Blue eyes crying on the page.
I never cried at a book until I was an adult. I'd teared up at movies as a teenager if they hit the right spot real good, but I didn't like admitting to it (looking at you Good Will Hunting). Now any movie where people come together to overcome their problems starts pulling at my heartstrings and loosening my tear ducts. So, basically most movies that are well written get me to at least think about not tearing up.
Books are different, though. Something about the words on a page couldn't get as much of an emotional outburst from me. Empathizing with characters I made up in my head from symbols on a page was harder for me to do, I guess. I've got a slight case of aphantasia in regards to characters so that doesn't help (more on that in a future essay).
What broke my tears loose was forced empathy through the longest series I'd ever read at the time.
Book 12 of the Wheel of Time, The Gathering Storm, brought tears I didn't know I had out. Tears for words on the page. Tears for a fictional character that I'd only imagined in my mind. The emotional swell of the story had brought me along for so long. I'd become so invested in this fictional character over the course of 3.6 million words thus far in the series - which totals 4.4 million - that I couldn't help but be moved by what happens to him in a conversation atop a mountain.
I remember the shock as tears rolled down my cheeks towards the page. I'd already begun standing as I read, pacing my living room as my eyes darted across the page and I turned through the thick paperback like a madman. Finally, like it did for Rand atop Dragonmount, it all broke for me and I was so moved that I cried. It was the only book in that series to do that to me, but it will always be one of my favorites.
I didn't come here to talk to you about the Wheel of Time though (don't get me started on WoT. I can talk for days on WoT), I came here to tell you about another series which brought me to tears and why.
It’s another series of fantasy doorstoppers, but don't walk away from me yet.
I came here to talk to you about The Stormlight Archive.
I've teared up at every damn book in this series. Four books long - until Wind and Truth releases tomorrow! - this fantasy series is about a lot of things, but what I describe it as most is this: How our mistakes and our faults make us who we are. How our weaknesses are what make us strong.
This is a series about mental illness of all sorts. One character suffers from depression so strong it makes my own bouts with the black dog appear easy. Another must come to grips with the horrific crimes of his past and how it can be possible to be a different man now. Another must battle with dissociative identity disorder stemming from childhood trauma. But it doesn't end there. The perk of each book being in excess of 400,000 words long - told ya about doorstoppers - is the ability to see so many people and so many points of view in this world.
Everyone suffers from something.
A side character's drug addiction. A girl with only 5 chapters across the entire series’ struggles with paralyzation and moving forward with her life. A woman who runs an orphanage having to turn away some children because there isn't enough food.
We all suffer.
But what Brandon Sanderson does so much better than another author with this series is more than simply show us the suffering. He makes us live with each character and their struggles, yes. But he shows how everyone, everyone, works (or doesn’t) to overcome their demons. Not all succeed, and not all even try, but showing those who ignore their problems does is make us closer to those that try. It doesn't matter if they defeat the demons that haunt them. Sanderson makes us understand that it’s the act of trying that is the most important part.
Words on a page are no more than abstract symbols. There is a magic that you and I are accomplishing right now that I cannot find a proper way to describe. These little squiggly pixels make thoughts appear in your head.
Little dabs of ink made people, characters, appear in my head as I read Stormlight as I read any other book. But the magic of good writing is not just making characters appear in my head from these words on the page, but making me feel for them.
I feel for these characters, all of them I listed above and so many more, like I feel for real people in my life. That's the beauty of fiction. We can see into lives that we never would have before.
It’s hard to let fiction to move us sometimes. None of it is real and I think that becomes a disconnect for many.
The great artists make readers push past that, stop caring whether a story is real, and know that it is real because we' imagine it now. It all is real. The words, the emotions that they make you feel, they are true, as true as the feelings themselves.
No series has moved me as much as Stormlight Archive. The happy moments and the sad within the series bring me to stand up as I read, to pace about the room like a madman, and yes, to even tear up and let those teardrops fall onto the pages.
In Honor of the final book in the first half of the series dropping tomorrow, I'll leave you with a few of my favorite quotes from the series in the vain hope it gets some of you to check it out. Thanks for giving this a read. Journey before destination.
"Sometimes a hypocrite is nothing more than a man in the process of changing."
"I began my journey alone, and I ended it alone. But that does not mean that I walked alone."
"We lift the bridge together, and we carry it."
"I'm not some glorious knight of the ancient days. I'm a broken man." said Kaladin. Syl replied: "That's what they all were."
"One can believe in a story without believing it happened."
And for some real fun, a short list of books I’ve shed full tears to:
· The Gathering Storm
· Hyperion (lookin’ at you Scholars’ Tale)
· The Stormlight Archive (all four books)
· A Man Called Ove
· The Martian
· The House in the Cerulean Sea
· The Stand
Thanks for indulging me and letting me gush a bit on this one. I'm so excited to dive into the 5th Stormlight book tomorrow and I hope I got even one of you to check out the series. It’s a lot to read, but the journey is worth it.
Happy Thursday.
Max
Photo by Ray Bilcliff