Egwene's Arc (Full Spoilers)

[Lord Ingtar Shinowa]

Did anyone else hate her as much as me? Hands down second worst character, second only to Gawyn. I respect her for doing what she felt strongly about, but come on. Rand is the Dragon and obviously right about the Seals. He was just being polite in asking her. Ugh she just bothers me so much. I did like her in the Tower figthing Elaida but that's basically the only time I liked her. And maybe tEotW. Marrying Gawyn was the worst decision ever. She just got more annoying as time passed. Anyone feel the same way?

[Suttree]

Did anyone else hate her as much as me? Hands down second worst character, second only to Gawyn. I respect her for doing what she felt strongly about, but come on. Rand is the Dragon and obviously right about the Seals.

 

They both brough info about the seals and that was a large part of Moiraine's role in getting them to work together. Egwene needed to be convinced they needed to be broken and Rand had to be convinced to wait until the correct moment.

 

To your question however you will find no shortage of people that feel the exact same way.

[Yamezt]

I respect her for doing what she felt strongly about, but come on. Rand is the Dragon and obviously right about the Seals. He was just being polite in asking her. 

 

To the reader it was probably pretty obvious re seals. But I don't see how it would be obvious for other characters. I also think you are too generous about him being polite to her. He did, after all, want her to rally everyone else to the meeting too.

[bathedinthelight]

It has taken me a long long time to find the words and the time to write this post.  Even now, my feelings are incomplete, but I feel the need to write things down in order to heal from what I believe to be a broken heart when it comes to TWOT and the most polarizing character of the book, Egwene Al'Vere.

 

Egwene was, like the other characters, extremely flawed.  But, we see her, time and again, swallow her pride and make an effort to humble herself to something bigger than herself.  In the White Tower, with the Aiel, in Elaida's WT.  The only time we don't see that is with Rand.  And I will agree, it was beyond frustrating.  After everything we have seen from Egwene, I could not believe that she would not just relent. I also could not believe that the fight between wasn't more epic.  If she was going to fight, then it should have been bigger and more private and we could have seen (like we eventually see with all the other characters) that love was driving her to fight him.  Love for the world, the WT and even love for Rand.  She doesn't want him to die and really, why would she think that he could kill the DO.  And in actually, she was right.  He can't really kill the DO.  Rand has proven to be powerful and compassionate but he has not proven to be infallible, not by a long shot.  I do believe that Egwene did the best she could with the information that she had available to her at the time.  But, she eventually comes around, when it is important so why be upset with her over the seals?

 

Which leads me to my biggest issue which is that I don't think that the character was written faithfully.  Egwene was a loyal, Two Rivers woman to her core.  Just like Nynaeve.  Even though she became the AS, she still held to her core values.  I don't think she held to those values in her final scenes with Rand.  Especially not when they were arguing with each other over the seals.  I just don't think she was that petty and small at the end, and yet she was written that way.  Which left me as a reader feeling very betrayed.  Egwene was willing to restructure the whole WT and take Nynaeve's words about the WT to heart and yet she acts like that in the meeting with Rand?  Maybe for people who absolutely hate Egwene then that was further fuel to the fire, but it just didn't make sense to me.  For the point above about Rand being "obviously" right about the seals (which he wasn't), Egwene was obviously right about the WH needing to be whole when it came time for the Last Battle.  Can you imagine if the WT and all the women had been taken hostage by the Seanchan?  They would be in Seanchan, and not fighting the LB.  Remember, after the attack, the Seanchan went back to Seanchan while Tuon stayed put.

 

Egwene has gone through more in the series than anyone, except Rand.  And maybe more than Rand because Egwene is really alone.  She has no one.  Rand has Min pretty much the whole time to keep him sane and grounded and feeling loved.  What does Egwene have? Rather WHO does Egwene have?  No one.  Yes, Siuan but she is an advisor.  Where are here friends? People who love her?  Really and truly love her?  Egwene does what she does, by herself.  And yet, I feel that never gets thrown into the equation of why she can act aloof and arrogant at times.  And she doesn't really have Gawyn, for all the good her eventually does her, until the second to last book.  And yes, bonding Gawyn and marrying him was just the worst thing ever.  She should have chosen Galad.  He would have been a better choice it turns out.  But, you can't help who you love.  Just ask Matt, or Perrin or Rand.

 

I actually have more to say, especially about her final moments, but I will leave that for another time.

