Donal Haldane

[DesertRose]

I went off on a mental tangent regarding revanne's remark in parentheses above, but since the topic is Camber and not Donal nor anyone else who was alive during the events of the Childe Morgan Trilogy, I have created a separate discussion topic under The Legends of Camber of Culdi; that thread can be found here: http://www.rhemuthcastle.com/index.php/topic,2187.0.html

[revanne]

Thank you.

[lenni]

<snip> I'm wondering if Donal's mother was Deryni...

<snip>
To keep the peace in a desperate land, Malcolm marries the Sovereign Princess Roisian Quinnell of Meara (she is Not Deryni by the way).
<snip>

As Laurna said, Roisian Quinnell was Donal Haldane's mother. Roisian's paternal line, the Quinnells, seem to be human. Her maternal line, however, was the royal family of Bremagne which had at least one Furstán in it (a ways back, I'll grant you). I think that Roisian WAS Deryni.She was originally betrothed to Prince Nikola Furstán (which made him the Heir Presumptive to the Principality of Meara!!), but the whole Killingford thing got in the way. :-(

Lenni

[Raksha the Demon]

It would explain a lot if Donal's mother was a Deryni, especially if she was aware and knowledgeable of her powers.   As much as I dislike Donal, he was, as a whole, an effective king and what we've seen of his reign shows some improvement (at least since the end of The Bastard Prince) in the lives of the Deryni of Gwynedd. 

[Lochiel]

Hi my friends was in Prydain for a bit but am back to Gwynedd. I wanted to thank the recent additions to the thread especially Laurna & Raksha. 

[lenni]

Lochiel,

Hi my friends was in Prydain for a bit but am back to Gwynedd. I wanted to thank the recent additions to the thread especially Laurna & Raksha.

Prydain is a good place to be!

Lenni

[Raksha the Demon]

I was rereading The Quest For Saint Camber; and it struck me that Conall, once empowered by Tiercel de Claron, is taking Donal's ethical shortcomings even farther than his grandfather.  Conall thinks once or twice of his having used his powers to 'persuade' various women to have sex with him, which puts me a bit in mind of Donal's plan to have sex with Evaine while she is unconscious due to his use of a deryni trigger.  I am not sure I can give Donal a pass because he begs Alyce's forgiveness when the trigger doesn't work and she awakens and struggles (psionically) against him: Donal's first reaction to Alyce's awakening is to try to re-apply the trigger; then, when he can't get past her "adamantine shields", his attempt to take her mind starts to reach back for the killing stroke he dealt Sief McAthan - it's only then that Donal stops, realizing that nothing, even the loss of the Deryni protector he was trying to create, is worth killing Alyce. 

Though I dislike Donal, his grandson Conall is far worse.  (remember when he took over the mind of his pregnant mistress, Vanissa, and offered her to Tiercel as if she were a cookie - ewww.  Donal would never have sunk so low) But they both are at least trying to use their powers to sexually coerce and/or rape women - is it due to a hereditary streak of selfishness (that is not shared by most of their other Haldane relatives), the corrupting effects of the combination of temporal and supernatural/Deryni powers, or both?

[DesertRose]

I was rereading The Quest For Saint Camber; and it struck me that Conall, once empowered by Tiercel de Claron, is taking Donal's ethical shortcomings even farther than his grandfather.  Conall thinks once or twice of his having used his powers to 'persuade' various women to have sex with him, which puts me a bit in mind of Donal's plan to have sex with Evaine while she is unconscious due to his use of a deryni trigger.  I am not sure I can give Donal a pass because he begs Alyce's forgiveness when the trigger doesn't work and she awakens and struggles (psionically) against him: Donal's first reaction to Alyce's awakening is to try to re-apply the trigger; then, when he can't get past her "adamantine shields", his attempt to take her mind starts to reach back for the killing stroke he dealt Sief McAthan - it's only then that Donal stops, realizing that nothing, even the loss of the Deryni protector he was trying to create, is worth killing Alyce. 

