A Tinking good time at TG!

[Leafburner]

So what does everyone make of the Tuatha’an? What will their role be in the Last Battle?

 

Are they going to become a liability? A group of people Rand will be forced to protect?

 

Will they do their part and strap children to their backs in preparation to run should the shadow break the lines of the Light?

 

Will they work with the armies, providing supplies and watering horses and tending wounds etc?

 

Or, will their purpose be something more profound? Will the Aiel and the Tuatha’an once again become one? Will Perrin’s connection to Aram have a part to play yet in the destiny of the Tinkers?

 

I for one am not sure. I do hope they find the song, and I am even more hopeful that the song will be instrumental in defeating the Dark One, or perhaps simply by bringing them and the Aiel together. But for Aram’s close proximity to Perrin and Rand’s relationship to the Aiel, I think the Tinkers are not yet tinked out. They have a part yet to play. It is all woven into the pattern.

[Duggadugga]

The Dragon has heard the Song before. Whether or not he remebers the Song from his flashback jouney in Rhiuden(sp)has not been addressed yet. Now that I think about, the clan chiefs and the Wise Ones may have knowledge of the Song depending on the eyes they saw the Aiel's past through.

 

Well, making a long story short, I think the Song will help push back the Blight when the phrophecy is fulfilled.

[Luckers]

One of the key themes of RJ's work is that looking to the past is not the way to move forward. I don't think the Aiel and the Tuatha'an will rejoin. Too many years and too much change has occured. I mean, it would be like the italians and the egyptians rejoining, because a couple of thousand years ago they were together...

 

As to the Song... well, it seems likely the Song requires a skill called the Voice, a specific ability like channeling or the ogier ability to Treesing. That skill, that ability, seems gone, long since from hummanity. The actually words of the song Rand remembers is not the Song, its a Singing... the words are unimportant, its the sound and the power of the Voice that grants it its potency. I think it is gone.

 

That being said, the Blight does have to be fought, and the Song seems a viable method of fighting sickly plants. We saw that Loial could do it through such a power, and Someshta, so who knows... maybe the Song will return, and the skill was just dormant because no one tried. Or maybe that will be the Ogiers role, or maybe Elayne will create new Nym... which are living ter'angreal.

[Jellybelly]

There never was a song. A central theme in Jordan's writing is that as the memory of things that actually happened is lost, these memories get twisted into legends and myths. This is what has happened. The memory of the Da'shain Aiel's singing with the Ogier and Nym has become a legend to the Tinkers. What actually happened has been twisted into a legend of a Song that will miraculously set things right. Just as Avendesora is just a leftover from the AoL given excessive importance through legend, so is it with the Song.

[Jeppit Groccin]

**KoD spoiler**

 

Perrin's connection to Aram is now defunct, Aram is dead from an Aiel arrow after attempting to kill Perrin in the attack on the Shaido.

 

Also, the Nym are not extinct. The Green Man was the last, and he was killed in EotW, so unless Loial discovers some hidden talent to create Nym or proves to be a god-like treesinger, I don't see the song being discovered anytime soon.

[Leafburner]

Jeppit,

 

I know that Aram is dead, but that doesn't mean Perrin will cut all ties to him and not feel any sense of responsiblity for his death. Perrin knew him when he was a Tinker and watched him take up the sword and even sheltered his new choice of life. Do you think he is going to shrug and forget about it? Hardly. Their connection is not defunct at all. It has just now beginning to get interesting.

 

Is it not possible to consider that Perrin, having gone through his own experience with laying down a weapon, will feel in some way connected to the Tinkers? It's just a thought, but I wouldn't be too quick to assume that Aram's part in this story is finished.

[Leafburner]

"Also, the Nym are not extinct. The Green Man was the last, and he was killed in EotW, so unless Loial discovers some hidden talent to create Nym or proves to be a god-like treesinger, I don't see the song being discovered anytime soon." - Jeppit Groccin

 

Do you mean they are or are not extinct? because if the Green Man was the last, then it sounds to me as though they are.

[Red States Rule!]

The Leafers are going to be doing one thing:

 

SHAGGING!

 

I just remember that cave scene in Matrix where they are having a party before the end......

[Fel]

I would hope that the Tinkers have some key role to play in TG. Perrin has been involved with the tinkers on and off since TEOW and I've always assumed he would make the tinkers a force that can eb used in the final battle (maybe to beat the blight or other dark one tricks?)

