And so ends Part Two, our Cosmere Chickens! It’s been a wild ride so far, and we’re only getting started. It seems like all hope is lost, but as we know, that only means that we’re in for a long upward climb as our heroes make their way out of the mess in which they’ve found themselves.
Reminder: We’ll be discussing spoilers for the entirety of the series up until now. If you haven’t read ALL of the published entries of The Stormlight Archive (this includes Edgedancer and Dawnshard as well as the entirety of Rhythm of War), best to wait to join us until you’re done.
In this week’s discussion we very briefly mention the current deity of Mistborn and Hoid’s behavior on Scadrial in the Epigraph section.
Heralds: Jezrien (a.k.a. Jezerezeh, Yaezir, Ahu), Herald of Kings. Windrunners. Protecting/Leading. Role: King.
A: Pretty sure we can put all four Jezriens right down to our leading Windrunner, this week! Protecting, leading, Windrunner… everything except actually being a king.
Icon: Banner and Spears, for Kaladin’s POV.
Epigraph:
Regardless, please make yourself known to me when you travel my lands. It is distressing that you think you need to move in the shadows.
L: Anyone who knows Hoid at all shouldn’t be surprised that he’s skulking about in secrecy. That’s his thing.
A: Sure, he’s going to make himself known to the local deity… not. (I’m starting a reread of Mistborn Era 2; I’m going to have to watch for any sign that he’s actually met with Harmony there! I sure don’t remember any from my previous reading.)
Chapter Recap
WHO: Kaladin
WHERE: Urithiru
WHEN: 1175.4.6.4 (Within a few hours after Chapter 42)
(Note: For the “when” notations, we are using this wonderful timeline provided by the folks at The 17th Shard.)
Kaladin is with his parents when a pair of stormforms arrive to take the unconscious Radiants. Much to his father’s disgust, Kaladin kills one and lets the other go in order to take Teft to safety.
Overall Reactions
She pulled a handkerchief from her pocket and gave it to Kaladin as he found himself yet again wiping his brow.
L: I’m surprised that neither Hesina nor Lirin commented on the excessive sweating. It seemed very out of place to me, and made me concerned that there was some sort of plague sweeping through the tower (you know, as if they didn’t have enough problems).
A: Hmm. Plague didn’t really occur to me (at least not this time). It’s pretty clear that Kaladin is under severe stress; he’s sweating, he’s not thinking clearly, he feels very odd… I assume part of it is PTSD, magnifying the stress of the situation they’re in; Kaladin actually thinks about this at one point, as he thinks of what his patients must be going through, and admits to himself that he’s in just as bad a shape as he assumes they are. I suspect it’s also partly the suppressor field, which is messing with his bond. It sounds like a vicious cycle, with each factor exaggerating the others.
Buy the Book
The Witness for the Dead
L: That’s definitely possible that the suppression field is messing with him physically as well as suppressing his powers. It’s messing with the other Radiants physically, after all!
“What would have happened, son, if instead of trying so hard to escape all those years, you’d instead proven yourself to your masters? What if you’d shown them you could heal instead of kill? How much misery would you have saved the world if you’d used your talents instead of your fists?”
L: He probably wouldn’t have been sold to the bridge crews which means he wouldn’t have been there to save Adolin and Dalinar, which means they’d have lost that battle and Dalinar never would have bonded the Stormfather and and and…
Sorry, Lirin, but you can’t just spin hypotheticals like that when your son is pretty much The Chosen One.
A: Well, of course he couldn’t have done any of that stuff, because that’s not the story Sanderson is telling. But hypothetically, yes, his life would have been very different. He might even have still (hypothetically) become a Radiant; it just would have been under different circumstances. And we don’t even know that he wouldn’t have been in place to save Dalinar and Adolin… but he most likely would not have saved Bridge Four.
“Son, think about what all those years spent fighting did to you. How they broke you.”
L: What about all the lives he saved? Life is not so black and white as Lirin believes and I hate how he constantly berates Kaladin and beats him down emotionally over this.
A: You see it as “constantly berating and beating down.” I see it as a father’s concern for his son—whom you definitely recognize as being broken. Lirin may be partially incorrect about what broke Kaladin; from our perspective it was more the people he couldn’t save no matter how hard he fought, and in that way they are very much alike. But he’s right about his son being broken, and broken to the point that he can’t fight without doing himself further damage. Everyone has acknowledged that; it’s why Dalinar took him off active duty, after all.
A more interesting question, to me, is why Lirin thinks it was the fighting. There’s the obvious part: Kaladin went off and joined the army, and next time Lirin saw him he was pretty messed up. But IMO, there’s another story that we haven’t yet been told, that would give us more insight into just why Lirin is so strongly against violence. It’s possible that he simply believes with all his heart that healing is better than killing—and most of us would agree with that, as far as it goes. (Or… we would if we weren’t so intent on protecting Kaladin from any criticism…) But I still think Lirin had some experience in the past that cemented this belief far beyond intellectual assent.
L: Oh, I’m not protecting Kaladin from criticism. God knows he deserves it now and again. He is, after all, still a very young man and he makes some real doozies of mistakes. But there are ways of offering criticism that are more gentle than others, and when you’re dealing with someone who suffers from PTSD and depression, the “hit them with the hammer” type is rarely productive.
“Now,” Lirin said, “think about these last few weeks. How good it felt to be helping for once.”
“There is more than one way to help.”
