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When was the last time Hoid got a hug? (before WoR)

I agree that it is still Wit in disguise. I've been trying to think of a motive for that, and hug avoidance is possible. I think it more likely that he didn't want to continue his conversations with K & A, but I'm still not sure.

Great additions. OP updated. Thanks especially for finding Pali's mind--I remembered reading that one and couldn't locate it. Also, can't believe I missed Damnation.

Mysty, I like your Hoid one. The final "Where is Hoid?" made me think of us here on 17S poring over a gigantic cosmere Where's Waldo. Which is kind of what happens. Live-->alive is n-->adj, and therefore much better from a grammar rule POV. I do still like the sound of living better, but I think this is the fix I'll go with. Ooo, good question. My immediate thought was "Keteks, for sure," but on reflection that's not really true. I think it is easier to write a bad sonnet than a bad ketek, but a good sonnet is at least as hard as a good ketek. For me, at least, keteks are harder to write because the constraints take so much thought and revision before I get a workable version, good or not. Sonnets have fewer rules, so it's easier to pound one out that obeys all the "this is what makes a sonnet" guidelines. But my first-pass sonnets are almost invariably terrible, and it takes a lot of work to make them into worthwhile poems. I'm going with sonnets as harder because there is a lot more substance there, more words that have to work together. That all may have to do with familiarity, though. I generally write blank verse, but there was a period about two years ago where I was writing a lot of haiku and related forms. I then tried to experiment with cinquains, which are of about the same length but with even syllable counts instead of odd. It was so much more difficult to make the mental transition than I thought it would be. When I've written a sonnet or been reading Shakespeare, the next sonnet comes a lot easier than if I've just read Green Eggs and Ham. The same was true for the keteks: once I got going with them they started to form themselves much more easily in my mind. (Still haven't come up with more to post here, though.)

Good suggestions. I've added the examples and categories mentioned. @EMTrevor, I couldn't find the tongue reference. Do you know where that was? If I can get a quote I'll add it to the list. I do think it is interesting that the heralds each have a body part association, but that is not same as the "body focus" found in the essences table. "Ash's eyes" kind of makes sense since she is called the Herald of Beauty. The others I'm still wondering about.

This is a compilation of all the curses and exclamations used in the Stormlight Archive. Hopefully it will illuminate the culture, magic, and history, and provide some entertainment as well. I appreciate your continued help in finding any that I have missed. This post is complete through Edgedancer. You can find a list incorporating curses from Oathbringer here. UPDATE Sep 2017: I have reworked and consolidated the organization. In most cases, I have removed the speaker attributions for the sake of clarity, as I felt that the speaker’s identity was superfluous. The speaker is noted in some instances to help identify the cultural context. If you think a particular phrase should be attributed (or not), please make your case in a comment. I believe the list is now exhaustive for WoK, WoR, and Edgedancer. Storms and Storming are universal, and people use them frequently. So far we haven’t had many scenes from people on the western half of the continent where the storms are weaker; there is a good chance that the storms are invoked far less in such regions. Notably, Taffa uses a storm-related curse in Dalinar’s Starfalls vision, indicating that it was used historically as well. Variants and related curses: "Stormwinds" (Lirin, Taffa), "Storms alight" (Jasnah), "Blustering" (Yalb), The Heralds, collectively and as individuals, are invoked across many Rosharan cultures. Vorin speakers most frequently swear by Kelek, but by the end of WoR Vorin speakers have invoked each of the ten Heralds at least once. As they occur in curses, the Vorin forms are: Jezerezeh, Nalan, Chana, Vedeledev, Pailiah/Pali, Ash, Battah, Kelek, Talat, Ishi [Herald] knows or [Herald] send are frequent formulations. ”Chana help” is a similar construction [Herald’s] [attribute] A herald is often paired with a body part or attribute. Some appear to be traditional associations, but others are most likely spontaneous variations. Examples Kelek's breath Kelek's tongue Ash's eyes Ishar's soul Nalan's hand Pali's mind—(Adrotagia) by Vedeledev's golden keys—(Kabsal) Talat's hand Other Variants: “Living Heralds above” Heralds send” "What in Kelek's name”—(Talik) notable because Rysn is amused at the usage of a Vorin curse by a Reshi trader Azish speakers use alternate names for the heralds, primarily invoking Yaezir (Jezrien) Variants: "for Yaezir's sake," "Yaezir help" Kadasixes and Stars--used by an Azish vizier. Kadasix is their word for Herald, but the association with stars is interesting, especially considering cosmological features like Taln's scar and the gas giants shown in the star chart in Arcanum Unbounded. Tashikki speakers frequently invoke Tashi, probably the Herald Taln, though other possibilities have been proposed (see this thread). Variants: "Tashi above," "Tashi, God of Gods and Binder of the World" Other Vorin Curses Almighty is a frequent Vorin curse, referencing Honor/Tanavast. Many variants of usage are found: "Almighty above" "by the Almighty's tenth name" "what in the Almighty's own eyes?" "by the names of God himself" "Almighty, cast from heaven to dwell in our hearts" Stormfather is a ubiquitous Vorin curse. NOTE: While the general usage is distinct, we should remember that Vorinism has conflated the Stormfather with Jezerezeh/Jezrien. We see explicit instances of this conflation from Kaladin, Moash, and Sigzil in WoK. Damnation is especially common among Vorin speakers. Zahel (a worldhopper living in Vorin society) has also used this curse. Variants and related phrases “What in Damnation's eleventh name?"—(Sebarial) “What in the Halls”—(Van Jushu) a reference to the Tranquiline Halls Other Cultures Passions--Thaylen Flick my sparks –(Lopen) Herdazian exclamation, a reference to sparkflickers. Blight it all – (Axies) presumably Siah/Aimian Dustmother—(Ton, a Bavlander in a Szeth interlude of WoK). Possibly Vorin? Glories within—(Szeth) presumably Shin Kali’kalin’s ghost –(Rock) Unkalaki, possibly referencing a Herald? Starlight-(Geranid) Speaker is a Vorin ardent with extended residence in the Reshi isles Spren So far, the only instances we have are from Wyndle: “Sweet virtue” and “Oh blessed mother” Unique or Uncategorized Drynets—a sailor curse implied to be quite inappropriate. Starving--unique curse used by food-obsessed Lift. Storming Mother of the World and Father of Storms Above. (Lift) Originally Reshi, Lift has travelled widely, so it is difficult to assign a parent culture. By the Brightcaller's Rays -- used by Drehy, so presumably a phrase from far western Roshar (presumably Rira) Past Eras, as seen in Dalinar’s visions Three Gods--(Taffa) Sweet wisdom of Battar--(Taffa) Worldhoppers Shadows—(Nazh) Threnody

