Age Differences In The Liveship Traders [LST Spoilers Alert]

[londonlassie]

OK, this is probably a silly thought, but it’s been niggling at me since I first read Liveships. Exactly how much older than Althea is Keffria supposed to be? I always thought that since it’s implied they grew up together, it would be a few years at most – say, Althea is in her teens and Keffria is in her early twenties. But Her Hobbness also made it seem that Keffria was considerably older than Althea, the points showing which I’ve listed below.

He’d died fourteen years ago, on the deck of the Vivacia. He’d been sixty-two, and Althea herself but a little girl of four. – SOM, Chapter 2, page 53

- Thus Althea is eighteen.

“[Kyle] has been Keffria’s husband for close on fifteen years!” – SOM, Chapter 3, page 61

- Thus Althea was three when Keffria married.

It was the old shout from when she was small and she would quarrel with Keffria…”Look what you made me do!” Keffria had screeched it at an annoying small sister as often as Althea had shrieked it up at an older oppressor. - SOM, Chapter 5, page 180

- Thus Keffria and Althea grew up together, despite Althea’s being three when Keffria married (and Keffria therefore wouldn’t have been at an age where she was screaming, “Look what you made me do!”)

The half-deliberate breaking of a dish or vase, the dumping of a bucket of water, the tearing of a dress. - SOM, Chapter 5, page 180

- If these were the chores the girls were doing when they were arguing, I sincerely doubt Althea was doing them aged three. I don’t know any three-year-olds, but I can’t imagine them having the strength to carry buckets of water or tear dresses. Pushing vases off tables…possibly.

After that, of course, Keffria would have been married and therefore would have behaved like an adult. Screaming at her baby sister wouldn’t have been seen as particularly adult behaviour, and even if Ronica/Ephron had tolerated it (which seems unlikely), I doubt Kyle would have been impressed with his wife conducting herself that way.

Also, Wintrow is thirteen at the start of SOM. That means he is only five years younger than Althea, his aunt. Now seeing as Keffria probably wouldn’t have had a skull navel ring, Wintrow probably would have been conceived shortly after she was wed to Kyle. So assuming he was born the year after Keffria married, Althea would still only have been four. So wouldn’t she have been more likely to grow up shouting at Wintrow, rather than her sister, as he is closer in age?


On a slightly different note, (and because I wouldn't feel right posting anything that didn't have Kennit in it ), in Mad Ship, Kennit tells Etta, “I thought you would be with me for a time, until another attracted you…[Wintrow] is closer to your age than I am.”
While there’s never any evidence I’ve come across to agree with or dispute this, it’s not mentioned IIRC how old Kennit or Etta actually are. So either my mental picture of Kennit is younger than the Kennit in the book (which is definitely possible since I do tend to age down my favourite characters for some weird reason ), or my mental picture of Etta is older than she’s meant to be, because I never had either of them down as particularly old, but I definitely didn’t see Etta as being particularly close to Wintrow’s age, which is fourteen in Mad Ship IIRC. Am I the only one who got this feeling?


So, any thoughts? Is there something I'm missing, or is the Keffria/Althea one a...(dare I say it )...mistake?

I put spoilers in the title since I wasn't sure if anything I've posted here is spoilerish.

Ack, another long post alert.

[Farseer]

That is just....okay, the only word I seem to be able to come up with is...*awesome*! I didn't think on their ages/age differences at all, most likely because I couldn't stand Keffria and wanted to avoid her as much as possible. That's good stuff, londonlassie!!!

I know that I'm going to have to think on this some but if we can't break any ground here together, you can always go directly to our Tangle Leader and ask her yourself.

Such an enlightening post you did just post here!

[londonlassie]

That is just....okay, the only word I seem to be able to come up with is...*awesome*!

Yay, thank you!

I didn't think on their ages/age differences at all, most likely because I couldn't stand Keffria and wanted to avoid her as much as possible. That's good stuff, londonlassie!!!

I wasn't a big fan of Keffria either. Too passive for my liking

[fool-ish]

Yet another thing I didn't pay attention to! Honestly fool-ish, you really must try harder!

[londonlassie]

Have to correct myself here:

If Keffria and Kyle have been married fifteen years, and Wintrow is thirteen, then he was born two years after they were married rather than one, which would have made Althea five, not four.

['thul]

If Keffria is the oldest and Althea the youngest, taking the deceased sons into account, then a fifteen-year gap is not as odd. In a modern society (provided whole family lives together) it might be more likely for her to shout at her nephew, age-wise, but at the same time, nothing can be as provocative to a young child as an older sibling who is too serious about everything. At the same time, Althea did not spend all that much time at "home". She traveled a lot with her father, so she might not have seen much at all of winthrow before he was sent to the monastery.

[Farseer]

If Keffria is the oldest and Althea the youngest, taking the deceased sons into account, then a fifteen-year gap is not as odd.

Ah, now there's a good point. *nod* *nod* *nod* True, true...

[londonlassie]

She traveled a lot with her father, so she might not have seen much at all of winthrow before he was sent to the monastery.

Also a good point, especially since she doesn't even seem to recognise him or be happy that he is home when she arrives back in Bingtown, before she hears her father is dying. If they'd seen a lot of each other as children, she would have recognised Wintrow.

I still can't imagine the girls being "so close" (as Keffria said they had once been when Althea yelled at her over "stealing" Vivacia), with a fifteen-year age gap, though. My cousin and her little brother have a thirteen-year gap between them, and they're not close at all, just because the older child has no interest in the toddler. They don't even argue, because the older child doesn't want to spend enough time with the toddler for them to argue.

Now my cousin would probably shout at or be horrible to her little brother because these days, fifteen is still a child and she's expected to behave like a child, so it would be excusable. But in Bingtown, a married woman, as Keffria would have been, behaving like a child would probably be frowned upon.

[Lewons7]

Also Ronica and Ephron had other sons (I'm not sure how many) some were probably born inbetween Althea and Keffria and coupled with the low fertility rates and blood plauge, the age difference makes sense.

[Jaythree]

On a slightly different note, (and because I wouldn't feel right posting anything that didn't have Kennit in it ), in Mad Ship, Kennit tells Etta, “I thought you would be with me for a time, until another attracted you…[Wintrow] is closer to your age than I am.”
While there’s never any evidence I’ve come across to agree with or dispute this, it’s not mentioned IIRC how old Kennit or Etta actually are. So either my mental picture of Kennit is younger than the Kennit in the book (which is definitely possible since I do tend to age down my favourite characters for some weird reason ), or my mental picture of Etta is older than she’s meant to be, because I never had either of them down as particularly old, but I definitely didn’t see Etta as being particularly close to Wintrow’s age, which is fourteen in Mad Ship IIRC. Am I the only one who got this feeling?

It's never directly stated but I think there's enough timeline clues to figure it out. My thoughts on it were always that Kennit is in his forties and Etta would be early to mid twenties. I don't have facts and figures to hand so this is just conjecture from memory.

Kennit was a member of Igrot's crew when he was, I assume, around Wintrow’s age and Paragon has been beached for at least a couple of decades, I think. Add in a few years for Paragon to actually make his way back to Bingtown and you've got Kennit comfortably in his "middle years" as Fitz would put it.
As for Etta I think the simple fact that she's working in a whorehouse means she's on the younger side of things. Her attitude and life history imply she's out of her teens at this point but if she was much older than 25 I think characters would make reference to it.

So the way I see it is that Etta is 7 to 10 years older than Wintrow and and Kennit is 20+ years older than her.