“And your nightmares?” Lirin asked. “The cold sweats? The times where your mind numbs? Was that caused by my kind of help, or your kind? Son, our mandate is to find those who are hurt, then see them cared for. We can do that even if the enemy has conquered us.”
A: He’s not wrong. However, there’s something more going on here. I’d like to point out a change in Lirin that I think has a major effect in this scene. When we saw him in Kaladin’s flashbacks, he was certainly committed to non-violence, though he only expected his own family to adhere to that; he believed that being a soldier was something any fool could do. (Not a very Vorin perspective, I have to say!)
L: I will say that I think it’s cool that he is so very different from other Vorin men. I appreciate characters who go against the societal norms of their culture.
A: Right? One of the things I admire is his willingness to follow his convictions, never mind what other people say. (I could tell some stories about RL people with similar convictions, but not here. This is going to be long enough as it is!) But he was definitely not committed to non-resistance; he resisted Roshone in dozens of subtle ways, with Hesina as an able accomplice.
In Rhythm of War, though, we’re seeing him prioritize not merely non-violence, but non-resistance. There is a profound difference, and it’s why I have so much sympathy for Lirin. Contrary to what it often looks like, I do understand why people get mad at him, but there’s a level that often gets ignored. Lirin feels personally responsible for Tien’s death and Kaladin’s current condition. For years, he believed that his oh-so-clever resistance to Roshone’s bullying caused the death of both his sons. Now (though he doesn’t say it in this scene—it comes in a later conversation), he believes that he is to blame for Kaladin’s experiences. Yes, Kaladin survived and Tien died, but the physical and mental damage to Kaladin from those years of soldiering and slavery really are appalling. And Lirin believes it’s his fault. If he had simply given Roshone what he wanted, not stood up to him in any way, his sons wouldn’t have been the target of Roshone’s viciousness. Tien wouldn’t have been sacrificed to the army, and Kaladin wouldn’t have tried to protect him. Like any parent, he longs for his son to be healed of all the terror and trauma of those years—and the more so, because he sees it as his own fault. That’s why he’s so hard over on the idea of just submitting to the Fused, keeping their heads down and being healers: He’s seen the kind of thing people in power do to those who resist. He doesn’t want Kaladin to bring that kind of attention to himself or his people. I’d go so far as to say he doesn’t want Kaladin to bear the guilt of being the one whose resistance caused the death of his parents and his baby brother.
It would have helped if he’d managed to talk about all this with Kaladin over the last year, but he didn’t expect it to become an issue.
L: I do have sympathy for him as a character. Thinking that your actions directly resulted in the death of your child will mess you up. And you’re right, Alice, in that this is almost certainly why he is now so adamantly non-resistance.
“That’s always been your problem, son. Letting your heart override your head.”
… Besides, isn’t the entire reason we became surgeons because of the heart? Because we care?”
“We need both heart and mind,” Lirin said. “The heart might provide the purpose, but the head provides the method, the path. Passion is nothing without a plan. Wanting something doesn’t make it happen.
L: He says this as if Kaladin has never had a plan before. Yeah, it’s absolutely true that he’s dived into things without thinking about them, but he’s not a complete idiot driven completely by his passions, either.
A: Kaladin has a history of acting before he stops to think. We saw it in his flashbacks, we saw it in the bridge crew (side carry, anyone?), we saw it in Adolin’s 4-on-1 duel, and many more. He does what feels right, without thinking through the possible consequences. He generally doesn’t make the same mistake twice, but he continues to go on gut instinct more than thoughtful planning. (It’s kinda funny… those leaps are the times where we either wish we were like him, or we cringe in secondhand embarrassment. His best and his worst moments seem to result from unthinking decisions. Hmm.)
“I can acknowledge—have to acknowledge—that you accomplished great things serving Dalinar Kholin.
L: Jeez, Lirin. Don’t strain anything admitting that your son is a great hero who saved thousands of lives.
His father was correct. Kaladin could accomplish far more by backing down than he could by fighting.
L: To head off the argument, yes, Alice. Lirin is right. Kaladin acknowledges this. It’s the WAY he is telling his son about it that’s abusive and problematic. You can be right about something and at the same time be inconsiderate and hurtful in the method by which you convey the information.
A: Let’s just say you and I have different views of what constitutes “abuse.” I’m personally reluctant to overstate this sort of thing; it’s like someone equating a wolf whistle to rape—it diminishes the victims of actual rape. I can agree that Lirin (like Kaladin) often thinks he understands something based only on what he can see, without realizing there’s another angle to consider. But I really think that what we’re seeing is a father terrified that he’s going to lose his son again.
Oh, and it’s also worth noting that Kaladin isn’t exactly sweet and kind when he’s talking to his father. He says a lot of sneering and hurtful things himself. Like father, like son, I guess.
Kaladin stood quietly on that precipice. Balanced. The Regal leaped forward, swinging his axe. And Kaladin stepped off the edge.
L: As nice as it is to see Kaladin taking some time to heal his emotional scars, I have to admit that watching him kick ass and take names is just so, so satisfying as a reader. Whenever something like this happens, this is basically my reaction.
A: I mean… there was never really a chance that Kaladin would stop fighting.
Even for a soldier, he corrected. You’re no surgeon.
L: Oh, Kaladin. You can be both. Don’t subscribe to your father’s black and white world view mentality.
A: But I don’t think he can be equally both. He has to put one ahead of the other, and while he can do the work of a surgeon—and do it well—he will always be a soldier at the core. IMO.
