Donaldson, Moorcock etc

Dear Jeff, I didn' t write that the heroes (or anti-heroes) - Covenant and Elric - were repulsive to me. I wrote that the books were (their authors writing style). I don't remember to be shocked by the "rape scene" from Donaldson (I was not a teen), but I remember an intense dislike of how the book was written. I glanced at the "Elric". I have to admit that this time (after many years) my dislike was much less, I was just bored. I'll try to explain. There is no doubt that Moorcock is quite an erudite. But I don't like how he uses his erudition. To me it is like a badly done theatric background - the pieces of this and that squeezed into some rough picture. It is told that Elrik is in some way antagonist to the heroes of Tolkien. To Conan, that you mention, as well. But Tolkien used his knowledge of history, folklore, languages to create depth, what is most impressive in his "Lord of the Rings" is more than 10000 years of history subtly influencing the present

If you like that aspect of JRRT, you should definitely check out Steven Erikson. He is an anthropologist/archaeologist rather than a linguist, but he uses his own areas of expertise, much as Tolkien did, to create a huge sense of the abysmal past and how it continues to influence the story's present.