This has a high chance of being intentional, but it stuck out to me as odd so I'm posting as a potential typo: I paid a lot of attention to the curses people used through the book. With Vorin speakers, each herald seems to be associated with a given body part: Ash's eyes, Ishar's soul, etc. Twice someone swears with "Nalan's hand." In another place, the phrase is "Talat's hand." (I believe it's on pg 632, Shallan speaking right before she hides inside the boulder illusion.) Talat is not a herald name as far as I can tell. It is close to Tanat, but not quite. It is likely that this is just something that doesn't fit the rules I'm trying to impose on the world. She could be swearing by a non-herald, or Talat could be a herald name. And maybe heralds share swear-associations in Vorin culture. "Nalan's hand" is used by Kaladin and by Adolin, so maybe the Talat vs Nalan difference is regional between Jah Keved and Alethkar. (The other curses seem consistent across all Vorin speakers). Anyway, wanted to point it out just in case.

This is a good point, and something I've worried about. The official description "allows for variation in verb forms," but I've got verb-->adjective, verb-->noun, and adjective-->adverb shifts here. When I analyze it, I feel comfortable with everything except verb-->noun, as you say. I think the others are justified. For now I'll leave it (I think it's just the one in Szeth's right?), but I am looking for other ways to have more non-redundant meaning in repetition. That's also true. I guess I'm just too used to line breaks in poetry. Having seen the beautiful way Navani wrote hers out into a single glyph, though, I'm becoming sold on the single-line version for keteks.

Yes, clearing the cache on Chrome (in Win 8) fixed both issues.

Are there images of the "Where's My Chull" book? I really want to see it. Also, who is it from? That was a brilliant idea.

This started happening for me yesterday, and in my case it is definitely a browser issue. Using Chrome in Windows 8, everything was fine through Saturday night. Then I tried accessing the mobile site using an Android phone (running Chrome), and after that something broke in my viewing of the site with the computer. Spoiler tags won't open, and none of the post formatting options are available--it looks very "html-y" as someone else said. However, that is only the case in Chrome. IE works fine on that computer, and Safari displays fine using a different machine. I'll update here if I figure out what caused the problem, or if it goes away. Hopefully this helps identify the issue if it is a problem for others.

Thanks for the feedback, guys. I agree, Kaladin's isn't quite there yet. Here is an alternative Kaladin, and one for Mr. T. Both have room for revision, and both contain potential WoR spoilers.

