Moderator's Note: This is several posts moved from T'rin Thread
LDoza: « Reply #20 on: March 11, 2009, 03:12:05 PM » 
Found pic of a hint of T'rin at the Adanotu festival.. remember, blue loincloth and boots
and tattoos enhanced with blue/silver body art?
(from NGLTF Miami Beach Party, 3.1.09)
SilverMoon28 « Reply #21 on: March 12, 2009, 01:05:58 AM »Blueeeeee!!!
That looks really cool, actually.
Vani
LDoza « Reply #22 on: March 13, 2009, 09:05:13 PM »Don't know if Falconer has this somewhere. But ? T'tin. or possibly Desin....
It's Vin Diesel.
... and a shadowy Rini in background.
Magical_Jen « Reply #23 on: March 14, 2009, 05:12:44 PM »Hmm was trying to add an image of what I thought might be a good person for T’rin but it seems that even the most basic computer task confound me. If someone could tell me how you posted yours to the reply box that would be much appreciated. my pics are too big for attachments, i'll try to link this somewhere else.
Matthew Haldeman-Time « Reply #24 on: March 14, 2009, 05:21:26 PM »If the picture's on-line, hit the second button on the second row of stuff above the reply box (underneath the button for italics, above the row of smileys). That should give you image tags. Then, if the picture's on-line, copy and paste the URL in between the image tags.
[ img ]URL here[ /img ] (without the spaces)
If the picture's not on-line, and you can't attach it, um, maybe you could describe it really, really well?
-Matthew
Falconer « Reply #25 on: March 14, 2009, 05:22:42 PM »If it's not online (or if you don't have the url, but then you need to save it on your computer first), you need to host it on a website like imageshack.us, tinypic.com or imagevenue.com. It will give you a link which you can use with Matthew's method.
Magical_Jen « Reply #26 on: March 14, 2009, 05:36:04 PM »Success!
blondiechic0 « Reply #27 on: March 14, 2009, 07:13:33 PM »Yes! Jen, that is exactly how I pictured him!
LilacMajesty « Reply #28 on: March 14, 2009, 08:32:23 PM »This is how I picture T'rin to look like (it goes with what Jen posted, actually):
Grrrrr....
Yummy 
Magical_Jen « Reply #30 on: March 15, 2009, 05:16:42 PM »I don't know why, but I've always pictured T'rin as looking more Native American.
Yeah I can see how he could be but one of the reasons that lead me not to believe that he would not be Native American is that when Orinakin first describe T'rin he says he has a shaved skull. I know that we should not try to impose "earthy ideology" in the ITL universe but that description really does limit the type of tribes that T'rin could come from. While there are cases where Native American warriors would shave the frontal forelock of their heads as a sign of courage, for the most part hair especially keeping long hair is an important part of Native American culture. Moreover, in some Native American tribes to have, a shaved or scalped head is a sign of defeat, dishonor or disgrace; it is something done to certain enemies after a battle. Where as baldness in say and African tribe is typical. While T'rin's mannerism and dress would make it seem like he could be apart of either tribes. The way that Matthew had described the environment of the Plains and the way society works in Kela, it remained me many of the African cultures I read about in my tribal history course. Meh, I can be wrong though.
LilacMajesty « Reply #31 on: March 15, 2009, 05:59:33 PM »No where does Matthew say that T'rin has dark skin.
Lelehti Dazzio « Reply #32 on: March 15, 2009, 06:24:07 PM »No where does Matthew say that T'rin has dark skin.
I don't recall T'rin being described with dark skin colour. But damn, those guys are sure great to look at. Yummy.
Lelehti Dazzio « Reply #33 on: March 15, 2009, 06:28:23 PM »Don't know if Falconer has this somewhere. But ? T'tin. or possibly Desin....
It's Vin Diesel.
... and a shadowy Rini in background.
Magical_Jen « Reply #33 on: March 15, 2009, 06:28:23 PM »No where does Matthew say that T'rin has dark skin.
I don't recall T'rin being described with dark skin colour. But damn, those guys are sure great to look at. Yummy. He also doesn't say that he doesn't have dark skin. Actually when ever anyone talks about T'rins physical appearance they always refer too his muscle, histattoos, the taut smoothness of his skin or wonder at his lack of hair. His skin complexion is never mentioned, so I guess we all can keep picturing T'rin as we do.
JaeFire « Reply #35 on: March 15, 2009, 10:38:39 PM »I know that we should not try to impose "earthy ideology" in the ITL universe but that description really does limit the type of tribes that T'rin could come from.
I won't reveal what I think T'rin looks like, because it has no bearing on what I'm going to say: Like you said, we shouldn't impose "earthy ideology" in the ITL universe. With that as a given, it should then be understood that T'rin's "description" does
not limit the type of tribes T'rin comes from at all--because we shouldn't be seeing him as coming from any tribes from the real world
anyway, Native American or African. It's not fair to limit ITL to the strictures and limitations of the real world. This is a fantasy series, and more importantly, a literary work.
Sure, things in ITL may remind us of certain cultures, but I very much believe that we should never, ever impose the mores, practices, and physical descriptions of those cultures onto ITL. It limits the scope of Matthew's work, and it leads to assumptions that have no basis in the text. Such imposition is not only unfair to Matthew's work, to the characters and the cultures, but it often lends itself to inaccurate literary interpretation.
