Talents vs. Weaves

[balefireruinssteaks]

I started to get a little confused.

 

Some uses of the One Power are considered Talents.  Healing, for instance.  Other things are simply weaves that anyone can use.  Air to lift a potted plant, for example.

 

When does a weave gain a name and start to be considered a Talent?  Does it have to do with strength in the Power and ability in that particular weave? 

 

I understand that at some point, a channeler combined Spirit, Water and Air and Healed someone.  Perhaps they used all Five Powers.  But then other channelers realized that they didn't really understand the working of that weave and how to manipulate it so some channelers became more skilled at Healing until it became considered a Talent.

 

We see that some weaves don't have names, like lighting a candle or creating a bulb of light.  Other weaves like Deathgates, Folded Light, Milking Tears, Traveling, Illusion, Healing, etc. gained names and were considered Talents.  And still other abilities like seeing ta'veren, recreating the effects of ta'veren, and Dreaming have little or nothing to do with the Power at all.  Aviendha's ability to "read" ter'angreal for example might be a Talent.

 

So I guess I was just confused because I wasn't sure when a weave became a Talent or what determined if a weave was just a weave.  I just wondered if in an Aes Sedai's training at some point does someone go "And now we are going to learn Folded Light; here is the weave for Folded Light" or does each Aes Sedai just stumble onto their Talents on their own?  Or in their training do they at some point go "and this is how to light a candle, there is no name for lighting a candle you just use a flow of Fire"?

[Besolyn]

I think different people have different strengths in particular areas, and that is sometimes referred to as talent (lower case). Something a channeler can do without any training is a Talent (upper case).

 

Traveling is called a Talent by the modern Aes Sedai, because until recently they didn’t know how it was done. Only the legend survived not the knowledge of whether it was a common weave or not. Now we know that you have to be a certain strength to make the weave useful. You can lay the weave, but it may not coalesce into a Gateway. In Traveling this corresponds with a person’s strength in the OP.

 

Healing is a little different. Some Aes Sedai can’t heal much more than a bruise. Two AS can lay the exact same weaves on a person and get different results, so you would have a talent for Healing in the stronger results not necessarily the stronger AS. But it’s still not a true Talent. It’s more like being better with Air & Water or Fire & Earth.

 

Dreaming is a Talent. Egwene had Dreams before she even got to the White Tower. Aveindia didn’t know she could Read ter’angreals until the first she held, but she needed no instruction. Reading residues is also a Talent.

[Kaznen]

A talent is an area of skills and a weave is the making of one of those skills.

 

For instance, somebody strong in the Talent of healing can save lives while somebody not so strong, using the same weave could barely heal a bruise.

 

 

[trakand_01]

Yeah Kaznan is pretty much right.

 

A 'Talent' is a particular skill that a person has. Healing, for example is a Talent. Not everyone can do it, and some just have a 'Talent' for it, like Nynaeve. She hadnt been taught to do it, but she did it naturally because she had the Talent. Travelling is another Talent - some are better at it than others. Elayne's 'Talent' is making angreal, Aviendha's Talent is 'reading' Angreal, Egwene's Talent is dreamwalking.

 

A Weave, on the other hand has nothing to do with skill, it is purely the name given to the implementation of the power to do something. A Weave is the way the channeler arranges the flows of whichever elements they are using. The organisation.

 

So, a channeler takes the flow of the source and makes the weave (you've read about them organising the flows properly, wrapping this around that and under that, over that and so on, that's creating the Weave), then sets the Weave in place, and that creates whatever they are attempting to do with the power.

 

The channeler HAS a talent.

 

Have you read the chapter where Aviendha, Elayne and Birgitte are fleeing the Kin's Farm, when the Seanchan are after them? Elayne picks apart the gateway. What she's actually doing is picking apart her Weave. She's pulling each thread of the power out of the weave, one by one.

