Line #45 Literature/MajipoorSeries


1	[[quoteright:224:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/lord-valentines-castle_9836.jpg]]
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3	The ''Majipoor Series'' is a PlanetaryRomance ScienceFantasy series by Creator/RobertSilverberg; probably his most popular and successful work. Starting with the award-winning ''Lord Valentine's Castle'' in 1980, the series has grown to include half a dozen novels and several short-story stories.
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5	Majipoor is a very large planet, although its low density and lack of heavy metals means that its gravity is similar to Earth's. It's a remote backwater, but several different species live on the planet, including humans, who constitute the majority of the population, and the shape-shifting native Piurivar. The society is agrarian and feudal, ruled by four people: the Coronal (Lord Valentine in the first novel), who lives in a great castle atop Castle Mount; the Pontifex, who is always the previous Coronal, and who lives deep underground in The Labyrinth; the Lady of the Isle of Sleep, who is always the Coronal's mother, and who sends dreams to the planet's inhabitants; and the King of Dreams, who lives on the remote continent of Suvrael, and who sends nightmares to punish wrongdoers.
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7	In the first book (as the series was written), Lord Valentine, the current Coronal, has lost his memory, and must make his way across the planet on a journey of self-discovery. The next two books, ''Majipoor Chronicles'' and ''Valentine Pontifex'' also focused on Lord Valentine, but other books in the series, especially the prequels, have simply shared the setting.
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9	A French comic adaptation started in 2009.
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11	!! Books in the series (in internal chronological order):
12	* ''Sorcerers of Majipoor'' (1997)
13	* ''Lord Prestimion'' (1999)
14	* ''King of Dreams'' (2000)
15	* ''Lord Valentine's Castle'' (1980)
16	* ''Majipoor Chronicles'' (story collection, 1982)
17	* ''Valentine Pontifex'' (1983)
18	* ''The Mountains of Majipoor'' (1995)
19	----
20	!! Tropes in this series:
21	* FourOneNineScam: "A Thief in Ni-Moya" has a woman swindled out of her savings by people claiming these are fees for inheriting a large estate.
22	* BigFancyCastle: The eponymous castle (on Castle Mount, natch), home of the current Coronal. It's several thousand years old, and it's traditional for each Coronal to add at least one major building project to the castle.
23	* BigLabyrinthineBuilding: The Labyrinth, home of the Pontifex, who is always the last Coronal to serve on Castle Mount. This strange city is in a desert region and is built almost entirely below ground. Many layers beneath the ground, the bureaucracy that actually runs Majipoor is busy with their statistical analyses and other "official" paperwork. The Pontifex himself, technically the top executive of the planet, is more or less stuck here.
24	* BlueAndOrangeMorality: [[StockNessMonster Water-lords]] have been hunted for meat like game animals since the planet was founded. Later in the original series, it's revealed that [[LetsMeetTheMeat they're sapient]]...and ''despite'' this (and despite the fact that they put up a fight when hunted), their attitudes towards death result in their stance on the matter being roughly "by ''all'' means, keep eating us; it's a great honor, and a service that we provide."
25	* CareBearStare: Lord Valentine has this power.
26	* CameFromTheSky: Khun in ''Lord Valentine's Castle''.
27	* DisneyDeath: [[spoiler:Valentine in ''Valentine Pontifex'']].
28	* DreamWeaver: Both the Lady of the Isle of Dreams and the King of Dreams have the power to send dreams to any of Majipoor's inhabitants.
29	* ExtraEyes: The Liimen, one of the several races found on Majipoor, generally working at menial jobs, have three eyes.
30	* FakeKing: A usurpation of this sort (carried out by [[VoluntaryShapeshifting the Metamorphs]], no less) drives the plot of ''Lord Valentine's Castle.''
31	* FictionalCurrency: Majipoor has its own currency, which is explained in the beginning of ''Lord Valentine's Castle'' when Valentine tries to buy a single sausage with a golden royal and has to be told the values of the coins in his purse.
32	* GrandTheftMe: Dominin usurps by doing this to Lord Valentine.
33	* IAmWho: In ''Lord Valentine's Castle'', the protagonist who has been memory-wiped discovers that he is Lord Valentine.
34	* InterspeciesRomance: ''Majipoor Chronicles'' features two such stories: "Thesme and the Ghayrog" (human/[[LizardFolk Ghayrog]]) and "The Soul-Painter and the Shapeshifter" (human/[[VoluntaryShapeshifting Piurivar]][[spoiler:, and he [[ButYourWingsAreBeautiful finds her true form more appealing]] because it's honest]]).
35	* LetsMeetTheMeat: One of the titular planet's native (most of the population are immigrants from the other worlds) sentient species, the enormous and [[PsychicPowers psychic]] [[StockNessMonster water-lords]], are actively hunted by the most of the land-dwelling inhabitants[[note]]well, except ''another'' native species, who worship them as gods, but it's a long story[[/note]], mainly because for the most of the planet's history ''nobody knew'' that they are sentient. In the unexpected twist, the water-lords are ''[[ValuesDissonance perfectly okay]]'' with being hunted and eaten, as [[BlueAndOrangeMorality they view this as a moral obligation]], and generally consider death differently from the all other races. Yes, they are ''[[StarfishAliens weird]]''.
36	* LizardFolk: The Ghayrogs, one of the many species living on Majipoor, resemble humanoid lizards, right down to their forked tongues. They display little emotion, rarely sleep, and sometimes serve as functionaries in the human-dominated government.
37	* MetalPoorPlanet: Majipoor is ten times the size of Earth, and only habitable thanks to this trope. The lack of metal leads to SchizoTech, with draft animals and {{Vibroweapon}}s existing side by side.
38	* PlanetaryRomance: A fairly standard example, with magical elements generally hand-waved as PsychicPowers.
39	* OfferedTheCrown: Valentine remembers this in his BackStory in ''Lord Valentine's Castle''.
40	* SatisfiedStreetRat: Hissune from ''Lord Valentine's Castle'' is this, played straight in the novel itself, while in the sequel [[spoiler: it's subverted as all hell, when Lord Valentine makes him a nobleman and eventually Valentine's successor as king of Majipoor.]]
41	* SwallowedWhole: Happens to several main characters in ''Lord Valentine's Castle''. Luckily for them, [[StockNessMonster water-lord]] anatomy is [[BizarreAlienBiology weird]].
42	* {{Telepathy}}: Used extensively throughout the series, and drives many of the events.
43	* TheGoodKing: Lord Valentine.
44	* ThouShaltNotKill: Valentine struggles with this for a little while in ''Lord Valentine's Castle''.
45	* VibroWeapon: In ''Lord Valentine's Castle'', the group encounters and recruits a gigantic amazonian woman who wields a vibroblade.
46	* VoluntaryShapeshifting: The native species, the Piurivar (aka Metamorphs), have this power.

Context Literature / MajipoorSeries