The Vampire Lestat
question
Plot holes between IWTV and TVL
Dru
(last edited
Apr 09, 2015 05:13AM
)
Apr 09, 2015 04:22AM
Aren't there a few plot holes between IWTV and TVL?
Specifically:
1) IWTV has Louis stating that he'd just seen Lestat eating rats and looking pathetic in a run down house in New Orleans in "late spring of this year". Now, we can guess what "this year" is from context, as it is never explicitly stated in the book...the interviewer has a mini-cassette tape recorder which runs on batteries, there is traffic outside with headlights mostly likely (as "the passing beams of traffic"), there is an electric overhead light in the room. Left to a best guess, the date is no earlier than somewhere in the mid 1970s or later. Since the book was published in 1976, let's call the date of setting to be 1976.
But in TVL, Lestat claims that he was in that rat-eating ruined state only up until 1929, at which point he went "to ground" and didn't come back up until the 1980's, at which point he was immediately drawn to the rock band and began his new crusade as a rock star, with no contact with Louis at all.
2) In IWTV, Louis says that Armand says, of Lestat's surviving the fire at Theater of the Vampires that "Two vampires who had been made with Lestat by the same master had assisted him in booking passage to New Orleans." But Lestat was made by Magnus, and we know from Lestat's story that Magnus ONLY made Lestat. Armand surely knew this!
Specifically:
1) IWTV has Louis stating that he'd just seen Lestat eating rats and looking pathetic in a run down house in New Orleans in "late spring of this year". Now, we can guess what "this year" is from context, as it is never explicitly stated in the book...the interviewer has a mini-cassette tape recorder which runs on batteries, there is traffic outside with headlights mostly likely (as "the passing beams of traffic"), there is an electric overhead light in the room. Left to a best guess, the date is no earlier than somewhere in the mid 1970s or later. Since the book was published in 1976, let's call the date of setting to be 1976.
But in TVL, Lestat claims that he was in that rat-eating ruined state only up until 1929, at which point he went "to ground" and didn't come back up until the 1980's, at which point he was immediately drawn to the rock band and began his new crusade as a rock star, with no contact with Louis at all.
2) In IWTV, Louis says that Armand says, of Lestat's surviving the fire at Theater of the Vampires that "Two vampires who had been made with Lestat by the same master had assisted him in booking passage to New Orleans." But Lestat was made by Magnus, and we know from Lestat's story that Magnus ONLY made Lestat. Armand surely knew this!
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Since Lestat rants to Louis in book 4 that he 'wrote him weeping' when 'no such thing happened', I guess that the meeting with Louis simply didn't happen. Then again, both the first and second book are written from a single view-point only, so one of them could have lied about what happened.
Also, the author has a reputation of getting involved with fans in a negative way so it might as well be that a reader pointed out this inconsistency and she felt that she had to adress it in some way.
To 2: No idea. I actually can't remember if Lestat told Armand his 'origin story'. This might actually simply be a good old plot hole because Lestat might have become a fully fleshed out character with a backstory only when the author wrote the second book. The second book feels very often like an attempt to redeem Lestat in the eyes of the reader. Given how many books are narrated by him, I'd say that he's the author's favourite.
Also, the author has a reputation of getting involved with fans in a negative way so it might as well be that a reader pointed out this inconsistency and she felt that she had to adress it in some way.
To 2: No idea. I actually can't remember if Lestat told Armand his 'origin story'. This might actually simply be a good old plot hole because Lestat might have become a fully fleshed out character with a backstory only when the author wrote the second book. The second book feels very often like an attempt to redeem Lestat in the eyes of the reader. Given how many books are narrated by him, I'd say that he's the author's favourite.
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