“How dare you!” Lirin whispered, his voice hoarse.
Kaladin hesitated, shocked.
“How dare you kill in this place!” Lirin shouted, turning on Kaladin, angerspren pooling at his feet. “My sanctuary. The place where we heal! What is wrong with you?”
L: Good lord. Someone shut this sanctimonious bastard up. Let the boy save lives. Sometimes, especially in this world, violence is the only answer, and all of our wishing to the contrary won’t stop evil people from committing atrocities. Kaladin gave them every chance to live. He tried to use non-lethal methods. And he let the other one go.
A: Hang on. You either don’t have any real concept of, or you’re ignoring, the depth of Lirin’s conviction and the way he regards his place of healing. Kaladin has desecrated it. He’s also put his family in a terribly vulnerable position, with this resistance.
L: I have sympathy for the putting the family in danger part, but “desecration” is a BS excuse when you’re dealing with the possibility of someone dying. Life is more important than some ideal of purity and moral cleanliness. A place can be cleansed. A life once taken can never be returned. And yeah, I know. Kaladin took a life himself. But, as stated earlier, he did not have a choice in this situation. He did try. He gave them every opportunity to walk away, tried to end it by choking him out… it was only when all other attempts failed did he resort to lethal means.
A: No, I don’t think Kaladin should have given Teft up to the Regal and his stormforms. At this point he didn’t know whether he was saving or endangering Teft’s life by trying to hide him. But having waited too long to find a better hiding place, he didn’t really have much choice—he could let them take Teft, or he could stop them. And stopping them meant killing the Regal. That doesn’t really make it any better to see him doing so in the surgery with a scalpel—the place and the object intended for healing, not killing. (FWIW, I think this was actually a brilliant move on Sanderson’s part; it ramps up the contrast and the emotional impact far more than “in the corridor with a dagger.” And now I’m in a Clue game.)
L: Yes, thematically it’s a beautiful thing. The symbols of healing being used for lethal means is very strong symbolism on Brandon’s part. Kaladin had two sides of himself, and in this case he is sacrificing the sanctity of one side in order to fuel the other. From a writing perspective, this is such a strong image.
A: He probably also delights in this particular argument—or would if he knew about it. LOL
“Heralds above…” Lirin whispered. “They really did kill my boy, didn’t they? What have they done to you?”
Kaladin’s smidgen of Stormlight ran out. Damnation, he was so tired. “I’ve tried to tell you. Your boy died years ago.”
… “Storms…” Lirin whispered. “Storms, my son has become a monster.…”
L: Honestly, I wish I had words for this, but it makes me so angry that I can’t. This is not how you treat your child. I do hope that someday we may see Lirin realize the error of his ways and come around to an understanding of the necessity of his son’s actions, and that he apologizes for his behavior. Parents believing that they’re right about everything no matter what is… Just so problematic. None of us are infallible, and we have to be able and willing to admit when we’re mistaken, especially to our children.
A: Have you forgotten the ending?
L: Possibly. We all know how great my memory is. I also haven’t read it since the beta so things may have been changed since then? I remember Kaladin saving Lirin, but I don’t remember Lirin apologizing to him for his words.
A: (Spoilers: Lirin gets the shash painted on his own forehead because he figures that if an entire tower was going to show faith in his son, maybe he could do the same. The words are very much Lirin’s way of speaking, so some people still don’t find it an adequate apology, but IMO it’s pretty profound. Also, it’s Lirin’s touch that brushes away the remnant of Kaladin’s brands, which is beautifully symbolic.)
L: Fair point, I’d apparently forgotten this. It’s a step in the right direction, for certain. I hope he continues in that vein and helps to heal his son (emotionally) rather than causing further harm.
“I’ve taken oaths too, Father,” he said. “I’m sorry I’m not the man you wanted me to be. But if I were a monster, I would never have let that other soldier go.”
L: At least Kaladin isn’t taking the words completely to heart.
A: Kaladin understands his father better than most readers do.
Bruised and Broken
“It was a nice dream, wasn’t it, Syl?” he asked. “That we could escape? Find peace at long last?”
“Such a wonderful dream,” she whispered.
A: Heartbreaking.
L: Agreed.
Oaths Spoken, Powers Awakened
Wind surged through the window behind, brushing past him, bearing with it two twisting windspren that moved as lines of light.
L: I love all the instances of windspren appearing around Kaladin when he’s nearing this ideal.
A: It’s almost like they wish he’d hurry up and speak that next Ideal so they could help him, or something.
So many reasons to stay where he was. But one reason to move.
They were going to take Teft.
L: Protecting those who cannot protect themselves.
A: I still can’t decide whether the repetition of “They were going to take Teft” is supposed to be an indication of Kaladin’s muddled state of mind, only able to focus on that one thought, or if it’s just trying to communicate the urgency to the reader. It comes across to me (at least at the moment) as the former, but it’s a device Sanderson uses sometimes to focus the reader.
“Because I will take responsibility for what I’ve done! I will work within whatever confines I must in order to protect people! I have taken oaths not to harm!”
A: Lirin sounds like a Bondsmith here, but he demonstrably takes responsibility for things he really isn’t responsible for. Wonder where Kaladin learned it.
Singers/Fused
Two of his soldiers took the Stoneward’s squires, one each, and hauled them out of the second exam room. “I think we should throw them all off the tower and rid ourselves of a huge problem. The Fused want us to collect them though. Guess they want to have the fun of killing these themselves.”
