Rand al’Thorres Posted July 6, 2018 Report Share Posted July 6, 2018 1st at all, sorry for my bad english. I have a question, I read that BS said that ALL Heralds are mad. The madness of all the Heralds is evident except one, Shalash in my opinion. Do you see this as I do? What kind of madness do you think that Shalash has? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ScarletSabre he/him Posted July 6, 2018 Report Share Posted July 6, 2018 Don't forget she has the compulsion of destroying any image/imagary of herself, regardless of her current objective. That, so far seems to be the extent of her madness that we've seen, but madness can take many forms. She's literally self-destructive and seems to resent her previous self and worship of her as a Herald, wheras Jezrien seemed to find it bitterly amusing. 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rand al’Thorres Posted July 6, 2018 Author Report Share Posted July 6, 2018 Just now, ScarletSabre said: Don't forget she has the compulsion of destroying any image/imagary of herself, regardless of her current objective. That, so far seems to be the extent of her madness that we've seen, but madness can take many forms. She's literally self-destructive and seems to resent her previous self and worship of her as a Herald, wheras Jezrien seemed to find it bitterly amusing. Mm ... you're right, I thought the goal of destroying any image of herself was because she does not want to relate to the worship of the Herald that people have, and no other reason. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ScarletSabre he/him Posted July 6, 2018 Report Share Posted July 6, 2018 Just now, Rand al’Thorres said: Mm ... you're right, I thought the goal of destroying any image of herself was because she does not want to relate to the worship of the Herald that people have, and no other reason. That certainly could be one reason for it, but we see when she's meeting Mraize that it's also literal compulsion with her, one she can very rarely resist. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Calderis he/him Posted July 6, 2018 Report Share Posted July 6, 2018 She intentionally avoids looking at things in one scene because she knows they have depictions of the Heralds, and she knows that if she sees it she'll have to destroy it. It's not a choice. 8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wandering Investor Posted July 6, 2018 Report Share Posted July 6, 2018 You are correct that it is related to her not wanting worship. She feels guilty for leaving Taln in damnation alone, and believes the heralds are not worthy of worship. To this end, she compulsively tries to destroy any artwork featuring her. Emphasis on the compulsively. She also mentions she doesn't notice the time passing. That may just be her age, or another part of her maddness, trying not to think about anything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ScarletSabre he/him Posted July 6, 2018 Report Share Posted July 6, 2018 8 minutes ago, Wandering Investor said: She also mentions she doesn't notice the time passing. That may just be her age, or another part of her maddness, trying not to think about anything. That could also just be a byproduct of immortality. We know that in our world, as we get older, time appears to move more quickly due to our perception. (I don't have a link to the studies but it was mentioned on an episode of QI, so I urge you to go find and enjoy that on Youtube! You'll thank me later. ) So for an immortal being living centuries and millenia, I'd imagine it's easy for a few decades to just be a blur to them. Some forms of immortality, like Hoid's, and presumably Heightening and it's changes in awareness, probably have some innate defence against this... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wandering Investor Posted July 6, 2018 Report Share Posted July 6, 2018 @ScarletSabre Oh I know about age allowing for quicker time perception. But I also got the impression that she is purposely ignoring the world, so as to not think about how long Taln has been in damnation. Either or both is possible. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cfphelps he/him Posted July 6, 2018 Report Share Posted July 6, 2018 8 minutes ago, ScarletSabre said: That could also just be a byproduct of immortality. We know that in our world, as we get older, time appears to move more quickly due to our perception. (I don't have a link to the studies but it was mentioned on an episode of QI, so I urge you to go find and enjoy that on Youtube! You'll thank me later. ) So for an immortal being living centuries and millenia, I'd imagine it's easy for a few decades to just be a blur to them. Some forms of immortality, like Hoid's, and presumably Heightening and it's changes in awareness, probably have some innate defence against this... If you think about it the time perception makes total sense. As you get older, the same time duration becomes a smaller percentage of your total life. So when you're 2 years old, a year is half of your life! When you're 40 years old, it's only 2.5% of your life! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leyrann Posted July 6, 2018 Report Share Posted July 6, 2018 I think Shalash' madness is that she blames herself (and the other Heralds) for leaving Taln to suffer in Damnation alone, which results in her compulsively destroying any artwork depicting her because she feels she's not worthy of that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Calderis he/him Posted July 6, 2018 Report Share Posted July 6, 2018 I personally think that the madness of the Heralds (save Taln, who just has the worst case of PTSD possible) is due to their broken oath. They are immortal due to the power of Honor suffusing their being. The friction between what they've done and what sustains them is tearing them apart. Add in that they were able to feel Taln's torture, and they had an ever present reminder of their transgression. Yes this manifests differently in all of them, but it's the same problem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bort he/him Posted July 7, 2018 Report Share Posted July 7, 2018 I think it's because she is cut off from part of her soul, namely Re-shepir. See the link in my signature for details. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Toaster Retribution he/him Posted July 7, 2018 Report Share Posted July 7, 2018 20 hours ago, Calderis said: I personally think that the madness of the Heralds (save Taln, who just has the worst case of PTSD possible) is due to their broken oath. They are immortal due to the power of Honor suffusing their being. The friction between what they've done and what sustains them is tearing them apart. Add in that they were able to feel Taln's torture, and they had an ever present reminder of their transgression. Yes this manifests differently in all of them, but it's the same problem. I think that they all have some kinds of PTSD, in addition to their ”oathbreaking-madness”. They were all tortured and killed again and again for thousands of years. So for Taln its just PTSD, for the others it is both PTSD and additional stuff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ScarletSabre he/him Posted July 7, 2018 Report Share Posted July 7, 2018 21 hours ago, Calderis said: I personally think that the madness of the Heralds (save Taln, who just has the worst case of PTSD possible) is due to their broken oath. They are immortal due to the power of Honor suffusing their being. The friction between what they've done and what sustains them is tearing them apart. Add in that they were able to feel Taln's torture, and they had an ever present reminder of their transgression. Yes this manifests differently in all of them, but it's the same problem. They couldn't feel Taln's torture unless they were on Braize with him, could they? Else they'd have known instantly when he broke and returned to Roshar. That makes me think they couldn't feel his torture for the last 4000 years, which means it wouldn't be a factor to their madness. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Calderis he/him Posted July 7, 2018 Report Share Posted July 7, 2018 1 hour ago, ScarletSabre said: They couldn't feel Taln's torture unless they were on Braize with him, could they? Else they'd have known instantly when he broke and returned to Roshar. Taln's interlude in WoR makes me question that. He's so broken mentally I don't think it was easy to tell. Nale didn't seem to realize he'd broken, but Nale also denied Stormform meant anything. I could be wrong, but I don't think it's something that they could be separated from. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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