Robert Jordan

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Sep. 17th, 2007 | 02:15 pm

A few minutes ago, I heard from another author on the phone that Robert Jordan had died.

I started copyediting his books with The Shadow Rising, in 1992. When you work on a long-running series for so many years, you develop a strangely personal relationship with the author even if you never meet face-to-face or speak over the phone, and I feel...bereaved, in a way that's hard to articulate. And frustrated, with a shake-your-fist-at-the-universe kind of anger. The Wheel of Time was the grand work of a lifetime, and he should have had the lifetime to complete it.


Making Light, with many more links in the comments

Dragonmount (server appears to be overwhelmed)

Associated Press release, via Google

The longer AP obituary via the New York Times

A mirror of his cousin Wilson's statement

The Robert Jordan Memorial Forum at TarValon.net



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Comments {15}

dsmoen

from: [info]dsmoen
date: Sep. 17th, 2007 07:09 pm (UTC)
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I was wondering how you'd feel, and last night I was thinking it would be an odd and complex grief, especially given how many years you'd been copyediting his work.

That said, I hope you get to work on the final volume.

I hadn't realized how sick he was. Ever since Rick stopped being as involved in the Robert Jordan newsgroup or the FAQ (which we host at our home), I simply hadn't been following his life or career.

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TM(tm)

from: [info]terrymcgarry
date: Sep. 17th, 2007 08:09 pm (UTC)
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I knew it was bad, but I kept hoping he'd rally and feel well enough to write a couple of more books and maybe, if he could, finish it up. I wish he could have had that personal gratification, just for himself. I was thinking about him this weekend, in fact, and a lot of last week, for various reasons. Coincidence, I'm fairly sure, but there could very possibly have been a little psychic something at work too.

Thanks, Deirdre.

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webfarmer

from: [info]webfarmer
date: Sep. 17th, 2007 07:29 pm (UTC)
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I'm sorry for your loss, Terry.

Big virtual hug from here.

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TM(tm)

from: [info]terrymcgarry
date: Sep. 17th, 2007 08:12 pm (UTC)
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Thanks, D. I feel strange accepting condolences, but it's no stranger than anything else in this whole strange mix of personal and professional, writer empathy and reader empathy and relationship with the sentience behind the words on all those many, many pages, and I am very sad. Your hug is much appreciated. {{{hugs back}}}

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webfarmer

from: [info]webfarmer
date: Sep. 17th, 2007 09:00 pm (UTC)
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Our large number of distance relationships seems to make this a lot more "normal" a reaction it might have been in bygone eras. These days, I often feel closer to many of my on-line friends than I do with friends in the so-called real world.

For example, I'd only met Grace Paley a couple of times in social settings but when she died it was a sadness. I'd spent more time with her husband Bob at Camp Social Ecology and feel badly, albeit at a distance, for him as well.

I wasn't a "fan" of either. Just an acquaintance. Good people both.

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Erin Cashier

from: [info]therinth
date: Sep. 17th, 2007 08:29 pm (UTC)
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*morehugs*

Thought about you.

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TM(tm)

from: [info]terrymcgarry
date: Sep. 17th, 2007 08:30 pm (UTC)
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Thanks, E. I'm keeping Harriet and the rest of his family very much in my thoughts. I appreciate that I was in yours. {{{hugs you}}}

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Daniel Arenson

from: [info]danielarenson
date: Sep. 17th, 2007 09:36 pm (UTC)
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I had no idea that you copyedited his books. Yeah, I heard the news 6:30 this morning as I woke up. I remember reading his books when I was 15 years old; he seemed like a nice, intelligent guy.

Daniel

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TM(tm)

from: [info]terrymcgarry
date: Sep. 18th, 2007 01:06 am (UTC)
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It came up sometimes on convention panels, but not too much in online conversation, beyond explanations of why I was missing, say, a WFC because of a rush job. Locus mentioned it in an article once, but that's pretty unusual.

His books do convey goodheartedness and intelligence; I was (and am, since the books live on) immensely fond of that narrative sentience.

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Michael

from: [info]akaspeedo
date: Sep. 18th, 2007 12:36 am (UTC)
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Oh man, his fans must be going crazy--no ending to the saga now.

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TM(tm)

from: [info]terrymcgarry
date: Sep. 18th, 2007 01:20 am (UTC)
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I keep thinking about how my mother, now in her eighties, still grieves Mervyn Peake, who died when we were six years old and left a cycle of books unfinished. She wanted so badly for him to bring Titus home. I think a lot of people will grieve this the same way. It's very sad.

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from: anonymous
date: Sep. 18th, 2007 01:27 am (UTC)
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Grieving is the word I would choose - grief twinned, actually, both for the story that I won't get to read and for Robert Jordan, that he did not live to have that last book in his hands. The second is perhaps the most unfair.

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TM(tm)

from: [info]terrymcgarry
date: Sep. 18th, 2007 01:46 pm (UTC)
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Yes, to both sides of that grief, for me too.

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hand2hand

from: [info]hand2hand
date: Sep. 19th, 2007 06:37 pm (UTC)
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*raises glass*

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TM(tm)

from: [info]terrymcgarry
date: Sep. 21st, 2007 04:53 pm (UTC)
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*raises glass as well, toasts with you*

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