 

If not, then I just don't see what Perrin brings to the table for Rand going into the last battle. Yeah, you've got the wolves, but how big an impact is that really going to be in the last battles as compared to Mat's command of the Seanchan armies or Rand's enormous army/Ashaman/Aes Sedai?

 

I've assumed that Perrin would figure something out (with some more referenced to blacksmith puzzles of course!) about how to push back the dark one's influence using the tinkers and have to convince Raen and Ilya to do it using the way of the leaf. Else, why waste many, many pages on perrin's interactions with the tinkers?

[teehee]

it could just as easily become on of those many things rj mentioned would remain unrevealed. I mean its not neccesarily vital to the plot and can always be somthing that people can be left wondering about... another what if? sorta thing. And we could have the tinkers used as diversions :P i mean comon, after all those years of running, i'm sure they've close to perfected the skills (all the slow guys die off, evolutionist sorta thing). Hence, rand sends them in, trollocs chase, they run and lead them somewhere or other etc etc.

 

 

It's not likely, but its another possibility ^^

[Inara]

perrins pages with the tinkers are not wasted, they form an integral part of his character, he admires them and feels responsiblity towards them. they keep him from turning into a 'bloodthirsty dragonsworn', ther are his internal conflict

 

...them and faile

 

i think the tinkers just might be 'shipped off' somewhere, rhuindeen would be poetic...

[Aldazar]

i definatley think perrin has some part in finding the song for the tinkers for this ill referance Min's viewing of him in EotW

 

“All sorts of things,†Min said, with a grin as if she knew what he really wanted to ask. “The War . . . ah . . . Master Andra has seven ruined towers around his head, and a babe in a cradle holding a sword, and . . . †She shook her head. “Men like him—you understand?—always have so many images they crowd one another. The strongest images around the gleeman are a man—not him—juggling fire, and the White Tower, and that doesn’t make any sense at all for a man. The strongest things I see about the big, curly-haired fellow are a wolf, and a broken crown, and trees flowering all around him. And the other one—a red eagle, an eye on a balance scale, a dagger with a ruby, a horn, and a laughing face. There are other things, but you see what I mean. This time I can’t make up or down out of any of it.†She waited then, still grinning, until he finally cleared his throat and asked.

 

here Min say's she see's trees flowering all around him sounds like a reference to singing to me.

[Darwynn]

By the sounds of it (from the Min viewing) it looks like Perrin will be there when the blight gets sung, but how will the tinkers learn to sing plants to life again? Will one, or more than one, go to Rhuidean through the ter'angreal? Presumably they are descended from the same ancestors as the aiel, so it should work for them too. But how would they think to go there? What a conundrum :?

[Luckers]

Again i state that the Song is not a learned skill. Lews Theirn and others, including Rand's visioning experience, show that the Voice is a Talent... you must have it to use it. The tuatha'an conception of the song is memory of that ability, but learning the words is not enough.. "Have you the Voice" etc, shows that.

[Bob T Dwarf]

Being another closed and largely inbred society, the Tinkers may well have a high proportion of Singers.

 

Actually "finding" the Song is the easiest part of their problem. All Rand has to do is learn that they're searching for it, and for LTT to remember that he knows it. If that never happens, there's still Elayne's musical angreal.

[TaeaDawn]

And one thing to remember is the Seanchan. Who knows what the Ogiers they have know about the singing and all that. Loial says it's a dieing trait for Ogier here, but so is leaving the Stedding and going to battle, but we know that the Ogier with the Seanchan don't seem to have problems with it. Who knows what knowledge they'll pass on once Mat and Rand get them all on the same side.

[Luckers]

Mmm. Maybe, but i dont think its as simple as that. The Tinkers have tried to learn the Ogier Treesinging in the past and failed.

[Darwynn]

Maybe one of the aiel will be the one to teach the Voice to the tinkers... since they are all related. But really I still think one of the tinkers will go to rhuidean. I dont think Rand is capable of describing it to them, I think they have to see and hear for themselves.

[Luckers]

Again, i dont think seeing or hearing it is enough. It's not a song, its a talent.

 

In any case i dont see it happening... its too romantic for RJ's writing.

