Welcome back to the Words of Radiance reread as we begin Part I: “Alight.” Today’s post covers Chapter One. This is Shallan’s book, and we start with her, a few days after the big confrontation with Jasnah in Kharbranth (The Way of Kings, Chapter 74). As promised, they have taken ship to get to the center of it all, shifting their search for truth to the Shattered Plains.
This reread will contain spoilers for The Way of Kings, Words of Radiance, and any other Cosmere book that become relevant.
Chapter One: Santhid
Point of View: Shallan Davar
Setting: The Wind’s Pleasure, in Longbrow’s Straits
(between the Frostlands and Thaylenah)
Symbology: Shadesmar Icon, Paliah
IN WHICH seafaring is undertaken; Shadesmar is drawn; an odd Pattern is observed; extinct creatures are not extinct; a great idea is argued but abandoned; the Cognitive Realm is explained; spren are discussed; solutions to House Davar’s problems are proposed (ahem!); the big secret of Power is explained; a great idea is retrieved and enacted; and Shallan takes a dip.
Quote of the Week:
“There is a secret you must learn, child,” Jasnah said. “A secret that is even more important than those relating to Shadesmar and spren. Power is an illusion of perception.”
Shallan frowned.
“Don’t mistake me,” Jasnah continued. “Some kinds of power are real— power to command armies, power to Soulcast. These come into play far less often than you would think. On an individual basis, in most interactions, this thing we call power— authority—exists only as it is perceived.
“You say I have wealth. This is true, but you have also seen that I do not often use it. You say I have authority as the sister of a king. I do. And yet, the men of this ship would treat me exactly the same way if I were a beggar who had convinced them I was the sister to a king. In that case, my authority is not a real thing. It is mere vapors—an illusion. I can create that illusion for them, as can you.”
“I’m not convinced, Brightness.”
“I know. If you were, you would be doing it already.”
Does this play into last week’s discussion about Jasnah’s relationships with Gavilar and Shallan as reflections? It is certainly an eye-opener for Shallan, as she begins to consciously deal with the importance of perception, and that it doesn’t necessarily match reality. While I don’t think Jasnah had Lightweaving in mind during this conversation, Sanderson almost certainly did. A large part of this book concerns Shallan’s development, both magical and non-magical, of the illusion of perception.
Stormwatch: The date is Tanatashah 1173 (a.k.a. 1173090605), the day following the highstorm in The Way of Kings, Chapter 75.
Commentary: Although there’s a relaxed feel to this opening chapter, the book starts out at a run. There’s no time lapse between TWoK and WoR; even for Shallan and Jasnah only a day or two have passed. I think it’s the seagoing that makes me feel relaxed in the beginning, because no matter how much the ship is making good time, rushing them to where they want to go, they have very little to do until they arrive. The journey gives them time to study and prepare, but all they have to work with is the books and notes they brought along. It’s a slower pace.
Except… not.
The chapter begins with Shallan drawing Shadesmar from her memories, with some frustration that her drawing doesn’t do it justice. This is, to my surprise, followed in a few pages by a whole lot more revelation about Shadesmar than we’ve had to date. All things exist in the Cognitive Realm in some form, just as all things exist in the Physical Realm. The cognitive part of a person, the unconscious self, experiences the world in the Cognitive Realm, making intuitive leaps of logic, creating art, and so on. To quote Jasnah again,
“There is an entire world, Shallan,” Jasnah said, “of which our minds skim but the surface. A world of deep, profound thought. A world created by deep, profound thoughts. When you see Shadesmar, you enter those depths. It is an alien place to us in some ways, but at the same time we formed it. With some help.”
Oddly, given all this explanation, I’m still with Shallan—“That made almost no sense whatsoever to me.” Still, glimmers of understanding are an improvement!
The chapter closes with the delightful scene, plausible or not, where Shallan uses her new understanding of power to make Tozbek stop the ship and let her look at the santhid. I couldn’t quite convince myself that Tozbek would really change his attitude so quickly, but I loved it in context anyway. (I wonder if Pattern took a hand.) In any case, I giggled my way through Shallan having to fight with her dress—it’s such a Shallan thing, to not think it quite all the way through the process—and I melted when she put her head under the water and forgot about all such mundane things as she saw this wonderful creature in its natural setting. More on that in a minute.
What about the Part One title, “Alight.” According to the dictionary, there are two distinct senses in which this word is used: to land, or step down, or get off; or, to burn or illuminate. I ought to have something profound to say, but I don’t. Clearly there are later references to burning, as when the assassins come and when the stick refuses to burn. Could it also refer to Shallan’s beginning to come alight as a Radiant, as her relationship with Pattern develops? Could it, in the first sense, be a reference to finding her purpose? Ideas, please!
Sprenspotting: Oh, so much! In the extant Catalogue, windspren and gloryspren were already noted. There are two exciting new spren in this chapter, as well as more explanation of spren than I expected to see for several books yet.
There is the “group of strange spren shaped like arrows” which move through the water around the santhid. Are these in some way similar to the spren around the chasmfiends, enabling the santhid’s great size or movement?
And… Pattern! Did you realize we actually saw Pattern in the fifth paragraph of the first “real-time” chapter? The twenty-third line of the chapter? It hadn’t quite registered before, that he shows up so soon—and that he scares the living daylights out of Shallan right off the bat. Heh.
And finally, Yay! Yippee! Explanations of spren!! By now it’s almost “old news,” but when I first read this, I was completely blown away. I expected glimpses and hints for another book or two before we got this much information! And… then I realize that just as many new questions are raised as answered. SANDERSOOOOOOON!!!!
Still. Spren are living ideas, elements of the Cognitive Realm that have leaked into the physical world, concepts that have gained sentience. They are
“wild in their variety. Some are as clever as humans and create cities. Others are like fish and simply swim in the currents.”
They do not trust humans, because of the ancient betrayal, which they won’t discuss but which, with later information, we can identify as the Recreance. How, why, or what it was, we still don’t know—but this is our first clear indication that the Radiants betrayed, not primarily mankind, but the spren. Looking back, it’s hinted in Dalinar’s Feverstone Keep vision: he dashes out among the abandoned Blades and is struck with “a sense of immense tragedy, of pain and betrayal.” Now we can see that it was the spren who were in pain and being betrayed, though we didn’t know enough about Shardblades to make that connection at the time.
Finally, there’s this:
“The old ways are returning, and I don’t see it as a hopeful sign. It’s an act of self-preservation. The spren sense impending danger, and so they return to us.”
::shudder::
All Creatures Shelled and Feathered: Three new creatures show up here: redwaters and khornaks, both of which are clearly hazardous to humans, and… the santhid. Of the first two, we’re given nothing more, but the name “redwater” gives me the shudders.
The santhid, though… the santhid is beautiful, in a knotted-grey-blue-mass sort of way. It’s ponderous, and majestic, and alien. And it looks right at Shallan and sees her. This will be Significant.
Ars Mechanica: It is a minor but interesting detail, that Navani is unsurprised by Jasnah asking about Shallan’s broken Soulcaster; furthermore, she seems to think it may well be fairly easy to fix. Finicky things, fabrials, but awfully handy.
Heraldic Symbolism: Paliah represents the divine attributes of Learned and Giving; I assume she shows up on this chapter because of the learning that goes on. Perhaps, as a secondary note, Paliah represents Jasnah teaching (giving learning to?) Shallan, as well as giving her solutions to some of her more distracting problems.
Shipping Wars: Adolin! Adolin! But why not Renarin?
I loved everything about Jasnah’s arrangements for Shallan’s betrothal. Not that I’m in the habit of thinking that arranged marriages are the best way to go, but Shallan herself points out her lack of wisdom wrt romantic relationships. I’m not sure what I like best: the idea, Jasnah’s hesitation about Shallan’s anticipated reaction, Shallan’s reaction itself, or Jasnah’s reaction to Shallan’s reaction!
There’s real genius here: marry Adolin to a proto-Radiant, settle him down, and solve much of Shallan’s family’s issues with a high alliance. Jasnah thinks of it with a certain amount of loathing, even though it was her own idea; her view of marriage is… not entirely positive, it seems. She thinks of it as restrictive, and as being beholden to a man—despite the fact that her mother shows no signs of being a terribly subservient sort of woman. Is it because of the flaws in Gavilar’s and Navani’s marriage, or because she is too strong a personality herself to seriously wish to allow anything in her life that she doesn’t control?
Shallan, on the other hand, doesn’t have a problem with it, and immediately sees all the advantages—including some that Jasnah doesn’t. She always expected to have her father arrange her marriage, and despite the problems of her home life, she doesn’t see marriage as either restrictive or an interruption to her beloved scholarship. She’s young, relatively poor, and a bit romantic, so I suppose the being betrothed to the world’s most eligible, young, handsome, wealthy, noble bachelor would be more appealing to her than to Jasnah-the-king’s-sister.
Of course, she raises a good point, and one that we talked about before WoR came out—why not Renarin? Jasnah answers the question of “what do I have to offer?” but she never responds to the question about Renarin.
Well, I’m firmly on the Shallan-Adolin ship, so I’m happy.
Just Sayin’: I find delight in noticing the Roshar-specific figures of speech, so I’m adding a recurring unit. Today’s phrase comes from Shallan: “Why on the winds would I be offended?” Where we might say “Why on earth…?” (or variants with more shock value but less meaning), the natural form for storm-swept Roshar is “Why on the winds…?” Just sayin’.
“A causal—a conditional betrothal, in Vorin terminology.” I’m putting this in for anyone who hasn’t caught it yet. “Causal” is not a typo for “casual”. It’s the deliberate choice of an unusual word; I don’t know what was behind Brandon’s etymology here, but it’s not a misspelling. What does it “cause”? Well, in Shallan’s case, it causes a great deal of relief!
Okay, that’s more than enough out of me. See you in the comments!
Alice Arneson is a long-time Tor.com commenter and Sanderson beta-reader. She has been a fantasy lover since the age of eight, when her third-grade teacher loaned her his copy of The Hobbit. (Thanks, Mr. Hamilton!)
First on Alice’s Part!
And wow, not much summary. I need to do my homework I guess. :-)
I must have read this chapter 3 times before the official release (Thanks Tor!) And it still gets me. By pulling out our Quote of the chapter, it really points out how important this conversation was to the rest of the book.
How would Shallan have acted without this conversation? Would she have been able to get to the Shatter Plains? If not, we never would have enjoyed the “Boots!” exchange. I know the other woman takes over as Shallan’s teacher for a bit, but this really sets up the whole of her growth for this book.
Oh, and this is my favorite picture of the B&W. Much as I enjoy Isaac’s stuff, this one just takes my breath away.
Wonderful post!
Quick typo, though:
You probably mean “with”
And now, to discussion!
I arrived at the same conclusion regarding the presence of Paliah as a herald icon. It’s worth noting that we generally saw Paliah in WoK when they were in the Palanaeum, and we were uncertain whether to ascribe it to the location or the fact that learning is taking place. While it may have been a combination of both, I think we can definitively say that it’s here because of the learning.
I was extremely surprised to see so many of my questions answered so early in the book. There’s stuff here that I thought we’d have to look hard to find. I’m wondering if we can extrapolate very much about the spiritual realm, based on the terminoligy that Jasnah uses here–she says that there are three parts to everything, the physical part, the cognitive part, and what she calls the “soul.” We had some debate as to whether Brandon was using the word “soul” in the same way that Mormon theology dictates, and I would cite Jasnah’s usage of the word as definitive proof that he is not. I submit that the “soul” that makes up the spiritual aspect of a being is something different. As to what, that’s kind of up in the air.
Oh, also, did anyone else picture the Santhid as being basically a mixture between a brain and an octopus?
I actually like the way the ‘summary’ was undertaken—essentially briefly setting the scene before having a much more detailed walkthrough during the comments. Maybe it would have been an issue if I hadn’t just read the book a couple of months ago but I thought it was really effective.
Either way, my main takeaway was Alice’s obvious gift with these types of discussions. It had great flow and wonderful insight. I am really looking forward to her continuing work on this reread moving forward.
Congrats, Wet/Alice – now we’re off and running. Well done. (I knew her back when she was one of the little people….)
wrt is short for “with respect to” – not a typo.
The summary format used is very akin to the style used in Brust’s Paarfi novels. Was that an intentional decision by our bloggers? Just curious.
Memespotting:
Headdesk = SANDERSOOOOOOON!!!!
Merriam-Webster defines causal as: making something happen. So, an arranged marriage, as opposed to a marriage due to romance. I thought it was a typo as well, when the preview chapter got posted, but Peter set me straight.
Great start, Alice! Keep ’em coming!
@5 RobMRobM
Huh, you learn something new every day. Never mind, then!
@5 RobMRobM: That summary style was very common in previous centuries, where it was used in the books for chapter titles or a little bit of text right after the chapter number. I think Carl said they were basing their usage on Winnie-the-Pooh.
Wetlander FTW!
Brandon is a master at building double or triple meanings into his work. It’s quite impressive. The one about ‘alight’ possibly referring to Shallan’s developing relationship with Pattern sailed right by me.
One thing that confuses me about Shallan and her Blade (yes, I’m skipping ahead a little, forgive me) is that she summoned the Blade well before she ever met her spren pal. I’m pretty certain her Blade is not of the dead-spren variety. So what’s up here? Was Pattern acting on her behalf even before they were formally introduced?
ETA
I want to add that the Santhid scene was…captivating, even if Capt. Tozbek’s rapid change of heart about stopping the ship was a bit abrupt. Ben McSweeney’s illustration brings the scene to life. And let’s not forget Alice’s role in forging the embarrassing-floating-skirt problem and resolution. Accuracy FTW.
Love the interplay between Shallan and Jasnah in this chapter, and how Shallan is learning about herself and her capabilities. I’m pretty sure it was this chapter that completely changed my opinion of her.
@10, Ways
You didn’t skip ahead far enough–she bonded pattern when she was a little girl. Presumably the first person she killed with it was her mother.
Great first post, Alice! So nice to see you up top, where you belong. ;-)
Jasnah’s quote @@@@@ Shadesmar…..It makes me think of the Cognitive Realm as what we know as dreaming, only they can access it voluntarily, whenever they wish.
Julia Cameron in her book, The Artists Way, discusses accessing the “Creative Unconscious”, and suggests ways to train your mind to reveal those thoughts and ideas. Those thoughts/ideas made extant by the artist would then become the living manifestations of themselves, in that they cause reaction and discussion….like this one. That’s as close as I can get to an understanding of Shadesmar. ( See also Carl Jung.)