Though I dislike Donal, his grandson Conall is far worse.  (remember when he took over the mind of his pregnant mistress, Vanissa, and offered her to Tiercel as if she were a cookie - ewww.  Donal would never have sunk so low) But they both are at least trying to use their powers to sexually coerce and/or rape women - is it due to a hereditary streak of selfishness (that is not shared by most of their other Haldane relatives), the corrupting effects of the combination of temporal and supernatural/Deryni powers, or both?

I think part of the reason Conall's behavior is worse than Donal's is immaturity.  Conall is much younger than Donal and has not had the years and the cumulative realities of being king to temper his decision-making processes the way Donal has.

I'm not sure it's hereditary selfishness per se, although I'd grant that there's a definite streak of ruthlessness in the Haldane line. Kelson doesn't seem to display the trait until he has been king a few years, and there is also the fact that ruling a kingdom in that time requires a certain level of ruthlessness.

But I also think that had Conall not been executed, he'd have been even worse than Donal in terms of abuse of power (temporal and psychic/psionic).  Just my gut call--I can't really back it up with any citations.

[Raksha the Demon]

I was rereading The Quest For Saint Camber; and it struck me that Conall, once empowered by Tiercel de Claron, is taking Donal's ethical shortcomings even farther than his grandfather.  Conall thinks once or twice of his having used his powers to 'persuade' various women to have sex with him, which puts me a bit in mind of Donal's plan to have sex with Evaine while she is unconscious due to his use of a deryni trigger.  I am not sure I can give Donal a pass because he begs Alyce's forgiveness when the trigger doesn't work and she awakens and struggles (psionically) against him: Donal's first reaction to Alyce's awakening is to try to re-apply the trigger; then, when he can't get past her "adamantine shields", his attempt to take her mind starts to reach back for the killing stroke he dealt Sief McAthan - it's only then that Donal stops, realizing that nothing, even the loss of the Deryni protector he was trying to create, is worth killing Alyce. 

Though I dislike Donal, his grandson Conall is far worse.  (remember when he took over the mind of his pregnant mistress, Vanissa, and offered her to Tiercel as if she were a cookie - ewww.  Donal would never have sunk so low) But they both are at least trying to use their powers to sexually coerce and/or rape women - is it due to a hereditary streak of selfishness (that is not shared by most of their other Haldane relatives), the corrupting effects of the combination of temporal and supernatural/Deryni powers, or both?

I think part of the reason Conall's behavior is worse than Donal's is immaturity.  Conall is much younger than Donal and has not had the years and the cumulative realities of being king to temper his decision-making processes the way Donal has.

I'm not sure it's hereditary selfishness per se, although I'd grant that there's a definite streak of ruthlessness in the Haldane line. Kelson doesn't seem to display the trait until he has been king a few years, and there is also the fact that ruling a kingdom in that time requires a certain level of ruthlessness.

But I also think that had Conall not been executed, he'd have been even worse than Donal in terms of abuse of power (temporal and psychic/psionic).  Just my gut call--I can't really back it up with any citations.

I think any ruler has to harden his/her heart to some degree; and a medieval ruler more so than many modern heads of state.  We can see Kelson's struggle against ruthlessness; this is something KK shows rather than just tells:  in his thoughts when he is about to marry Sidana, when it is revealed how desperately Kelson wants to stop killing and have peace (Please, Lord, let it be peace between the two of us, as well as our lands.  I don't want to have to kill her people.  I don't want to have to kill anyone else.  I want to create life, not death.  Please, Lord....).  And then, of course, Llewell strikes and destroys all hope of peace at least anytime soon.  And in The King's Justice, Kelson has Loris and Corrigan hanged with almost complete ruthlessness; then tries to spare Judhael of Meara from his own sentence of death, telling Judhael I'm tired of killing, Judhael!  Your uncle and all your cousins have died because of me.  Oh, all of them but Sidana brought it on themselves, but - God, there must be some other way!  Judhael sadly reminds Kelson that Kelson must be strong and let him die because Kelson cannot afford to let him live.  I think it's this killing, even more than Sidana's murder, that makes Kelson the focussed and occasionally ruthless king he has to be.  (he offers Judhael what he refused to his own cousin Conall - a reprieve, though Judhael had not begged for mercy as did Conall)

