety of the Rivan line is more important than any personal ego issues she may have about changing her appearance. Of course, logic exists in the Belgariad-verse only when Eddings thinks he can make it do something for him.
** Actually the books do mention that it's difficult to magically alter your hair color because you need to focus on each strand. EVERY STRAND. I don't blame her for not being thrilled at the thought.

* Why did Beldin transform him and his new... wife? into a hawk at the end of the Malloreon? Why would they never see them again? What was the point of that part of the story? Were they incapable of having a fufilling relationship without forever forsaking their human forms and cutting every relationship they ever had forever? That is something that annoyed me that Eddings ended his works with such asspulling actions, with no rime or background.
** I think it was because what really attracted Vella to Beldin was that he could fly. Turning them both into hawks worked because Beldin wouldn't be ugly and Vella would get to fly again. As for why they were never seen again- they probably lived as hawks for the rest of their lives and weren't easy to find.
* I believe he answers this in the book: he prefers to stay ugly because people underestimate him. They don't expect him to be as brilliant as he is. Plus, people are much less likely to notice him.

* It is stated in (I think) the same general area of text as their human-to-hawk transformation that the animal forms they take when they change shape immediately (albeit slowly) begin to take over their awareness. This is supported by Garion's numerous transformations into the forms of both a wolf and a falcon (at Kell?) and his associated distraction by the form's idiosyncrasies and peculiarities. If they never changed back from their hawk form eventually neither of them would ever remember having been human, a sorcerer, their companions and loved ones, or (presumably) anything they had done during the entire course of the books. Taken in that light their choice makes even less sense than it did before, especially given Beldin's own certain knowledge that this would be the case!

** Remember, the bad guys have their own prophecy too, and it's just as powerful and accurate as the good guys'. The prophecy and the dark prophecy have been at it for milennia with each trying to become the sole destiny of the universe- the things in, say, the Mrin Codex therefore aren't absolutely perfect predictions of what will happen no matter what, they're checklists of what has to be accomplished if the Light wants to win. At least, that was always my take on it.
*** That was my interpretation as well; we're following one side of the equation, watching as their prophecies are fulfilled. What we don't get to see is the bad guys running around fulfilling their prophecies, or watching them go up in smoke.

*** Not only does the other side have their own prophecies, it's hinted in (I believe) Belgarath the Sorcerer that the prophecies only reveal details when they're necessary. This lets the two sides react to victories and losses and alter their plans accordingly. Given the chess motif of the whole series, it's not a stretch to say that some of the events as they happen in the novels were not in the Light Prophecy's original plans and had to be changed as a result of the Dark Prophecy winning an [=EVENT=] offscreen.

** I always took it that if Torak had won at the end of the Belgariad, Geran would still have to come into existance. The Dark Prophecy would know that the final meeting needed Eriond and Geran, therefore it would make sure that Geran would still be born so he could play his part.

* Re-read The Mallorean, specifically the last chapter of Melcena in Book 4: Torak leaves a message for Belgarion at the end of The Ashabine Chronicles that pretty much makes it clear that, had Belgarion failed, ''Torak'' would have been the new Child of Light, with Polgara as his wife and either Belgarion or [[spoiler:Errand/Eriond]] becoming their "son".

*** On the other hand, Garion is given to understand (I don't recall which book- it's the very first time Garion learns he may have to kill Geran) that Torak passes the torch of duty to stop Zandramas' quest to his "hated brother" Garion in the sequence of Events that led to the Choice. Had Garion lost at Cthol Mishrak he would have been dead and no child between himself and Ce'Nedra would ever have been born (it was stated repeatedly that the meeting at Cthol Misrak was a fight to the death). In that case Torak would have remained the Child of Dark and it's possible, and given the perverse sense of humor of both Prophecies even intended, that the child born of a union between himself and Polgara would have been the Child of Light (Torak would have remained the Child of Dark and it's implied elsewhere that that never changes). This idea is supported by the knowledge among the Dals that Cyradis' choice was a choice between the Light and the Dark, which implies that a Child of Light must exist at that later date regardless of Garion's success or failure at the City of Endless Night.