(It also reminds me of the unconscious state that Elodin is trying to get Kvothe to access for Naming.) Good stuff here.
This was where I finally started to like Shallan. She’s eaten her crow, and is now ready and open to learning. Nothing like Truth and Honesty to free your mind, eh?
Something I forgot to note in the Symbology: the Shadesmar icon was Shallan’s “insignia” all through The Way of Kings – it was the clue that a chapter would be primarily her POV. And so it is again, except that in Words of Radiance it was also used for Jasnah’s POV in the Prologue.
King @2 – I probably should have put a colon after it, though.
“Oh, also, did anyone else picture the Santhid as being basically a mixture between a brain and an octopus?”
::gigglesnort:: Yeah, kinda that.
Underbelly @3 – ::blushes:: Thank you very much! I still feel a bit like an amateur, but I’ll do the very best I can to help make this a great place for discussion and community – and fun. :D
RobM @@.-@ – Absolutely. In fact… you may have been here before I was! Also @5 – Yes, Peter has it @9. Pooh Bear FTW!
JamesEdJones @6 – ROFL! Nice one. Also, pretty accurate.
Ways @10 – One of the many things I’m eager to discuss is the various hints we will get about the past relationship of Shallan & Pattern. There are so many along the way – most of which are only caught on a reread, which is what makes this so much fun!
TKOCF @11
I don’t recall a ‘bonding’ scene, but that’s why I’m re-reading the book slowly–along with these weekly posts. May have to jump ahead to the flashback chapter where she killed her mom, though.
I was expecting something more akin to Kaladin’s developing relationship with Syl.
i wonder if/when we get an explanation of why the Knights Radiant all quit at the same time like they did. if so, i’m thinking it will be caused by them finding out that all but one of the Heralds quit…
Tek @12
Exactly! Was thinking the same while reading Wet’s commentary.
@15 – Exactly. That has always bothered me too but I would guess that you are probably right. Even still, I bet the discovery of the Herald’s abandonment was probably pretty epic because of how they disposed of their Shards during the flashback scene. Such a feeling of tragic finality.
The KingOfCarrotFlowers @2,8: Expanding slightly on RobMRobM’s response @5, “with respect to” is a phrase that comes up a lot in mathematics (“derivative with respect to” is the most common use), so my college and grad school notebooks are filled with “w.r.t.” IIRC, Alice (or, as I will always think of her, Wetlandernw) is an engineer, so she would have probably seen that abbreviation a lot as well.
Maybe this belongs more accurately in one of the next few chapters, but since the subject has come up I’ll just ask this here. Pattern was clearly able to act as a shardblade for Shallan when her life was threatened, even as a little child. But when we’re first introduced to him as a spren, it’s implied that he’s just now fully able to come into the physical realm and is still learning what words mean and how humans interact. Don’t these two conflict? Unless perhaps Pattern was able to become a blade before becoming fully aware of himself? And if that’s so, why haven’t any other spren shown that capability?
Nick31 @19
Fleshes-out my…lack of understanding…mentioned @10. Wetlander said she would pay special attention to clues given about their relationship as we progress through the re-read.
@14,19
No, see, Shallan had progressed somewhat far in her bond with Pattern as a child–to the point that Pattern would become a shardblade when necessary. When she killed her mom, her father “locked” the shardblade in the safe–I think that what happened here was that young Shallan knew what the shardblade was, and repressed memories of Pattern because of it. Her father locking the shardblade in a safe made Shallan capable of figuratively locking him out of her life. Because of that, their bond atrophied until Pattern was forced back to the other side (much as we see happening to Kaladin and Syl’s bonds when Kaladin isn’t acting like a Windrunner should).
What we see in the coming chapters is Shallan starting to be a Lightweaver again. Her bond with Pattern had never completely been severed, but she has to rebuild it. Apparently one of the things she retained was the ability to have Pattern become a blade for her.
Tektonica @12 – Re: Shallan… I was pretty sure that even the people who disliked her for (apparently) being a shallow, selfish, spoiled little twerp in TWoK would see her differently in WoR. There were hints in the first book that there was something more going on, but in spite of the fact that we were in her head a lot, she turned out to be a very unreliable narrator because she had deliberately blocked so much of who she really was. She’s still a bit gauche and naive in WoR, but she’s more and more honest with herself and… well, with Jasnah, anyway, if not really anyone else. I love the character Brandon created in her.
Good catch on the parallel with Elodin!
FSS @15 – That question is driving me crazy. There are just enough hints to spawn about a thousand theories, and not enough to evaluate them based on anything but our own expectations.
bad_platypus @18 – That’s probably where I got it – but it’s become such a part of my thinking that I couldn’t even identify, much less prove, the origin. And all that math happened a long, long time ago. ;) I think, if I were being scrupulously correct, I would have to write “w.r.t.:” – but I probably won’t!
TKOCF @21
Atrophy sounds plausible. I’m expectantly awaiting the clues mentioned by Alice, which I definitely missed in my 1st read.
Does the Santhid remind anybody else of the Lion Turtle from Avatar: The Last Airbender? Both immense sea creatures with monumental gravity in terms of plot/characters. Both beautiful.
@13 as soon as I saw the Shadesmar icon in Chapter 1, right after its usage in the Prologue, I realized it was actually being associated with Jasnah, not Shallan. At least in this book. Not sure about TWoK
@21 That explains some of it,maybe.But she never broke the bond so it’s odd that pattern was returned to default mode,lol.
I so appreciate these rereads and discussions… the first reading of a Sanderson book is usually done in a frenzy – read, read, read… what, there are chapters? chapters have names? symbols?
Nope, for me it’s a mad dash to consume the book whole. It’s in the rereads (these group ones and the ones I do on my own) that the
subtleties and sophistication and mysteries appear.
RE: Jasnah’s views on marriage and its limitations for women – I think our opinions about things like marriage often come from our point of reference when we first learn of them. Even though Navani is self-directing and independent now, what role would she have had to play when Gavilar was alive? It may be that during Jasnah’s formative years she saw her mother – a brilliant, creative person – having to “be” less than she actually was, to do less than she was capable of doing, all to fit within the role of wife. We haven’t seen much about Gavilar/Navani’s relationship, but we do know it was terribly frustrating for Navani, which in and of itself might have been enough to put a negative spin on marriage for Jasnah.
@2 – At first I thought the two small images above and to the left of the eye in the santhid drawing wer other creatures swimming around it. In my reread I decided that they are elevation drawings of the santhid – one from the side (with a white line showing the above/below water line) and a top elevation. So for me a cross between a turtle and an octopus/squid.
@11 – I’m not sure I would say that Shallan bonded Pattern when she was younger… I think it was more that Pattern was attracted to her. I think the bonding is more of an active choice, rather than a passive occurance. But I could be wrong, of course. Maybe for Pattern to have come to Shallan’s aid they would have to be bonded.
@12 – my thoughts exactly re: Shadesmar, especially the (The Artists Way) Creative Unconscious reference… that’s exactly what I was trying to remember reading that seemed relevant to Jasnah’s description of Shadesmar.
@21 – while I was writing this post so many great ideas have been posted. I think you are on to something re: Shallan forgetting/Pattern regressing.
I suspect that Tozbek’s change of attitude toward Shallan has a lot to do with Jasnah’s presence. He also defers greatly to Jasnah, who is a princess, where Shallan was a rather flighty girl. But now, he realizes, Shallan has a Patron, a powerful one, and Shallan’s attitude reminds him of her. The fact that Jasnah had come out of her cabin and requested a seat on deck like Shallan’s has established that that Shallan’s patron holds her in some regard. This flighty little girl has grown up and shown some teeth, and it’s a bit of a shock. At this point, I don’t think Shallan could have pulled off such a change in their relationship without Jasnah silently weighing in.
@26
Since Shallan used Pattern as a sword when she was a child, I would have to say that their relationship was much more firm than a spren attraction. Kaladin couldn’t use Syl as a sword until he spoke the 3rd Ideal.
In addition, Pattern also that she used to be able to make full illusions of people with sound and everything “before.” This indicates to me that their relationship was much mroe evolved in this ill-defined “before”
Great first post! (But I expected nothing less….)
I agree that this book started out surprisingly fast-paced. Yes, it’s apparently a slow, voyage chapter, but we learned SO MUCH about spren right off the bat. I, too, was surprised by how much BWS gave away there. And worried, because that means there is SO MUCH MORE he has yet to tell us.
I always assumed redwaters were some sort of shark, maybe a great white (or the Roshar equivalent).
The Santhid scene was awesome.
Paliah is learned. Jasnah featues heavily, plus Shallan is learning a lot as well. Seems pretty straightforward. Giving is a little murkier, but I’ll buy that Jasnah is giving knowledge. Plus Jasnah arranging for Adolin to marry Shallan is a form of giving, as well (giving her family’s wealth, power, and connections to the poor Davars).
Shallan plus Adolin: shipped! Big catch for Shallan. Renarin could have been possible but Jasnah knows that Shallan is young, and as an artist seeks beauty, and Adolin certainy proves to be her type in the end. Plus Renarin is a little odd, and sickly. Surely Jasnah respects him, but I’m not surprised she didn’t propose him for a match. It seemed like he might end up joining the ardentia in the last book, maybe Jasnah foresaw that possibility, too.
@26 It’s also possible that because Jasnah is so brilliant, she has a hard time finding a man who is intellectually in her same weight class, and she would have problems respecting anyone else. I cannot imagine that the warrior ideal and the Alethi emphasis on the masculine arts of hitting things would appeal to a scholar such as her. About the only candidates for educated men are from the ardentia, and there are multiple hints that her relationships with the ardentia are not good. There are also hints of a possibly traumatic experience with men in her past. In the incident with streets in Kharbranth, part of Shallan’s horror comes from wondering what had been done to Jasnah to provoke such a powerful reaction.
My pet theory on the Recreance is that a Bondsmith did something really nasty to sever the bonds between all voidbringers and voidspren. The severing removed the consciousness of all the voidspren, and even though it was a “good” outcome for the humans, it was looked on as an atrocity by the denizens of the Cognitive Realm.
At that point, it was decided that the grand experiment of Physical Realm spren consciousness wasn’t worth the risk, and all the bonds were severed. I’m guessing the Stormfather had a hand in it.
Re: Shallan & Pattern –
That is the biggest relationship that I want more information about. I believe I said it in the Spoiler review thread, but bears repeating…
What the heck was an 11 year girl doing that could attract a KR spren to herself?!?
We never get that part of the relationship in her flashbacks. We start with her mother’s death. So very powerful, but I wish we could rewind a few more months / years to see what actions she was taking to attract Pattern to begin with. Thank you Wet, for planning to look for more clues in the text.
@@@@@ Peter? Any words you can share about this? Any plan for us to learn more about her past?
Great post, Alice!
Re: Causal – What does it cause? It’s a cause and effect (social) contract – conditionally leading to engagement if the
inputs…err, characters involved agree. Its also a causal system – the outcome (whether they get married) depends on certain inputs (how well they fit together), rather than being determined before knowing how those factors fit.I’ll stop there, before this engineer starts rambling even more ;)
I don’t know if I am remembering this right…Shallan started drawing…things… He father admonished her “go out to the garden and draw what you really see”…Could her drawing talent be what attracted Pattern to her??
@35 Potentially, but remember, spren
areappear to beattracted to “broken” people…so what could have broken Shallan at such a young age?Hmmmmmm, good question. Wonder if Alice can sleuth out an answer? Or maybe this can go on the list to ask Brandon…
If everything has a representation in the cognitive realm, does that include people? What would happen if you touch inside Shadesmar a bead representing a person, would the person sense it in the physical realm?
Oh and yes, I loved the santhid picture. When I first read this chapter, I hoped to see it, and was very happy when my wish was fulfilled.
Monta @26 – First two paragraphs… yup. Absolutely. :D
Good points re: Jasnah’s perspective on her parents’ marriage. It certainly had its drawbacks, and as a highly intelligent girl she’d have seen a lot of them. I think Confutus @31 also makes an excellent point, which may be related, in that Jasnah would have a hard time finding a man who is in her intellectual weight class. Perhaps she saw Navani “lowering herself” in terms of her in academic capability in order to be a good wife/queen for Gavilar, and decided she couldn’t stand to do that. And of course, since she’d have to “marry down” in terms of both status and intelligence, it would be pretty easy to decide marriage is not worth it.
Another very, very good point (which I somehow missed/forgot) is the scene in The Lesson when Shallan, hearing a certain edge to Jasnah’s voice, wonders in horror what was done to her and who did it. This is something that may not be clarified until we get Jasnah’s flashbacks, but if Shallan was right, it could explain a good deal about Jasnah…
Confutus @27 – Thank you. That makes much more sense of Tozbek’s change toward Shallan, so I no longer find it so hard to believe. This makes me happy.
Ross @32 – Hmmmm. Very interesting theory. I’m not sure I’m convinced, but I’ll have to go read over a whole bunch of the book to decide. Oh, wait, we’re doing a reread! Hey, how convenient! ;)
Braid_Tug @33 – I can only assume that the various kinds of spren have different criteria for their partners. There’s the possibility that Syl has been hanging around Kaladin a lot longer than we know, but even so… IIRC, it’s pretty clear by the end of the book that Shallan had said some of the Lightweavers’ Truths during her childhood, but we don’t know what they were or under what circumstances she said them. If you compare her to Lift instead of Kaladin, though, the contrast isn’t so great. Lift is only 13, and has been connected with Wyndle long enough to have quite a thing going. We don’t know enough yet to know whether Lightweavers and Edgedancers are chosen young and Windrunners are usually a few years older, or if those are merely the individual choices of Pattern, Wyndle and Sylphrena.
@35-37 – Perhaps the question we should ask Brandon is whether some level of brokenness is required for the beginning of a bond… We don’t know them well enough to answer, but in what ways were Ym and Lift “broken”? What about Jasnah? What if the breaking happens as part of the bonding process, and you don’t reach full Radiantity until (what? It’s a word! I just made it!) you’ve gone from whole to broken to remade?
I honestly don’t have any answers. Just spitballing…
Longtime lurker here! I very much enjoy the re-read, there’s always something new to consider and speculate about.
The idea of spren being living, sentient concepts is mindblowing. It also makes me think of this Doctor Who quote: “What if we had ideas that could think for themselves? What if one day our dreams no longer needed us?”
So here’s a thought: If there’s a honorspren, and a truthspren, is there a lovespren? Are there different kinds, like parental-lovespren, compared to romantic-lovespren?
Great changes to the reread! I love them!