The difference between Conall and Kelson in terms of ruthlessness is that Kelson doesn't want to be become a ruthless killer, but has to do it; understands that it is sometimes necessary, but never enjoys it; while Conall ruthlessly plans the murders of Kelson and Dhugal and relishes the outcome of their supposed deaths even though it is through his own careless attack on his father that he wins what he wants the most - marriage to Rothana and the inheritance of the throne of Gwynedd.

It could be that Donal was once, at the age of 17-18, far less ruthless than he is in his late middle age to senior years.  We don't know what trials strengthened, toughened and embittered Donal; but no Haldane king's time on the throne has been a bed of roses.

[DesertRose]

Well said, Raksha, and I agree.

There's a difference between accepting the facts of holding medieval-style royal power and learning to live with the ramifications of the decisions (as Kelson does) and being ruthless and even cruel purely for personal gain/ambition (Conall and, I think, to a lesser extent, Donal).

[revanne]

In support of the difference between Kelson and Donal and Conall, on the occasion that Kelson acts with utter ruthlessness in TKJ and has Brice and Ithel summarily strung up, and would have applied random decimation until stopped by Alaric, what triggers this is being "shown" by Rothana what Janniver felt like being raped. And he accepts Alaric's rebuke for what the latter considers an abuse of power.  I wonder too if some of  his similar ruthlessness towards Loris and Goronwy, isn't in part triggered by reading their minds and seeing the depth of their cruelty towards helpless victims of their hate.

Kelson does learn that part of his role as king is to wield the sword of justice as well as to show mercy but this is not self-seeking or self-serving.

[DesertRose]

In support of the difference between Kelson and Donal and Conall, on the occasion that Kelson acts with utter ruthlessness in TKJ and has Brice and Ithel summarily strung up, and would have applied random decimation until stopped by Alaric, what triggers this is being "shown" by Rothana what Janniver felt like being raped. And he accepts Alaric's rebuke for what the latter considers an abuse of power.  I wonder too if some of  his similar ruthlessness towards Loris and Goronwy, isn't in part triggered by reading their minds and seeing the depth of their cruelty towards helpless victims of their hate.

Kelson does learn that part of his role as king is to wield the sword of justice as well as to show mercy but this is not self-seeking or self-serving.

Indeed.  Part of Kelson's learning-to-rule process involves knowing when to wield the sword of justice and when not to wield any sword because he's too angry/[insert emotional state here] to think clearly.  Which is probably a good bit of why he accepts the dressing-down from Alaric, because in his heart, the king knows his champion is correct, and pulling them out of their roles, Kelson trusts Alaric's judgment (which is absolutely spot-on in the instance of Alaric, Kelson, and the proposed decimation).

[Raksha the Demon]

Sigh.  I had a nice long post about Kelson and two times he stepped, or was ready to, step over the moral line, and it vanished because there was some kind of Page Error that came up when I clicked.

If I can do it briefly...Kelson threatens to cross the moral line that his grandfather and cousin (to a far greater degree) went through:  First, in Chapter 18 of The Bishop's Heir:  Kelson promises the scared and defensive captive Sidana, as he proposes marriage to her, that he will not force her to do anything against her conscience; yet a minute or two later he's thinking that he hasn't ruled out the use of force, despite his promise to her, if she continues to refuse.  This is rather troubling; I can only reconcile it with my decades of fondness for the character of Kelson if I believe that he would not have forced Sidana even if she had refused; he would have put her in a convent under guard or some fortress, and continued to woo her; which I think is a possibility.  Kelson was trapped between the needs of the state to neutralize Sidana as a potential focus of the Meara rebellion; which he could only do by killing her or making her his queen and the mother of his heirs; and the desires of his heart to stop the killings of Mearan rebels by ending the rebellion and to save the pretty and innocent young Sidana. 