Polgara and Ce'Nedra are supposed to be strong, confident, powerful women who stand out in a world where women aren't generally viewed as such. OK, fine. The problem is that they come off as something quite different. Polgara comes off as strict, controlling, always certain she's in the right, unable to take any criticism and something of a bitch, and no one ever calls her out on it (OK, there was that one time in ''Queen of Sorcery'', but then she turned around and gave a Garion a TheReasonYouSuckSpeech right afterwards.) Ce'Nedra is a spoiled brat who never thinks of the consequences of her actions and puts herself above everyone else and gets called out occasionally, but otherwise, everyone pretty much does whatever they say and don't argue. That bugs me, because half the time when I'm reading the books I keep wishing that someone would stand up and give them a [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech Reason You Suck Speech.]]

* It bothers me that the women always get the last word in any bickering/snarkfest. If they're trading witty barbs, the women will win. Polgara and the queens are especially bad at this. Smug little twerps.

** What bugs ''me'' is that conversation about the tree in the woods. The women said that yes, it's still a sound, which is fine ... but their answers were stupid and missing the point. There's a much ''better'' answer. If Polgara had said "Yes, because a sound is simply vibrations in the air caused by the tree hitting the ground, and those vibrations will occur whether or not there is anything to hear them. If you think it shouldn't be called a sound unless there's someone to hear it, then you are discussing semantics, not physics." I don't mind the women winning the arguments, ''so long as they earn their victories.'' In this case, they really didn't. "Trees can hear, too," ''honestly''. It's a ''hypothetical'' situation. That's got nothing to do with it.

* What always bugged me was that bit in ''Queen of Sorcery'' where Ce'Nedra was teaching Garion to read. Polgara sees them and tells Garion to pay attention, because knowledge was important and he should learn as much as he can. Well, uh...if she thought learning to read was so important, ''why didn't she teach him before that?''

* I haven't read ''Polgara the Sorceress'', so maybe this is discussed there, but something that's always gotten to me in ''Pawn of Prophecy'' is how, in Val Alorn, Polgara just destroys Martje's ability to see the future so casually and in such a high-handed manner. It's a serious case of her being arrogant. I suppose it's a good example of a character flaw, which most good characters need, but... I wish we had seen the consequences, or something, anything that resulted from that. Besides further establishing Polgara as incredibly arrogant, the act seems worthless.
** I agree. It's a serious case of ProtagonistCenteredMorality - Martje might have been annoying, and she shouldn't have kept harassing Barak, but that's no excuse for Polgara to just fuck her over like that. (BTW, no, it's not mentioned in ''Polgara the Sorceress''- the book ends before ''Pawn of Prophecy''.)
** If I'm not mistaken, Garion reacts to this event pretty negatively. It's one of the things he mulls over at the beginning of the next book when he's dealing with the isolation that comes with learning that both Polgara and Belgarath aren't the "Aunt Pol" and "Mister Wolf" he grew up with. Polgara is a callous person from time to time, but I think that comes from thousands of years of watching loved ones and family members die and being forced to harden her heart in the name of the mission.
** As I recall, Martje had just noticed Garion and was about to blow his cover, tell all about his role in the prophecy. So curing Martje may have been cruel, but necessary.
* One thing that confuses me in Pawn of Prophecy specifically and to a lesser extent in the others extent is how Polgara is on a first name relationship with the queens. She'd been undercover for nearly fifteen years raising Garion. Would she have even had a chance to even meet some of them?

* Not only does Polgara seem controlling and bitchy in The Belgariad, but I'd say that her treatment of Garion in The Queen of Sorcery is firmly in {{Abusive Parents}} territory. After her ward murders a man in a pretty terrible way and is traumatised by it, Polgara starts pretending that his given name isn't really his name with no further explanation. Then she starts to telepathically deliver smug advice to him and tamper with his mind (making him write "Belgarion" instead of his real name when Ce'Nedra is teaching him to write). Not to mention that previously when Durnik, a grown-ass man, had a similar incident of killing a man for the first time and was very distraught by it, Polgara behaved very differently. Imagine all this from Garion's perspective; that's some FridgeHorror right there. No wonder Eddings retconned a lot of Polgara's character in the prequels.

*** Two easy answers: The half is metaphorical - Yaska is the Light Half, Sardius is the Dark Half. Or the polishing process Aldur put it through condensed it. The Sardius was relatively untouched. I tend to lean toward the former.
*** I always thought that maybe the Orb was the 'heart' of the whole stone, and the Sardion was the hollow exterior. They are magic stones, we wouldn't necessarily have to see a hole in the Sardion.

