Robert Jordan
Robert Jordan | |
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![]() Jordan in 2005 | |
Born | James Oliver Rigney Jr. October 17, 1948 Charleston, South Carolina, U.S. |
Died | September 16, 2007 Charleston, South Carolina, U.S. | (aged 58)
Occupation | Novelist |
Genre | Fantasy |
Notable works | The Wheel of Time |
Spouse | Harriet McDougal |
Signature | ![]() |
James Oliver Rigney Jr. (October 17, 1948 – September 16, 2007), better known by his pen name Robert Jordan,[1] was an American author of epic fantasy. He is known best for his series the Wheel of Time (finished by Brandon Sanderson after Jordan's death) which comprises 14 books and a prequel novel. He is one of several writers to have written original Conan the Barbarian novels; his are considered some of the best of the non-Robert E. Howard efforts by fans.[2] Jordan also published historical fiction using the pseudonym Reagan O'Neal, a western as Jackson O'Reilly, and dance criticism as Chang Lung. Jordan claimed to have ghostwritten an "international thriller" that is still believed to have been written by someone else.[3]
Early life[]
Jordan was born in Charleston, South Carolina. He served two tours in Vietnam (from 1968 to 1970) with the United States Army as a helicopter gunner.[4] He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross with oak leaf cluster, the Bronze Star with "V" and oak leaf cluster, and two Vietnamese Gallantry Crosses with palm.[5] After returning from Vietnam he attended The Citadel, where he received an undergraduate degree in physics; after graduating he was employed by the United States Navy as a nuclear engineer.[6] He began writing in 1977.
Personal life[]
Jordan was a history buff and enjoyed hunting, fishing, sailing, poker, chess, pool, and pipe-collecting. He described himself as a "High Church" Episcopalian[6] and received communion more than once a week.[7] He lived with his wife, Harriet McDougal, who works as a book editor (currently with Tor Books; she was also Jordan's editor) in a house built in 1797.[8]
Illness and death[]
On March 23, 2006, Jordan disclosed that he had been diagnosed with cardiac amyloidosis and that, with treatment, his median life expectancy was four years.[9] In a separate weblog post, he encouraged his fans not to worry about him and stated that he intended to have a long and creative life.[10]
He began chemotherapy at Mayo Clinic during early April 2006.[11] He participated with a study of the drug Revlimid, which had been approved recently for multiple myeloma but not yet tested for primary amyloidosis.[12]
Jordan died on September 16, 2007,[13] and his funeral service was on September 19, 2007.[14] He was cremated and his ashes buried in the churchyard of St. James Church in Goose Creek, outside Charleston, South Carolina.[15][16]
Jordan's papers can be found in the special collections of the College of Charleston.[17]
Selected works[]
The Wheel of Time[]
Jordan published 11 books of a total 14 in the main sequence of the Wheel of Time series. Reviewers and fans of the earlier books noted a slowing of the pace of events in the last few installments written solely by Jordan owing to the expansion of scale of the series as a whole.[18] Because of his health problems, Jordan did not work at full force on the final installment A Memory of Light (later split into three volumes beginning with The Gathering Storm), but blog entries confirmed that he continued work on it until his death, and he shared all of the significant plot details with his family not long before he died.[19] He maintained that in doing so the book will get published even if "the worst actually happens."[20] On December 7, 2007, Tor Books announced that Brandon Sanderson had been chosen to finish the Wheel of Time series. Harriet McDougal, Jordan's widow, chose him after reading Mistborn: The Final Empire.[21]
No. | Title | Date | Length | Audio | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
0 | New Spring | 6 January 2004 | 334pp (PB) / 334pp (HB) 122,150 words | 12h 31m | Prequel set 20 years before the events of the first novel. |
1 | The Eye of the World | 15 January 1990 | 782pp (PB) / 702pp (HB) 305,902 words | 29h 32m | |
