*SPOILERS* The Slow Regard of Silent Things *SPOILERS*

[Frank Fitzpatrick]

Clearly the majority of you guys are much smarter than me, 'cos most of this stuff went way, way over my head. That said, it has been a few years since I originally read the two books so much of it wasn't exactly fresh in my mind

Erm, it was a weird one really, I neither liked it nor disliked it. I found myself entirely indifferent to the book. But again, that maybe down to not being clued in with what was actually going on. I did think it was extremely well written though.

[thistlepong]

(snip) as it stands, I feel like Rothfus knew that this was not marketable, and tried to beat us to the punch by rather long windily explaining himself.

All accounts suggest that he didn't want to market it at all, despite a serviceable if not exemplary job of doing so. Agent asked to see the completed story. Agent contacted publisher, who has the first option on his work under contract. Rothfuss more or less apologized for everything you see in the foreword and afterword and says something like, "but what can we do with this?" Betsy Wollheim says something like, "We're going to publish it, silly." So far it's debuted at #2 and stayed in the top ten for hardcover fiction for a month. So it was apparently a solid bet on her part.

None of which is meant to deny or diminish your feelings of manipulation or those of any reader. I'm just not sure the ire at the price tag or the existence of the book are being properly directed. I'd probably start with The Ocean at the End of the Lane.

(disclaimer: I pre-ordered the digital version for six dollars, and am thus alienated from most of the impact of all this)

Anyway, it's been a busy couple of days. Reading The Slow Regard of Silent Things: Part VIII.i BEAUTIFUL AND BROKEN went up.

[thistlepong]

And Part VIII.ii.

[Howdyphillip]

All accounts suggest that he didn't want to market it at all, despite a serviceable if not exemplary job of doing so. Agent asked to see the completed story. Agent contacted publisher, who has the first option on his work under contract. Rothfuss more or less apologized for everything you see in the foreword and afterword and says something like, "but what can we do with this?" Betsy Wollheim says something like, "We're going to publish it, silly." So far it's debuted at #2 and stayed in the top ten for hardcover fiction for a month. So it was apparently a solid bet on her part.

None of which is meant to deny or diminish your feelings of manipulation or those of any reader. I'm just not sure the ire at the price tag or the existence of the book are being properly directed. I'd probably start with The Ocean at the End of the Lane.

(disclaimer: I pre-ordered the digital version for six dollars, and am thus alienated from most of the impact of all this)

Anyway, it's been a busy couple of days. Reading The Slow Regard of Silent Things: Part VIII.i BEAUTIFUL AND BROKEN went up.

I really do not care how much the book has made in sales. As a matter of fact, I do wish the author the best in his financial life. What I am saying is that this book is not worth the price I paid for it. I also bought the digital version, and it cost me $10. It most certainly was not worth this, as it isn't even a story.

[lanceschaubert]

I should totally be working on the script that's due tomorrow, but here I am... sucked into the world again....

So I haven't read Slow Regard yet – getting it for Christmas – so I'm not going to read the other posts, but after doing some rereading and note taking on the last two, my current pet theory goes something like this:

Primary assumptions ::

1. Changing one's name involves a splitting of essences, an unbinding of principles within the soul. This seems to be supported in the ideas of trapping a name in a box and of Elodin's split personality as Manet.

2. Elodin freaks out when he discovers that Kvothe may have changed his name.

Side assumptions ::

3. Kvothe is obsessed with finding – and killing – Cinder.

4. Cinder is a Chandrian and Chrandrian have a history with naming that dates back to to Haliax who gained tons of power in an attempt – as Lanrae – to save Lyra.

5. Here's where we need to hit pause. From what we can tell so far, Iax started the creation war by moving the moon as a shaper. People have made a connection with Iax and Haliax. Obviously Jax = Iax; Lanrae = Haliax. We have speculated before that Encanis = Haliax. If this holds, then we could make a clean chart:

Kvothe's story Creation war (fae) Folklore (human) Tehlin Myr Tarinal

Haliax Iax Jax Encanis Lanrae

This seems consistent with the overall themes of (1) naming, (2) the shifting appearance of things, and (3) Rothfuss' fascination with alternate stories to the same historical events (starting with Kvothe and ending with the archives).