* The only part the Orb played was that it was one of few things in the Universe able to actually wound a god. If UL or the Universe created a super-powered thorn which would be able to scratch the gods, they still wouldn't heal. No matter how much healing magic you throw at the gods, they just won't heal. Period. And, I didn't see much, if any, healing magic in the books, anyway.

** Thank you. Thank you. THANK YOU! I have, no joke, read the ''Belgariad'' and the ''Malloreon'' more than thirty times, but never once put together Belksambar and Belmakor's particular significance with respect to specific theaters of the War of the Gods. That makes such great sense now!

* There is a quote floating around from Belgarath about Zedar. Something along the lines of "Every once in a while I feel guilty, but then one remembers all the horrible things he did." And to remember correctly, Garion has nightmares about how he burned his parents' murderer alive. I agree that it seems brutal to our society, but it's probably less so for a medieval-esque society that's been engaged in divine warfare for a few hundred centuries.

** One thing that has always struck this one about Belgarath is his ability to commit unthinkable crimes in furtherance of his divine mission. There's a scene in ''Demon Lord of Karanda'' where he and Silk waylay and butcher a few townspeople just to get regional dress to move around in. It makes an interesting point to me, since I'm also an author (not to the scale of the Eddingses): if the fate of the universe were at stake, how far would YOU go?

* Still, in difficulty sympathising with the characters a lot of the time, because their extreme ProtagonistCenteredMorality effectively alienated them. And since she's here, she'll mention Beldin. Everyone ''says'' that he's actually very gentle - but he's one of the most violent and vindictive of the 'good guys'. ''He thinks Zedar got off too easy'' (It falls into the 'feels sorry for Zedar' camp). One is supposed to believe he's a sweet and caring guy? One sees why he became that way, sure, but... ''get real''.

** Which doesn't help me any, since I ''haven't'' known Beldin and Zedar for eons, and I'm being told this stuff by people whose own morality (or rather, the lack thereof) is also alienating me. ''Their'' opinions about Beldin may be justified, or at least understandable, but I can't share them and that limits how much I can sympathise. I do enjoy the books, but often when I'm reading them I find myself wanting to shake the characters and scream "It's not all about you! Other people matter! Just because you don't personally know and like someone, doesn't mean they're not important! YOU AREN'T THE CENTRE OF THE WORLD!" Also, what Belgarath did to Zedar was both stupid and unnecessary. Kill him, sure; it's impractical to leave one of your greatest enemies around to stab you in the back (though I don't think Zedar would have bothered unless Torak told him to, and he probably would've been quite relieved if the boss kicked it). It was vengeance, pure and simple, for a murder of a guy who was asking for it, which he regretted. A guy who ''didn't even stay dead.'' Yes, in-story it was revenge for a whole heap of other stuff as well, but nothing that we the audience get to see. Which means that he hasn't really done enough for us (or me) to take a twisted, sadistic pleasure in his suffering, and the whole thing reflects poorly on Belgarath. Which also means that it's sloppy story-telling on behalf of David Eddings, since he's made no secret that this is meant to be the literary equivalent of peddling dope, and so he should be trying to entertain and connect with the reader. That should take priority over Belgarath getting his vengeance on. Note: as much as I feel sorry for Zedar, under the circumstances I would not have blamed Belgarath for killing him. The old guy just takes it too far.

It really bugs me that whenever Garion gets upset, everyone else is just like 'Garion, stop whining and live with it. You're being immature.' Why couldn't someone just try comforting him and explaining things to him instead of being snarky bitches all the time?

*** It seems to me that one of Polgara's most glaring flaws is her inability to relate to the concerns of ordinary people, so there is a reason, just not an excuse.
** Something that just occurred to me -- do kings in this world have the right of "high justice"? I know the cultures Eddings based everything on did, but I don't recall it coming up in the novels. If so, then Garion got a solid lesson on the death penalty in the course of killing Asharak. Granted, he doesn't know at the time he's gonna ''need'' that lesson later on.