2 | The Great Hunt | 15 November 1990 | 681pp (PB) / 599pp (HB) 267,078 words | 26h 08m | |
3 | The Dragon Reborn | 15 October 1991 | 675pp (PB) / 545pp (HB) 251,392 words | 24h 31m | |
4 | The Shadow Rising | 15 September 1992 | 981pp (PB) / 891pp (HB) 393,823 words | 40h 31m | |
5 | The Fires of Heaven | 15 October 1993 | 963pp (PB) / 684pp (HB) 354,109 words | 36h 34m | |
6 | Lord of Chaos | 15 October 1994 | 987pp (PB) / 699pp (HB) 389,823 words | 41h 37m | Locus Award nominee, 1995.[22] |
7 | A Crown of Swords | 15 May 1996 | 856pp (PB) / 635pp (HB) 295,028 words | 30h 31m | |
8 | The Path of Daggers | 20 October 1998 | 672pp (PB) / 591pp (HB) 226,687 words | 23h 31m | |
9 | Winter's Heart | 7 November 2000 | 766pp (PB) / 533pp (HB) 238,789 words | 24h 18m | Prologue released as a promotional eBook in September 2000. |
10 | Crossroads of Twilight | 7 January 2003 | 822pp (PB) / 681pp (HB) 271,632 words | 26h 03m | Prologue released as a promotional eBook on July 17, 2002. |
11 | Knife of Dreams | 11 October 2005 | 837pp (PB) / 761pp (HB) 315,163 words | 32h 24m | Prologue released as a promotional eBook on July 22, 2005. |
12 | The Gathering Storm | 27 October 2009 | 766pp (PB) / 766pp (HB) 297,502 words | 33h 02m | Completed by Brandon Sanderson. |
13 | Towers of Midnight | 2 November 2010 | 864pp (PB) / 843pp (HB) 327,052 words | 38h 17m | Completed by Brandon Sanderson.[23] |
14 | A Memory of Light | 8 January 2013 | 912pp (PB) / 909pp (HB) 353,906 words | 41h 55m | Completed by Brandon Sanderson,[24] epilogue by Robert Jordan.[25] |
– | Totals | 22 years, 11 months, 24 days | 11,898pp (PB) / 10,173pp (HB) 4,410,036 words | 19d 5h 25m |
All paperback (PB) page totals given are for the most widely available mass-market paperback editions. The page count for the hardback (HB) editions do not include glossary or appendix page counts.
The World of Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time is an encyclopedia for the series about the unnamed world where the plot takes place, which is often referred by fans of the series as the World of the Wheel. It is published in the United States by Tor Books and in the United Kingdom by Orbit Books. The bulk of the text was written by Teresa Patterson based on notes and information provided by Jordan, who also served as overall editor on the project. While the information in the guide is broadly canonical, the book is deliberately written with vague, biased or even downright false (or guessed) information in places, as Patterson felt this would reflect a key theme of the series (the mutability of knowledge across time and distance).[26]
Conan the Barbarian[]
Jordan was one of several writers who has written Conan the Barbarian stories. When Tom Doherty obtained the rights, he needed a novel very quickly, so Jordan's wife Harriet McDougal recommended him because she knew he had written his first novel, Warriors of the Altaii, in thirteen days.
So he thought I could write something fast, and he was right, and I liked it. It was fun writing something completely over the top, full of purple prose, and in a weak moment I agreed to do five more and the novelization of the second Conan movie. I've decided that those things were very good discipline for me. I had to work with a character and a world that had already been created and yet find a way to say something new about the character and the world. That was a very good exercise.[27]
- Conan the Invincible (1982)
- Conan the Defender (1982)
- Conan the Unconquered (1983)
- Conan the Triumphant (1983)
- Conan the Magnificent (1984)
- Conan the Destroyer (1984) (adaptation of the movie of the same title)
- Conan the Victorious (1984)
They were packed into two separate volumes par Conan the Destroyer:
- The Conan Chronicles
- The Further Chronicles of Conan (The Conan Chronicles II in the UK, different contents)
Jordan also compiled a well-known Conan Chronology.
References[]
- ^ "Robert Jordan" was the name of the protagonist in the 1940 Hemingway novel For Whom the Bell Tolls, though this is not how the name was chosen according to a 1997 interview he did on the DragonCon SciFi Channel Chat.
- ^ "Good Reads – 8/26/10". December 26, 2006.
- ^ Ross (September 2005). "Radio Dead Air Interview with Robert Jordan". Radio Dead Air. Retrieved April 16, 2012.