@39 There’s actually some indication from the Lift interlude that Wyndle would have preferred to bond with an older person, possibly already grown up. He indicated that each “species” of spren holds general preferences, although they are not set in stone.
@32 Great idea! I’d love to know more about what Bondsmiths actually do and what their power encompasses. I can’t wait until Dalinar’s book!
Thanks Alice.
Congratulations on your first official WoR reread post! This is looking to be pretty fun.
Now, if we only get Freelancer, SubWoofer or Tektonica to do guest posts on occasion, too. :-)
I really wonder if this great first chapter was conceived after that article here on tor.com about how boring travel by sea usually is in Fantasy. I agreed with that article but this chapter is the exception. All those questions answered, all those new questions brought up and the delightful scenes with the santhid made it a real standout. I wonder if Brandon read that article and decided to subvert the trope.
Oh, bother.
I just realized that my link text isn’t nearly as relevant as it was before I did my revisions… I had the whole thing written up, and it was nearly 3000 words, so I HAD to cut it back. One of the things I cut out was Yalb. This makes me very sad, because I love Yalb. Just… Yalb. He makes me laugh. I hope someday we find out that he survived.
Props to subverting tropes!
Wet @39
Are you sure it’s not full Radiancy? (More power, Scotty!) You started to
soundwrite a little like LDB there, which is not a bad thing by any means. So, keep up the great work! I really appreciate you jumping in to comment regularly too, hope you can keep doing that.In noting the level of activity for the prologue blog and so far on this installment, it wouldn’t surprise me if we routinely tally over 100 comments for each chapter. That is decidedly awesome. Together we’ll solve this mystery. Well, maybe not so much, but it’s so much more fulfilling trying to elucidate where BWS is headed by gathering and discussing all the clues that are nigh impossible for one person to pick up reading alone.
Which brings up a question: It would be a bit cliché to grab the hunny for the Storm Cellar. But some type of gold ring on this merry-go-round might be appropriate. Thoughts?
#44 Didn’t we see a dream or a vision where Yalb and his crew washed ashore? I recall something about it, even if I can’t place it exactly.
WRT Broken people being rebuilt, this is what gives me very high hopes for Taln. He is as broken as it comes right now. He needs some time to heal, mentally, and spiritually. But when he does, I expect he is going to make the old pre-Recrence Heralds look tame in comparison.
WRT Shipping Jasnah – I expect she will be every bit as picky about a marriage as she ever thought about being with an apprentice. And as it was pointed out, she needs someone in the same weight class intellectually, and she doesn’t get along well with the ardents, she probably hasn’t had many positive experiences. That can make a person bitter without even realizing it.
Kaladin/Jasnah is a possibility, but I am not convinced the rest of their personalities mesh all that well. But if they happen to meet while Kaladin is on the way to his hometown, it would be hilarious to see him employ logic and Occam’s Razor to suggest she isn’t Jasnah and can’t really be alive.
I actually had thoughts early on that Szeth/Jasnah was a possibility. I mean, Szeth isn’t in her intellectual class (no one on Roshar may be in her class there), but it would have a certain symmetry, with Jasnah’s quest to find the truth about her father’s death leading her to the man who actually killed him, and her resulting struggle with the ability to forgive him and to recognize his good qualities (plus, we know that she does value Shin ideology on some level, as she sent Shallan to fetch a Shin philisopher in WOK).
@47
I don’t know if we can even really say whether or not we know where Szeth stands on the TIS (Taravangian’s Intelligence Scale), since he doesn’t think about his life before being made a truthless.
In Shin society, it’s not forbidden of men to read, and we know that Szeth was cast out because he believed that the KR were coming back–which suggests to me that he may have had some experience with scholarship.
Zen @46 – Yes, we saw it… but we don’t know for sure what it means. It was Shallan drawing without thinking – so whether it was a “true seeing” or merely wishful thinking is still unknown.
@@@@@ 47 – Hmmmmm, how would that work exactly? I think it would probably go something like this:
Jasnah: You killed my father. *saunters over seductively* Prepare to get…
Szeth: Woah! Hold on there. I mean by Jezrien, I killed your father. I might hate myself but you are Battar shit crazy. Get some help, truly. *backs away slowly*
WRT the discussion on Shallan bonding Pattern as a child, we have this WoB:
Concerning the Ship:
I think Shallan’s easy acceptance of the betrothal is a clear sign that it will go terribly, terribly wrong. My guess- she will fall in love with Kaladin, instead. In classical romance style, Andolin will give up his womanizing ways and truly fall for Shallan, but she will fall for someone else (Kaladin!). The drama, the conflict!
@12 @16 I was thinking the same thing.
I was also immediately reminded of Alvaron’s discussion of inherent and delegated power during Jasnah’s very similar lecture to Shallan.
Brandon doesn’t typically do ordinary love triangles. Whatever he does, it will not be the usual. Unrequited love is something he has done though.
Wetlander @13: “King @2 – I probably should have put a colon after it, though.”
No, you shouldn’t have. That would be saying “Shallan herself points out her lack of wisdom with respect to: romantic relationships.” It’s totally unnecessary.
Sorry, that was bugging me. I’ll go back to reading the rest of the comments now.
Congratulations, Alice, on a very nice start to your half of the WOR reread. I love the various and sundry matchings of main characters which can be more about the interests and imaginations of the would-be match-makers than realistic proposals. I’ll let BWS flesh out such matters. Barring surprises, the matchings of Shallan with either Adolin or Kaladin are expected in addition to Dalinar and Navani. Equally expected are the absence of matchings of Jasnah and, especially, Szeth. In terms of combat matchings, a rematch of Kaladin and Szeth is expected. I suspect also that there will be combat between Kaladin and his former friend, Moash, with the latter having obtained new powers – possibly from an honor blade.
I don’t mean to steal our host’s thunder but the Santhid episode has later repercussions in Chap. 7 that are similar to the ending of the Rysn interlude. In both cases our intrepid female protagonist deliberately encounters a giant creature (in the Rysn interlude, the creature is as big as an island and mistaken for one) who notices them and saves their lives. Thus we have gentle giants (the ‘isle’, Relu-Na, and the Santhid) as well as voracious and vicious ones – the chasmfiends (not to mention the thunderclasts).
This is just a test. I’ve tried posting twice recently. Once to ask BWS about spren, and again last week. Sadly, the new re-cap style leaves me feeling like I need to re-read WoR every week just to understand the weekly re-read. Good job Alice. I never noticed the ‘causual’ verses ‘casual’ when I read WoR. I guess the brain sees what it expects to see instead of what’s truly there. Later-
I noticed Shallan seems to have a habit of making wrong assumptions about what Jasnah thinks of other people. She did this in TWoK with Taravangian and here with the sailors.
“”You think they’re superstitious fools,” Shallan said softly, watching the sailor leave.”
Shallon has spent this much time with Jasnah and she is still discovering that Jasnah is more complex than she realizes.
Some textual evidence about Shallan and her knowledge of Pattern before the incident with her mother:
Chap. 3 pg. 69: A memory rose unbidden. A silvery sword. A pattern of light. Truths she could not face. She banished them, squeezing her eyes shut.
Chap. 6 pg. 105:
A long discussion about Pattern’s first memory. “First,” Pattern said. “With you.” They discuss plants and her father’s garden, and Shallan starts remembering. “Her father’s gardens. Pattern on the ground, drawn in the dust… “Remember,” Pattern said, voice likes a whisper. No, Shallan thought, horrified. NO!” She keeps breathing hard in fear, but that could be partly from the surprise of the lightweaving she did.
Chap. 13 pg. 115-116: Pattern says he was sent to her because of lies and her family, and then urges her to remember again. “This time, not a garden seat, but a sterile white room. Her father’s lullaby. Blood on the floor. No.” Pattern said humans’ minds break, but Shallan’s only cracked. Her lies save her and drew him. [Lies before AND after the red carpet day?]
Chap. 17 pg. 256-257: Shallan tells Pattern she won’t kill him because she is not one of the Knights Radiant. “You spoke oaths.” Shallan froze. Life before death…The words drifted toward her from the shadows of her past. A past she would not think of. “You live lies,” Pattern said. “It gives you strength. But the truth… Without speaking truths you will not be able to grow, Shallan.”
Chap. 45 pg. 526-529: Shallan’s first encounter with Wit. He can tell she is a surgebinder [like Zahel can sense Kaladin’s spren?]. “Tell me, young one. Do spren speak to you?” The lights going out, life drained from them. Twisted symbols the eye should not see.” … Then he shows her that her math problems had made Wikim happy, transforming him like she did with Bluth and the soldiers later on . Shalan then says “Warmth. That warmth she felt, a deep glow, was like the joy she had known before. Long ago. Before everything had gone wrong. Before Mother.” [ On pg. 278, Pattern tells Shallan that she transforms people in a process beyond just lightweaving. Did her mother notice her changing people? Why are cryptics enabling this apparently joyful process?] Shallan describes a scene of beauty with her family (including “The people my mother knew…Dreder…never came to our home.”) and lightweaves, not knowing what she is doing, but then stops. Wit comments about having to understand the nature of lies because the shards are very strict and that Shallan is not fighting completely natural things. [VERY interesting!] “Shadows from her past shifted in the depths, surfacing just briefly toward the light.” … “Shallan watched him go, the deep things within her settling again, returning to the forgotten parts of her mind.”
Chap. 47 pg. 547 epigraph: “Yet, were the orders not disheartened by so great a defeat, for the Lightweavers provided spiritual sustenance…”
Ch. 47 pg. 553: Shallan says she is good at sucking in Stormlight “considering how short a time I’ve been doing it.” “Short time?” Pattern said. “But we first…” She stopped listening until he was done.”
Ch. 60 pg. 737-738: Longest conversation of Pattern insisting Shallan must remember their past. Only a few quotes: “I know that you have forgotten much of what once. Those lies attracted me. But you cannot continue like this; you must admit the truth about me. About what I can do, and what we have done. Mmm…More, you must know yourself. And remember.” “Those memories all pointed one way, toward carpet bloodied. And carpet…not.” [Is the “carpet not” thing a reference to something she did before killing her mother, something that drew her attention?] “To remember herself as a child, discovering Light in the gardens, Patterns in the stonework, and dreams that became real…” [Does the dreams thing mean her drawings of the ship’s crew and Shallash are real visions?] “My memory is weak,” Pattern said. “I was dumb so long, nearly dead. Mmm. I could not speak.” “Yeah,” Shallan said, remembering him spinning on the ground and running into the wall. “You were kind of cute, though.”
So I’d say it’s pretty firm that Pattern was around when Shallan was still very young, that she knowingly swore the first oath, and that she started experimenting with lightweaving and something, probably the character transformation stuff somehow, that brought her the same deep joy she felt helping her brothers become better versions of themselves. WHY this young girl would discover the first oath and likely be broken is a fascinating question. Pattern was attracted to her lies before she started her big lie to herself about what happened on the day her mother died…
I can’t help but draw parallels between Shadesmar and Tel’aran’rhiod, the dream world from Wheel of Time. As we learn more, I’m sure it will become separated, as this may be only because Wheel of Time is still fresh on my mind from Leigh Butler’s awesome rereads.
“…it’s such a Shallan thing, to not think it quite[/i] all the way through the process…” This is one of Shallan’s most endearing traits to me. It is almost stereotypical red-headishness (I am married to a red head, it is quite the adventure sometimes) and makes for a great character trait for her.
Shallan is a good example of taking what life has dealt you, learning from it, then using those skills in becoming better. For example, when Jasnah is looking at her drawings, as she stops at the drawing of Shadesmar, Shallan waits patiently for Jasnah to collect her thoughts and say what she is thinking. A little note in between there tells us that this is a skill in which she was well trained by her Father. Back then, I’m sure she didn’t think of it as a skill, but now it is a boon. I wonder if it is intended to be her thought, as she is sitting there waiting, if she realizes that her patience was something as an unexpected gift from dealing with her father.
You can get a glimpse on how Shallan’s mind works on an artistic level when Jasnah asks her to look into the water and she replies, “I see eternity”. The other main characters have more linear thinking: Dalinar thinks about war and politics; Kaladin thinks about his men; Adolin thinks about women and dueling. But Shallan’s mind wanders into the more abstract thinking, adding dimension to what she can sense in the physical world. This may be what made her a prime candidate for spren-bonding. And what allows her to give surprising accurate answers to Jasnah’s questions as well as do the amazing things that she does later in the story.
Jasnah’s description makes her sound like a modern Sarah Palin, at least in my mind. Well dressed, pretty, but business like. I bet she was one of those children who called her mother by her first name from a young age, like she does in the narrative. It is a palpable distance that Jasnah puts between herself and her family.
@@@@@2, et al: Maybe the Santhid is a smaller form of the large turtle-like creatures that walk in the ocean. Greatshells, I had to go back a look it up, the one Rysn encounters in I-3.
@@@@@ 39 I think you’re spot on about the brokenness. The two main characters have had some serious dysfunctional crapola happen in their childhood, but even look at Lift. She’s very young, but has obviously had several lifetimes worth of problems. Maybe these rebel spren are looking for people who are broken down enough to be receptive to spren bonding. Maybe they are like minded and are attracted to brokenness. I hope to see sometime later on the attraction and the reasoning about who is bonded and why. Is it a pragmatic approach (a broken spirit is more open to the bonding) or is it a relationship approach (spren are drawn to the characteristics of their ward)? Hmmmm…
@@@@@ 52 I’m seeing a potential triangle there as well. Great side story. A shardbearer and a Knight Radiant fighting over another Knight Radiant! I like Adolin, but I’m rooting for Kaladin.
@@@@@ 54 I bet something will happen between the three that we never see coming. Maybe a reverse Rand al’ Thor poligamy!?!
I maybe crazy to say this but Jasnah’s explanation of Shadesmar seems very reasonable to me. It feels like a realisation of sub-conscious. Where ideas have found lives of their own.
Although this way, how it all blends in with the whole Honor shard gets confusing then.
Also – I remember someone referring to how one of the Heralds was removing trace of themselves from the world and how Dalinar has no memory of his wife. Could this Nightwatcher (if i remember the name correctly) be that Herald and not another Shard bearer?
I thought the Santhid was a Portugese man-of-war with a Roshar-typical shell.
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@62 After looking back, my initial mind-impression was off. If a turtle and a jelly fish mated (don’t visualize that) then maybe that will produce a santhid.
I was pondering the personality traits that attract a spren bond, like the the propensity to “not think all the way through the process” (commentary, Wetlander). Lift definitely has this personality trait and so does Kaladin, i.e., the challenge to Amaram (that adrenaline/testosterone/hate combo is a bad mix, bro).