[bRANDan]

Have you read the chapter where Aviendha, Elayne and Birgitte are fleeing the Kin's Farm, when the Seanchan are after them? Elayne picks apart the gateway. What she's actually doing is picking apart her Weave. She's pulling each thread of the power out of the weave, one by one.

 

Quite right. And even though Elayne and Aviendha are pretty close in strength in the Power, Aviendha picked her weave apart much more easily because it is her Talent.

[trakand_01]

Aha, good point.

 

Actually 'Aviendha did it better' is a bit of an understatement, given what happened when Elayne let them slip...

[Besolyn]

I didn’t think that had anything to do with a Talent, but more to do with pratice. That was Elayne’s first time and she tried it on the Traveling weave. Avendia said she’d had the same result on her first. The difference was it was a small knot of Air, and therefore less volatile.

[bRANDan]

Those that can perform specific things better than others are said to have a Talent in that area. Aviendha says that every Wise One learns how to do it, she didn't say they were anywhere near as good as she. She does say that some can do it better than others. I think she is in the "better" category.

 

Plus Moridin is amazed that anyone can do such a thing. If the ability was rare enough that in the AoL it was never done then I think it is safe to say that Aviendha's skill in "unweaving" is a Talent.

 

People that have a natural ability with something have a Talent.

[Bob T Dwarf]

Per the Glossary printed in the back of most of the books ( handy things glossaries, check out the ones in the books you have) -

 

Talents: Abilities in the use of the One Power in specific areas.  Aptitude in various Talents varies widely from individual to individual and is seldom related to the strength of the individual's ability to channel.  There are major Talents, the best known and most widespread of which is Healing.  Other examples are Cloud Dancing, the control of weather, and Earth Singing, which involves controlling movements of the earth - for example preventing or causing earthquakes or avalanches.  There are also minor Talents, seldom given a name, such as the ability to see ta'veren, or to duplicate the chance-twisting effect of ta'veren, though in a very small and localized area rarely covering more than a few square feet.  Many Talents are now known only by their names and sometimes vague descriptions.  Some, such as Traveling ( the ability to shift from one place to another without crossing the intervening space ) are only now being rediscovered.  Others, such as Foretelling ( the ability to foresee future events, but in a general way ) and Delving ( the location of ores and possibly their removal from the ground ), are found rarely.  Another Talent long thought lost is Dreaming, interpreting the Dreamer's dreams to foretell future events in more specific fashion than Foretelling.  Some Dreamers had the ability to enter Tel'aran'rhiod, the World of Dreams and ( it is said ) even other people's dreams.  The last acknowledged Dreamer previously was Corianin Nedeal ( coh-ree-AHN-ihn neh-dee-AHL.), who died in 526 NE, but there is now another.  See also Tel'aran'rhiod.

 

 

[Kaznen]

Avi's Talent isn't picking apart a weave, but reading the residues from a weave (Rand has the same talent BTW) is.  In PoD she tells the AS that anyone who can read a residue could weave a gateway to that very spot.

[bRANDan]

Per the Glossary printed in the back of most of the books ( handy things glossaries, check out the ones in the books you have) -

 

Bob T Dwarf, what books do you have? I have several different versions, hardcover and paperback, and none have a glossary, nor have I seen one that does.

[Vambram]

All my WOT books from Tor have glossaries.

[trakand_01]

So do mine, every last one, paper back and hardback.

 

They're not extensive glossaries but each book covers the new characters or terms mentioned in that book so that going through all 11 books, practically everything is covered.

[Bob T Dwarf]

My hardbound "New Spring" is the only one without a glossary.

 

KoD in hardcover even has one. 

 

The rest of mine are TOR paperbacks.  Most entries are duplicated between books, but each book has entries specific to that book.  The earlier ones all have pronunciation guides for names and uncommon words. 

[bRANDan]

Sorry, I'm an idiot. For some reason I was thinking Annals, like the 150 page things in LotR. Yeah mine have glossaries too.  :P