I've been trying to compose keteks for various SA characters. (I'm thinking to include them in karaokeang's WOR tour scrapbook.) Some are still giving me trouble--hopefully I'll be able to tweak them into presentability and post them later. These three are pretty close to final revision, though. I'd love to see what others come up with if you want to compose some too. Szeth Unheard screams own my life, still Truthless, still living, my own screams unheard. Shallan Lies held close dangerously hide self from self, hiding dangerous closely held lies. Kaladin Protected, trained to heal; betrayed and wronged, overcome. Choosing honor, by honor chosen, overcoming wrongs and betrayal healing to train, protect.

When are you planning to wrap this up? I am not near a signing but thought I'd send in a few cards anyway. When do you need to receive them for inclusion?

The other question (very end of the linked post) was That certainly leaves room for the Radiants being added later, and possibly a reason why the Oathpact isn't as broken as the Heralds assumed. I thought they just didn't know the ins and outs of the contract, but it could be the Radiant Rider tacked on as an addendum that they overlooked.

In the last chapter Dalinar has this conversation with the Stormfather: While it is possible that the two move at different speeds, I interpreted that to mean that the scholars are wrong and that there is more than one highstorm and only one Everstorm to account for the different frequencies.

I look forward to the transcript. Those are some excellent answers that I'm surprised weren't RAFO.

I liked it a lot, but was also disappointed with some things. Mostly predicted by the epilogues: my issues came when either foreshadowing stole the novelty or my expectations were too high. I absolutely loved the moments that broke expectations, demonstrating that the world or magic were larger than I thought. This includes the moment when Pattern suggests Shallan "soulcast" the deserters into better people, the clairvoyant drawings Shallan does of Yalb and Shallash, and the huge differences between the various KR orders. Oh, and the ever-expanding number of secret societies (seriously, everyone and their axehound belongs to some shady group). Additional scenes I loved even more than the others: boots, nightblood, Eshonai's mom, and Veil's meeting at the pavilion. I also really liked seeing Shallan/Veil analyze subtext to conversations, demonstrating that she is actually clever, not just mouthy. I felt cheated that Renarin and Mr T got so little face-time. There was clearly a lot happening with both of them, and the story felt deliberately constructed to show as little of either as possible. My biggest disappointment was that Kaladin's arc seemed too obvious. As soon as Syl "died" I thought, "Oh, but he'll just fix that by speaking the next oath." It was hard for me to take his loss seriously when it never seemed permanent. On a reread, when nothing needs to be surprising, I'll probably appreciate his journey a lot more. When his arm got sliced in the first Szeth appearance I was shocked and intrigued. It was a huge setback for his character. But he only had to deal with it for about 4 pages, and only about 30 seconds, before stormlight came in and fixed everything. This was my feeling for much of the book, that the costs to the characters were too low or too temporary. Nobody important stayed dead, or injured, or anything. Each instance made sense, but overall the heroes' accomplishments were cheapened.

Could you post quotes of the two descriptions? It would be helpful to have those side by side and my books aren't handy.

If he were to use Allomantic gold, what would Hoid think of his gold shadow?

The dart-snatching is also a point in favor of it being Jes specifically, not just because he can catch them but because those darts were aimed at Amaram, and Jes is the one known for protecting others. Taln's attributes are Dependable and Resourceful, which are good things but don't necessarily suggest instinctive assassination-thwarting.

We've been concluding that "Taln" has an Honorblade at the end of WoK because it doesn't disappear like we would expect a (dead-spren) Shardblade to. Bonded shardblades disappear when dropped, but unbonded ones don't. The blade remains if the bond is broken, either by death of the bearer or by giving it up after losing a duel to Adolin. We know that Renarin, Dalinar, and Moash all had to lug their new blades around for 5 days before they could be dismissed (and before any eye-color changes set in). Regardless of whether the man who arrives at Kholinar is Taln, or whether he has an Honorblade, it is entirely possible that the blade we see has always been a plain old, mundane, dead-spren shardblade. Not sure if I believe this, but it is a simple explanation that doesn't require swapping out any blades or madmen.

I've been thinking about this question (I really like it, btw) and got to wondering: If you were going to perform Hemalurgy on Roshar, would you use gems rather than metals? It seems like a logical question to me, but I'm less realmatically versed. What do you think?

Argent, I'm impressed with the wording on a lot of those questions. Very well thought through. I'm curious what you are trying to get at with the dark sphere question. (And I don't remember the mural from Sel at all--I'll have to go look that up.) As an alternate or follow-up the the Listener forms question: "Does one of the new Listener rhythms correspond to the Thrill?" i.e. if he answers that the forms don't match up to the orders, then this would be a way to ask if the Unmade-inspired rhythms do instead. As Argent will tell you, there has been some spirited discussion of the topic. There are some indications that all is not as it seems with that person and his blade.

Glad to see you loved the "boots" segment as much as I did. Thanks for the great reactions--it reminds me of how I felt reading through the first time. :-)