Timewaster's Guide Archive
Local Authors => Brandon Sanderson => Topic started by: MrMLK on November 23, 2009, 03:09:40 AM
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Let me start off by saying that I am a huge fan of Brandon Sanderson's writing. I have read Elantris (twice), the Mistborn Trilogy (once, but I plan to start a reread next year) and I am on my second reading of Warbreaker. So please don't think of me as a troll. I think he is one of the two best writers of fantasy working today.
But, as I was reading Warbreaker yesterday, it occurred to me that the system of feeding breaths to the returned doesn't really make much sense. Why would they go out of there way to find your children to give up their breathes? Can you really picture Allmother turning some random child into a drab each week?
Wouldn't it make more sense to go and find old and dieing people and get their breaths. Nothing in the book says anything about breath getting stale, so you would think these breathes would be just as good. In fact, you would think a cottage industry would start up where almost no one would die without selling their breath for the benefit of their family.
And another thing, if Vivenna really wanted to get rid of all of her breath except one, she could have awakened a rope or something small, and then dumped the rest of her breath to someone or something and then retrieved the one breath from the rope.
The second point is just the math nerd in me, but I really think it would have made more sense if they were turning old people into drabs, rather the young children.
Any thoughts?
Michael
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The thought of awakening a small object, or just storing one breath in and object, and then reclaiming afterwards also occurred to me but I chalked it up to Vivenna's inexperience with awakening and/or her wanting to guarantee she kept her original breath. As for the Returned getting their weekly breath from children instead of the weak/sick/aged/poor/dying probably has something to do with the whole idea of virgin sacrifice and the innocence of children.
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Vivenna not carefully reclaiming one breath for herself wasn't a mistake in plotting or the development of the magic system. It was deliberate on Brandon's part. He wanted to portray her as lost, confused and somewhat inept when it came to Breath. Your proposed method is perfectly sensible. That Vivenna didn't do it says something about Vivenna, but on purpose!
I don't know why it was primarily children that gave their breath to keep the returned alive. I think that thematically, Morderkaine's answer contains truth, but that's not really an in-story reason for why Hallandren would do it the way they did. Maybe they believed (or maybe it is even true) that children's breath would do a better job of keeping the Returned alive. After all, the breath is shown to reflect the health of the individual who donated it, and different breath's are claimed to have different strengths.
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Maybe they believed (or maybe it is even true) that children's breath would do a better job of keeping the Returned alive. After all, the breath is shown to reflect the health of the individual who donated it, and different breath's are claimed to have different strengths.
I don't remember anywhere he said that different breaths have different strengths. Just the opposite, the book says things like "you need 50 breadths for the first awakening....", not "50 young breadths" or anything like that. Or it said you need one breadth to bring something to independent life.
Michael
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It's probably because young children/their families need the money they get from donating their breath and the old, dying people--not so much. Or all the old, poor people have already donated their breaths.
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It's probably because young children/their families need the money they get from donating their breath and the old, dying people--not so much.
Well, some of the old people would have families that might need the money, and the rest - as long as they were still breathing - could probably still use the money for themselves. I know a fair number of old people, and none of them have run out of a use for money.
Or all the old, poor people have already donated their breaths.
Why just poor? I would suppose that a middle class person on their deathbed still could use some money, but doesn't have much need for their breath any more either. I imagine rich old people would give their breath to their favorite child as part of their inheritance.
Michael
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Well, it seems to me that most people would like to keep their breath if at all possible. So they would have to be in dire circumstances before considering giving their breath away. Just my opinion.
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Lightsong questions this himself. Also, doesn't he say that they're always checked to make sure the children are healthy? If so, it might be that hold people are considered too unhealthy.
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Well, it seems to me that most people would like to keep their breath if at all possible. So they would have to be in dire circumstances before considering giving their breath away. Just my opinion.
I agree. That's actually my whole point. People are their deathbed are in a better condition to sell then kids.
Michael
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Yes, but you missed my point. I think that they are checked to make sure they're HEALTHY. If they're on their deathbed they certianly aren't healthy.
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Lightsong questions this himself. Also, doesn't he say that they're always checked to make sure the children are healthy? If so, it might be that hold people are considered too unhealthy.
I don't remember this. Do you remember where he says this?
Since people with a lot of breaths cannot get sick, if this is true, it would certainly imply that he wanted healthy kids for a different reason, but it does seem to go against everything else Brandon says about breath.
Michael
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Yes, but you missed my point. I think that they are checked to make sure they're HEALTHY. If they're on their deathbed they certianly aren't healthy.
Would dieing of old age be considered "unhealthy"?
Plus, I am not a grandfather, but I would imagine that if I was a healthy 70 with a young grandchild that I was fond of, I would give up my breath before I made him/her give up theirs.
Michael
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It's probably like organ donation. It sounds like a great idea, but not everyone is an organ donor because it is too weird or inconvenient or whatever. And I agree the health of the individual is probably a factor.
