A Matter of Trust
Whom can you really trust? This is not always a rhetorical question. When things move from rhetorical into the realm of being a matter of death, trust becomes an issue of such serious contemplation that it can transform into imagery. Or, at least, it can in this installment of the book series where becomes of such import it is immortalized in a repetitious song:
“But trust is the color of a dark seed growing.
Trust is the color of a heart's blood flowing.
Trust is the color of a soul's last breath.
Trust is the color of death….”
Gender Issues
Part of the overall tapestry of imagery which connects all the books together is the constant contemplation among men about what is wrong with women and among women about what is wrong with men. To put it bluntly: this is a very binary world. Still, as long as that is the case, credit the author with pursuing the why and how of its existence The following example exists not in a vacuum; it is representative of an enormous number of examples spread across the length and breadth of this fantasy series and it is an element that has remained a constant subject of conversation and debate among fans:
“If the world is ending, a woman will want time to fix her hair. If the world’s ending, a woman will take time to tell a man something he’s done wrong.”
Am I Not a Woman?
Just in case the point hasn’t been made that about the very binary gender system in this fantasy world through the observations made about one sex by the other, there are scenes which punctuate the difference. Even these are often, however, instigated by a certain element of chauvinistic thinking:
“I don’t think of you as a woman.” It was the wrong thing to say; he knew it as soon as the words left his mouth.
“Oh?” Tossing back her coat, she placed her hands on her hips. It was not the all-too-familiar angry pose. Her wrists were twisted so her fingers pointed up, and somehow that made it very different. She stood with one knee bent, and that. . . For the first time he really saw her; not just Min, but the way she looked. Not the usual plain brown coat and breeches, but pale red, and embroidered. Not the usual rough-cut hair that barely covered her ears, but ringlets brushing her neck. “Do I look like a boy?”
The Death Glare of the Intercessor
Some imagery exists on its own within a kind of floating vacuum effect in which it what it is. Then there another kind, often reserved for the effect of being a knockout punch. This type of imagery begins with the set-up establishing the foundation of the situation. The set-up proceeds inexorably toward that payoff punch that elevates the standard descriptive imagery to a whole new level. It is this type of imagery that is going on in this example below:
“Pale-haired Delana…focused her equally pale blue eyes on them as soon as they set foot inside the door. Nicola jumped. Nynaeve would have felt better about that had she not done the same. Usually the stout Gray’s eyes were no different from any other Aes Sedai’s, but when she really focused on you, it was as if nothing else existed but you. Some said Delana was successful as a mediator because both sides would agree just to make her stop staring at them. You started thinking of what you had done wrong even if you had done nothing. The list that popped into Nynaeve’s head made her curtsy as deeply as Nicola before she knew it.”
