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scm288

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  1. It's also been made clear, from Words of Brandon, that Kaladin's title of "Son of Tanavast" (used by the Stormfather) is not without significance. There is definitely more going on here.
  2. I find it very likely that the Lord of Scars is going to start getting very involved on Roshar. Remember that the question here is not just the primary antagonist of the first five volumes, but of the Stormlight Archive as a whole. Brandon has told us that he intends to write Mistborn Era 3 during the gap between the two halves. I don't think that's without significance. Mistborn is going to hit modernity, and with it, modern science and technology. We're already seeing commodification of Allomancy and Feruchemy on Scadrial. We're seeing overt attempts on Roshar by the Ghostbloods to engineer means to sever Connection and transport Investiture across the Cosmere. I highly suspect that, at some point in the next few books, we are going to see Kelsier unleashed from Scadrial. And if there's one thing that Kelsier hates, it is power. A planet with multiple warring deities vying for power is like a giant flashing target for Kelsier. Nobilities to pull down, corruption to cleanse, and powers in turmoil... I think the war between the singers and the humans will reach its conclusion in Book 5. I suspect that Books 6 through 10 will feature a Scadrian invasion.
  3. Brandon Sanderson does indeed pull a lot from his own religious background for his material. As someone of the same faith, it's sometimes really apparent. A man claims to have visions from God, puts out a book, and leads a new religious movement? Admittedly that's pretty similar to many religions when they start. I wonder if Dalinar will institute a priesthood or hierarchy, or if others will institute one without his say... I wonder what his reaction would be to people making him into a religious leader without him asking them to. I don't think it's fair to call the Knights Radiant a religious order, so I wouldn't say that he's already building a religion deliberately.
  4. As someone who was diagnosed with gluten-free needs this year, let me just affirm: I really miss pizza. And pasta. And bread. Wow, bread--the delicate crunch of a buttered garlicky baguette... The rippling folds of a perfect cinnamon roll. Cold cereals of most varieties. Kitkats and Twix. Whoppers. Chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream. Heck, cookies. Pastries. Cakes. You get it, the list goes on and on. Poor Hoid indeed.
  5. Is it possible that the Command that made Nightblood is, itself, a Dawnshard Command? Intent and a Command. Sound familiar?
  6. I was really glad to see that her receiving/becoming the Dawnshard of Change did not magically heal her legs. Instead, Brandon maintains the emotional weight of her physical struggle instead of turning it into escapism. It really fits the rest of the book's narrative about people not valuing her for who she is, but instead focusing only on her disability... Brandon was respectful of her disability and didn't turn her into a vehicle for a magical healing narrative, which would've been an easy route to take. I don't think that healing stories are impossible to pull off, but I think Brandon's focus on getting readers to recognize the real difficulties of the disabled--and giving Rysn hope for freedom within her disability--is a better plot by far.
  7. I suspect, after reading this, that the Third Ideal is less about hatred, per se, and more about not letting yourself get in the way of protecting others--or perhaps, rather, to not let your personal desires stop you from protecting others. As such, selflessness is the key principle of the Third Ideal. I think. "I will protect even those I hate, so long as it is right." - Kaladin had to let go of his hatred of others and not allow it to determine his willingness to protect others, even those who arguably didn't deserve his protection, like Elhokar. "I will protect even those I hate, even if the one I hate most is myself." - Teft had to let go of his self-hatred, which was spiraling him downwards into self-pity, self-rejection, and self-torment. He had to be able to look outwards and focus on protecting those who need protection, notwithstanding his own failings. "I will protect those who hurt me." - Huio had to look past the way in which his cousin aggravates him. We get a small sense of how annoyed he gets by Lopen in this story. Can you imagine having to live with Lopen? For your whole life? There's probably a lot of hurt there that Lopen didn't necessarily mean, but it sounds like it was enough to be an obstacle for Huio to overcome to reject his emotional wounds in order to protect. "I will protect others from myself." - Again, it's the self that's getting in the way. Lopen wants to protect but his own personality, the one he's chosen, is getting between him and that ideal. In each of these, the primary element is not hatred, or some interpretation of hatred, but an interpretation of the character's focus on the self, and the need to set aside that self-centeredness in order to fulfill the Ideal. That Kaladin and Teft's interpretations of it deal with hatred is not endemic to the Third Ideal itself, but are instead manifestations of their strongly hateful character arcs at that point in time. The point is to give up the self.
