The Children
of Dara

In assembling the Timeline of Amber, one thing that has troubled me is the seeming contradiction arising from the offspring of Dara.

The children of Dara (that we know about) are: Merlin, Despil, and Jurt. Merlin is the son of Dara and Corwin. Despil and Jurt are the sons of Dara and Prince Sawall. Here is a simple family tree:

We know that Merlin was born and raised in the Courts of Chaos sometime between Dara's seduction of Corwin in The Guns of Avalon (approx. +4y 129d) and Corwin's impromptu visit to the Courts in The Hand of Oberon (approx. +4y 180d ) when he encounters Merlin as a young man.

We also know that Despil and Jurt are born after Merlin. Mandor clearly states this in Sign of Chaos (SOC) Ch. 2, when discussing the succession to the throne of Chaos:

But you [Merlin] are a legitimate heir. You follow me [Mandor] but take precedent over Jurt and Despil.

But when were Despil and Jurt born, more precisely?

Here is what Merlin has to say in Blood of Amber (BOA) Ch. 5:

I sometimes felt she liked both of her sons by Sawall, the old Rim Duke she'd finally married after giving up on Dad, better than me.

This statement follows a flashback of a childhood duel between Merlin and Jurt.

But how can this be? Dara does not "give up" on Corwin until the end of The Courts of Chaos (TCOC). As late as Ch. 2 of TCOC, she tells Corwin: "I like you. It could be more than that one day, if you feel anything." But by then, Merlin is already grown. Corwin has encountered him as a young man weilding a crossbow. And there can be no doubt that Merlin is a young man by then, given this exchange with Martin:

"Martin, who is this?" I [Corwin] asked.

"The man who made these extra Trumps," he said.

"He drew one of himself while he was about it. I do not know his name. He is a friend of Dara's."

His use of the word "man" is undeniable.

In short, how can Merlin have childhood memories of Despil and Jurt, when Dara cannot have married Sawall until after Merlin is grown?

There are 4 possibilities, as I see it:

1. The flashback in BOA may indeed come from a time after Dara's "giving up" on Corwin, which she does at the Patternfall War (after Corwin kills Borel). In this scenario, the scene where Jurt loses an eye would have to come after the Patternfall War, and after Corwin's telling of his story to Merlin. That is to say, Merlin would have to be a grown man, and the duel was not from "childhood" at all.

This explanation is challenged given that the flashback paints them as not yet grown men; as the duel ends, Despil says "Mother is going to be mad". That said, at one point during the scene, Mandor says: "Is there satisfaction, gentlemen?" The word "gentlemen" may suggest they are older than mere children.

But this explanation is rendered essentially impossible when you consider Merlin's thoughts just after the duel: "I'd once overheard it said that I reminded her [Dara] of my father, whom I'd been told I resembled more than a little. I wondered again about Amber." This statement makes it explicit: Merlin has not yet met his father at the time of the duel. Yet, Merlin clearly meets his father in TCOC before Dara "gives up" on Corwin and marries Sawall. Herein lies the contradiction.

2. The second possibility is that Despil and Jurt are born before Dara gives up on Corwin, but that her marriage to Sawall comes after the end of TCOC.

After all, when Merlin says "the old Rim Duke she'd finally married after giving up on Dad", he does not explicitly say that the births of the children of Dara and Sawall come after their marriage. Jurt and Despil could have been born earlier, prior to Dara's marriage to Sawall. This would allow Merlin, Despil, and Jurt to grow up as children together; and this would allow the duel scene and Merlin's statements after it to make sense.

However, it would require that Dara had an affair with Sawall in the period following the birth of Merlin, but before the Patternfall War. She would have had to give birth to Despil and Jurt while still expecting to be Corwin's Queen in Amber. Then, much later, after giving up on Corwin, she would then return to Sawall and finally marry him.

This explanation, though stretched, is possible.

3. The third possibility, similar to possibility 2, is that Despil and Jurt are born during Merlin's childhood, before the Patternfall War, but that Dara is -- in fact -- already married to Sawall at that time. In this scenario, Merlin would have to believe that Dara had "given up" on Corwin much earlier. He would be unaware that she has not given up on him, which her statements at the beginning of TCOC make clear, statements that Merlin himself does not actually overhear. (Credit to Mike Weilgart for this theory.)

This scenario is also somewhat stretched. We have no indication that Dara has given up on Corwin before the death of Borel and the Patternfall War, and no indication that Merlin, specifically, would have any reason to believe that. On the contrary, right up until the Patternfall War, Oberon still expects Dara to be Corwin's queen, and for Merlin to be the heir to the throne of Amber, and Merlin is not unaware of this grand plan ("I was told that I would one day rule in Amber", he says, in TCOC Ch. 12).

4. Finally, the most obvious reading of TCOC is that Dara "gives up" on Corwin at the end of TCOC when she says, "I do not believe that we will ever meet again." Without tying ourselves into knots, we can safely assume this is the moment Zelazny intended when Merlin made his reference to his mother "giving up."

The final possibility is that Zelazny simply got things mixed up. When he wrote the childhood flashback involving Merlin, Despil, and Jurt, he did not realize that he had also stated that Dara married Sawall after having given up on Corwin (at which point Merlin was already grown).

P.S. - Related information:

• We know that Despil is the eldest of the Dara/Sawall children, from BOA Ch. 5: "I had always gotten along reasonably well with Despil, though he tended to take Jurt's side more often than my own. But that was understandable. They were full brothers, and Jurt was the baby."

• Mandor is the son of Sawall by another marriage, and is older than Merlin. Merlin describes his relationship to Mandor in SOC Ch. 2: "While Jurt and Despil are my half brothers, borne by my mother, Dara, to Prince Sawall the Rim Lord, Mandor was Sawall's son by an earlier marriage. Mandor is considerably older than I, and as a result he reminds me much of my relatives back in Amber. I'd always felt a bit of an outsider among the children of Dara and Sawall."

I'd love to hear your thoughts! Please follow me on Twitter @RZAmberFan, or email me at jkisherenow@gmail.com.

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