- ^ McQueeney, W. Thomas (2017). The Rise of Charleston: Conversations with Visionaries, Luminaries & Emissaries of the Holy City. The History Press. p. 242. ISBN 978-1625858597. Retrieved August 7, 2019.
- ^ "Robert Jordan". Obituaries. The Daily Telegraph. September 21, 2007. Retrieved August 7, 2019.
- ^ Jump up to: a b Jordan, Robert (June 1, 2007). "(untitled)". Dragonmount, the Robert Jordan blog. Archived from the original on July 5, 2007.
- ^ Denzel, Jason (September 27, 2007). "My Journey to Robert Jordan's Funeral". Dragonmount, the Robert Jordan blog. Archived from the original on October 11, 2007.
- ^ "Robert Jordan and the Wheel of Time". Archived from the original on October 12, 2007. Retrieved August 10, 2009.
- ^ "Letter from Robert Jordan". Locus Online. March 23, 2006.
- ^ Jordan, Robert (March 24, 2006). "Sorry about the premature announcement". Dragonmount.
- ^ Jordan, Robert (March 25, 2006). "Important note". Tor Books.
- ^ "Important note from Robert Jordan". March 25, 2005. Archived from the original on April 5, 2006.
- ^ "Jordan's death". Dragonmount. Retrieved November 28, 2011.
- ^ "James Oliver Rigney Jr". The Post and Courier. September 20, 2007. Archived from the original on July 21, 2012.
- ^ "Robert Jordan (1948–2007)". Find a Grave. Retrieved November 28, 2011.
- ^ ""The Stone" – Entry in Robert Jordan's Blog at Dragonmount, dated October 6, 2008". Dragonmount.com. Retrieved November 28, 2011.
- ^ "Inventory of the James Oliver Rigney, Jr., Papers, 1905–2012". archives.library.cofc.edu. Retrieved January 7, 2019.
- ^ Cannon, Peter. CROSSROADS OF TWILIGHT (Book). Publishers Weekly; December 23, 2002, Vol. 249 Issue 51, p.50
- ^ "Robert Jordan's Official Blog". Dragonmount.com. Retrieved November 28, 2011.
- ^ "Forbes article on Jordan's illness". Forbes.com. November 30, 2006. Retrieved November 28, 2011.
- ^ TOR Press Release
- ^ "1995 Award Winners & Nominees". Worlds Without End. Retrieved October 7, 2009.
- ^ "Brandon Sanderson's Facebook page". (registration required)
- ^ Sanderson, Brandon (August 1, 2012). "Brandon Sanderson – Google+ – Today I got up, and I did not have a Wheel of Time book to work on". Retrieved August 4, 2012.
- ^ "Brandon Sanderson Blog: It's finally out". Brandonsanderson.com. January 8, 2013. Retrieved March 25, 2013.
- ^ Teresa Patterson at DragonCon 2005
- ^ Ernest Lilley (January 21, 2003). "SFRevu Interview with Robert Jordan". SFRevu. Retrieved April 13, 2012.
Further reading[]
- "Robert Jordan". The Times. September 19, 2007. Retrieved September 22, 2007.
External links[]
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Wikiquote has quotations related to: Robert Jordan |
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Wikiquote has quotations related to: The Wheel of Time |
- Robert Jordan's Official Blog (hosted by dragonmount.com)
- Robert Jordan at Tor Books
- Robert Jordan at the Internet Book List
- Reviews at FantasyLiterature.net
- Robert Jordan at Worlds Without End
- Robert Jordan at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
- 1948 births
- 2007 deaths
- 20th-century American novelists
- 21st-century American novelists
- American Episcopalians
- American fantasy writers
- Anglican writers
- Conan the Barbarian novelists
- Deaths from amyloidosis
- Writers from Charleston, South Carolina
- The Citadel, The Military College of South Carolina alumni
- The Wheel of Time
- United States Army officers
- Recipients of the Distinguished Flying Cross (United States)
- United States Navy officers
- American male novelists
- Novelists from South Carolina
- United States Army personnel of the Vietnam War
- Disease-related deaths in South Carolina
- 20th-century American male writers
- 21st-century American male writers
- 20th-century pseudonymous writers
- 21st-century pseudonymous writers