Crazy Theory: Hoid knows he's in a book.

[Galavantes]

“I’ve many.” The man shook Kaladin’s hand. “I began life as a thought, a concept, words on a page. That was another thing I stole. Myself. Another time, I was named for a rock.”

 

Maybe this only strikes me because I also had a concept for a character that was aware he was inside a book. But maybe...maybe Hoid is actually aware of not only the Cosmere, but of OUR world as well. 

Slightly crazier:

The cognitive realm is Brandon's imagination. Hoid knows this, and therefore he is able to move through Brandon's mind to reach into his other novels.

The idea that Hoid "Stole himself" could refer to the very real fact that characters often evolve through story telling in ways that even the author didn't predict. Perhaps Brandon ended up going places with Hoid that he never intended to, and feels like the character ran away with itself.

 

Just a possibility. 

[Worldhopper]

Mind boggling theory.

 

A little like going into a dream, within a dream, within a dream

[Dros]

A bit Stephen Kingish too.

[Observer]

Breaking the fourth wall can only ever really be done for humorous purposes, or else it just ruins the immersion. In this massive web of books, wrecking the immersion simply isn't worth it, and I find it unlikely that Brandon would make Cosmere characters self-aware like that. No, I think it's more complicated than this.

 

On that note, however, this is a somewhat rediciuslous thread made on April first. My ability to take it seriously is at rock-bottom as is.

Edited April 2, 2013 by Observer

[Galavantes]

Firstly breaking the 4th wall and having a self aware character are not the same thing. Technically you are only breaking the 4th wall if the character addresses the audience directly. That may not be something that Brandon believes is even possible for Hoid. In much the same way that a 2 dimensional creature may be aware of a 3rd dimension, but not actually able to interact with it.

 

Secondly I'm not saying this will affect the plot. It might not even be something that Brandon ever intends to directly reveal. The way I picture it is that Brandon believes that Hoid evolved beyond his own expectations, and giving him sentience is Brandon's way of expressing that.

 

Finally I'm not even saying I believe this is true, it probably isn't. But it IS the very first thing that I thought when I read that line. So I put it here because it's original. It did say "crazy theory" right there in the topic line. And while it may ruin the immersion for you, it doesn't for me. So to each his own I suppose. But the fact that you can't take it seriously really has no impact or relevance at all, nor does it add anything of value to the discussion.

[Observer]

To your first comment:  This is somewhat beside the point. The fact remains that, whether it is "technically" breaking the wall or not, it has the same effect on the readers anyways. This line of thought is irrelevent, so I won't go into it.

 

To your second comment: While it's quite possible for Brandon to be alluding to something like that, I was simply saying that "Words on a page" is probably a reference to Dragonsteel and/or events that will be revealed about Hoid's past, rather than a random and somewhat pointless meta-moment.

 

To your third comment: I was simply establishing that this was not an April Fool's post. I'd waded through a massive helping of really bad jokes, and was rather sick of them. Discussions on immersion and how breaking the fourth wall changes it are irrelevent, so I won't go into it.

 

Again, it may be Brandon's way of representing how far Hoid has come, but I find it far more likely to be foreshadowing for something else.

[BlairJ]

This just wrecked my mind for the day.....

[Leuthie]

It would be a good question to ask him: What were your motivations for hinting at Hoid's origins in his talk with Kaladin and what were Hoid's?

[happyman]

I honestly don't see why it can't be both.  Books (and the author) can be self-aware without having a good in-world reason as well.

That said, I suspect he is refering to part of his actual backstory.  That is makes him seem self-aware is either an easter egg for the readers who pay attention or an extreme bit of commentary.

[Morsk]

It could be allegory rather than actual self-awareness.

I'm uncomfortable with it though. "Hoid started out as a fictional character, then became real," seems mutually exclusive with "Hoid knows he's in a work of fiction," and I really like the former. Unless this is Inception and it's turtles all the way down, but I don't think I like that either, heh.