So basically rebel spren are looking for broken, headstrong, reckless humans with good hearts. All three have shown good hearts, including Ym, the shoemaker.
So who else has the resume for spren bonding? At the end of WoR, we see some emerging Knights Radiant, and they ALL can fit into that category. Broken, headstrong, but good hearts.
Braid_tug @1 (and possibly others – I have not read out all the comments). I could not agree more. The quote about the illusion of power is the key to Shallan being able to accomplish what she did throughtout this book in areas other than Lightweaving. I think that without this knowledge, it would not matter that she could Lightweave. The Lightweaving only changed her appearance. It did not allow her to grow her inner self – her inner authority. Without that, she could not have accomplished all she did.
Thanks for reading my musings.
AndrewHB
(Aka the musespren)
(Sent from my smartphone; please ignore any typos)
@@@@@ 59. Patillian; Thank you for collecting all the Shallan and Pattern information like that. It clearly shows Pattern has been around for a very long time.
Yet, I still wonder, how did an 11 year old, from the “back country”, know the first oath of the KR?
Oh… wait… Kaladin was using stormlight before he spoke the Oath. He just got better at it after he spoke it. So Shallan’s first 8 years, was her using it on the subconscious level. Pattern was around, much like Sly in her dumb windspren form.
I’ve been thinking that she had said the words as a child, and was already a padawan KR.
@65 “how did an 11 year old, from the “back country”, know the first oath of the KR?”
There are 2 answers, really. One is that she was almost certainly using stormlight without speaking an oath, just as Kaladin was, as you pointed out.
The other possibility, one that I deem more likely, is that she did speak the actual oath. Based on what Pattern says later in WOR, something along the lines of “but you did speak the Words, long ago…”. This doesn’t seem to indicate that she knew the words from something that was taught to her. It seems that part of Nahel bond, probably some form of the power of Honor, influences proto-radiants to help them find the words. Kaladin, when he spoke his oath before exploding with light and leaping across the chasm, was never told the words, but he just knew them, instinctively. I believe that part of the Radiants’ power comes in enhanced mental capactity, including knowledge passed to them (likely by the spren, on a subconscious level). So just as Kaladin has known the words for the ideals of his Order, so too must Shallan have known and spoken the First Ideal when she was younger. Unfortunately it is one of the MANY memories that she still has blocked, so we can’t know for certain.
Great reread post, and great comments!
One thing I haven’t seen mentioned re: Jasnah/shipping — am I the only one that thinks that Jasnah might be a lesbian? I feel like there have been several hints throughout (not being married at her age seems a big one), but when I read this chapter I took her offense at being “beholden to a man” directed more toward the man part than the beholden part.
Don’t get me wrong– I’m sure Jasnah enjoys the freedom of not being wed. But I really don’t think a princess of her stature would need to be worried about being controlled by her husband — it seems they could find someone who “gets” her. And I agree, maybe she’s waiting for someone of more intellect… but I don’t know. I just get a lot of vibes from her (sorry I can’t dig for quotes) that she tends towards the same sex.
The way she talks to Shallan too I always got the impression that she liked Shallan. IIRC, Jasnah’s reaction to Shallan so casually accepting the causal was a little bit sad — which again I read as a tinge of disappointment that maybe Shallan didn’t have the same inclinations as her.
Maybe I’m reading way too much into it. But Jasnah so far is my favorite character and trying to figure her out has been a lot of fun.
@59, Patillian, thanks for the citations of instances of Shallan’s early exhibitions of her Stormlight and spren interactions. She did, indeed, exhibit such talent from childhood (at age 11, or earlier), but her mother’s discovery of that talent in her child lead to a disaster. Perhaps too much is made of the main characters, Shallan and Kaladin, being ‘broken’. According to the awedKaladin, to whom Shallan revealed that she killed her father, she is not broken – only marked. The same can be said of Kaladin – despite his protestations. She can still genuinely smile despite her heart-breaking family experiences, and he can come to the realization that Amaram’s crimes against him and his men was borne of a sense of mission. She was a nascent Radiant prior to any of those horrible experiences. The killing of her mother in self-defense and the later killing of her father to save her brother were incidents that she had to suppress to continue to function. Pattern’s repeated advice was that she had to learn to remember and live with those memories, if she was to progress. When she is made to remember the childhood incident involving her mother’s death near the end of WOR, she exclaims in her grief, “I hate you”. Pattern responds that she will yet have her revenge and will ultimately kill him. “I don’t want revenge”, she exclaims in tears, “I just want my family back”. So much for Shallan not being a sympathetic character.
@66 MDNY:
But didn’t Teft tell Kaladin about the First Ideal and explain the meanings of it’s parts before Kaladin spoke it? In case of Shallan, of course, it is entirely possible that Helaran was interested in the Knights Radiant before their mother’s death and could have been the source. Of course, there is still Lift…
Anyway, as far brokenness of various incipient KRs is concerned, Lift was hinted to have a hellish childhood in some truly terrible place, so it is quite obvious.
Ym had that dark period of living on the streets and being an accessory to murder in his youth, which he was still trying to make up for by his charitable work. So, also quite clear.
Shallan… Hm… I’d venture to guess that her relationship with her mother was always bad enough to break her? I mean, isn’t it significant that Shallan has no good memories of her, and that her brothers didn’t register any change in their relationship, even when their mother developed murderous intentions towards her only daughter and repeatedly quarreled with Lin about her?
In fact, I find it difficult to believe that Helaran and Balat could have been as oblivious towards their mother’s change, unless it was more or less business as usual between her and Shallan from their PoVs. Still, seems odd that they could have missed on all these loud (according to Shallan) quarrels between their parents and how they concerned their beloved little sister. Oh, well.
I think Kal was told initially by Teft about the oaths, before he spoke his first one. However the second oath he spoke came spontaneously near the end of this book, iirc. I believe there was some fudging of the actual words, but the meaning was there, so the Stormfather accepted them, as they were good enough for Syl.
I took this to mean that it has to come from the heart, from the very nature and beliefs of the person speaking them, in order to be binding. The words can not simply be repeated rote.
@68 WRT broken individuals, the back cover of WoR says
“The Knights Radiant must stand again.
The ancient oaths have at last been spoken; the spren return. Men seek that which was lost. I fear the struggle will destroy them.
It is the nature of the magic. A broken soul has cracks into which something else can be fit. Surgebindings, the powers of creation themselves. They can brace a broken soul; but they can also widen its fissures.
The Windrunner, lost in a shattered land, balanced upon the boundary between vengeance and honor. The Lightweaver, slowly being consumed by her past, searching for the lie that she must become. The Bondsmith, born in blood and death, striving to rebuild what was destroyed. The Explorer, straddling the fates of two peoples, forced to choose between slow death and a terrible betrayal of all she believes.
It is past time for them to awaken, for the Everstorm looms.
And the Assassin has arrived.”
So far, I’m not seeing any mention of the epigraphs. This one has a quote from Navani’s (future) personal journal, a hint that something disastrous is coming soon.
Hurray, the Words of Radiance reread! Hi Alice! Hi, everyone!
I was a latecomer to the Stormlight Archive, but I’m glad to be taking part now and plan to be with you all for the duration! Probably writing Walls o’ Text, as is familiar to those who know me from the WoT reread. I’ll try and keep it under control – at least to organize what I want to say, rather than be full-on stream of consciousness.
I read Alice’s commentary and the bulk of the comments a few hours ago. I want to respond to specific points there, but I’ll save that for a later (post-Work Day) post. For now, I have a few lingering ‘big picture/big concept’ thoughts.
First – like a lot of people last week, I wasn’t prepared for the new short style of chapter summaries, but I like it. (Peter, your comment about how this used to be a common way of starting chapters in times of yore helped me decide to like it. I knew it seemed familiar!) It does mean that I will *actually* have to reread as we go – something I’ve never done before, through the WoT or other rereads I’ve taken part in. But that’s not a bad thing, esp. since I’ve only read WoR the one time. I reread chapter 1 last night, so I’m ready to go.
Second – I still find Brandon’s Physical/Cognitive/Spiritual division a bit confusing. How much do I link it to other ideas from our world? For instance, does Plato’s realm of the ideals fit in Cognitive or Spiritual, or neither? Is the Spiritual the afterlife? A pre-and-post life? Also, the physical/mental/spiritual split isn’t clear to me from other Cosmere related works. In Mistborn, for example, Ati and Leras manifested in multiple ways – I think – as metals, as Shardpools, as mist. Are those supposed to relate to physical/cognitive/spiritual? Because a pool or a mist is as material as a solid metal. Nevertheless, the shardpools seem to be portals into Shadesmar, while the atium and lerasium were definitely supposed to be the physical body, so…
Well, like Shallan, I don’t entirely get it. The thoughts from a few of you about the Cognitive Realm being a realm of the Unconscious/Dreams etc. is helpful, though. Two specific things I wonder about Shadesmar:
a) what is the nature of feedback between the physical and cognitive realms? It seems that humans live in both at once, and human thoughts shape the Cognitive realm, including spren. But spren live in cities (which blows my mind), meaning they, too, are shaping the Cognitive realm to their own design. That’s what building a city implies – shaping your environment to your own specifications. But if the environment of Shadesmar is the unconscious thoughts of people – or sentients in general – wouldn’t spren altering the environment of Shadesmar mean they’re altering the, I dunno, the collective unconscious? Are honorspren and cryptics reshaping human thoughts about honor or lies when they form their societies and build their cities? After all, they can only build their cities out of ideas…ideas they bring into proximity, combine in different ways…
b) Shadesmar isn’t a place; the Cognitive Realm is everywhere and coexists with the Physical; hence, using Shadesmar to ‘move’ between places and even worlds is possible since Shadesmar connects them all. Fine. But something about Shadesmar near Roshar (either the world of Roshar, or perhaps the greater solar system) seems to be different, doesn’t it? Spren are an omnipresent fact of life on Roshar. If they’re a bleed-through from the Cognitive, why does it happen on Roshar and not on the other worlds of the Cosmere? Warbreaker may be (or be infused with) something like a spren, but on no other worlds of the Cosmere have we seen spren present in such obvious and ubiquitous ways. It makes me wonder if something – probably something calamitous, like Desolations or fights between Shards of Adolnasium – shatter/altered/broke Shadesmar in the Rosharan vicinity.
(If Shadesmar was broken/shattered/something, could that be why Rosharan spren bond with broken humans, maybe? Seeking wholeness?) On the other hand, much of the fauna of Roshar seems to have evolved (or been designed?) to be symbiotic with spren. Chasmfiends and those giant island things and presumably Santhids need spren to move, we think. Even the Parshendi need spren bonds for something as basic as mating. Which makes the differences in Roshar seem to be by design rather than by disaster. Or perhaps some of both?
Finally, a spren question or two, strongly related to my Shadesmar musings. Shallan says here, and Jasnah agrees, that spren are living ideas. But several spren, like Syl, also tell us they are pieces of ‘God’. That is, pieces of Honor for certain, and possibly of Cultivation as well. Can both be true? Can spren be *both* living ideas *and* pieces of Adolnasium? (Is everything and everyone a piece of Adolnasium?) If so, could those pieces of Honor (and Cultivation) be what gave those ideas life and sentience in the first place?
Ok…back to the read and the comments!
@60. nerdalert Honestly, Shadesmar reminds me more of the Nevernever from the Dresden Files than it does of Tel’aran’rhiod, from Wheel of Time. It isn’t a particularly dream-oriented place. And the distances in each are not correlated, so a large distance in one, might be a short distance in another. Now that I mention it, there is also a similarity between spren as ideas, and the fae (from the Nevernever) as personified forces of nature.
@73. chaplainchris1
We do have spren in other Cosmere books, but they were called by different names, and had different manifestations.
In any case, yes, I would characterize them as tiny fragments of Adolusium. Recall Syl saying something about being a tiny god.
I don’t believe that BWS has given out sufficient information for us to arrive at a clear picture of his Cognitive realm and Shadesmar. However, it is more than the Platonic world of ideas, for the ideas developed by humans in the physical realm and carried over into the Cognitive realm are manifested there in the form of entities called spren and rolled up dimensions called spheres. These entities have individuality and may even exercise independent judgment such as the honorspren, Sylphrenia, who defies the Stormfather and enters the physical realm seeking a human model of honor with whom to bond (i.e., Kaladin). Then there is the ‘stick’ sphere who refused Shallan’s entreaties to turn into fire. The Stormfather is one of the more powerful spren (a portion of the Shard called Honor) who contributes importantly to the energy contained in Roshar via his Highstorms. The cities built in the Cognitive realm by the Cryptic sprens are also a manifestation of the human inspired desire to organize and control their surroundings. While Roshar was apparently formed with the inclusion of spren as forces and associates of living organisms, the presence of intelligent, communicating spren represents a ‘leakage’ of the Cognitive realm into the physical.
Ways @45
I’m also very pleased, that Wetlander (so far) keeps discussing with us in the comment section, despite now being a blogger in her own right.
100 = 10*10 must be a truly holy number, so “hunny” doesn’t feel right. I don’t have a good suggestion though.
@33 I’ve wondered the same thing. Besides, Pattern says that he was attracted to lies. So what lies attracted him? We know that most of the lying she does to herself is to block out the memories of what happened to her mother, and why. So what the hell happened before then?
Bellaberry @58 – Heh. That was almost in my commentary, albeit from another angle. I loved Jasnah’s response – Girl, they found something they can do, and they take pleasure in doing it well. More people should learn how to do that. (Paraphrased…)
@many – Interesting discussions on brokenness! When applied to a person, exactly what does it mean? For that matter, what does it mean when applied to an object, which is the best analogy we’ll be able to make? I’m pretty sure it doesn’t mean “irreparable” or there would be no point in talking about it. Is it like a broken bone, which will heal well if properly set? Or is it like a vase, which can be glued back together, but will never again be unmarred? Or is it like a sword, which can’t be “fixed” in any meaningful way, but can be melted down and reforged as good as (or better than) new?
Confutus @72 – We’ll probably address the Part 1 epigraphs as a whole, at the end of Part 1. So far, there hasn’t been any direct link between the epigraph and the contents of the chapter, although one is coming soon, IIRC. All we have for now is this indication that something terrible is going to happen – and from the dates, it’s not going to be very long until it happens.
chaplainchris @73 – Hey, there! ::waves enthusiastically:: Glad to see we’ve
corruptedluredenticedencouraged you to join us! :D I very much enjoyed your comments on Shadesmar.travyl @77 – Absolutely. I love being part of the discussion, and I’m certainly not the only person around here with insights and ideas! I can start things off, but the great part is really what goes on in the comments, and I have no intention of dropping out.