[Rhienne]

@bathedinthelight: I agree with a lot of your post, but I think it was Egwene's choice not to have close friends and people who loved her.  Both she and Rand felt they had to drive the people they loved away from them (Rand did so because he felt people close to him would be threatened; Egwene did so because she couldn't afford to compromise her position as Amyrlin).  Rand eventually came to terms with letting people love him, as we saw with the numerous scenes in AMoL where he has very personal moments with people (e.g. Tam, Lan, Elayne, Aviendha).  Egwene can't afford to change her stance because she believes she will be Amyrlin for hundreds of years, and her Amyrlin-ship is still in its infancy.  I believe she does consider Nynaeve and Elayne her friends, and Gawyn her husband, but I think she considers them her subordinates as Aes Sedai and Warder first.  Rand, strictly speaking, doesn't actually have subordinates (apart from perhaps the Asha'man), while Egwene very much does.  

 

I agree 100% about the scene at Merrilor.  I know some people liked the way Rand and Egwene were written, as they felt it highlighted the fact that only two years had passed, and they were still just two young people from the Two Rivers, struggling under massive pressure.  I found them both to be petty, immature and spiteful, and that the scene went backwards in terms of character development for both of them.

 

Something I find very interesting r.e. the seals is how many people sympathise with Rand and feel like Egwene is completely in the wrong, when actually they were both partly wrong and partly right.  But from the reaction of the vast majority of fans, Egwene's 'rightness' wasn't conveyed very clearly or well at all.

[bathedinthelight]

@bathedinthelight: I agree with a lot of your post, but I think it was Egwene's choice not to have close friends and people who loved her.  Both she and Rand felt they had to drive the people they loved away from them (Rand did so because he felt people close to him would be threatened; Egwene did so because she couldn't afford to compromise her position as Amyrlin).  Rand eventually came to terms with letting people love him, as we saw with the numerous scenes in AMoL where he has very personal moments with people (e.g. Tam, Lan, Elayne, Aviendha).  Egwene can't afford to change her stance because she believes she will be Amyrlin for hundreds of years, and her Amyrlin-ship is still in its infancy.  I believe she does consider Nynaeve and Elayne her friends, and Gawyn her husband, but I think she considers them her subordinates as Aes Sedai and Warder first.  Rand, strictly speaking, doesn't actually have subordinates (apart from perhaps the Asha'man), while Egwene very much does.  

 

I agree 100% about the scene at Merrilor.  I know some people liked the way Rand and Egwene were written, as they felt it highlighted the fact that only two years had passed, and they were still just two young people from the Two Rivers, struggling under massive pressure.  I found them both to be petty, immature and spiteful, and that the scene went backwards in terms of character development for both of them.

 

Something I find very interesting r.e. the seals is how many people sympathise with Rand and feel like Egwene is completely in the wrong, when actually they were both partly wrong and partly right.  But from the reaction of the vast majority of fans, Egwene's 'rightness' wasn't conveyed very clearly or well at all.

 

 

The last part is spot on!  Rand and Egwene were both right about the seals.  But, Egwene is the one who receives the blame for the scene.  Why is that?  They needed each other in that moment and they both acted ridiculous.  It's almost as though the scene were written by one of those rabid "Eggy" haters.  

[bathedinthelight]

And while I agree with you re: Egwene being the AS and needing to remain apart, I really feel that in her heart she was doing her part.  Elayne accepting her duty to be Queen and dealing with the mess in Andor, Avi needing to be a Wise One to help guide her people.  And Egwene accepting the reins of the WT because really, she was the only one who could be trusted and who would have Rand's back.  Wasn't the plan, oh so long ago, to make sure Rand was surrounded by people he could love and trust.  I mean way back when they were all Accepted and just sent to search for the Black Ajah?  I am getting off topic, but Elayne was bonded with Bridgette and Rand, not to mention her near sister bond with Avi.  Nynaeve got Lan, enough said there. Egwene got dealt a really tough hand.  I mean, she was the AS but her plot points, not her choices, were what rendered her so alone.  I never really saw her pushing people away so much as pushing people to accept her as the true AS and not as a young girl playing at it.  And she and Nynaeve weren't friends, not in the sense that her and Min and Elayne were.  

 

And I will leave it at that for now, because the friendship, indeed the sisterhood between the women in the book.  Especially, between Egwene and the other women.

[Rhienne]

  I mean, she was the AS but her plot points, not her choices, were what rendered her so alone.  I never really saw her pushing people away so much as pushing people to accept her as the true AS and not as a young girl playing at it.  And she and Nynaeve weren't friends, not in the sense that her and Min and Elayne were.  

I think that makes it very hard to be friends though.  You can only really have friendships between equals, and Elayne and Nynaeve are no longer Egwene's equals.  They know that they are friends when Egwene wants them to be friends and AS subordinates when Egwene wants/needs them to be AS subordinates.

 

You raise an interesting point about how Egwene, Elayne and Nynaeve all spent the early books (tGH-tFoH) talking about how they could get the AS to help Rand and support him.  At some point this does seem to go out the window and become opposition.  Yes, they are right to oppose him on some occasions, but the AS never make any real move to support Rand under Egwene, despite her original intentions this way.