[mightisright]

Some KOD Spoilers *******

I believe that the Tuatha’an are simply a device RJ uses to trigger Perrin's internal conflict. He has to choose between the axe and the hammer. In his heart he is a builder, a peaceful blacksmith, but in times of conflict he protects his own and becomes the wolf and the axe. Where should he draw the line? The constant conflict throughout the books and his interaction with the Tuatha’an make him brood over this choice. While he won’t accept the way of the leaf he is definitely a reluctant combatant. He won’t lead an army for Rand to battle Sammael and he does not dispatch the crazed Masema or his men (yet). I do not believe Perrin has ever been very susceptible to accepting the axe. In conflict he is a bloodthirsty butt kicker but he is the most cautious of any character about making decisions. And he is more concerned with protecting his own then anything else. So in some ways it was a foregone conclusion when he throws away the axe. His line of the Karaethon Cycle makes that very clear. I’m not sure exactly what this decision meant in practical terms. I’m sure someone can help me on this. He did not become less desperate to get his wife back. He still plows through the Shaido. Maybe this will make a concrete difference down the line.

 

I do believe one thing though. I do not think Min’s vision of trees flowering around him is connected to the Tinkers or the song. I believe this vision is a general synopsis of his character as a builder. He saved the Two Rivers and gave homes to the refugees from Tarabon and Arad Domon. And, at the end of KOD, Faile and him add to their number taking in a large number of the Shaido’s former prisoners/slaves. It was noteworthy that RJ took the time to demonstrate the gratitude of the new followers as well as the ones from Tarabon and Arad Domon in KOD. Besides the whole issue of the broken crown, he is building a melting pot kingdom for the homeless masses (or at least a few of them). A pillar among the storm of chaos raging in Randland. I think we will see this trend continue to be played on in the last book. Perrin was meant to build something new. If RJ ever does a few books later on down the road I wouldn’t be surprised to see Perrin (the most noble, identifiable, enrapturing, and sometimes boring character) have a role in them. For the record my favorite character is Mat but I like Perrin’s emerging thread/destiny as the reluctant, but capable and benevolent ruler. (it comes to mind though that RJ said he wouldn’t use any of the same characters IF he did do another book set in WOT, right?) Ow well I like where this is going, now just get rid of Faile.

[garapeto]

My guess is that normally humans use terangreal to join in the singing. After all, trees don't listen to humans.

 

The tinkers can sing the song, but it will only be powerful once the terangreal is present.

If you wonder how they know the song, well Mat already knows that most of the songs are the same melody, just different words.

Perhaps this will explain what happened to the song...it didn't disapear, just the terangreal that works with it.

[Luckers]

My guess is that normally humans use terangreal to join in the singing. After all, trees don't listen to humans.

 

There is no evidence of this. Moreover every indication that at one stage humans had a talent for singing to trees. The 'Voice' and all that jazz...

[Shadow_Eternal]

i think that tinkers wont find song. I dont think that it actually exists. Remember that the tinkers are in fact the Group of ''Aiel'' who actually stayed true to the Dai'Shain Aiel's beliefs. Though we see that it was in fact the Jenn who made Rhuidean and protected the TA and SA. During the Breaking, they were constantly trying to escape the very earth that was shifting and transforming. This lasted for quite sometime apparently. Undoubtedly there would have been separations and deaths aplenty. The remaining survivors possesed knowlege that had been passed on and probably garbled and twisted along its way. The Song they refer to just may have been a really great song, that calmed the soul (figratively) and sounded good. Remember, there were few troubles the Age of Legends. By all accounts, the Song could have just been a happy-peaceful thing and nothing else. Nowhere does it say that the tree-songs of the Ogier or the Nym hare the same as the tinkers one.

 

Furthermore, they say that the one power had countless uses then other than being weapons. We see moghedien make that doorbell chiming weave when she goes to visit graendal in PoD. Those with the Voice could have been people who could use some aspect of the OP to alter their voices to sing better. Maybe (like Min and Perrin), their were those with the ability to Sing? in some special way.

 

Honestly, this is entire discussion probably insignificant and utterly useless. From RJ's style of writing, we can see that not everyone gets what they want. For every good there must be a balance. So while Rand and Co win Tarmon Gai'don, the tinkers will all cry for a while, and then returh to their Caravans, get drunk and dance scandalously and that will be the end of them.

[Kadere]

But we do know there was a song, because in "The Dedicated" in TSR while Rand is seeing his history, he goes back into the Age of Legends and hears the Aeil sing the song with the help of Ogier and the Green Man. The song does exist, whiether or not they'll recognize it is something to ponder.

[ShadowEternal]

i never said that there was'nt a song. Its just that the song that the tinkers belive exists a hyped up myth based upon the existence of that song.