** Immortality did not do enough "weird things" to Polgara to keep her from recognizing ''Durnik's'' distress after first killing another man, and comforting him. Her failure to do so for Garion indicates either a serious continuity error or a flaw in her character verging on a spiritual disfigurement. Given that no one (not even Durnik, who I expected to) calls her out on this, I'd say the flaw lay with the preconceptions of the author(s) (including Leigh here) - somehow the storytellers felt that Durnik's distress "deserved" such comfort, and Garion's did not. Given that both characters have are "plain folk" Sendarian in outlook, I can only think that the difference lay either in their age (Durnik being an adult, Garion being a teen) or in Garion being "really" a destined king. So, in the view of the author(s), either the moral distress of smiths is important while the moral distress of kings is not, or the moral distress of adults is important while the moral distress of teenagers is not. Both possibilities raise somewhat disturbing questions. I think we'd best chalk it up to some serious ValuesDissonance between readers and authors on this matter.
*** The difference is that she's ''in love'' with Durnik, which the story makes relatively clear pretty early on. The only other time we see her in love, she's preparing to abandon everything to go down fighting with the Wacites. It fits her characterization that her feelings for Durnik get him special attention that Garion does not. For Durnik's part, I don't think he'd gotten over his worship of her enough to call her out on much of anything.

** We know Torak banned the teaching of Old Angarak (presumably the Grolims got an exemption, since every copy of the ''Book of Torak'' we encounter is written in Old Angarak). Simply altering the language a bit wouldn't have taken care of matters from his viewpoint; 21st century English-speakers can still read Shakespeare and get most of the jokes, and I can get most of the sense of Chaucer in the original. A hypothetical "New Angarak" language would still have allowed anyone literate to read and comprehend Old Angarak. He ''could'' have devised a completely unrelated language, but using the common tongue of the West was probably simpler. As for the Dals, in one of the prequel novels Polgara greets the Gorim in Dalish, because she hasn't studied the Ulgo language yet. The Dals probably switched languages to make their tasks easier.

Seriously, dear young, useless Lelldorin. If you think about it a little, the whole saga could have been written even without him and still being perfectly working. Not that I dislike Eddings or anything, but come on! All he did was drop out of nowhere near the beginning of the second book, chat with Garion and provide some firepower in a couple of battles and then being PutOnABus and making mess offscreen. Seriously, why he even bothere putting him as one of the prophetized warriors in the first place!?

* I believe it's explicitly stated by Belgarath that Chamdar subtly influenced Silk's mind, much like he did with Garion's, to keep him from putting two and two together.

* I think that the Purpose was just messing with Garion when he said that him and the Orb would be heading for a new address if Cyradis has chosen differently (or it is a mistake on Eddings part). Part of the Mallorean Gospels states how the Child of Dark will look as though "all the stary universe was contained within", the Codex said no such thing since it didn't apply to the Child of Light. Plus, Cyradis said that Zandramas would have the same fate regardless of her choice.

* It seems to be a matter of power, or maybe of divine intervention. If you think about it, the only immortal sorcerers have been the disciples of Aldur and the most powerful Grolims, who are all either Torak's disciples or the disciples of Torak's disciples (Asharak). Failing that, it could easily be that they simply live that long because the Prophecy ''needs'' them to, which I believe is hinted at in the story. Salmissra, on the other hand, has relatively minor powers and ''isn't'' necessary to the prophecy (well, this particular one isn't, because as Polgara states, all Salmissra's are basically the same and thus the Prophecy needn't bother preserving her).

* My personal explanation is plain GoldFever and that the quasi-magical properties of Murgo are a folkloric fiction to explain away why people who were to all appearances loyal and trusted have been taking massive and highly obvious bribes.

Both Garion and Durnik are considered disciples of Aldur. Garion gets his Bel. I don't remember if Durnik officially gets one, but he does get called a disciple. They're both sorcerers. Does this mean they live forever? I imagine Garion would eventually pass the Rivan throne onto his son, but does that mean his son is immortal? Will he outlive Ce'Nedra and his kids? Are Durnik and Polgara's kids immortal? The only reason I ask this is several times throughout the story, its mentioned that the Light Destiny rewards the people it uses for its purposes with happiness. I can't imagine outliving your non-sorcerous loved ones is much of a reward in the end.
* It is established that Dryads live as long as their tree does, which can be for centuries. I don't know if Garion will outlive his children, but considering that Belgarath had a sorceress, daughter, it's not too far of a stretch to assume that even if most of the kids aren't immortal, at least some of them will be.

* Beldurnik sounds kind of wrong, I don't think Durnik would wear that sort of nonsense.
** Time has a way of influencing things. Belgarath is almost surprised when he's reminded that his name was originally Garath, having forgotten his name before his Master's blessing. Even Garion isn't quite comfortable with his Bel yet. (One line from either the books or a fic I read had Belgarath joking that Garion's 'Bel-' still squeaks when he goes around corners.) Give it a few hundred years and Belgarion and Beldurnik will probably be far more comfortable.