[fionwe1987]

Egwene may not have had friends her own age who hung around her as much, but she had plenty of more mature people. She had Leanne as Siuan, the Wise Ones, etc. Beyond that, though, she did end up with a job where she can't be friend's first. That would be doing the job badly, which would mean losing the respect of those very people whose friendship she values. 

 

So no, I don't really think she was friendless. Just not someone who visibly needed the help of her friends to deal with the changes that power brings. She was just better at learning from her teachers, which freed her friends to deal with the real problem-case: Rand.

[Rhienne]

Egwene may not have had friends her own age who hung around her as much, but she had plenty of more mature people. She had Leanne as Siuan, the Wise Ones, etc.

I don't think Egwene is friends with the Wise Ones or Siuan.  She has very little interaction with the Wise Ones post tFoH, her only real interaction being when she tries to arrange an agreement between the White Tower, the Wise Ones, and the Windfinders, and in this situation they don't behave as friends.

 

As to Siuan, she sees Siuan as a mentor, but not a friend.  The way she speaks to Siuan following her rescue (whether you think she was right or wrong to dress her down so severely in public) is not the way anyone speaks to a friend.  Especially as there is no apology in private afterwards.

[hatsoff]

Which leads me to my biggest issue which is that I don't think that the character was written faithfully.  Egwene was a loyal, Two Rivers woman to her core.  Just like Nynaeve.  Even though she became the AS, she still held to her core values.  I don't think she held to those values in her final scenes with Rand.  Especially not when they were arguing with each other over the seals.  I just don't think she was that petty and small at the end, and yet she was written that way.  Which left me as a reader feeling very betrayed.  Egwene was willing to restructure the whole WT and take Nynaeve's words about the WT to heart and yet she acts like that in the meeting with Rand?  Maybe for people who absolutely hate Egwene then that was further fuel to the fire, but it just didn't make sense to me.

 

 

Hmm.  I guess I never really saw Egwene as a "loyal, Two Rivers woman to her core."  From the very beginning it seemed like she wanted to leave Emond's Field.  (Remember her chat with Rand about wanting to be a Wisdom somewhere else?)  But then when she found out that Moiraine was Aes Sedai, she became intent on leaving the Two Rivers entirely and seeing the world.  And then when she found out that she herself could channel, she immediately decided to become Aes Sedai, perhaps never to return.

 

I'm not saying she didn't appreciate the Two Rivers.  I'm sure she had fond memories of the place, and for instance she sent letters back to her family of a fairly regular basis, at least for a while.  But it seemed to me that after becoming Aes Sedai, she viewed the White Tower as her home, not the Two Rivers.  Her loyalty was to the Tower, and her values, while certainly shaped by the Two Rivers, seemed to be influenced more by the Tower.  Or so it seemed to me.

[fionwe1987]

 

Egwene may not have had friends her own age who hung around her as much, but she had plenty of more mature people. She had Leanne as Siuan, the Wise Ones, etc.

I don't think Egwene is friends with the Wise Ones or Siuan.  She has very little interaction with the Wise Ones post tFoH, her only real interaction being when she tries to arrange an agreement between the White Tower, the Wise Ones, and the Windfinders, and in this situation they don't behave as friends.

 

As to Siuan, she sees Siuan as a mentor, but not a friend.  The way she speaks to Siuan following her rescue (whether you think she was right or wrong to dress her down so severely in public) is not the way anyone speaks to a friend.  Especially as there is no apology in private afterwards.

 

Ummm... Egwene has tons of interactions with the WO after she leaves them, including one scene where she says she thinks that approaching Amys is like approaching her mother.

 

Similarly, there have been statements from both Egwene and Siuan where they state that while they had a mentor-student relationship, and a leader-advisor one, they also felt friendship for each other.

 

As for how Egwene reacted to Siuan's obvious disobedience to an explicitly given order, that is precisely one point where she couldn't treat Siuan as a friend. How does that say anything about their general relationship?

[fionwe1987]

 

Which leads me to my biggest issue which is that I don't think that the character was written faithfully.  Egwene was a loyal, Two Rivers woman to her core.  Just like Nynaeve.  Even though she became the AS, she still held to her core values.  I don't think she held to those values in her final scenes with Rand.  Especially not when they were arguing with each other over the seals.  I just don't think she was that petty and small at the end, and yet she was written that way.  Which left me as a reader feeling very betrayed.  Egwene was willing to restructure the whole WT and take Nynaeve's words about the WT to heart and yet she acts like that in the meeting with Rand?  Maybe for people who absolutely hate Egwene then that was further fuel to the fire, but it just didn't make sense to me.