  8. I am not certain that Vasher/Zahel's theory of Cognitive Shadows is entirely correct... In Mistborn, Secret History, we see "There's always another secret..."
  9. Don't know if anyone has mentioned this, but this is linking to last week's discussion
  10. Right, it's also easily attributable to the 'Rule of Cool,' which is also viable. Sanderson's penchant for having connections in places make me a little paranoid on that front, haha. Thanks for the input.
  11. I finished rereading Warbreaker last week, and it struck me this evening: named Shardblades have very Returned-style names. Maybe it's just a coincidence--maybe you can't read too much into it; after all, Brandon has confirmed that there has been hundreds if not thousands of years of cultural trade between Roshar and Nalthis; this could just be cultural happenstance in the same way that shash is a shared linguistic trait between the two worlds. But here are some names of the Returned: Lightsong, Blushweaver, Allmother, Peacegiver, Strifelover, and of course, Warbreaker. Here are some names of (named) Shardblades: Firestorm, Sunraiser, Oathbringer. I don't count Mayalaran because that's her spren name, in the same way that Sylphrena is the name of Kaladin's spren; not sure what to make of spren names. But really--where do Shardblade names come from? They seem to have a similar naming tradition as the Returned: two-part words, often involving a verb. Sunraiser and Oathbringer both fit that bill. Is there a connection? Or is it happenstance?
  12. Good call on the Re-Shephir. I wonder if the Midnight Mother fled because 1) she knew she could be captured by someone like Shallan, or 2) when she and Shallan connected, Re-Shephir saw the truth of Shallan that Shallan is hiding from herself... and was terrified? Or even both? What is Shallan still hiding?
  13. Good clarification. By "Prime" I meant original, but I get your point. Veil certainly seems to have taken over as the prime personality. (I have to wonder how Adolin feels about that development--or if he's even aware...) I suspect that the unspoken truth Shallan is hiding is going to complicate these issues quite a bit. Shallan seemed terrified of the prospect of confronting that truth. What could be so much hairier than admitting to killing your own parents?
  14. In Chapter 2, we see Shallan have a tussle with her other selves. The thing is, her other selves don't think of Shallan as, well, Shallan. Or Shallan Prime, or anything like that. The Shallan from the first couple of books--the artist, the quiet girl of House Davar, Jasnah's ward, Adolin's betrothed--is treated by them as just another personality, as insubstantial as Veil or Radiant. Just another face to wear. So that gets me thinking: is it possible that the Shallan we know is just another face to wear? As evidenced by Chapter 2, there are deeper truths that Shallan still hasn't admitted to herself. There's something dangerous lurking there, deep beneath the surface. Is it possible that there really is another Shallan--a Shallan Prime, as it were, the original Shallan--a fourth personality who developed artistic Shallan as a defense mechanism? How do we know that we don't have a Typhoid Mary on our hands here?
  15. My understanding of the balance of power between the Fused and the Radiants is that, even without access to Surges, the Fused would come back again, and again, and again. Kill your enemy a dozen times--if he just keeps coming back in a different body, how do you defeat that? Any Radiant dying is irreplaceable except through the slow development of a new Nahel bond. Any Fused dying just means that it gets sent back to Braize, only to be reborn once more. I recall the Stormfather explaining to Dalinar that this was the reason for the Oathpact and the creation of the Heralds--to try to balance the scales and even the odds. To give Radiants a recurring, reincarnating team of superpowered Radiants to match the might of the Fused.
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