A: Okay, honestly, I’m kinda glad this particular Regal is dead. Just sayin’… (Not that Raboniel’s plans for them are any better, mind you.)
L: The fact that this guy was willing to just straight up murder unconscious people in their sleep increases my lack of sympathy for him.
“That’s him, Brightlord! The one the Pursuer is searching for! He matches the description exactly!”
The Regal grinned. “You’re going to make me very rich, human.”
A: Yeah, not so much…
L: ::snicker::
He was in warform, so he appeared fearsome, but his expression told another story. That of a person who wanted to be anywhere else, a person horrified by the brutality of the fight.
Storms… He hadn’t considered that singers might feel battle shock too.
A: Sigh. The pragmatic part of me thinks Kaladin should have just killed this one too, but I’m glad he didn’t. I’d like to think this one might be one of Leshwi’s people in the end.
He’d told himself that those fights were more meaningful, but the truth was that he hated killing common soldiers. They never seemed to have much of a chance against him.
Yet each Fused he killed meant something even worse. A noncombatant would be sacrificed to give that Fused new life, so each one of them Kaladin killed meant taking the life of some housewife or craftsman.
A: I really do love the way Sanderson portrays the complexity of the situation. There really isn’t anything straightforward about the entire conflict.
Humans
She had white and grey hair, but was young enough that it seemed premature, and had a pair of white gloves tucked into her belt. An Alethi master-servant doing double duty as a messenger.
L: This is your tuckerization, right, Alice? How does it feel to give Kal a little snark?
A: It me! It me! I love getting to give Kal some fetch. Yes, this is my tuckerization, and I couldn’t be happier with it. Backstory: I almost always go to Brandon’s signings in Seattle dressed as a master-servant. There are a few tasks (like taking pictures) for which I know his protocols well enough that he doesn’t have to explain anything other than “Alice will take care of it.” When I showed up as a master-servant in this book I was absolutely giddy.
You and I need sleep, because we’re going to become very busy men over the next few days. There’s an entire tower full of frightened people, and likely as not a few hotheaded soldiers will take it upon themselves to make trouble despite the queen’s orders. They’re all going to need two rested surgeons.”
L: When he’s not berating his son, I do generally like Lirin. He cares for others and genuinely wants to help them.
A: He tried to talk the Regal out of taking Teft and the Stoneward, arguing that clearly he was better able to care for them, and after all they’re completely unconscious. Isn’t it ironic, then, that he ends up taking care of all the captive unconscious Radiants later? (Um… right up until that wretch Moash shows up and starts killing them, and uses Lirin as a hostage…)
Then Lirin, overcoming his shock, scrambled into the room to try to help the dying singer.
Father is fine, Kaladin thought.
A: ::snort::
Brilliant Buttresses
“Go back to bed, boy,” he eventually said. “You don’t want to try my patience today.”
L: I love it when people underestimate Kaladin like this. Just makes me want to…
We’ll be leaving further speculation and discussion to you in the comments, so have fun and remember to be respectful of the opinions of others! Next week, we’ll be back with the first of the interludes between parts two and three. Brace yourselves, because it’s a Vyre one.
Alice has survived the record-breaking heat wave in the Pacific Northwest, mostly intact—although her brain may have melted slightly. Her mission this year is to get fit enough to run messages like Alili. Oh, and also to reread MB Era 2 this summer, because The Lost Metal is on its way. Sixty percent on the status bar!
Lyndsey has finished one Renaissance Faire and is now moving into rehearsal for the next two, and is so relieved that her “day job” is back. She has been a Sanderson beta reader since Words of Radiance and is also a fantasy author herself. She’s been doing weekly tie-in videos to the reread and silly cosmere cosplay vids on TikTok, or you can follow her on Facebook or Instagram.
Lirin made me SO angry during this chapter. Especially when he called his own son a monster and also for this bit: “I’m telling you that if you want to change the world, you have to stop being part of the problem.” I’m without words… how dare he? At this point, I dislike Lirin more than Moash, which is saying something.
Why didn’t you just be a good slave, Kaladin?
I think a lot of Lirin’s attitude can be tied to his having studied medicine in Kharbranth. His attitude is very similar to Tarabrangian’s reasons for visiting the Night Watcher.
I despise Lirin. He says that Kaladin is selfish. I think Lirin is the selfish one. It is one thing to have convictions, even if you try to convince others that your beliefs are the best for society. However, you need to respect that other people may not feel the same as you. That does not make them a monster. How is Lirin any different than a dictator/tyrant? Kaladin is mature enough to recognize that his beliefs are not for everyone; but they are right for Kaladin. Lirin is too immature to understand this.
Alice. I understand your point about Lirin second-guessing himself. Thinking that if Lirin had given Roshone what Roshone wanted (the spheres) and not passively resisted Roshone, then Tien would be alive and Kaladin would not be psychologically scarred. Unfortunately, Lirin does not take into account one important component: Roshone’s character. IIRC, Lirin thinks he is a good judge of other people’s character. (To be clear, I think Lirin is a lousy judge of character. He lets his own philosophical biases prejudice his assessment. Yet, Lirin thinks otherwise.) Roshone is insecure. He was always going to view Lirin as a threat. Lirin was a high nahn. IMO, Roshone was always going to view Lirin as an enemy. He would continue to be vindictive. I have no doubt that even if Lirin had been Roshone’s most ardent defender, Roshone still would have had it out for Lirin. Especially, after Lirin could not save Rillir. At that point, Roshone would do whatever he could to try to get even with Lirin. As a result, I believe Roshone would have arranged it so Tien was drafted into the army. Kaladin, believing it was his duty to protect Tien, would follow Tien into the army.
