Search the Community

Hey all - I was doing a re-read of Mistborn 1 and came across a passage that I found particularly interesting given Brandon's specific choice of word. I am not sure if this has been brought up before, I couldn't find any note of it in the tags despite the many different topics and discussions of Trell. So wanted to bring the communities attention to this. I am unsure whether this is a purely co-incidental word choice by Brandon, but as we know of our favourite author, very little of what he writes is accidental, which makes me think given our knowledge of new shards, perhaps the truth has been staring us in the face since the first time we heard about Trell. Here is the passage: 'It listed the tenets of the Nelazan people, who had worshipped the god Trell. Sazed had always been partial to this religion because of it's focus on learning and the study of mathematics and the heavens...True, the Nelazan had known a great deal about astronomy, but their teachings of the afterlife were sketchy - almost whimsical. Their doctrine was purposefully vague, they'd taught, allowing all men to discover truth for themselves...What good was a religion without answers? Why believe in something if the response to half it's questions was "Ask Trell, and he will answer?"'. Page 410, Chapter 46 - Hero of Ages. A few points on this: 1. The specific choice of the word whimsical to describe the religion of Trell now takes on a potentially insightful new meaning given that Whimsy is now a confirmed Shard. 2. Brandon specifically notes that the Nelazan had known a great deal about maths and astronomy - if I was to chose two words that would indicate to me that a group of people were Cosmere aware, without being obvious, those two words would be high on my list. They had a religion with it's focus as the study of science and the universe - which sounds very much like a basis understanding of how the Cosmere works. 3. The core worship structure of not having answers to questions, but just a believe that Trell will answer - as opposed to religions that already lay out all the answers upfront in a creed, suggests that they are confident that their god exists, lives, and importantly 'can answer'. While at the same time coming into line with the core concept of Whimsy - 'a sudden wish or idea that cannot be reasonable explained'. They didn't need answers, as they didn't know what all the questions were. They just had faith that their God would answer. 4. Given Trell's involvement in Mistborn 1.5, we can safely say that the Nelazan were onto something with their religion - that it had a grounding in truth. If we draw this all together, then Brandon's use of the word whimsical, in conjunction with describing the Nelazan as seemingly cosmere aware, and the concepts of their faith matching into what could be considered Whimsy. We might have a good argument to state that Trell is of Whimsy. Also - wouldn't it be fun for Trell to be connected to a Shard we know very little about as a way to introduce potentially a new major player into the cosmere game. A trickster Shard inserting himself in small religions across the Cosmere under the noses of other Shards, not bound tightly to one planetary system but working through avatars everywhere. Would love it if anyone gets the chance to ask Brandon if his choice of word in Hero of Ages was important. Also - as always, would love for the community to rip this to pieces and show me some tasty WoB's that disprove me that Trell is linked to Whimsy. Stay positive and negative!

Hi all! Thought I would run this one by you, What if the Ten Fools (three of which we have names for) are real, and what if they are creations of Whimsy? Although we really know nothing at all about the Shard Whimsy, I feel that this is right up their alley- Honor creates his ten Heralds, and Whimsy sees their opportunity to parody these solemn and epically heroic individuals. Whimsy creates their own ten highly invested cognitive shadows, each of whom bears a comedic flaw in contrast to the mighty attributes of the Heralds. I am in love with the idea of these ten immortal, super invested, interstellar jesters. Spreading Whimsy, but not being all that helpful to the grand scheme of things. My ambition is to someday put this theory to Brandon to get his views on whether this has any merit. In the meantime, I really wanted to share it with you all! Thanks gang, stay silly

Hi everyone, I’m kinda new here but since none of my friends are into Cosmere and I need people to talk to about my crackpot theories so here we go, Brandon has said (I think) that he has plans for a Silverlight novella/novel and the other thing that he said that stood out to me is that it’s really weird. I was thinking about the shards that we don’t really know anything but their name (Valor and Whimsy) and I came up with the idea that I think Whimsy is the shard of Silverlight. I know it is not necessarily a planet but from what little we have heard I think it is a good connection. The other connection that I thought of are that Sazed says that Whimsy would not be useful in helping with Odium, and if I remember correctly Silverlight has a nonintervention policy. Coincidence???? I THINK NOT! what do y’all think?

So here is Brandon's first comment about this shard on reddit: So there you have it, based on Brandon's comment Whimsy is as close to Caprice as it gets which to my mind makes it the most terrifying shard out there (regardless of what Cultivation says about Odium!). A good question to ask Brandon would be why he chose Whimsy and not Caprice. Is that related to the vessel's perception of the shard? Or is there an actual difference between Whimsy and Caprice?

So after accidentally detailing another thread, @GroundPetrel and I decided to make this an official thread of its own. This idea started with a simple premise: If Kelsier ever took up the Shard of Whimsy he would be the Q of the Cosmere. Naturally, that makes Hoid Guinan, and from there it spiraled. After all, if Star Treck were Cosmere, who would be Picard? (Jasnah.) Our current NG cast: Kelsier + Whimsy = Q Hoid - Guinan Jasnah - Picard Marasi - Riker? ? - Doc Crusher MeLaan - Wesley Crusher Lirin - Dr. Pulaski Steris - Data Rlain - Worf Azure - Tasha Yar Dalinar - O’Brien Navani- Keiko Gavinor - Molly Ranette - Geordi Adolin - Deana Fourth Bridge - The Enterprise Sequence - Lore Odium’s forces - the Borg. Feel free to suggest your own ideas! Stories and fan art are welcome.