* I believe Polgara is referred to by a different title in the Angarak prophecies. Perhaps all of them are? The only people who ever refer to Durnik as the Man With Two Lives are familiar with the Western prophecies.

** I imagine Durnik's title in the Dark Prophecies is something like "The Man Who Stays Alive".

The trope page says this (emphasis mine):

Ce'Nedra's personal reasons are even more vague. I think the idea was a rehash of the Lord of the Rings. March the Armies of the West to distract attention from what Garion et al were up to. However, the way things were set up didn't have any of the the elements that made that plan make sense. Torak knew he was coming anyway, and no one involved in the Angarak side of the war would have been in the way to begin with.

I don't know why, but if Adara's rose can [[{{Panacea}} heal about any known and unknown disease]], why didn't they use it on the plague victims of Mal Zeth?

** Exactly. Sovereign SPECIFIC. That's telling everyone that it's a "cure-all" for poison. I would imagine Polgara did a lot of research and testing after the adventures, though, after finding out how to actually administer it.

Something which always bugged me - we are told Silk's mother was once a famous beauty whose face was hideously disfigured by disease. However, as it also rendered her blind, she is unaware that her beauty is gone and everyone around her keeps up the pretence to spare her the knowledge. Well...she has hands, still, doesn't she? Are we supposed to believe, in all these years, she never touched her face?

In a world where sorcerers can transmute living creatures into something else, and sometimes even create things from thin air, they spend a great deal of time pitying the only remaining dragon yet not creating a mate for her and claiming they can't do anything for. I do not recall at any point in the story the Gods forbidding another dragon from being made for her to mate with. Hell, Sorcerers can transform into other creatures. Some Grolim didn't think they could get on Torak's good side by repopulating the world with Dragons?

It has always bugged the crap out of me that Begarath would have a wolf (Poledra) accompanying him for a few hundred years, and NOT REALIZE something funny was going on. Oh, sure, he said he thought about it once or twice...over a few centuries. What, is he that obtuse?

*** ''"Asharak snarled and struck the bowman a crushing blow to the side of the head. The bowman fell twitching to the stone floor."'' Hardly evidence by itself, but it also supports the theory, since Asharak is a Grolim priest, and is unlikely to have received any 'job perks' Aldur might have handed out. While this troper has never actually tested it, she assumes you would have to be pretty strong to do that to an armoured Cherek warrior (do they wear helmets?) and the choice in language implies the same.

This troper gets that Polgara and Ce'Nedra are supposed to be strong, confident, powerful women who stand out in a world where women aren't generally viewed as such. OK, fine. The problem is that they come off as something quite different. Polgara comes off as strict, controlling, always certain she's in the right, unable to take any criticism and something of a bitch, and no one ever calls her out on it (OK, there was that one time in ''Queen of Sorcery'', but then she turned around and gave a Garion a TheReasonYouSuckSpeech right afterwards.) Ce'Nedra is a spoiled brat who never thinks of the consequences of her actions and puts herself above everyone else and gets called out occasionally, but otherwise, everyone pretty much does whatever they say and don't argue. That bugs me, because half the time when I'm reading the books I keep wishing that someone would stand up and give them a [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech Reason You Suck Speech.]]
* I guess it makes sense that no one really talks back to Polgara considering that she's a essentially disciple of a ''god''. I mean, it would be like giving lip to Moses or something. Ce'Nedra, on the other hand, seems to receive an awful amount of tolerance from such no nonsense people. I mean, Silk is a veritable wellspring of snide remarks - you would think he would have a few for Ce'Nedra. As it is, Garion's the only one who ever really argues with her, and everyone else seems to put that down as teenage bickering.

This troper gets that gods can't heal naturally and that Torak was asleep, so he couldn't wake up and heal himself... but why didn't Urvon or Zedar try to heal him?