Thanks for reading my musings.
AndrewHB
aka the musespren
@@.-@ – You know, something just struck me. I wonder if Kaladin saving his father at the end, a scene Sanderson had anticipated for many years, was impactful as he hoped it would be? Because Lirin is such a jerk and so many fans can’t stand him, I just wonder if that scene is as cool/awesome as it should have been?
Austin @5. Speaking only for my self, I thought the scene where Kaladin saved Lirin cool. Even if a tiny portion of me wanted Lirin to splatter against the ground. But in order for Kaladin to be true to his character (and for Kaladin to possibly start to heal himself emotionally), he had to save Lirin. My hatred of Lirin did not diminish how I felt abouth the scene.
Thanks for reading my musings.
AndrewHB
aka the musepren.
Oh god, here I am again waving my little Lirin flag. Sorry.
I think the hate for him can get a little OTT. Sure, he doesn’t provide the affirmation Kaladin could really do with (and that we want for him), but it’s hard to see what he’s actually wrong about a lot of the time. Resisting the invasion isn’t practical in any way: all the Knights Radiant are incapacitated and resistance will get a lot of civilians extremely dead without changing the situation for anyone. In a wider sense, Alethi warmongering is a grotesque way to run your culture. If the war on the Shattered Plains hadn’t come along, they’d have fractured into warring kingdoms again and more Alethi children would have been killed by Alethi children. It’s like the worst excesses of the First World War every day.
On top of that, I think we do ourselves and the writer a disservice by getting mad at Lirin for being a mean, horrible father. He’s…not real. This is a wholly constructed scenario and we might understand it better and less furiously if we think about what purpose Lirin is serving in the narrative, what Sanderson’s intending to convey with him and how successful it is. Rather just, you know, stanning Kaladin till our hearts go bang.
Personally, I think Lirin is an interesting study of how hard it is to live at odds with the values of your society. He’s a man of principle but no one else holds those principles and everyone thinks he’s mad for having them. Under those circumstances (and if one of your sons is dead and the other one missing in action/sunk into the criminal dregs of society), it’s hard and miserable and…you might curdle a bit.
I think this is the first time I feel like Lirin crosses the line from a difficult, stubborn parent to either borderline or full-on abusive father. I felt like Lirin was mostly in the right every time Kaladin thought back to their interactions, but that Lirin was missing the obvious need for people to fight during a war, and taking it personally when Kaladin suggested becoming a soldier. At this point, though, it seemed to me that Lirin was beyond not seeing Kaladin’s point of view (an easy mistake for anyone to make, and particularly hard for stubborn fathers) and was incapable of seeing any point of view that clashed with his own. This whole scene is almost a microcosm of Shallan’s father’s downfall: Lirin wants to do what is Right, and wants others, particularly his own son, to also only do what is Right, and that desire lets him unleash his worst impulses on his family. Fortunately for Lirin, and unfortunately for Kaladin, he doesn’t attack him physically, he lashes out in the worst way to hit Kaladin, in his self-esteem. I can’t imagine how badly something like this would have hurt Adolin if Dalinar said that to him, but thankfully Kaladin has been through enough pain to more or less brush ‘monster’ off. That doesn’t make it not emotionally abusive here, but at least it doesn’t further break Kaladin’s soul. I do feel pity for Lirin here. I don’t recall if Hesina was present for this outburst, or if she hears about it after the fact, but I don’t think that Lirin would be able to ignore the pain he inflicted here if Hesina was aware of it, and I don’t know if he would forgive himself, literally forever. I agree that he likely still feels responsible for Tien’s death, and the ‘death’ of Kaladin, but even if he, in the moment, felt that Kaladin his son was gone, some part of him knows that he went too far.
Great discussion, everyone, and it’s wonderful to have both Alice and Lyndsey back.
Lirin knows that Kaladin is a soldier, but this is probably the fist time he actually killed before his eyes. He is probably just as tired as Kaladin, his way of giving in to stress is just not killing. Why is he not allowed to react to stress while Kaladin’s stupid actions that endanger his family are ok? Just because Kaladin is “the hero” doesn’t mean everything he does is right and nobody may disagree with him.
Lirin only gets some redemption because of one thing and one thing only: Hesina calling him out on EVERYTHING. his wife knows Lirin, and knows where he is coming from, but because of her love for her son and for him, she realizes that the world isn’t as black and white as both of them think it is. Sometimes, you have to kill, and sometimes you have to heal. What i’m saying is: Hesina is the best, and Lirin does get called out in story for his words and actions.
This chapter was so painful for me to read. Kaladin has Lirin’s personality. I agree with you, Alice, that we need more backstory on Lirin. I think Syl was originally attracted to Lirin, and something happened to make him reject her and fighting. And Lirin definitely has his own form of PTSD and guilt over his sons. It hurt horribly for him to call Kaladin a monster, but I understand his stress. He doesn’t stop to think how his words will affect any more than Kaladin stops to think how his actions will affect. Definitely like father, like son.