If we carry it through, we could potentially assume that many of the "endless" beings are those present in folklore, including the Cthaeh. I would suggest something along the lines of the following:

Kvothe's story Creation war Folklore Tehlin / Ruach Myr Tarinal Adem

Haliax Iax (shaper) Jax Encanis / Lecelte Lanrae Alaxel

Cthaeh Cthaeh(knower) God Tehlu Selitos

Perial / Deah Lyra

Cinder Kirel (ash) Ferule

Enlas Stercas

Geisa Usnea

Imet Dalcenti

Ordal Alenta

Andan Cyphus

Aleph (?)

Take the Ruach characters from Skarpi’s story:

• Tehlu - Not much is said about him, but as a Ruach he appears to be mortal. He says he values justice above all and is willing to leave the world behind to serve Aleph . This is almost certainly why Skarpi is arrested of heresy by the Tehlin .
• Kirel - Tall, has burns from being left living in the ash of Myr Tariniel's destruction
• Deah - lost two husbands to the fighting with face, mouth, and heart as hard and cold as stone
• Enlas - does not carry a sword or eat animal flesh, and no man had heard him speak hard words
• Geisa - had one hundred suitors, from the city of Belen, and the first woman to know the unasked-for-touch of a man (assuming this means raped).
• Lecelte - laughed easily and often even in bad times
• Imet - likely between 14-16 years old, never sang and killed swiftly without tears
• Ordal - youngest of all, had never seen death, and wore bright gold ribbons in her hair
• Andan - face was a mask with burning eyes and whose name meant anger

Subtract Tehlu (assuming he's Selitos/Cthaeh) and Deah (assuming Lyra) and you end up with seven. Take those seven and line them up with this:

Cyphus bears the blue flame.

Stercus is in thrall of iron.

Ferule chill and dark of eye.

Usnea lives in nothing but decay.

Grey Dalcenti never speaks.

Pale Alenta brings the blight.

Last there is the lord of the seven:

Hated. Hopeless. Sleepless. Sane.

Alaxel bears the shadow's hame.

...and it works almost like a seamless logic puzzle.

Backup points for the above chart:

Iron hurts the fae. The wheel used to bind Encanis was iron. So Tehlu binding Encanis by changing him into a faen form (Haxial) makes sense in one regard. This also lines up with Myr Tariniel as the place where Alaxel was bound. The Fae believe that Lanre was provoked by meeting with the Cthaeh. I'm suggesting here that Lanre in his rage destroyed these cities through naming and assembled some followers – I'm suggesting the kings of the six cities or something to that effect. When he went to the eight city, it would take the power of the ever-moving moon itself to destroy Myr Tariniel. This is key: Haliax is now part-moon, that's why he's always encased in shadows. He bound up a bit of the moon's name and turned Myr Tariniel into the Fae, binding Selitos in the process and perhaps even changing Selitos' name into something like a tree. Selitos, however, seems to be closer to a knower than a namer. So he cursed Lanre (Haliax) to his faen/shadowed self until the stars fell nameless from the sky. The other half of him – the human half split when he took part of the moon – was banished. "Where does the ever-moving moon go when it's no longer in our sky?" Easy – it walks the earth as Haliax. Haliax, you could say, •is• the dark side of the moon, the man in the moon (very fairytalesque, by the way). The only power Selitos (Tehlu) has, then, is that of verbal influence and persuasion. He's always had that – he watched the mountain passes and would adjust his plans based on whatever was coming. It fits too with Selitos founding the Amyr to hunt down the Chandrian and the ties the Amyr have to the Tehlin church.

If this is the case, we could draw some interesting conclusions:

1. The Fae is the eight city.
2. The Ruach are a broader category divided into Chandrian and Amyr or Chandrian and Selitos.
3. The changing of one's name can change one's form.
4. Mortals can become Chandrian.
5. Chandrian are former kings or king-like heroes (very Tolkienesque, as is the whole Ruach category thingy and much of the rest).