Good point about the hunny… I like it, myself (Pooh Bear FTW!) but you’re right. On Roshar it ought to be a very holy number, and grabbing a hunny-pot seems a little impertinent. We’ll have to work on that.
I must say, I’m delighted to see the level of discussion so far; not only the sheer number of comments, but also the quality of ideas and the courtesy/community that is developing. I love having a place where we can argue vehemently and still know that we are all a part of the same thing.
QueenofDreams @78 – The only thing I can suggest about early “lies” from Shallan to attract Pattern is her cleverness with wordplay. We’ll see times when Pattern refers to various figures of speech as “lies” because they aren’t literally true – even though both the speaker and the hearers know perfectly well what is meant. Perhaps he found her witty badinage sufficiently interesting?
Chaplain@73: Nice to see you!
I’m new here too, having arrived at the WoK late to the party, as well.
Perhaps Shadesmar is a reflection of our world, since spren are ideas made manifest. There must be a completely symbiotic relationship between humans and spren…. as in Roshar ideas of a thing are extant. Visible, as spren. We create our world, and they create theirs in a parallel plane, or their world creates our physical one?
This is making my head hurt.
As for the Cognitive/Spiritual/Physical delineations, and the Spiritual being pre or post life……Isn’t Eternity a continum, whether pre-post-during life, we are still spirit, in differnt states perhaps? And aren’t we all pieces of god? Is this what Brandon’s implying here?
Anyway…I love your “musings”! Heady stuff.
chaplainchris1 @73 – You raise a lot of good questions. I’m going to use the Gospel of Cosmere according to The King of Carrot Flowers to try to answer them, or, barring that, raise more questions.
Honestly, I’ve thought about this specifically a lot. We know that the cognitive realm is “where” thoughts, ideas, and concepts more or less bounce off of eachother. Things change in the cognitive realm when peoples’ perceptions (either of themselves or of other things or people) change. I’ve wondered exactly how they’re changing, and whether they’re changing to fit anything in particular, and I’m thinking that the spiritual realm is analogous to Plato’s realm of ideals. That is, there is a spiritual ideal for every object–an ideal that both the physical and cognitive aspects are trying to replicate. The cognitive realm is “closer” to the spiritual realm, and so when things change there, they can more readily affect the spiritual ideal that the physical and cognitive aspects are following.
Notably, we see two instances of a Spiritual ideal changing. Kaladin’s slave brands won’t heal–that’s a physical wound that was inflicted upon him, that he has cognitively embraced, thereby changing the spiritual ideal that his body is following. I think that this type of change–one that starts in the physical realm–is probably fairly uncommon.
The second instance of spiritual ideals changing we can see quite often with Shallan’s lightweaving. I think that she’s directly affecting a person’s cognitive aspect, causing their spiritual ideal to shift to what Shallan considers to be a “better” version of them. Or maybe she’s changing the spiritual ideal directly, and their cognitive is aligning with that.
Here’s something that I’m quite unsure about. Syl tells Kaladin at one point that spren can’t attract spren–which means that I can’t really accept that the spren themselves are building cities. Perhaps they’re gathering together in large groups, or perhaps they’re using non-spren materials to create cities, but I can’t think that they could possibly be shaping the cognitive realm in the same way that a human can. I wonder–why can’t spren attract spren? Are spren a purely cognitive aspect of Adonalsium? We’ve seen other spren-like creatures all over the Cosmere (think of the Seons in Elantris, for instance), are they all just cognitive aspects of shards that are leaking into the physical realm?
This, at least, I think we have an answer to. Well, kind of. Some spren seem to be attracted to change, and some seem to cause it. Word of Brandon (and Syl, really) is that with some spren, there’s a sort of feedback loop. Kaladin does something honorable, so Syl comes around, and helps him to become more honorable. So she was attracted by his honor, but she helps strengthen it, and grows when he does more honorable things. It’s a symbiotic relationship.
I’ve already addressed the possibility of spren-like creations on other worlds. Syl says in-text that she’s a tiny, tiny part of a God. This is a nod to Cosmere-aware readers, essentially stating that she is a splinter of Honor. Literally, she is a small piece of a shard. Similarly, the breaths of the Returned are splinters of Endowment, and the Seons of Elantris are splinters of Devotion.
I wonder about this a lot, too. I wonder if Brandon put these types of relationships in here to show how long the spren have been affecting Roshar. I wonder if the spren that we see are actually splinters of Adonalsium, rather than splinters of any one shard–though perhaps Honorspren are actually directly splinters of Honor.
I think that the two are synonymous. A shard is named after its intent, and the intent takes over the man that holds the shard. I think that the splinters of shards are sentient micro-intents.
I’d say probably not.
I think that this goes back to the symbiotic relationship between men and spren. They enhance and encourage behavior that already exists. But I could be wrong.
@78 Pattern is so literal-minded that to him, similes, metaphors, sarcasm, and jokes are all lies. All fiction and much of what is taken as nonfiction are, to him, lies. Any form of visual art must also be a lie, because it is a representation and can’t be an exact duplicate of what it represents. I would therefore not take his comment about being attracted to her lies too literally. He could be talking about her art or artistry. It seems to be the abundnce, the variety, and the subtlety of Shallan’s various forms of “lies” that attracts him.
I think that the broken aspects of people that spren/surgebinding fill, are a lot like the Japanese practice of Kintsugi. (look it up!) That is a kind of pottery repair where the cracks are filled with gold. The cracks in this case, give the spren operating room, where they can rebuild the person’s soul as “better, faster, stronger”.
Regarding spren being attracted to “broken” people, I have long thought this is the case, but it appears that there are many ways that a person can be broken. Kaladin is fairly straightforward, with his emotional/spiritual anguish over losing Tien likely the initial thing to attract Syl (we know that she was bonding to him on some level even before he became a slave, so that can’t be the impetus for his bond). With Shallan, it’s unclear at this point, as we still know virtually nothing about her from before she attracted Pattern, or even when she attracted him. Yes, Shallan has been broken in some ways, but everything we know about her still antedates her initial bond, whenever it happened. Renarin, most clearly, was actually physically broken. It sounds like he had some sort of epilepsy, though never made quite clear, but other than his physical impairment (and the mental and emotional anguish that resulted) we don’t have much info on him being subjected to a specific breaking force. Dalinar had something profound happen to him when his brother died. You could argue that the death of his wife was the most impactful thing for him, but from the timelines it appears that what really drove Dalinar to start getting visions was likely the death of Gavilar. As others noted, Lift has had a rough life growing up with thieving crews on the streets on lands far from her home country. And of course, all the new proto-radiants from Bridge Four have been subjected to extraordinary stress recently, which almost broke them.
My point is that I think people can be broken in different ways to become a radiant, especially among different orders. What attracts one type of spren won’t necessarily attract another type, so maybe we don’t always have to look for the similarities among the new radiants.
@84
We don’t know anything specific about Shallan before she first attracted Pattern, but I strongly feel that we can say that her mother likely had an affect on her. The woman was planning on killing her own daughter, I can’t believe that any sort of healthy relationship would have led to that. In addition, it seems like her brothers all had some kind of break that may have preceded her mother’s death.
@85 Fair point, but then again, we know that people have VERY strong feelings about the recreance, the radiants, and what they THINK happened in the past. All we know is that Shallan’s mother discovered something about her bond/spren/abilities, and then fetched a man to help kill her. We don’t know if she was a member of some group that fears the Radiants, some religious group, or if it was just an isolated response to her daughter’s new abilities. We don’t know anything about her, the first time we ever see her she’s trying to kill Shallan, and then she’s dead. So it’s hard to say much about what their relationship was like before. It would seem to have been bad, but can you really say that young Shallan as a child did not have 2 loving parents? I just don’t know.
Wetlandernw @22: Your comment reminded me that in my notebooks it actually is “wrt,” since I would have been taking notes in cursive and wouldn’t have bothered to break the “word” for periods. When teaching, I printed on the blackboard, so I added the periods then.
So whichever works for you is fine by me. :-)
bad_platypus @87 – Well, that would explain something. Since I only ever used it for myself, I probably just never bothered with the periods – or the perhaps-questionable colon, which I have seen as well. I just… use it like a word. Huh. Now I’m going to be thinking about it every time!
Re: Shallan & her mother… I have a distinct impression that they had a perfectly normal relationship until Shallan started Surgebinding. I’ll have to do some more research to justify the impression, but IIRC her mother was teaching her to draw and was quite proud of her progress.
My guess would be that the Surgebinding horrified her mother, who perhaps had come from an even more-than-normally superstitious (or rabidly anti-Radiant) background. Further, I would speculate that when she saw what Shallan was starting to do, she not only talked to (and argued with) her husband about it, she also contacted her family, friends or former associates – whoever she thought would have the most authority based on her own beliefs. Then, when her husband wouldn’t do anything to stop Shallan, she called in the “friend” who determined that the only thing to do was to kill the child.
I have to admit that the thought of a mother who is willing to kill her own child is deeply disturbing, though it happens all the time. The thought of a mother who’d spent eleven years raising a little girl, suddenly being so convinced of the evil of her daughter’s abilities that she’s willing to kill the child…
Well, my daughter’s eleventh birthday is tomorrow, and I can’t imagine anything that would bring me to that conclusion.
But I’ll concede that seeing my daughter draw pictures and then give them movement and sound would rather freak me out!
Jasnah uses the palace sphere in Shadesmar to recreate the corridor. Maybe spren cities are something similar (where do they get the Stormlight?). There are already spheres for buildings.
What is the granularity for spheres? If there are spheres for buildings, are there also spheres for bricks that are part of those buildings and for cities made of the buildings? Did the stick sphere separate from a tree sphere when the branch broke off from the tree?
(Some) spren are splinters of Honor, and Honor is a splinter of Adonalsium. There seem to be multiple levels there, too. Could mindless Windspren be splinters of broken Honorspren?
could anyone direct me to the storm cellar? i’ve no idea where to find it
I think Jasnah and Kaladin could work. Kaladin is very intelligent, he simply has not had the same access to education as Jasnah. He has not demonstrated any fervent religious bent, in fact he thinks to himself during the fight with Moash “Was he back to praying now?” Perhaps indicating a lack of religious belief. But most importantly, he won’t be cowed by Jasnah. Jasnah must find it terribly exasperating to have people constantly in awe of her intellectual ability and status.
Besides, Sanderson has totally set her up as a cougar. “Jasnah was pretty….her mature beauty was something to be admired, even envied.”
So, basically, I am all in for a Kaladin/Jasnah romance.
@91 I too in all in for Kaladin/Jasnah. I think they could challenge each other in very interesting ways. For Kaladin, he went from thinking he was going to marry a lighteyes (Laral, who stood by while Rillar tried to humiliate Kaladin) to believing he could not even be attracted to one like they were some separate breed (while at the Ardent’s training grounds, Kaladin answers any questions regarding Shallan’s attractiveness, with “she’s a lighteyes!”) to obviously being attracted to Shallan. This is of course coupled with Kaladin’s struggles to trust lighteyes at all. Will he initially judge Jasnah to be the height of lighteye privilige? If so, a relationship with her would mark the overcoming of his remaining lighteye prejudices.
For Jasnah, Kaladin could truly upend her worldview. We know from Adolin that the Almighty determined that lighteyes should rule darkeyes. We know from both Lhan and Elkohar that Elkohar was appointed by the Almighty to be king. If Jasnah does not believe in the Almighty, by what right does her family rule? Daddy won the war? If so, it makes her philosophy argument to Shallan rather hollow. Good breeding? Kaladin is a living example of how unfit well-bred lighteyes are to rule.
Has Jasnah ever asked these questions? They seem obvious yet we know from our own history (e.g. the enlightenment) that they are often the last questions asked by the nobility. So these may be hard questions for Jasnah yet if forced her intellectual honesty and her courage will IMO allow her to answer them. A relationship with Kaladin will force the question.
In WOR chapter 3, Jasnah explains that she and Shallan are potential KR’s and Shallan replies:
“But we’re women:”
“Yes,” Jasnah said lightly. “Spren don’t suffer from human society’s prejudices. Refreshing, wouldn’t say.”
I remember thinking, “hmm, will you still think that way when the Spren choose a former dark-born slave who is Sas Nahn. The interchange with Kaladin will be interesting.” Obviously I abandoned that line of thinking a few chapters later but immediately revived after reading the epilogue. Even if their relationship is not romantic, I look forward to their interchange in book 3.
I want to ship The Lopen and Jasnah! It’s not going to happen, but if anyone should get one of the most powerful, intelligent and beautiful women in Roshar it’s totally Lopen! Lopasnah FTW!!!
I like the idea of Kal and Jasnah as well. I think he has an excellent intellect, that will blossom with education. But first he has to overcome his distrust of Light Eyes. Of course, now he IS one!! Come to grips with that, buddy!
Seriously, I think Dalinar has gone miles in changing Kal’s mind about his trust of Light Eyes. I hope he’ll realize there are a good LE’s and bad LE’s, just as there are amongst the DE’s. (Although, most of the LE’s we’ve met have an abundance of hubris.)
Just finished reading WoR and absolutely loved it. It’s going to be tough waiting for the next book, so these re-reads are going to keep me going. Thanks to both re-readers, and of course to the amazing Brandon – thanks for another INCREDIBLE book.
Going to put my vote in with others who’d also like a more detailed summary of the plot in the re-reads.
Really missed the ‘real’ Kaladin that we meet in book 1 though. I totally understand that Brandon needed to take him through a personal journey of emotional character development, but I seriously hope he is back to his amazing ‘awesomeness’ from now!
Haven’t seen too many comments about Shallan and Kaladin, but those sparks seriously burnt off the page, so I’m guessing poor Adolin is somehow going to be out of the relationship in the next book. I like him as a character – but the chemistry is all set up for ShallKal.
My bet on next book – it’s going to be Jasnah’s. Yee-ha!
@95 The third book is titled “Skybreaker” (changed from “Stones Unhallowed”). Both prospective titles almost certainly fit a book about Szeth. The list based on what BWS has told people are:
Book 1=Kaladin
Book 2= Shallan
Book 3=Szeth
Book 4= Eshonai
Book 5= Dalinar
So we’ll have to wait till book 5 to know WTF is up with Dalinar’s wife, and him seeing the Nightwatcher, which are 2 of my biggest questions (especially what the Nightwatcher is, exactly).