I have to wonder: if Lirin were anybody other than Kaladin’s father, would he generate this level of controversy? He’s clearly not perfect; like most people, he has some strong traits but also extreme blind spots. However, if we hadn’t been being fed Kaladin’s story from the start, following every detail of his descent into depression, almost killing himself and Syl, returning to save the day, falling back into depression and effectively losing his job…
Lirin, despite being Kaladin’s father, has not experienced most of this part of Kaladin’s life. He doesn’t understand what Kaladin has been through. He doesn’t understand how Kaladin’s bond with Syl has changed his life, a bond that is centered around his ability and willingness to protect people. This in no way justifies his comment, for example, about Kaladin becoming a monster… I just think that we expect Lirin to be more than he is, that we project our experiences with Kal onto his father, and sometimes that just isn’t fair.
However, I probably got some strange looks from my coworkers when I laughed at this line:
Because after all I’ve just said… I don’t really like Lirin, either. I don’t think he’s irredeemable, but so far…
@11 – It’s been made pretty clear that Syl came over to bond Kaladin. Besides, Lirin is the exact opposite of protecting those who can’t protect themselves.
“Storms, my son has become a monster.…” I was on the fence before, but that, right there, is definitely emotional abuse. (although I didn’t really see it myself until similar language was turned on my sister.)
@12 if he wasn’t kaladin’s father, he wouldn’t have the same ability to *hurt* kaladin. if some rando calls you names, it can still hurt, but when your own parent does it it cuts *deep*. At least kaladin is old enough to know that his father isn’t always right :/ but knowing something and believing it aren’t exactly the same thing.
PS: yay, Lyndsey is back! balance is restored ;) it wasn’t until she was away that I noticed how they complement each other.
This chapter is so painful; on my first read, I remember being shocked that it ended the part and (for the first time in a long time) wanting to skip ahead past the interludes to find out how it would turn around.
I personally agree with Alice on this one. Lirin makes a lot of choices that we see as mistakes, but so does literally everyone in this book (with the possible exception of Adolin, the world’s most perfect man). Equating him to Moash is just so extreme that I can’t even wrap my mind around it. Moash wouldn’t ask Kaladin to leave; he would bait Kaladin into following him downstairs and then hand him over to the Pursuer personally, all the while claiming that it isn’t his fault, no one can expect him to make good choices, blah blah (not a Moash fan here). Have readers here never disagreed with their own parents? As children grow up, they become adults, and they often don’t see eye to eye or even have the same core values as their parents. I know that when my parents talk with me about politics, they see a stranger, and there have been conversations that have devolved into name calling. As an adult myself, I know that they still love me, and that when cooler heads prevail life will go on. This is a discussion about politics on steroids. They are living the change, no one has slept, they have been engaged in life or death healing for 20 hours, and 2 very stubborn, strong, and broken men with opposing convictions on how to best help find themselves thrown into a situation where they cannot both hold to their convictions. Kaladin using a medical tool to kill in a surgery room is the icing on the cake for Lirin. Of course hurtful things will be said! Put yourselves in Lirin’s shoes; this would be like your adult son, whom you thought you raised to be accepting of all sexualities, coming to the same sex wedding of a loved one and standing up during the ceremony and hurling invectives at the couple.
For what it’s worth, I thought the ending with Lirin was beautiful. I am sure it won’t magically fix all of his conflict with Kaladin, but it is his way of showing that he is trying to meet Kaladin where he is.
Spotting parallels being my thing: AndrewHB mentioned Rillir (Roshone’s son). I just now realized that Rillir is a direct parallel to Tien, despite Brandon clearly intending that (once I noticed). It might well be Roshone’s motivation to get Tien specifically killed: “You let my son die, I’ll get yours killed in revenge!” directed at Lirin. I should have seen that, but the narrative is so tightly focused on Kaladin that Roshone’s motivations weren’t in my head–he was just “the ogre” of the story and I couldn’t realize that he was focused, not on Kaladin at all, but on Lirin.
BTW, Ishar killed Rillir. If Lightweavers or Truthwatchers existed, he could have been saved, but the Skybreakers killed them because Ishar said to.
Speaking of parallels: Lirin and Lin Davar can’t have such similar names and roles by accident. If you compare Lin to Lirin, he does come out looking very shiny, doesn’t he? They both have the role of being the childhood antagonist of their proto-Radiant children, though. Hesina definitely wins over Shallan’s nameless mom, who literally tried to murder her.
@alex:
That’s the opposite of how reading stories works for most people. The whole point of a story is to be immersive, to react to the characters as if they are real people. It isn’t a hypothetical mathematical simulation of human behavior, it’s a story.
@birgit
No, it doesn’t, but Lirin also doesn’t get a free pass, and he doesn’t have the excuse of literally having his resiliency sapped by the power of Voidlight suppressing his soul, as Kaladin does.
@carl Oh yes, that’s how we read stories, absolutely. But this is the Rhythm of War *Reread* isn’t it? We’re digging in, looking for details, poking at the machinery. We’re even wondering why Sanderson chose the specific artwork at the beginning of each chapter and how it relates to the themes of the story.
We’re not just reading and reacting to the story, we’re trying to understand it, and I think we and that aim are both ill-served by getting mad at Lirin like he’s a real life asshole being mean to a friend. It harms our ability to understand what’s going on in the story in the same way as if Alice and Lyndsey were just looking at the Heralds at the start of the chapter and saying “Whoah, nice beard. Anyway, moving on…”
Someone do a “bad dad” comparison / contest between Dalinar and Lirin.
At least Lirin has Hesina to temper some of his paternal shortcomings. Navani will only ever be Adolin and Renarin’s aunt.
Thank you Evelina!