- Jae
Magical_Jen « Reply #36 on: March 16, 2009, 01:51:45 AM »Mm I knew I was going to get into trouble when I used the word “limits”. It was not my intention to limit the scope of Matthew work or trivialize the intricacies of ITL.
However, part of this discussion consisted of people offering different images of what they felt that T’rin could possible look like. Because there was such a differences between the pictures I posted to the others that were offered, I thought that it would be interesting to offer and explanation as to what in the text lead me to visualize T’rin in the way that I did. I should have made this clearer when I prefaced my explanation by saying, “we shouldn’t impose ‘earthy ideology’ in the ITL universe”. What I meant is, if I could use what we know to be true about T’rin, and take it out of the context of ITL Universe and apply it to what I know to be true of some civilizations in our would then these are some of the assumptions that I would make.
Yes, I realize that the purpose of these boards it that we would engage only with the text and that ideally we would only uses the literature to fuel our discussions, questions and out conclusions we make. However in cases where we haven’t received all the information or details about characters there are going to be times when we might uses information based on “earthly ideology” that will as you said lead to inaccurate literary interpretation. However, I thought we could embrace these mistakes, isn’t the purpose of out discussion to expose and explore all the facts and all hypothetical assumptions.
Eighty-five members from all over the globe have or soon will participate in the discussion, and each will have will come with their experience and knowledge will likely seep into the discussion we see here. We still have to wait for six more books and the only one us that has the answers is Matthew, if we begin to censor our discussion because we may risk the change of inaccurate literary interpretation then these boards are going to get really tired very soon.
That being said, Matthew if my remarks have managed to case any offences, that was not my intention it was most unconsciously done. I apologies, I meant no slight on your work, your world or your vision. In future, I will make a more conscious attempt to refrain from making comments that may incite any distress or is in need of reproach.
Matthew Haldeman-Time « Reply #37 on: March 16, 2009, 03:16:09 AM »That being said, Matthew if my remarks have managed to case any offences, that was not my intention it was most unconsciously done. I apologies, I meant no slight on your work, your world or your vision.
No, not at all. You're fine.
I think that what we're seeing is a recurring theme. There was some concern about belas, because when we in our world think of sex workers, there's baggage attached. When we talk about priests, a few people have brought Catholic priests into the conversation (even though they're not relevant) because in our world, that's what we're used to. And now we're talking about what T'rin looks like, and it's natural to turn to what we know in our world and what we're used to.
Since ITL is a fantasy series, though, it takes place not just "outside of our world" as if they were just next door on Mars; it takes place
without our world. We don't exist. Our experiences and perspectives aren't theirs and have no bearing on their world.
They do have bearing on how we read and interpret their world, and we have to be careful about when we bring our perspective into it and when we don't.
What you imagine when you see T'rin is, ultimately, up to you. And unless the text describes him differently, one interpretation is as valid as another.
If we say, Kudorin's a pharaoh, Egypt has pharaohs, therefore Kudorin looks Egyptian, that would be inaccurate, because you're basing what Kudorin looks like based on this world.
Now, I will say, the world of ITL (aside from having two moons) seems to follow our math and science pretty closely, so I imagine that their weather/atmosphere/whatever works similarly to ours. I would guess that, having whole clans of people frequently exposed to the elements for generations upon generations, on the plains (which don't sound like a tundra), the sun would get to them after a while, and their skin wouldn't be pasty-white. But that leaves open a lot of variety of shading.
-Matthew
Matthew Haldeman-Time « Reply #38 on: March 16, 2009, 03:30:35 AM »I don't want to stifle the conversation. I encourage y'all to discuss ITL in all directions. That's what this board is for!
At the same time, our world and the world of ITL aren't the same, and too much discussion where we put our cultural values/histories/etc. onto ITL's universe may lead readers to continue in those directions. When I write ITL, I'm carefully constructing a large world and several detailed societies. If we here on the board make real-life associations between our world and ITL's world, readers may pick up on those ideas and carry them over and apply them as they read ITL. Which confuses a lot of the issues and ideas I'm trying to present.
What we know of basic human experience and human interactions, absolutely, bring those in. The ITL folks are human and they share in the same emotions we do.
But if you know a lot of French diplomats, don't expect Orinakin to act just like them, because "that's how diplomats act." That's how diplomats act here on Earth inside of the culture, constraints, and political hierarchy of France. Which has nothing to do with Orina Anoris.
Matthew Haldeman-Time « Reply #39 on: March 16, 2009, 04:06:07 AM »This is horribly incomplete, but here are four random descriptions of T'rin:
...but [Bade's] musculature wasn’t as fiercely chiseled as T’rin’s... [ITL 14.2]
T’rin was muscular from effort, dark from the sun, and in touch with the land. [ITL 16]
It was amazing, how perfectly defined his muscles were, like he was a living sculpture of the perfect athlete. [ITL 22.8]
T’rin’s body was hard and warm, powerful and sleek, with devastating muscular detail... [ITL 26.6]
T'rin's frequently described as muscular, but it's often with specific mentions of how defined/detailed/chiseled his muscles are, not how big they are. Considering what his job is, he has to be pretty light and fast. So, in my mind, that's less Desin/dukot and more "sleek."
-Matthew
