My own guess is that it was a combination of "immortality is cool" and "other series I liked (LOTR and the Belgariad) have it, too". After that, I guess he just forgot about it in favour of other stuff?
Yeah, he could certainly have made it more relevant than it was, even within the relatively short timeframe of the series (and I'm happy to see that I seem to have convinced you on the length!). It could be as simple as showing what kind of impact it has on elven society, which would also go a way toward fleshing out their culture. For Eragon... well, not having human Riders become immortal would solve the problem of him (and Murtagh) outliving everyone, and it'd only require relatively few changes to implement.
There's a reason why your average apex predator is going to be comparatively short-lived and fewer in number than their prey. Unlike, say, a tortoise who only eats plants.
Do apex predators actually live shorter than their prey? I haven't heard about that, and looking it up shows me that they tend to have rather long lifespans. Sure, tortoises can be quite long-lived, but they're an outlier, and Greenland sharks also live to hundreds of years and are certainly apex predators, so I'm not wholly convinced.
That list has me thinking of my own project, and I think I have another reason for that list in it: quite a bit of the potential immortals don't actually use it, either because they find mortality is something to aspire to (because that's naturally-occurring), or because of ideological trouble with it. Beyond that, mortality's quite high (since most of them are in animal forms), and since reproduction often requires specialised people, it's easy to get under control if necessary, too. As for tragedy, those who do go for immortality tend to seek each other out to lessen that kind of thing (and for a community), though it's still sad when someone you've known for a long while dies, so it's far from gone.
Back to what you're saying... yeah, the ancientness could be conveyed much better by giving us some concrete history, something like Dras-Leona having been settled four hundred years ago, for example. I find that easy to connect with and imagine, at least.
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Some thoughts of my own:
My own guess is that it was a combination of "immortality is cool" and "other series I liked (LOTR and the Belgariad) have it, too". After that, I guess he just forgot about it in favour of other stuff?
Yeah, he could certainly have made it more relevant than it was, even within the relatively short timeframe of the series (and I'm happy to see that I seem to have convinced you on the length!). It could be as simple as showing what kind of impact it has on elven society, which would also go a way toward fleshing out their culture. For Eragon... well, not having human Riders become immortal would solve the problem of him (and Murtagh) outliving everyone, and it'd only require relatively few changes to implement.
There's a reason why your average apex predator is going to be comparatively short-lived and fewer in number than their prey. Unlike, say, a tortoise who only eats plants.
Do apex predators actually live shorter than their prey? I haven't heard about that, and looking it up shows me that they tend to have rather long lifespans. Sure, tortoises can be quite long-lived, but they're an outlier, and Greenland sharks also live to hundreds of years and are certainly apex predators, so I'm not wholly convinced.
That list has me thinking of my own project, and I think I have another reason for that list in it: quite a bit of the potential immortals don't actually use it, either because they find mortality is something to aspire to (because that's naturally-occurring), or because of ideological trouble with it. Beyond that, mortality's quite high (since most of them are in animal forms), and since reproduction often requires specialised people, it's easy to get under control if necessary, too. As for tragedy, those who do go for immortality tend to seek each other out to lessen that kind of thing (and for a community), though it's still sad when someone you've known for a long while dies, so it's far from gone.
Back to what you're saying... yeah, the ancientness could be conveyed much better by giving us some concrete history, something like Dras-Leona having been settled four hundred years ago, for example. I find that easy to connect with and imagine, at least.