We don’t really know how Lrin would react here if someone was going to be immediately killed in front of him. He is still able to make himself believe that letting the soldiers take Teft and the others doesn’t mean they will die. At this point he can still justify non-action.
Using the scalpel as a symbol for both killing and healing is beautiful. It shows Kaladin and Lirin as two sides of the same coin, that coin being “to protect those who can not protect themselves”.
IMHO, Lirin is a beautiful example of Brandon’s writing skills. To create a minor side character into a person who generates so much debate is extraordinary. Lirin- Love him! Hate him! Straddle the fence with him! But don’t ignore him!
@16 what do you mean rilrr was killed by Ishar? He was killed by a whitespine from a failed hunt. Kal even sees the spines in the injuries. There was no sign of mysterious men with shardblades. That seems a bit complicated for ishar to somehow set up the whitespine hunt, have just the son die and not the father, predict roshone’s actions to get revenge, have amaran come to heartstone to recruit and pick up tien, and than have tien die by the actions of a random solider; when the sky breakers mo have been specifically looking into the lives of potential radiants to see if they broke any laws, or in the case of assassinating amaran, sending a shardbearer to kill him during a battle. That’s rather contrived honestly
@Gaz, you’re implying something interesting there. Old Dalinar was very much opposite to Lin in some ways — mass murderer vs. pacifist, for one — and both had sons that were seemingly on the autism spectrum. As of RoW, both have elder sons who resent them and refuse to live their dads’ plans, too.
I await Lin becoming the Nightwatcher’s Bondsmith.
(Well, it does seem the megaspren bond older-generation people with strong personalities.)
I don’t really expect that, but it would be a super-cool twist, actually, if Lin was one of the protagonists of the Back Five books, having to come out of his self-chosen peripheral role and actively determine the fates of nations and worlds, by methods that aren’t healing.
Now my brain is writing fanfic in which Lin gets so frustrated by his helplessness (like his eldest!) that he tries the Old Magic (because he doesn’t feel he could be a Radiant) and the Nightwatcher instead offers him a bond ….
Oh, no, I can’t stop it! And Lin, who is clearly highly Connected to Cultivation, ends up becoming the new Vessel.
Shut up, brain!
And this would force him to recognize Cultivation’s comment last book, about everything deserving growth, even the thorns (like Kaladin).
Stop it, brain!
@23 – It’s Lirin. Lin is Shallan’s father.
@22 – I think he’s saying Ishar is indirectly to blame because the Skybreakers were killing all proto-Radiants, and thus no Radiant was around to heal Rillir. That’s a huge stretch, though.
@16 Don’t you mean Nale? Ishar is the Bondsmith Herald.
@25 I know that. I was responding to Carl who seems to be mixing names up a lot today. He said ishar sent the sky breakers… which is even more confusing than what he was saying
Yea, I too was greatly irritated with Lirin here. And he is wrong that Kaladin wouldn’t have had PTSD if he had worked as a surgeon’s apprentice in Amaram’s army. Sure, it felt good to Kal to work as a healer again in Urithiru, but they weren’t losing any patients during that time, because life-threatening problems were referred to the Radiants. Kaladin’s inability to let unavoidable deaths of patients go would have broken him as surely as his soldiering did and probably more quickly. Lirin just doesn’t understand his eldest son at all!
Alice: It is only right that Lirin blames himself for Tien’s death, because it _was_ partly his fault. Nobody forced him to fake Wystiow’s will and steal the spheres, which lead to tangling with Roshone. He chose to put his family in danger, and he also missed the fact that Tien was vulnerable. In fact, if Lirin could have brought himself to swallow his pride and ask his father-in-law or let Hesina do it, the old ogre might have been willing to pay for Kaladin’s education. OTOH, see above, Lirin was just so desperate to vicariously live through his son that he missed the fact that Kaladin may not have been suited to be a surgeon despite his talent.
I was also always bothered by Lirin’s attitude towards Tien, by how he was so fixated on his golden boy that he failed to notice Tien’s talents and interests or to pay him any attention. And when Tien was drafted, and Kaladin volonteered to go with him, Lirin’s response was “How can you do this _to me_ !”, IIRC. In RoW, to add insult to injury, Lirin managed to somehow retcon Tien’s personality in his mind and thought how _both_ his elder sons could/should have been surgeons, sigh…
Having said that, Kaladin attacking and killing a Regal should have led to Lirin’s death, if not that of the whole family, without the thick protagonist plot armor. So, he wasn’t the brightest in this instance either.
Speaking of the crumbs of new information about the other Radiant Orders, Birgit pointed out during the discussion of the last chapter that one of the comatose Radiants in this chapter was a Stoneward and that she had squires with her who were also unconscious and this is indeed the case! I have completely missed it on my first read – so, we now know that Stonewards also get squires merely after the 3rd Oath, like the Windrunners. Which makes sense, for the most battle-oriented Radiants, whereas the Skybreakers only get squires after the 4th Oath, and judging by Shallan in OB so do the Lightweavers. It still seems illogical to me that squires would have been knocked out by the power suppression, while Regals only lose their powers, but it is what it is.
“had a pair of white gloves tucked into her belt” – so Alice’s cameo swans around with her safehand uncovered?! How scandalous!
Nale and his Skybreakers went around killing Radiants based on Ishar’s advice that doing so would put off the next Desolation.
Why they thought Skybreakers bonding with sprens was an exception to the rule is not explained (since the Heralds have gone insane, maybe they didn’t think about it)?
