From: Raymond E. Feist
Date: Tue, 07 Jan 1997
Subject: Re: Magician APE
A combination of a couple of things, actually. There were only 2,500 first and 2,000 second edition hardcovers of Magician published, a larger percentage of those going to libraries, so there were never many out there. Many people had all the harcovers except Magician. So, when we came to discuss what we were doing for King's Buccaneer, I asked if we could also reissue the hardcover of Magician. Lou Aronica at Bantam said he would only do it with new material. That's when we negotiated the reissue across the board of the entire package, if I would re-write Magician. As I had the original ms., it was pretty straightforward going through and deciding what to put back, what to "tweak," and what to add. Most of the material, i. e. the ale shed scene, the long discussion of magic between Tulley and Kulgan, were there from the start. I wrote no new scenes, but I did add a couple of references that had been generic in the original that made them specific in the APE. When Charles tells of the Minwanabi betrayal of the Acoma, I had know in gereral how that was going to fit into a book (if I wrote it) of the other side of the war, but I hadn't named the characters by then. That allowed me to retrofit the references so things would mesh better. I tossed in a bit of description here and there, or took an awkward line and smoothed it, but most of the material was stuff that had been cut from the 1st edition. So, that's how it came to be
ADMIN NOTE: There is a small error in the attributation of number to FIRST EDITION. There were 2500 FIRST EDITION (First Printing), the other 2000 were split between First Edition Second Printing and First Edition Third Printing, but as there is no identifier, you can not tell as far as we know the difference.
From: Raymond E. Feist
Date: Sun, 17 Aug 1997 Subject: Re: Editor's Cut (Was Director's Cut)
OK, the story behind the APE. By the time I was getting ready to do King's Buccaneer, (late 1990), I was hearing one thing a lot from hardcore fans: "I can't get a hardcover of Magician for blood or money." At dinner with Lou Arronica, I asked, "How about we do a 10TH anniversary printing of _Magician_ and put it out with _The King's Buccaneer_? " To which he said,"Only if it has new material in it." So, I decided at that point, I'd spend the time recutting it and putting back in the old stuff. By the time I got into it, I realized some of the old stuff needed to stay cut, but that some of it indeed should be added back. The ale shed scene, for example, was also one I hated to lose. It set the relationship between the three boys, and without it Roland's death was much more a "ho-hum." So, APE is 80% cut material being added back in, 10% rewrite, and 10% new material.
FAQ answers attributed to Raymond E. Feist are copyright by Raymond E. Feist.
It should also be born in mind that the answer given was only applicable on the date written, and to a specific question. You may find further, similar questions, in the FAQ.