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Maybe they believed (or maybe it is even true) that children's breath would do a better job of keeping the Returned alive. After all, the breath is shown to reflect the health of the individual who donated it, and different breath's are claimed to have different strengths.
I don't remember anywhere he said that different breaths have different strengths. Just the opposite, the book says things like "you need 50 breadths for the first awakening....", not "50 young breadths" or anything like that. Or it said you need one breadth to bring something to independent life.
Michael
It states in the Ars Arcanum that the number of breaths for the different heightenings are approximate, depending on the strengths of the breaths.
When Siri is tested before her, um, first night in Hallandren, she is described as being healthy and having a strong breath.
When the Idrian ambassador is dieing, his breath is described as going irregular.
But admittedly, any such link has not yet been made explicit, and these descriptions may just represent popular in-world beliefs anyway.
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Whenever I read that particular passage, I've always interpreted Lightsong's words to be more emotional than truthful. It isn't always children who give up their breaths, but Lightsong cares much more about it when they do, and so to him it seems to happen much more often. On top of that, children are probably more willing to give up their breaths, especially if their parents urge them to. The older people are either emotionally attached to their Breath or have sold it already.
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This really bugged me, too. Why does anybody die with their breath? Pass it on to your children, for Colors' sake! Nobody should have to give up their own breath until they are very old, because everyone should have an inherited wealth of the things from generations of passing it down.
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so i have something to say about why vivenna couldn't just awaken something small, give away the rest of the breath and then take back her breath from the object she awakened. This is not a flaw in the logic of the magic system, it fits.
The reason she could not do this is because the only objects that take only one breath to awaken are Lifeless and the breath given to these dead bodies is irretrieveable. if vivenna were to attempt what u suggest and awaken some other object she would have to invest in it any number of breaths depending on the objects resemblance to a man and its relation to living material. There is no way for her to invest only one breath and still be able to retrieve it. Following your method she would have fewer breaths true, but she would still be left with more than one breath.
I suppose if she were incredibly determined, she could attempt to find an object that would take exactly one less breaths than she had to awaken and then just get rid f the object, but seeing as biochroma is fairly imprecise, this would be extremely difficult. Unless, of course, she went around creating Lifeless after Lifeless, decreasing her stores one by one until she only had one breath left. but i doubt Austre would approve of that...
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so i have something to say about why vivenna couldn't just awaken something small, give away the rest of the breath and then take back her breath from the object she awakened. This is not a flaw in the logic of the magic system, it fits.
The reason she could not do this is because the only objects that take only one breath to awaken are Lifeless and the breath given to these dead bodies is irretrieveable. if vivenna were to attempt what u suggest and awaken some other object she would have to invest in it any number of breaths depending on the objects resemblance to a man and its relation to living material. There is no way for her to invest only one breath and still be able to retrieve it. Following your method she would have fewer breaths true, but she would still be left with more than one breath.
I suppose if she were incredibly determined, she could attempt to find an object that would take exactly one less breaths than she had to awaken and then just get rid f the object, but seeing as biochroma is fairly imprecise, this would be extremely difficult. Unless, of course, she went around creating Lifeless after Lifeless, decreasing her stores one by one until she only had one breath left. but i doubt Austre would approve of that...
It's not a flaw in the magic system because the technique is perfectly possible. Vivenna just didn't think of it.
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Late in the book Vasher uses basically that trick to give a breath to that little girl.
A lot of the rules described in the book are simplifications, based on in-world understanding, or what one character deliberately wants another character to think.
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After going through a complete read today, there's only one thing really bothering me, and was posted in another Warbreaker thread.
"Of course I didn't realize it the first time through, but now the reference to having up to the Fifth Heightening at any time makes sense ... Vasher could, as he did at the end of the book, revert back to Returned status with its accompanying mega-one-breath-equal-to-2,000-normal-breaths. This raises a number a questions/presumptions. Do all Returned have the ability to revert back to normal human proportions? (i.e., could Lightsong or Blushweaver or any of the other Hallandren gods have done the same thing?) In this process, what happens to the uber-Breath? Vivenna and others with Breath did not sense it ... has it been transferred to an object? or does it just become muted?"
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From what I've gathered from the threads, it requires a lot of mental gymnastics on the part of the Returned. As the Returned can alter their shape, if they go through some weird mental gymnastics and believe they aren't a god, they will return to a more normal shape. In the process, I believe, their divine breath is hidden.
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Eric, you've hit it dead on, and used some of the terminology that EUOL used at a signing when someone asked him. I almost thought you were quoting him... it was kind of odd.
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From what I've gathered from the threads, it requires a lot of mental gymnastics on the part of the Returned. As the Returned can alter their shape, if they go through some weird mental gymnastics and believe they aren't a god, they will return to a more normal shape. In the process, I believe, their divine breath is hidden.
This agrees with what I remember as well. Does anyone remember the source? I think it was a third-hand report from Brandon.
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I distinctly remember the "mental gymnastics" part. I'd guess, perhaps, the Barnes and Noble Q&A thread.