As @Dee says, I mean that Nale was killing all non-Skybreaker Radiants because Ishar (the sanest of the Heralds!) said to.
I did get the names reversed, because I was deliberately writing stream-of-consciousness and I was actually talking about how the names are so similar.
It is weird that squires get knocked out, now that it’s drawn to my attention. It seems (not shown) that a bond to a deadeye Shardblade did not cause that effect. I’m curious about the realmatics of what happens. The suppression also affects the actual spren, not just the bond, as we see with Syl. But we also see that strengthening the bond enough (like, say, by taking one’s fourth oath) lets the spren be immune, just as it does the human–but unbonded humans aren’t affected by the field. So would an unbonded Radiant spren be affected, say an Inkspren nearby in Shadesmar? If the attack was just on the bond per se, it shouldn’t work on Fused before reversal, they aren’t bonded to a Voidspren.
Would it affect later-in-this-book Adolin and Mayalaran?
This chapter, for me, is about where to draw the line. I have often had conversations with my mother about consequences. As Alice says Lirin and Kalaain both have ptsd. And both have a different view on how to live life. In real life I would agree with lirin the most. I think that glorifying soldiers is the wrong thing to do. But In this book I feel deeper about Kaladin. Because his inner thoughts about honor. We know why he fights, we know he hates killing, avoids it when he can.
We don’t know lirin as well s Kaladin so it’s easier to judge him. My biggist problem with lirin though is that he doesn’t speak with kaladin but he preaches. He doesn’t try to understand, he judges. I don’t think he sees his son, but only what he wants him to be, and what he clearly isn’t.
Also the fact he thinks slavery is something kaladin should have just accepted is a hard thing to get past for me. Calling your child a monster is also something i can’t get passed.
Thanks for all the discussion, folks. I was so disturbed after reading the first few comments that I didn’t come back and read any more until now. I’m still disappointed by the amount of vitriol, but it’s nice to see a level of understanding from some.
While there are differing views of parenting, by parents and professionals, I have before observed fans actually hating a fictional parent character over their attempted intervention with their offspring’s plans.
No parent is perfect! No child is perfect. And all of us should be learning lessons along the paths life lays out before our feet.
Years ago, I moderated an early, now long gone, LotR forum. Most of the members were maybe high school age, plus or minus. They just flat HATED Elrond over Jackson’s script having Elrond attempt to send Arwen “into the West.”
I mean these kids hated Elrond, based solely on the movies, and theirs was a frenetic, not-to-be-argued-with hatred.
Life experiences followed — they grew up, many became parents. And no doubt found occasion to lecture their kids when needed, in their eyes.
I appreciate Alice’s more nuanced views. Thank you for balancing out the hate.
This one was a little intense and I had to step away a bit. I think in some way the diversity of opinion may be due to your own experience with parents or other figures mentally/verbally cutting you down.
Lirin is a straight up asshole here, and his behavior is just as abusive (in a different way) than somebody who hits their kids with a belt. Even though it wasn’t always from a parental figure in my case, I can tell you these wounds run deep, and they don’t heal – you just eventually work around them. Those neural pathways are still the same though, telling you what a failure you are and always will be. And coming from a parent it’s even worse.
Some people are just bad parents, no matter their intentions or even if they may be good people in other ways. I see it in my own parenting – my own idiosyncracies make me ill equipped a times for fostering the healthy growth of another psyche.
I do think Lirin is fascinating in the strenght of his convictons and my views are certainly closer to his than the typical Aleth philosophy. I admire that he sees through it. But he also strikes me as a bit contrarian in that he is SO rigidly opposed to it he can’t even fathom any possible compromise between healing and fighting (in some ways the conflict here is similar to Perrin in Wheel of Time, who also has his own conflicts with militant – for lack of a better term – pacifists). I think Alice is onto something where there is like some trauma that pushed him there, as well as his own grief for the way his own acts of resistance led (in his mind at least) to the death/loss of his sons. To him it seems better to just keep your head down than risk any type of harm.
In some ways, I see a similar struggle playing out in the way certain groups view the pandemic and safety restrictions. How much is too much? How much should we go along with? I have a feeling Lirin would be on the side of ALL THE MASKS ALL THE TIME (especially as a surgeon lol). (Which to be clear, I also am generally pro mask but I can also see scenarios where our caution starts to outweigh our ability to live).
At any rate, you get zero passes for calling our son a monster and the little ways in which he berates and cuts Kal down for not being his carbon copy. I can definitely see his frustation with his own ways being violated in his own sanctum (as well as the risk Kal took upon not just himself but his family) but this is obviously deeper than that.
There’s an obvious difference between what Kal does (fighting in self defense as well as not using it as a first resort) than Alethi warmongering. One of the things I’ve come to realize his that few ideals/principles are absolute, at least not in an imperfect world. Even something as simple as ‘thou shall not kill’ or avoiding violence. Ultimately those point to the value of life (which I do believe is the absolute we are striving for) but sometimes even that specific principle (not killing) needs to be weighed against the harm being done in other ways if you stand by. A well formed conscience requires balancing that (without succumbing to flat out relativism or just justifying something because you want it). That’s why we also have the virtue of ‘prudence’.
“Reminder: We’ll be discussing spoilers for the entirety of the series up until now.”
And some points in the remainder of this book.
Could you just not? I love reading these articles, but there are three things mentioned here that are spoilers for future scenes.
@Andrew Peacock: that’s the premise of this Tor series, that it is a reread, so you can’t be spoiled about this book.