** It occurred to this troper to wonder the same thing about Belmakor, although she couldn't come up with any answers, except maybe that he was there to invent catapults (which seemed like a stupid purpose, since Beldin probably could have managed that on his own). With Belsambar, she just figured he was there to show them how to beat Torak in the first war.
** I had a rather depressing theory, but it is quite possible that Belmakor and Belsambar's entire Purpose *was* to die, for two reasons: 1/ Having known how it felt to lose those special brothers stayed Belgarath's hand during the EVENT that pitted him and Zedar in the Morindland wastes while he was on his way to retrieve the Orb. He even states he'd lost too many brothers to do that to Zedar, even after his betrayal. Since Zedar is necessary later on, to find Eriond and to steal the Orb (again) it is imperative that Belgarath NOT kill him. 2/ Their deaths prepared Beldin to deal with Belgarath's reaction to Poledra's apparent death. We know that Beldin and the twins watched him carefully and stopped him a few times as he gathered his will to obliterate himself while he was chained to his bed.

** This actually makes a lot of sense. The consequence of losing some EVENT or another costs the Prophecy of Light two sorcerers. It fits in with the chess motif of the series and how the two Destinies are playing the very long game. It also makes this troper wonder if it was an intentional sacrifice on the part of the Light to set up Belgarath's hatred of Zedar and the apostate's eventual fate.

It just bugs me in this as well as in other works of Eddings the brutal punishments dished out to bad guys. For example, what Belgarath did to Zedar which was implied would go on forever? I mean, that's just not cool, especially when it's never pointed out as being problematic in the text at all.
* There is a quote floating around from Belgarath about Zedar. Something along the lines of "Every once in a while I feel guilty, but then I remember all the horrible things he did." And if I remember correctly, Garion has nightmares about how he burned his parents' murderer alive. I agree that it seems brutal to our society, but it's probably less so for a medieval-esque society that's been engaged in divine warfare for a few hundred centuries.

* This troper thinks she recalls that, at some point, Belgarath points out that it's not exactly a [[BlackAndWhiteMorality Good vs. Evil fight]]. It's more like Us vs. Them, and the protagonists will occasionally have to [[DirtyBusiness do bad things]].
** One thing that has always struck this troper about Belgarath is his ability to commit unthinkable crimes in furtherance of his divine mission. There's a scene in ''Demon Lord of Karanda'' where he and Silk waylay and butcher a few townspeople just to get regional dress to move around in. It makes an interesting point to me, since I'm also an author (not to the scale of the Eddingses): if the fate of the universe were at stake, how far would YOU go?

* Still, this troper had difficulty sympathising with the characters a lot of the time, because their extreme ProtagonistCenteredMorality effectively alienated them. And since she's here, she'll mention Beldin. Everyone ''says'' that he's actually very gentle - but he's one of the most violent and vindictive of the 'good guys'. ''He thinks Zedar got off too easy'' (this troper falls into the 'feels sorry for Zedar' camp). I'm supposed to believe he's a sweet and caring guy? I see why he became that way, sure, but... ''get real''.

* The morality question is something that makes the series more "realistic". The characters are three dimensional characters that have the drives and failings of real people rather than being "good" or "evil". They live in the far more densely populated gray area between those extremes. Basically, bad people do good things and good people do bad things. Then, when you add in all the extraordinary things that these good and bad people do, you have a whole different scale of morality. If you have it in your power to trap someone in a wall for eternity because they helped kill your brothers or because they caused countless deaths then wouldn't you do it? Part of this troper's love of the Belgariad stems from the deep characterisations in the whole tale and the fact that it highlights the rashness of an action and the consequences for that person when the cold light of day hits. It Is Written that Garion agonised for decades about what he did to Asharak, and that Belgarath was still guilty about what he did to Zedar two decades after he did it. David Eddings was aware that morality is a thin veneer of civilisation that we all cover ourselves in, and that comes through in how he writes his characters.

* It is stated in (I think) the same general area of text as their human-to-hawk transformation that the animal forms they take when they change shape immediately (albeit slowly) begin to take over their awareness. This is supported by Garion's numerous transformations into the forms of both a wold and a falcon (at Kell?) and his associated distraction by the form's idiosyncrasies and peculiarities. If they never changed back from their hawk form eventually neither of them would ever remember having been human, a sorcerer, their companions and loved ones, or (presumably) anything they had done during the entire course of the books. Taken in that light their choice makes even less sense than it did before, especially given Beldin's own certain knowledge that this would be the case!

** Additionally, it is stated in the same general area of text that the animal forms they take when they change shape immediately (albeit slowly) begin to take over their awareness. Eventually, if they never changed back from their hawk form, neither of them would ever remember having been human, a sorcerer, their companions and loved ones, or (presumably) anything they had done during the entire course of the books. Taken in that light their choice makes even less sense than it did before, especially given Beldin's own certain knowledge that this would be the case!