@96
Unless there was a recent change that I don’t know about, it’s still tentitavely set to be titled “Stones Unhallowed,” but Brandon is probably going to change it if Rothfuss releases “Doors of Stone” before he releases SA3.
Nothing to add which has not been addressed, either here or in the spoiler review, so just popping in to congratulate Wetlandernw on her inaugural re-read post.
Oh, out of frame, a few folks at work who “gave up” on WoT after CoT, but have since finished based on my recommendation, have now been completely immersed in Brandon’s Cosmere, and hate me for getting them into another realm that won’t see an ending for more than a decade.
Tek @70:
Right on. This is my biggest problem with Shallan’s KR journey, and I argued about this at length in Alice’s WoR spoiler thread. WoR gives several hints that Shallan was very advanced into KR hood by the time she killed her mother at age 11 (!), so advanced that Pattern could turn into a living shardblade for her to use in her mother’s killing.
That means, she must have spoken the First Ideal earlier than age 11, perhaps much earlier if she was so far advanced.
But, as you point out above, the First Ideal is a complex concept, with layers of deep meaning behind the seemingly contradictory words on the surface. We have clear evidence in tWoK that merely saying the words means nothing. The words must be accompanied by a clear understanding of the deeper meaning of the oath, and I would argue, a kind of commitment on the part of the speaker to adhere to those ideals.
I have a really hard time accepting that an 8-10 year old (whenever Shallan did speak the words) can speak the First Ideal with the level of understanding and commitment that will turn those words into a power-enhancing KR oath. The whole thing feels forced to me and, for now, I regard it as a gigantic deus ex machina. Perhaps Brandon would provide enough information in future books to make Shallan’s KR hood more believable for me.
@97 TheKingofCarrotFlowers- Recently the title was changed to “Skybreaker”, according to Coppermind. Apparently this was in response to the pending Rothfuss release of day 3 of the Kingkiller Chronicles, Doors of Stone. The speculation according to Coppermind is that if Stormlight 3 is released first, it may still be called Stones Unhallowed, but that as of now the tentative title is changed to Skybreakers in anticipation of Rothfuss’ title being too close to that. I can’t find an actual quote to back it up, however, but on goodreads.com they wrote: “At a Q&A session in October 2013, he announced that he had changed his working title from Stones Unhallowed to Skybreaker.” Either way, it is definitely a Szeth flashback book.
@100
At the WoR release party in Provo, he said that it would still be called Stones Unhallowed if he gets it on shelves before Rothfuss gets Day 3 out.
@99, good points vis-a-vis the formulation of the 1st 3 oaths common to all KRs. However, some orders are less picky about their actual, sincere, declaration. At some point, Pattern informs Shallan that to progress she need only acknowledge a hidden important truth about her past. No further declaration of oaths, only a recognition of an important, albeit, very painful truth. In truth, Hoid had already alluded to that issue in his conversation with a 14 year old Shallan. For Shallan, the important matter is not that she is aware of the 3 oaths and their implications, but that she totally subscribes to them. ‘Life before death’: She has chosen to make the best of a horrible family life as preferable to the death that some of her brothers appear to seek. ‘Strength before weakness’: She is only a young girl living a very circumscribed life, but manages to bring encouragement and life plans to her brothers, Balat and Wikim, and rescues her other brother, Jushu. ‘Journey before destination: She undertakes what might seem to be a foolhardy journey to find Jasnah in order to rescue the family from impoverishment and worse. While that course of action involved lying, that doesn’t appear to be a problem for her spren, Pattern, a type of ‘cryptic’ also known as ‘liespren’. As to the early appearance of a ‘Pattern’ shardblade to the very young Shallan, that might just reflect the different behavior of the spren orders. An honorspren, like Syl, may need to hear 5 ‘Windrunner’ oaths, whereas a cryptic like Pattern, need hear none before transforming into a shardblade. As to the name of the 3rd book, ‘Skybreaker’ might be better than ‘Stones Unhallowed’ since most of Szeth’s appearances, apparently, will be in Shinovar, so that skybreaker would refer to his future role rather than stone-trodder, his self-enforced former role. In any case, I fail to see why another book containing the word ‘Stone’ need influence the name of Sanderson’s book.
First time posting. I too come from the WoT reread. I plan on being a much more active commenter . Personally I am really intrigued by book 3 being about Szeth. He is my most fascinating character and cannot wait to dive into his story more.
Great first post Alice. I have been waiting for the reread to got through WoR again and am reading along with the reread.
Allison @99 I agree completely, as is evidence with Kal when he acted less and less a radiant the bond with Syl got worse.
I think romance wise Shallan and Szeth would be be awesome. Szeth’s life and truthless status has been all a lie and with Pattern being lie spren and Shallon using illusions it fits. Thoughts?
@102
You present a decent case for “Skybreaker,” but I’m personally not thoroughly convinced that Szeth is actually on the path to becoming a real Knight Radiant. I don’t know that the person calling himself Nalan actually IS Nalan, or that even if he is Nalan, he has the power to just make anyone a Skybreaker. Szeth would need to attract an actual spren, but what he’s been given is a faux-shardblade created on the wrong planet with the wrong magic system.
@102: I’m not sure why Rothfuss’s book release will affect the name either. I know they have a friendly(ish) rivalry. And that the cross fan base would be happy to see both books come out the same year. Rothfuss’ fans would just be happy to finally get Day 3! :-)
Neither name is that close to the other, so guess it’s just a writer’s thing.
@103: Dennis, welcome to the
Bunker… Storm Cellar!@99: I agree with all your points about Shallan. After her mother died, she really was the rock that held the family together as her father fell apart.
But was she already acting as that rock, prior to age 11? That’s a ton of pressure to put on a child. I thankfully, was not from that type of dysfunctional family, but they do exists. Yet, it leads me to think her mother had some mental issues, to be that unbalanced by her daughter’s “imaginary friend” and drawing abilities.
To me, that would help make the bother’s reactions make more since too. We just don’t know how “normal” her father was prior to the downward spiral he went into after his first wife’s death.
@2, etc. Re: The Santhid:
To me, the Santhid appears to be an eyestalk of a much larger creature. It is assymetrical for one, and the ratio of the eye’s mass to the rest of it doesn’t make sense if that is the whole creature; where is its mouth, brain, etc.? The amount of energy used just for looking around with the giant eyeball would probably be better used for moving/hunting. IMHO.
Alisonwonderland @99 – I know we’ve discussed this before, but let me make a couple of comments anyway. (I’m echoing some of what STBLST said @102, but it bears repeating, IMO.)
1) Kaladin didn’t take multiple years to go through this process. From the time he spoke the first Ideal to the time he spoke the third and Syl returned to him as a living Shardblade was significantly less than a year – and that includes the time during which he’d alienated her almost to the point of mindlessness.
2) Shallan was 11 ½ when she used her Shardblade the first time. Her 12th birthday is just under 5 months (half a Rosharan year) after that event (about a week before the second flashback).
3) We know that each Order has different Ideals, and by the end of the book we know that after the first, commonly-held Ideal, the Lightweavers speak Truths as an approach to self-awareness.
4) We don’t know if all orders work the same way in terms of “when you get your Blade access” – it may even have been enough, in Shallan’s situation, that her life was threatened through no fault of her own, allowing her spren to protect her after only the first Ideal.
I think there are enough variables, and enough holes in what we know, to simply accept that Shallan’s path may be vastly different than Kaladin’s. I also don’t think we can assume that youth precludes the ability of an individual to understand the Ideals. My daughter just turned eleven, and IMO she’s perfectly capable of this level of comprehension.
For that matter, age can’t be much of a criterion anyway: Jasnah was 28 when she first saw her spren, and it was obviously after that when she spoke the first Ideal. Kaladin was 19 or perhaps 20 – his birthday went by unnoticed while he was a bridgeman. Lift was 13 or less. Renarin is 19, and Dalinar is 50.
Braid_Tug @105 – in her mother’s defense, it wasn’t just an imaginary friend and amazing drawing skills. There’s evidence that Shallan was able to craft some pretty detailed illusions – and give them both movement and sound. Tell me that wouldn’t freak you out just a little bit…
@99: The First Ideal is not innately understood by Kaladin or Dalinar when they speak it. They learn it from other people. It seems highly likely the First Ideal is not at all in the same category as the later oaths each Radiant speaks, as both Kaladin and Dalinar understand their later Ideals without anyone telling it to them. I don’t think Shallan had to ‘understand’ the First Ideal at all in order to speak it.
I’ve expanded more on why I think the First Ideal is unlike the others here:
http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/6973-theory-the-first-ideal-is-artificial/
More to the point, I suspect none of us fully understand it yet, in its complete depth.
@107 wetlandernw. Jasnah and Oaths- Wait, I never really thought about that. Could Jasnah already have a spren-blade that she’s not telling anyone about?
Regarding the KR developmental process, I have two questions (which may be unanswerable and/or appropriate for later chapters):
1) Is the order fixed? Obviously the first oath is the first but are the others determined by the challenges that the KR is currently facing and the choices that need to be made? If in WoK, Kaladin had come across Gaz (despicable at the time) being unfairly threatened by say Lamaril or Hashal, could he had decided to save Gaz and say the same oath he said while protecting Elkohar? It would be appropriate. Or would these words not have come to him until after he swore, “I will protect those who protect themselves.”
2) when did Dalinar bond the stormfather? I had assumed that he did so when he said the words at the top of the tower but on the shattered plains he seems to realize that he had been healing himself abnormally. And he “moved beautifully” when fighting Szeth. Certainly Kaladin had some sort of incipient bond with Syl before saying the words that allowed healing and use of stormlight.
My theory, half-baked as it is, is that the Stormfather who, unlike Syl or Pattern, doesn’t want to bond a human but, by giving the Dalinar the visions (in obedience to Honor), has to form a bond with Dalinar. Dalinar then exploits (poor word choice) the bond to force the Stormfather to accept the second ideal.
Thoughts?
Mooglefrooglian @108 – That’s a very interesting theory. I don’t really have an opinion one way or the other on it – mostly because, as Zen says @109, we just don’t understand it yet. We don’t know enough about the origins of Surgebinding and the origins of the Knights Radiant to say anything with confidence. I think, if I had to choose, I’d tentatively go with the notion that the Ideals as a whole are not inherent to Surgebinding, but are part of the structure of the KR.
We’ll have reason to continue this conversation when we hit Chapter 3, I think.
Bellaberry @110 – We don’t see it until the Epilogue, but at some point Jasnah acquires the Shardblade ability. We may even have to wait for her flashbacks to find out if she already had it during the WoK timeframe, or if it’s something that happened while she was in Shadesmar (or wherever she was). There are a LOT of unknowns about Jasnah… It’s even possible that she has deliberately chosen NOT to take the Ideals and that her bond with Ivory is outside the Radiant structure, though I think that’s a bit of a stretch. Hopefully we’ll learn a lot more from & about her in the next book, considering that she’s back on Roshar now and wants to take a hand in the happenings.
Shard_Rookie @111 – re: your first question, I think that would be a great one to ask Brandon! re: your second… I think that’s a valid theory. I like it, anyway. :)
Wetlandernw@113: Wow, how did I forget that? I guess that’s why I’m rereading- for detail retention.
@107 Wetlandernw, while I agree with your comment, your last paragraph may give the wrong impression. Clearly, Shallan exhibited some magical talent as a young girl. That could have lead to a distancing by her mother, not to seeking her death. The answer to that mystery presumably lies in the mother’s beliefs and affiliations. She may well have been a member of one those groups dedicated to eradicating evidence of surgebinding abilities. One could speculate about her allegiance to the Vorin religion (despite a presumed adulterous affair) which taught that the Radiants had become the enemies of mankind but had become extinct. If so, her extreme reaction is reminiscent of those deranged mothers who kill their children as supposed offspring of the devil.
And for all you Szeth fans, here is a picture of the assassin in white after
Portugal scores in the last second against the USAhe discovers the Knights Radiant have returned.@111 Shard_Rookie- I like your idea about the Stormfather a lot. It mirrors what my own theories about him and the Bondsmiths are. I can’t remember when exactly, but I believe we learned that the numbers of each order varied a lot, so while there were many windrunners, for example, there were some that had restricted numbers. I think the Bondsmiths only had 3 or 4 members at a time, likely all bonded to the Stormfather. And I have been operating under the assumption that everyone who has highstorm visions (Gavilar before he died, Dalinar, plus that random death quote chapter heading in Way of Kings from a man who reported highstorm visions) is bonded on some level to the Stormfather (a proto-Bondsmith, so to speak).
Moogle@108: Kaladin had the First Ideal explained to him by Teft, and Dalinar heard it in one of his visions. But, and here’s my point, both had lived enough and experienced life enough to truly understand the hidden implications of the words and the choices they would need to make in their lives in order to follow that oath. I will go and read your essay.
Wetlander@107: I don’t disagree with any of the points you raise, except the last one. Where you and I differ is in the level of life-awareness required to make the First Ideal meaningful (and I don’t mean a superficial understanding of the words, but how it translates into life choices). I don’t believe any 11-year old has lived enough “life” to truly appreciate what the First Ideal means to their life. Maybe that is just me.
@several:
I read Moogle’s thread (linked @108) on the 17th Shard along with the accompanying discussions, and I can see a few possible explanations for the difficulties I have with Shallan and the First Ideal. Specifically, the following potential explanations, among others, may get around the problem:
1) that the First Ideal is perhaps an organizing principle for the KR orders and not one required by the spren as a condition for forming and strenghtening nahel bonds;
2) that though it is required of all KR orders, the First Ideal may not be the first oath spoken, and indeed, may be spoken even after a person acquires the full powers of their order from the spren;
3) that the First Ideal does not need to be spoken, but must be lived (that is, if one lives according to the deeper meaning of the oath, that is enough);
…. and so on.
So, I hereby withdraw my contention that Shallan’s KR progression is a deus ex machina. As we get more information we shall learn which of these explanations, or other alternatives, is the most appropriate.
STBLST @115 – I certainly didn’t mean that it was acceptable for Shallan’s mother to try to kill her daughter – not even a little bit. I just felt that the referenced comment downplayed the situation too much. Drawings and imaginary friends are one thing – illusions that can move and speak are… rather another, wouldn’t you say?
Beyond that, I agree; I think Lady Davar’s background or beliefs led to the extreme reaction – and yes, it smacks very much of “the child is of the devil!” Whether she was actually deranged… … … you know, I can’t finish that sentence. You just about have to be deranged to think your pre-teen child needs to be killed, don’t you?