And now, assuming all of that nonsense ::

Kvothe, having killed Cinder (or Haliax), is now a Chandrian. Denna is the princess he has rescued from the sleeping barrow king – Master Ash being Cinder, and Cinder being King Kirel who was left in the ashes of Myr Tariniel – "barrow" meaning burial mound. Part of doing this involved splitting his name or changing it in some form, so Kvothe, having learned to become not just a namer but a knower, changes his name to that of the wind. Kvothe's sign is silence (he's the wind, remember?) and as the newest Chandrian he, like Cinder before him, is waiting to die. This is why the wounds have no effects. This is also why the skin changer talks to him in that tongue.

And so, the new name of the wind is Kvothe.

Obviously there are significant holes, but there's a start for those of you who can confirm or deny the validity of this pseudonym theory.

Side note:

Ruach – means “the wind” or “spirit” in Hebrew.

edit :: tried to fix chart – it didn't transfer well from .docx

[thistlepong]

Part IX.i of Reading The Slow Regard of Silent Things is up. Nate and Pat revealed some of the drawings that didn't make it into the book and two of them are from this chapter.

[Seiche]

Pat has posted a beta manuscript for Wise Man's Fear up on ebay as part of his annual fundraiser. The photos of it include 2 pages of text which involve Kvothe and Auri meeting. I'm not close enough to the text to see if there are differences here with what was published. There is also an interesting note on the last pictue, which I think is Pat writing a note to his beta readers. I read the note as "Beaton not Breton" and then "Jax not Iyas".

[Ninefingers]

Pat has posted a beta manuscript for Wise Man's Fear up on ebay as part of his annual fundraiser. The photos of it include 2 pages of text which involve Kvothe and Auri meeting. I'm not close enough to the text to see if there are differences here with what was published. There is also an interesting note on the last pictue, which I think is Pat writing a note to his beta readers. I read the note as "Beaton not Breton" and then "Jax not Iyas".

The auction listing says that Pat was still fiddling with the spelling for Breton's name. I guess they knew what people would zero in on.

[TheRevanchist]

Definitely hated reading this book. Auri was never my favorite character (or one of them) bust still got the book. And then, I was massively disappointed. Didn't like anything at all on it.

[thistlepong]

Pat has posted a beta manuscript for Wise Man's Fear up on ebay as part of his annual fundraiser. The photos of it include 2 pages of text which involve Kvothe and Auri meeting. I'm not close enough to the text to see if there are differences here with what was published. There is also an interesting note on the last pictue, which I think is Pat writing a note to his beta readers. I read the note as "Beaton not Breton" and then "Jax not Iyas".

Thanks for the heads up. The published version of those two pages isn't much different from what made it into the published version in 2011. There are changes, though.

In the 2009 version, Auri appears to have encountered Kvothe somewhere that wasn't contiguous with the rest of the rooftops. He climbs down, moves through some back alleys, and then back up on top of Mains. In the 2011 version, its all Mains. Most of the rest is added or moved text that improve the sentences or sense.

The page marked 30 is 32 in the final hardcover. "Iyas" is almost more obviously a version of Iax than Jax.

Part IX.ii is up.

[JezDynamite]

Thanks for the heads up. The published version of those two pages isn't much different from what made it into the published version in 2011. There are changes, though.

In the 2009 version, Auri appears to have encountered Kvothe somewhere that wasn't contiguous with the rest of the rooftops. He climbs down, moves through some back alleys, and then back up on top of Mains. In the 2011 version, its all Mains. Most of the rest is added or moved text that improve the sentences or sense.

The page marked 30 is 32 in the final hardcover. "Iyas" is almost more obviously a version of Iax than Jax.

Also, what's up with the title on the beta manuscript "The Song of the Broken Tree"?

[thistlepong]

Also, what's up with the title on the beta manuscript "The Song of the Broken Tree"?

The first page of the manuscript for The Song of Flame and Thunder (The Name of the Wind) is on display at the EMP museum in Seattle. I reckon The Song of the Broken Tree was another early working title based on the the various meanings of Maedre. I'm pretty sure Betsy Wolheim finalized the published title.

[JezDynamite]

The first page of the manuscript for The Song of Flame and Thunder (The Name of the Wind) is on display at the EMP museum in Seattle. I reckon The Song of the Broken Tree was another early working title based on the the various meanings of Maedre. I'm pretty sure Betsy Wolheim finalized the published title.

Thanks. And welcome back. You've been missed.