Malazan Book of the Fallen - Characters Pt. 2 Masters of the Monologue

The idea for looking at a couple more characters came from a mini story that was told through Mappo Runt, Icarium's former travel companion, in which the idea that the more wise you are the less you end up talking. In the mini tale, it talks about a battle that was going to take place between the Trell and a group of expansionist humans. Typically the outcomes of most battles does not favor the Trells; mainly because they rely on battle lust and charging downhill at their opponents with the aim of potentially running them all over and smacking them into oblivion. The Trell that were going to lead their people into the battle had all essentially put themselves in a coma, leaving one elderly Trell who had never really been in battle and never spoke. Needless to say his battle strategy won the battle for the Trell, and continued to do so for years to come. He attempted to unite the different Trell tribes, and in the end lost to the idea that civilization promised the younger Trell resulting in less traditional Trells existing. This resulted in this Trell leader losing himself to alcohol and he could be seen talking nonstop, and nothing that he spoke was wise in any way.

That above blerb made me think about the idea of wisdom always being accompanied by silence. And there being two characters in this series who ONLY speak in very lengthy monologues, and yet they are both powerful and wise in their own way.

Kruppe
 
(Artwork from malazanempire.com)

Kruppe is without a doubt one of the most interesting characters, despite the tedious monologues he puts all the characters through to their discomfort. He finds himself an ally to K'Rul; and Elder God and the source of the power for the warrens (I believe they say it is his blood). They speak and plan through the use of Kruppe's dreams. And there are times where it is difficult to tell whether the knowledge Kruppe is speaking is gifted from K'Rul or something that Kruppe actually knows. Early on in the series you begin to figure out how intelligent he is, once it is revealed that he is the secret leader of an intelligence group. He also gives Ganoes Paran (Master of the Deck) the push in the right direction in where he needs to look and act next. He keeps everyone that he talks to on their toes as to whether he is being truly ignorant about certain things or if he is hiding information. Out of the two masters of monologue, he is definitely my favorite. 

 Iskaral Pust


(Artwork from DeviantArt by dassemultor)

This picture above is exactly how I imagined Iskaral Pust. The difference between his monologue and Kruppe's, is that Kruppe essentially uses way more words then he really needs to; essentially 50 words for when 10 would suffice. Iskaral on the other hand is...different. His monologue consists of doing the spoken train of thought. He says his thoughts and feelings and verbally speaks about no one knowing what he is thinking despite him just mentioning it. And when people speak about something that was meant as a thought on his part, he acts as if he has no idea what they are talking about. His intelligence comes I believe from either being truly mad, or being a very good actor to keep others on their toes so they underestimate him. Which in my opinion does not seem to be too far fetched. It is easy to gauge his strength because he is the Magi of Shadow, which is not a role to sneeze at. And the fact that he has a tussle with a very strong D'ivers, and comes out a little bit winded after killing a few of them. I was open mouthed when reading that part in the book because I thought Iskaral was toast. To add to his mystery is his donkey. I will say no more about his amazing donkey, hopefully to get you to read the books out of curiosity :) 

Through thinking about these two characters, and the plot line in general, nothing in his books is really how it seems. He has exquisite plot twists, that completely change how you see the people you thought of as bad guys. A theme that reoccurs throughout the series is that when there is a war among the gods, the first blood that is spilled is by mortals. And it is interesting to see that has the series progresses that despite the amazing power that gods have, that messing with mortals is a risky business and it can have very dire consequences for said god.