Bah. It’s another case where Sanderson has written a character that’s actually realistic & believable and at the same time totally incomprehensible and abhorrent. SANDERSOOOOOOON!!!!
* * *
@99 I would not underestimate the ability of children to consciously understand and make binding commitments to ideals. They may have the advantages of an innocent unspoiled purity of intent compared with a battered, cynical adult. They may not understand all the difficulties or sacrifices that will be involved or how that commitment will be tested, but then again, neither do many adults with much more life experience. That seems to be what the later ideals test for. The first ideal is the start of a journey, not the destination.
In Shallan’s case, her innnocent unspoiled intent did not survive her mother’s death, and it required a lengthy detour to regain the self-awareness and abilities she once had. Perhaps she would have had to confront different truths if her life had been less traumatic, but she was told by the Cryptics in the beginning that “the stronger the truth, the more hidden it is, the more powerful the bond”. It may be that she is now potentially much stronger as a Lightweaver than she could have been before. I’m not sure we know enough yet about how the bonding works to be able to say.
Hey Wet, great job on the reread.
@@@@@ 113 you wrote “considering she’s back on Roshar now” (Jashna). Has it been settled that she did indeed leave the planet and not just venture to another location on it (is this sentence grammatically correct?)? What have I missed?
@Wet, regarding my “imaginary friend” @105. Okay, I spoke too lightly of Pattern. Not sure how I would react if I saw my child playing with lights and making them speak. Especially with the background of KR=Bad of modern Vorin religions.
So the question remains, why were relations between mother and daughter so strained to begin with? If the boys didn’t notice a strong change, as others have said, that implies much.
Most mother/daughter dynamics I’m familiar with don’t fall apart until the teen years. Then start to get better sometimes during the daughter’s 20s. (tounge in cheek)
KadesSwordElanor @@@@@123 – No, you didn’t miss anything. I should have said, “Now that she’s back in Roshar’s physical realm.” Some people are convinced she’s been to other places, some believe she’s been in Shadesmar… and none of us know for sure (except Brandon and maybe Peter, and they aren’t telling). I can’t say for sure what prompted the wording, other than simply acknowledging that she’s been elsewhere for the past 65 days or more.
Braid_Tug @@@@@ 124 – It’s another case where we just don’t know enough. From the few references made by Shallan and her brothers, it always sounded to me like they had a pretty normal life prior to the emergence of Shallan’s Surgebinding, and they all adored their mother. There are references to the parents laughing, and the kids messing around like kids do; a time when Father was rarely or never angry; Mother teaching Shallan to draw, and dreaming or planning of fashionable dresses to come… It’s a bunch of little things that add up in my mind to a normal, happy childhood, with apparently normal relationships. IMO, that came to an end when Shallan started Surgebinding. Then there were the shouting matches behind closed doors; beyond that, we really don’t know what happened in terms of family life until Mother’s “friend” came around.
I think the fact that none of the brothers seem to have noticed anything just means that Mother managed to keep up an appearance of normalcy everywhere else. I would go so far as to suggest that some visible tension rose between the parents, but not obviously between Mother and Shallan. Recall that no one seemed to have trouble believing that Father killed Mother and her “lover,” and no one seemed to have any notion that Shallan was part of the equation at all.
Difficult as it may be for us to believe it, I think it’s quite possible that there was no extended period of strained relationship between Shallan and her mother. We don’t even know how long a time it was from when Shallan started Lightweaving (at least when her mother could see) to when the attempted murder happened. It might have been mere days or weeks, in which case it would be eminently reasonable for a bunch of teenagers to assume that any coldness or tension from mother to children was just carried over from the parents’ disagreement.
The Eagles’ song “Hotel California” has a line that described the life as a bridgeman before Kaladin appeared: “You can check-out any time you like, / But you can never leave!”
Thanks for reading my musings,
AndrewB
(aka the musespren)
QueenofDreams @90
The Storm Cellar must be in Shadesmar. Unless someone else placed it somewhere else after your comment. I haven’t read the last 30 or so.
We broke 100 again. Big Sparkly Yay!
ETA
Patillian @59
That is such an awesome piece of research that I had to bookmark it for future reference.
What confuses me about this chapter, is how Jasnah stumbles into Shadesmar accidentally. Why? What was up with that?
And is the significance of the shadows point in the wrong direction?
@128 Zen- I agree that the reverse shadows is very significant, in a BWS typical way. It sparks thoughts about Aimians and their reverse shadows (Axies the Collector), but not sure of the significance yet. Regarding Jasnah’s accidental Shadesmar visit, it may not be that hard. Remember Shallan also accidentally visited when she soulcast the goblet into blood in WOK.
Well, I’m back. (To coin a phrase.) Crazy week and weekend, but a couple things I still wanted to chime in on.
1. Re: what Shallan’s relationship with her mom might have been, you’ve all perfectly confused me with the analysis for and against the idea that they had a good relationship. Something I’ll watch for carefully in this reread. I do think it’s evident that somewhere in the family – I’ve assumed on their father’s side, perhaps wrongly – there’s a heritage of mental illness, based on Shallan’s brothers. But is it nature or nurture or both?
Re: the different ideas on what broken-ness may mean and how it may facilitate the spren bonding…I presume you folks have long since talked about the way that concept echoes the requirement Allomancers have to ‘snap’?
2. Re: shipping – at the risk of alienating you all, I’ll say I don’t much care for it. Oh, I don’t mind the rest of you doing it, really; I don’t want to be a stick-in-the-mud and it’s fun to watch, for a bit. I actually kinda like that Carl and Alice went ahead and included it in their template, in anticipation of the fact that we’ll inevitably be talking about it. But…well, as a lifelong single whose vocation takes priority, I find the obsession with pairing people off to be a little wearing. I’m all for a good love story – and intense situations like the end of the world can bring out intense emotions – but on the other hand, it’s the end of the world. They have plenty to occupy their time!
Jasnah is a good example – based on the prologue, she’s found herself in a position where she needed to dedicate herself to her studies and protecting her family. And then she failed. And she saw magic. And she experienced it herself, in some terrifying and near lethal ways. And as she explored, she became convinced that the end of the world was coming, and few knew or even suspected. So…yeah, she’s had more on her mind than dating. I don’t find that it takes theories of hidden lesbianism, for example, to explain her. Nor do I see anything in her relationship with Shallan to suggest any romantic interest.
On the other hand, I do see reason to believe that issues of sexism, prejudice, and empowerment are very important to her. I wonder what experiences fostered that in her – especially, I wonder what her relationship with Elhokar is like. At least through the second book, Elhokar comes off rather poorly if compared to Jasnah…he has redeeming features and I’ve hopes for him, but he’s got nothing yet approaching Jasnah’s brilliance, presence, or strength. Yet, he’s the heir. Jashnah’s role in protecting the family – and the world – is entirely self-appointed, but it seems to me that she’d be a far superior ruler.
Can you tell I like Jasnah? I was incoherent with rage after chapter 7. :)
Anyway, all that said, I’ll note that as much as Adolin and Shallan seemed to work, there *did* seem to be sparks between Kaladin and Shallan. At least on his part – I’ll be watching for this on the reread, too. But it’s easy to guess that Adolin’s murder of Sadeas may have some dark consequences for him, emotionally as well as otherwise, and therefore on his relationship with Shallan.
Also, much as I enjoy the Lopen (he’s so much like Lift, I wonder if he’ll really be a Windrunner or WR squire, or will he be an Edgedancer!), being awesome doesn’t mean he ‘deserves’ Jasnah. She’s not a prize to be won!
3. Back to the original commentary: great quote of the week, highlighting some of the key themes, and Shallan’s need to master the art of perception – both magical and otherwise. But I also took note of Jasnah’s statement just earlier, when she offers to explain Shadesmar, and tells Shallan that she’s found that keeping secrets from young people just causes them to get in trouble investigating on their own. A) this is the plotline to every Harry Potter book ever, and B) I suspect this plays a lot into Jasnah’s backstory as well! Esp. with whatever Gavilar knew that he kept to himself….
Back to Jasnah’s advice to Shallan on the subject of perception and authority – I thought on first reading, and still think now, that this scene *strongly* echoes Tindwyl’s training of Elend Venture in leadership. Much of her training with him was about perception – dress right, speak firmly and with confidence, etc. I enjoyed that callback. (I’ve also appropriated some of that advice in my professional life, by the way!)
Edited out for being a weird double post.
Other thoughts on the commentary:
1. Stormwatch: how the blazes do you people know that the date is “Tanatashah 1173 (a.k.a. 1173090605), the day following the highstorm in The Way of Kings, Chapter 75?” This is not information available to us from the chapter, is it? Presumably you folks who’ve been part of the reread have discovered resources, maybe a Coppermind section? How does that date relate to Navani’s note in the epigraph – which is dated Jeseses 1174? Presumably it’s something like 60+ days, considering the deadline we’ll get in a couple of chapters.
Hm. If I presume that Tanatshah is the 9th month – named for Tanat/Talenel/Taln – and that Jeseses is the 1st month – named for Jezrien, then that seems to come out to approximately two months later.
But if the names of months come from extra-book sources, I definitely wouldn’t want to use them on a first read.
2. Re: the opening pace of the book, and how quickly we get explanations about Spren and Shadesmar – I loved this, and thought it was a nice case of Brandon subverting (I presume semi-consciously) my WoT conditioned expectations for a slower reveal. (Of course, Brandon’s own WoT books naturally have a breakneck pace of their own. There are several places through the book where he moves faster through something that I expected, I think always to my vast approval and sometimes relief. For instance, there were times when there were *headdesk* moments of non-communication between the protagonists, and I could feel my dismay building. And then they decide to communicate after all. Thanks goodness!
I agree with the several commenters that part of the speed of Tozbek’s capitulation to Shallan is due to Jasnah’s presence. Consider the sequence from Tozbek’s pov – 1. Shallan makes odd request/demand, is denied. 2. Shallan has long, obviously close talk with Jasnah. 3. Shallan repeats demand – now clearly an actual demand, and brooks no thwarting of her will.
It’s likely that Tozbek assumes that Shallan discussed things with Jasnah and that Jasnah had already given her support.
Re: sprenspotting, it’s interesting to me to remember how DEEPLY uneasy I was with Pattern’s appearance here. Shallan’s experience with the Cryptics in tWoK was incredibly creepy to me (some of Brandon’s best writing imo – along with this entire book). I don’t know, something about the idea that she was seeing creatures around her when she took a memory – creatures that didn’t register consciously but showed up in her drawings – creatures that were getting closer and closer and then OMG THEY JUST TOUCHED HER – wow, I was freaking out.
It reminded me of an episode of Star Trek: TNG where aliens are abducting the crew in their sleep and experimenting on them. The scene where several crewmembers are in the holodeck trying to recreate their barely remembered dream – and gradually they realize they dreamed the same thing, as each detail jogs all their memories – and then gradually they realize AHH NOT A DREAM – I always found that a really creepy episode, and had much the same reaction to the Cryptics.
So the fact that those horrible THINGS were still hovering around Shallan, and showed up in the fifth paragraph? Terrrifying. I remained deeply frightened of/paranoid about Pattern – up until the point where he starts bumping repeatedly into things like a puppy, which was ridiculous, hilarious, and hugely effective. But that’s still to come!
Re: the betrayal and the Recreance and the return of the spren – this seems to indicate that the coming of Odium is a threat to the spren as well as to humans, which…I don’t know that I’d thought about before.
A few last thoughts on comments, though this isn’t all the comments I’d like to respond to, it will have to do.
@@@@@74 ZenBossanova – I’ve suspected you’re right about us encountering spren prior to the SA, but how do you know? Can you give any examples of spren in previous cosmere books?
Either way, the point stands – we might have seen them before, but we’ve never seen them like we do on Roshar, where they are ubiquitous. Spren that appear when people feel strong emotions, when things rot and decay, when the wind blows…spren are everywhere on Roshar, so *something* is different. And Rosharan biology seems to require that in ways we’ve not seen before either.
@@@@@80 Tektonica (hi!): re: the Spiritual Realm and Eternity, I believe I’ve seen Brandon talk (maybe in the annotations to Mistborn, or in something on the 17th Shard?) about the Spiritual Realm being, not equivalent with an ‘afterlife’ concept, but touching on it. That through the spiritual realm Kelsier was hanging on? Or maybe that Sazed, as Harmony, had been in touch with Vin and Elend after their deaths?
Re: “aren’t we all pieces of god” – in real life theology, I’d say no. Some religions and views would differ – from my perspective we are children of God created in God’s image, but distinct. But in Brandon’s books, I think you’re right. Syl’s claims to be a piece of a god are interesting, and imply to me that *she* is, but Kaladin isn’t. (And Rock’s Horneater beliefs seem to agree with that.) But then we have Ym, in the second interlude, and his Azish belief that ‘to live is to be a fragment of the cosmere that was experiencing itself’. And the story he tells seems to imply that Adolnasium willfully and deliberately chose to Shatter into Shards in order to experience things differently.
@@@@@81 TheKingofCarrotFlowers – first, I’d never seen a carrot flower until your name made me Google it. (Which is when I realized it’s a song.) But the flowers are cool, so thanks for that, as well as your very thoughtful post. I think I very provisionally agree with you about the Spiritual Realm being fairly analogous to Plato’s Ideals – with Wetlander’s usual caveat that we simply don’t know enough yet for that to be any more than speculation.
I’ve wondered about Seons and spren – do we have any confirmation that they’re a form of spren? I’d thought they were fragments of Devotion, but I suppose one doesn’t preclude the other. Certainly ‘living ideas’ seems to be a viable description of them. But it’s interesting that while Seons bond to people, this doesn’t provide them any Invesiture, as the Nahel bond does.
Re: Shallan changing people with their lightweaving – I’m still not sure she’s changing people *magically*. Certainly she seems to have the ability to inspire, but I’m not sure that’s powered by a Surge.
“Splinters of shards are sentient micro-intents” is a very cool turn of phrase. One of the things that was a revelation to me – either in this book, or as a result of pursuing thoughts from this book into the Coppermind – was the idea that a “splinter” of a Shard didn’t necessarily mean a piece of a Shard that had been shattered through violence. I’d previously thought of splintering as something which resulted from things like Odium’s attacks on Devotion or Honor. But it seems not. This is obvious in retrospect, since Preservation made humans on Scadrial with pieces of himself, to make them more of Preservation than of Ruin. So, Adolnasium could very well have had pieces of itself/her/himself scattered around as or in spren – and in humans, for that matter. Which ties back into the idea that, in the Cosmere, everything may simply be pieces of Adolnasium.