Second, in Chapter 8 of King Kelson's Bride, Kelson has a royal temper tantrum and threatens to take little Albin Haldane away from his mother Rothana and raise the child himself if she doesn't end her plan to give the boy to the church.  In my opinion, Kelson is right that Rothana must let the child have at least a choice in whether he becomes a lord or a priest; it is important that a boy of Albin's rank and heredity, burdened as he will be by the stain of his father's treachery, feels like has some choice of direction, that he's not being punished by having to forfeit lands and marriage for the priesthood because of his father's actions.  But Kelson isn't threatening to "seize" Albin for the good of future harmony in the House of Haldane; he's doing so out of his frustration with Rothana's rejecting the possibility of marriage to him and most of all, I think, because Kelson visualizes Albin as the son he wanted to have with Rothana.  Fortunately, Alaric speaks with the voice of quiet authority and Kelson backs off, realizing "how easy it might have been, to step across that line into prideful power". 

I think that Kelson is very lucky that he not only had Alaric and Duncan, two of the most moral and loyal men in the eleven kingdoms, in his corner, but taking a prominent role in his life at a young age.  They became his protectors and close counselors when he was a newly fatherless boy threatened by a vicious sorceress who had killed his father and planned to kill him; they guided him into his power and gave him a father's love and devotion; and Kelson will rightfully trust them and listen to them for as long as they live. Perhaps the fact that Kelson came to depend on Alaric and Duncan at so young an age and in so vulnerable a state, strengthened the bond between the three; but he has loved them as a son loves a father ever since.  Donal might have trustworthy, loyal and affectionate relatives and counselors; but he was never placed in Kelson's vulnerable condition at the age of 13-14; Donal's father did not die until Donal was a mature man in his forties.  While Kelson will never be ruled by others (he is too strong a person), and seems to need less guidance than support as he matures; it is good that there are a few people whose advice he will heed in moments of stress.  Could Kelson's reliance on Alaric and Duncan at a time when he was quite young and vulnerable have given him the moral cornerstone that Donal seemed to lack?

I wonder what sparked Donal's moral laxity?  Do we know anything about his father's character? 

[Laurna]

My very favorite quote of all time is "With great power, comes great responsibility."  Spiderman.  I think this theme is very well set up in the Deryni world, with a race of people who have great power. The deference between the antagonists and the protagonists is the difference between self-serving abuse of that power and a tempered controlled of the power to only use for the good of the kingdom.  It is a tough struggle. Our author, KK shows us all the levels of how people use their power. She also shows us that coming into this great responsibility must be taught and learned. (modern analogy: Anyone can jump in a car, turn the key and step on the gas peddle, but that doesn't make that person is atomically a good driver. A mentor has to teach the new driver to stay on the correct side of the road, to stop when the signs tell them to, and to show courtesy to other drivers. Learning these rules will ultimately let everyone in the community get to where they are going, safely.) Kelson must learn the rules of this Deryni Moral Highway at an age younger than we modern folk even ask our own teenagers to learn to drive. I think it is important that we see Kelson thinking about testing the rules, but than before he acts out of line, we see him learning what "Great Responsibility means." And yes, I agree that Alaric and Duncan have very high moral codes and they are very good mentors for guiding their young king down the right path.  This in turn becomes the entire reason for the Schoola that Duncan starts and that Kelson patrons  at the end of Quest of St Camber and KKB.  The schoola isn't just to teach how to use Deryni powers, but also how to be responsible in its use.  The two ideas must go hand in hand. Otherwise we end up back at the beginning with more Imre's and Wincent's. No one wants that. 

[revanne]

"Sigh.  I had a nice long post about Kelson and two times he stepped, or was ready to, step over the moral line, and it vanished because there was some kind of Page Error that came up when I clicked."

The secret is to save as draft as you go along. I learnt that the hard way!!

Love your posts and the way you are throwing out things for me to think about.