[Aethling]

Honestly, I always interepreted that quote to mean he changed because of what he read in a book.  Remade himself in an image different from what he was originally due to principles set forth in a book.

 

That is pretty much what Dalinar is trying to do in Kings.

Elend attempted this in a way with his changing his views on Skaa and he did have a book club.

I felt a hint of it with the Godking liking Siri's stories and reading

Raoden was essentially an inteligensia and we know he studied a variety of different subjects.

 

 

Each of them could be said to have reinvented themselves based on principles they learned from books.  It really isn't all that uncommon even in our world.  How many people have changed upon finding words in the Torah, Bible, or Koran that helped them?

[Asperity]

A meta-character in a meta-series? Would be interesting.

[Truthless]

I've always taken that to be Hoid referencing the origin of his name - not his own origin. Breaking the fourth wall is pretty unlikely.

[PeterAhlstrom]

I was simply saying that "Words on a page" is probably a reference to Dragonsteel and/or events that will be revealed about Hoid's past, rather than a random and somewhat pointless meta-moment.

 

I don't know the answer, but I agree with this interpretation.

[Krelian]

Breaking the fourth wall CAN be done without just being humor. I've seen a few instances in comics where it didn't seem silly. 

 

However, in a series with the weight and scope of the Cosmere novels, I'd rather doubt it would work.

[Brian Stormblessed]

The idea that Hoid "Stole himself" could refer to the very real fact that characters often evolve through story telling in ways that even the author didn't predict. Perhaps Brandon ended up going places with Hoid that he never intended to, and feels like the character ran away with itself.

The problem that I have with this portion is that Brandon has said several times in Writing Excuses that his characters don't do this. He has things very well planned out and knows what the character is going to do and when.

[Windrunner]

See, if I'm remembering right, I've heard the exact opposite from him. Brandon tends to worldbuild and plot kind of heavily, but his characters are typically written much more fluidly. Like Vin being a boy early on. If the plot has a character doing something Brandon doesn't feel the character would do, he changes the plot.

[Brian Stormblessed]

I remember listening to a podcast that mentioned that same fact. However, the context of that conversation was not in a character doing something unexpected, but that the voice of Vin made it more natural for her to be a boy. However, this is not a plot issue. It was in an early writing excuses podcast where Brandon mentioned that his characters never do something unexpected since he is an architect writer. He decides what the character does long before he actually sits down to write, and if during the world building process the character changes the way the plot goes so be it. This change occurs, however, long before the character goes into the canonized version that we need to work off.

[Morsk]

Here's something equally weird I thought of in response to this theory. Perhaps the pre-Shattering world was a work of fiction; Yolen existed only in the Cognative Realm, and was a product of human storytelling. (Or alien storytelling, if they were weird enough to come up with humans.) The death of the gods and intrusion of Fain life corresponds to a drastic decrease in popularity of the story world. And one of the side-effects of the Shattering was to bring Yolen into the Physical Realm.

I haven't read Dragonsteel so it's possible this is easily refuted by information there. Also I don't even like it.  But it's pretty hard to come up with anything that fits Hoid's "words on a page" that I like! I almost want it to be a metaphor for being inspired to life changes by a book, like Aethling suggested above. But this is fantasy, and it's a bit of a letdown if something as enigmatic as Hoid's origins turns out to be metaphorical.

[Observer]

Hoid either takes incredible pleasure in being obscure and annoying, or he wants to drop hints about certain things to people, but can't say too much, and therefore talks in his irritatingly vague way. I can't wait for Dragonsteel to actually give us some answers >:/

 

Afterthought: Then again, he is a storyteller, so maybe he really does like being annoying...

 

Words on a Page could also mean that he himself originated in the cognitive world, and either became Midas later or somehow fused with Midas. Or maybe there was a prophecy about him, making him exist before he was born? And then he "Stole himself", using the prophecy to create his identity, making it self-fulfilling? Maybe he was true-name'd into existence? I like the middle one, but to be honest they're all kin dof far-fetched.