Anyway, it seems completely possible that spren could’ve been native to Roshar, created by Adolnasium – and that some of them could’ve then taken up pieces of Honor after Odium killed him and splintered his Shard. Although…it seems likely that Honor created the Stormfather himself, even as Honor created humans on Roshar. (Did Honor do this alone, or did Cultivation collaborate? Why does Vorin theology know nothing of Cultivation?)
@@@@@99 Alisonwonderland (and subsequent spots) – I understand your skepticism wrt how thoroughly young Shallan could’ve understood the First Ideal. In my own religious tradition, though, I made what we call a “profession of faith” at age 9, with full understanding of what I was doing. (Well…full enough. It has continued to grow and evolve of course, journey before destination indeed.) In my case, my thoughts and questions were sparked by my 14 year old brother asking philosophical and theological questions at the dinner table. I wouldn’t have gone there on my own at that age, but was able to go there with his influence.
As someone who teaches kids and teenagers in church – it’s a tough question. Some kids understand and are able to articulate complex ideas with astonishing clarity. Others are not. Being careful to respect their process and not pressure kids into premature decisions or commitments is very important to me…but I still don’t have trouble believing Shallan could’ve been precoscious in this area. It does happen.
@@@@@ several – I find the title “Stones Unhallowed” quite evocative, Skybreaker less so. (Though I love it as a name of a KR order, I just don’t think it’s as good a title.) I certainly don’t think it needs to be changed because of Doors of Stone. What’s more interesting to me is the thought that it’s even possible we’ll get Day 3 before the next Stormlight book. That’s certainly faster than I’ve dared hope! And I still don’t quite believe it.
By the way – if book 3 is Szeth’s, it’s liable to be quite depressing. Szeth is *thoroughly* messed up. Even, dare I say, broken? I do hope that he a) becomes a real Knight Radiant, and b) gets free of the influence of both Nalan and Warbreaker, both of which are…deeply disturbed as well.
But I do like the idea of Szeth becoming a Skybreaker. He was the first Surgebinder we saw, and the idea of him not being able to defy gravity and dance in the sky bothers me. (Almost as much as the idea of him exchanging the Windrunner Surge of Adhesion for the Skybreaker Surge of Division. As if he wasn’t lethal enough already! I wonder if bonding with Warbreaker can grant him those abilities?)
@@@@@110 and 113 – geez, I hadn’t thought about Jasnah with a Shardblade. She’s quite formidable already – nice!
@@@@@117 MDNY – it’s in an epigraph, to chapter 44, where we learn the Bondsmiths were limited in number. At that point in time they only had 3 members, and that was “not uncommon for them.” It goes on to say that their spren were “specific” and that trying to persuade them to grow to the size of other orders was seen as seditious! We also have word of Brandon that superspren like the Stormfather are able to form more than one Nahel bond.
Putting that together, it seems likely that all the Bondsmiths were bonded, not to multiple spren, but to one, the Stormfather. And it also seems that he was touchy even before the Recreance.
@133 chaplainchrist- “I do hope that he a) becomes a real Knight Radiant, and b) gets free of the influence of both Nalan and Warbreaker, both of which are…deeply disturbed as well.”
I think you mean Nightblood. Warbreaker was the name of the Returned, Vasher. Nightblood was the name of the sword that Szeth now holds. Vasher seems fairly likeable these days, if an alcoholic. And I always liked Nightblood, he makes me smile with his childlike love of “destroying evil”. But I agree that it’s not good for Szeth to be involved with Nalan, who seems like a truly messed up individual with his hunt for proto-radiants.
Chris @132 – I know it’s the same highstorm because Brandon said so. :D As for the naming convention, it can be worked out from the “death rattle” epigraphs in the first book combined with the Ars Arcanum. In this case, Tanat = 9th month, ash is for Shalash = 6th week, ah is for Palah = 5th day. String them together to get Tanatashah. Okay, it’s a geek thing… (or is it nerd? Or both? I get so confused.)
@133 and 134 – The thing that creeps me out about Nightblood is its power and intelligence combined with its lack of discernment. It only understands “evil” in the terms explained to it, but cheerfully destroys whatever (whomever) it understands to fit the definition. If Nale has convinced it that Surgebinders = Evil, this… is not a good thing.
@133. chaplainchris1
I seem to vaguely recall somethings Brandon said, but I don’t have time to look them up today.
In any case, there are the aeons in Elantris that are spren. If I recall, Brandon identified Breath as something analogous to spren. Though while Breath (Warbreaker) and the Mists (Mistborn) are similar, they don’t have the same intelligence manifested as many spren. I think there is a connection to how a Shard is Splintered, as to what kinds of spren you see.
Hey all – I’m a bit slow to the party this time around. I’ve been keeping up with the comments, but my ability to post is genereally restricted to times when A) I’m at work and B) I don’t have anything to actually be working on. It’s actually been a nice change of pace, but item B has been sorely lacking in the last week or so, as work has been pretty busy.
Anyways, it’s been great to see all the discussion. I really like the Kintsugi idea of brokenness suggested by ZenBossanova.
@@@@@ “Just Sayin” – I actually noticed Shallan saying “Why on Roshar?” in one of the later chapters. It’s very nice when even little things like turns of phrase can bolster the immersion.
birgit @@@@@62 (and possibly others) – I don’t think that the Santhiden are poisonous/can sting you though, mostly based on the fact that this one saves Shallan after she turns the Wind’s Pleasure into water. I got the same vibe after that as when hearing stories about dolphins rescuing people in our world.
Chris @@@@@130 – Did you just reference both Lord of the Rings and Disney in your wall of text? That is all kinds of awesome. I feel like we would be friends in real life.
Chris @@@@@133 – My understanding is that Seons != spren, in that they aren’t exactly the same thing, but that they are both types of splinters. So they would be similar in terms of power, etc., but would be distinct types of entities, primarily distinguished by how their parent Shard creates its spinters. Of course, I’m not 100% sure about that – it’s definitely been a while since I’ve read Elantris.
According to the Warbreaker annotations,
@134 – oops, yes, I indeed meant Nightblood. Thanks. Vasher good (more or less, we think), Nightblood creepy. For pretty much the reasons given by Wetlander @135.
@136 – yes, but *are* Seons spren? I had the impression that they were pieces of Devotion, yes, and perhaps shaped by AonDor…
The Mists were, I thought, part of Preservation – its Spiritual Aspect leaked into the Physical Realm, as a Shardpool is its cognitive aspect and Lerasium its Physical aspect.
Breath I understood as splinters or slivers or what have you of Endowment – voluntarily provided as investiture, rather than left over from a violent shattering or splintering by Odium.
I’ll try and find a moment to look those things up…
Oops, missed a few comments. @137 jeremy guybert, well…*faux modesty* One does one’s best. Pretty much all the Tor.com people I’ve been lucky enough to meet irl have become friends irl. Some have become so even though we haven’t met in person. We are each other’s people, it seems.
Agreed with you, at least until we have more info, that Seons are not equivalent to Spren.
@138 Nazrax, interesting that Brandon refers to the Breaths *interpreting* their commands. That does seem to indicate some kind of sentience.
Nazrax @138 – So… does that mean that Szeth will end up killing himself in the first chapter, thus bringing about the situation Brandon suggested, in which a flashback character doesn’t necessarily have to still be living?
chaplainchris1 @140 – Good point. Breaths are splinters, right, along with seons and spren? Yet, Breaths can’t exist on their own – they have to be Invested into something. If the Breaths can determine the intent of the Command and affect how the Awakened object acts, can they also affect the person into whom they’re invested?
Wetlandernw @141 – Does Szeth consider himself evil? Or does he still consider himself “good,” having maintained his honor by doing the evil things his masters required of him?
Of course, we don’t know what effect running Nightblood on Stormlight instead of Breaths has. As the Coppermind points out, everyone in Warbreaker who encounters Nightblood either A) goes into a bloodlust and kills everything, or B) experiences intense nausea; yet Szeth doesn’t have either.
@142: he’s also only held Nightblood for about 10 minutes, in story.
I’m looking forward to a chapter from Nighblood’s POV.
Re: Nightblood – Brandon has said that part of the reason Vasher/Zahel is on Roshar is that it’s far easier for him to get something there than on Nalthis. My assumption is that he’s referring to Investiture (i.e. Stormlight is more readily available than Breath). If true, this will mean, at the very least, that Nightblood will be able to be wielded for a longer duration than would be possible over there. My impression is that this longer “battery charge” (for lack of a better term) will be the primary (only?) difference in using him away from home.
Re: Szeth – He considers himself guilty of the sins he’s committing, but also feels honour-bound to be obedient to his master. I don’t know whether he would actually consider himself evil enough for Nightblood to turn on him. In any event, it will be extremely interesting to see.
Ooh, that would be cool, Braid_Tug.
Wetlandernw @141 and Nathrax @142 Great points both. Regarding Nathrax’ question: Does Szeth consider himself evil? Or does he still consider himself “good,” having maintained his honor by doing the evil things his masters required of him?
I think the answer is Szeth considered (past tense) himself evil. That was what I found so fascinating about him–he followed orders yet knew he would pay for his sins. As he tells Taravangian in WoK, “I am not absolved…It is my punishment. To kill, to have no choice, but to bear the sins nonetheless.” To Szeth’s credit he never killed indiscriminately (except when it was part of his orders when he killed the king of Jah Kaved). Otherwise, it was only his target and “collateral damage,” i.e. people trying to protect his target. When he was working for the petty crime lord (WoK I-6), he intentionally chose to carry out an assassination that did not include the target’s guards.
So to recap:
He follows his orders.
He knows he will pay for sins committed by following orders.
He, however, does not increase his sin by killing if he can avoid it.
This Szeth, as Wetlander suggests, would likely be killed instantly upon grabbing Nightblood. However, before Nalan gives Szeth Nightblood, he seems to exonerate Szeth: “I watched you destroy yourself in the name of order, watched you obey your personal code when others would have fled or crumbled. Szeth-son-Neturo, I watched you keep your word with perfection…I doubt I have ever found a man more worthy of the Skybreakers than you.” (Italics mine). Szeth, presumably because this was coming from a Herald, seems to believe him.
This Szeth can and does take Nightblood.
As one might guess I have thought about this a lot. The reason is because of a very key exception to Szeth’s personal code. Szeth kills soldiers in an attempt to kill Dalinar (collateral damage). He then shoots Dalinar into the sky and walks away believing the assassination is complete. Adolin is helpless and Szeth says, “I suppose I can kill one more, on my own time.”
No orders, no collateral damage, Szeth is choosing to commit murder. He fails due to the arrival of Kaladin but that only makes it attempted murder.
So I have wondered for a while if Szeth’s very serious violation of his code would come back to haunt him, maybe remove Nalan’s protection. However, based on the conversation, between WetlanderNW and Nathrax, I now wonder if Szeth’s guilt will return and Nightblood will kill him.
Very interesting discussion re: Nightblood and Szeth. I’m getting pumped for Stones Unhallowed/Skybreakesr already, this is not good LOL.
One thing I want to add is that while Szeth considered his actions evil, he never seemed to consider himself evil until the very end, when Adolin attacked him after he (apparently) killed Dalinar. I sensed a change in Szeth’s demeanor, where he forced himself to grin and said something like “I suppose I can kill one more, on my own”. It seemed like Szeth had reached his personal breaking point where he had pretty much lost all his inherent morality and was actively TRYING to be bad. Then, of course, Kaladin showed up and forced Szeth to reevaluate his entire circumstance.
I don’t think the beads in Shadesmar are the same as Platonic ideas. Ideas are abstract concepts of a whole category (prototypes/types), while the beads are representations of specific instances (tokens). A bead is not tables in general, but a specific table. If you change that table into something else, other tables are still tables.
QueenofDreams @90
We’re all in it. It’s here. It’s us. It’s this.
STBLST @115
The concept that Lady Davar was in an adulterous affair was a fabrication. She certainly had an affiliation with an agenda-driven group, one that believed her daughter’s abilities needed to be extinguished. After Shallan’s mother and her associate were slain, Lin determined to protect his daughter at all cost, so invented the story of an affair which drove him to kill his wife and her lover.
These lies and the damage they create (destroyed relationship with his sons, disdainful pity from peers, etc.), added to the intense fear of his own daughter, are what drove Lin Davar slowly mad and turned him into the man who later needed to be “put down” by Shallan.
Thanks Frelancer. I didn’t know if there was a separate discussion forum on here. I fell behind on all the chat here for a fe months
@148 Freelancer, I only mentioned a “presumed adulterous affair” between Lin Davar’s wife and her ‘friend’. That was certainly the understanding of her sons, even if mistaken. Shallan also reacted negatively to the presence of that friend even before the fateful incident that lead to their deaths. It may be, as you suggest, that the ‘friend’ was merely an associate or advisor to Lady Davar from whatever organization or cult to which they belonged. I don’t see, however, that you have sufficient information to be so sure of your assessment.
Chris @130
A history of mental illness in Shallan’s lineage? Didn’t see that one coming, and perhaps you are correct. I’d chalked her brothers’ problems up to the family being broken. Let’s watch for evidence one way or the other.
Ways @152 – perhaps I ought not to talk so glibly talk of a history or heritage of mental illness – such statements are awfully vague in real life. Mental illness? Mental disorder? Does having a history of depression, as I do, mean one has a history of mental illness? (Probably, yes.) But at any rate, as I mentioned, there’s the question of nature, or nurture, or both. Were mental/emotional disorders endemic in the Davar family? Or were they a result of (di)stress? Or did the stress and fractures in the family bring out latent tendencies? Or etc.
Mostly what i meant by my comment @130 though, was a desire to watch for signs of what Shallan’s relationship with her mom was like. Perhaps good to also watch for signs of instability in her brothers. I have to say, whichever brother(s) take pleasure from the pain of animals (it’s Nan Balat, isn’t it?), gives me the big-time creeps.
Shallan gets shipped…on a ship.
This was the birth of Shadolin. I loved her reaction and Jasnah awaiting for the reaction. They have a nice bond and 500 pages later, so do Adolin and Shallan. In a world that is dark and stormy( pun intended) it’s nice to have someone who can be your light. And that’s what the two of them are to eachother.
Although I don’t think that relationship is the most import thing of course, their dynamic is one of my favorites.
Ma favorite characters and Kaladin, Adolin and Shallan. So imagine my happiness when I found out that I won’t have to wait for 70 pages to read about my favorite but will quite literally have Shakadolin in the same scene.
Shakadolin is an amazing friendship. Shalladin was terryfing to me lol.