'Just a storyteller, not a prophet'

 

“I get up at an unholy hour in the morning; my work day completed by the time the sun rises. I have a slightly bad back which has made an enormous contribution to American literature.” –  David Eddings

 

Eddings made that statement shortly before his sudden death in 2009, and the contribution about which he spoke was his amazing output of epic fantasy series’, many created in partnership with his wife Leigh, who died in 2006.  

 

Born on this date in 1931, Eddings grew up in the Puget Sound area, and that idyllic and rugged region became the setting for some of his stories, including his first novel High Hunt, the tale of four young men hunting deer. Like many of his later novels, it explores themes of manhood and coming of age.                              

 

While he had moderate success with those works, it was when he turned to fantasy and the writing partnership with his wife that he made his mark.  Eddings' initial call to the world of fantasy came from a doodled map he drew one morning before work – a doodle that later became the geographical basis for a fictional world he called Aloria.

 

A terrific chess player, too, Eddings took Leigh’s suggestion to incorporate elements of chess into the Aloria tales.  From that point until Leigh’s death they joined forces to write 5 best-selling series.  The last – called “The Dreamers” – had characters who could use their dreams to foresee the future.  While his stories often seemed prophetic, David pooh-poohed those who held him up as a great visionary.

 

“I'm a storyteller, not a prophet,” he said.  “I'm just interested in telling a good story.”