 

 

Hmm.  I guess I never really saw Egwene as a "loyal, Two Rivers woman to her core."  From the very beginning it seemed like she wanted to leave Emond's Field.  (Remember her chat with Rand about wanting to be a Wisdom somewhere else?)  But then when she found out that Moiraine was Aes Sedai, she became intent on leaving the Two Rivers entirely and seeing the world.  And then when she found out that she herself could channel, she immediately decided to become Aes Sedai, perhaps never to return.

 

I'm not saying she didn't appreciate the Two Rivers.  I'm sure she had fond memories of the place, and for instance she sent letters back to her family of a fairly regular basis, at least for a while.  But it seemed to me that after becoming Aes Sedai, she viewed the White Tower as her home, not the Two Rivers.  Her loyalty was to the Tower, and her values, while certainly shaped by the Two Rivers, seemed to be influenced more by the Tower.  Or so it seemed to me.

 

This seems to imply to loyalty to home and searching for greener pastures are mutually incompatible...

[bathedinthelight]

I think Egwene was a truly loyal character.  She maintained her ties to her home as best she could and she insisted on marrying Gawyn and doing what was "right" based on how she was raised.  She was the AS and she insisted on marrying the man she loved because she couldn't go against her upbringing.  In that way, her and Nynaeve are very similar.  Just because she left didn't mean she wasn't loyal to her upbringing.

[bathedinthelight]

 

  I mean, she was the AS but her plot points, not her choices, were what rendered her so alone.  I never really saw her pushing people away so much as pushing people to accept her as the true AS and not as a young girl playing at it.  And she and Nynaeve weren't friends, not in the sense that her and Min and Elayne were.  

I think that makes it very hard to be friends though.  You can only really have friendships between equals, and Elayne and Nynaeve are no longer Egwene's equals.  They know that they are friends when Egwene wants them to be friends and AS subordinates when Egwene wants/needs them to be AS subordinates.

 

You raise an interesting point about how Egwene, Elayne and Nynaeve all spent the early books (tGH-tFoH) talking about how they could get the AS to help Rand and support him.  At some point this does seem to go out the window and become opposition.  Yes, they are right to oppose him on some occasions, but the AS never make any real move to support Rand under Egwene, despite her original intentions this way.

 

 

Well, Elayne and Egwene, when wearing the crown and the stole respectively are equals, and when they take those off, they are supposedly, great friends.  It seems to me that most people had someone with whom they could be themselves.  I guess my point is that Egwene has to face her destiny alone and no one else had that burden.  Everyone has someone to lean on and rely on when times get tough. They get to be vulnerable and human.  They get to feel loved.  Leane and Siuan, Gareth Byrne, they are all people who love the WT and need Egwene to succeed, but they aren't bonded to her the way Min is to Rand (not to mention Avi and Elayne) or Bridgette is to Elayne (not to mention Avi and Rand and her babies!) or any number of main characters with tremendous burden.  And because we rarely see that with Egwene people just seem to hate her because she is arrogant.  Name a character in the book who isn't arrogant or who doesn't have a blind spot.  If Matt had just read Verin's letter, well...but the same people who hate Egwene just love Matt.  And I get it!  I love Matrim! 

 

I bring it up to further defend her character and point out something that doesn't get mentioned enough.  And to point out how her arc was to be alone, in many ways.  And lastly I make the point to further illustrate how much Egwene actually did in terms of carrying her burden.  I think that the course of the series took great pains to construct that part of Egwene's character, however, the last book throws that out the window.  It seems like her arc, to me, is like a broken rainbow, something bright and beautiful that just gets snuffed out at the end.  Sorry, I don't mean to wax to poetic.

 

One thing I want to point to, is the idea of friendship, especially sisterhood.  I loved the books because the idea of sisterhood was so powerful.  Even with the plural marriage Aiel, it was the bond between the women that was the thing of true beauty and wonder.  It is what held the Aiel together.  Spear sisters, near sisters.  And the AS, being bonded by the same power but also the same symbol of the light, the same oaths.  I just love when Egwene, Elayne and Min fell in love and said that they would never let anyone some between them, "not even him" meaning Rand.  Which is an echo of what happens at the end when Rand tells the DO, its not about him but rather sisterhood and brotherhood and fighting for and with people because you love them.  When Perrin said to Rand, I got your back at the end (well, said it in his head) I broke down.  But where was that for Egwene?  Symbolically, she deserved an equally powerful moment where that sisterhood is revealed.  I HATE that she died, but I need to see Elayne or someone mourn for her sister.  No, instead we see the three wives staring after Rand.  Making sure he survives.The scene between Perrin and Nynaeve wasn't enough nor was it satisfying.  Nynaeve was upset because she saw it as her duty to make sure all the Two Rivers people made it out alive. Seriously, did BS hate Egwene as much as some of the folk in fandom?  Did he snuff out her arc as an homage to the "Eggy" hate?

[Rhienne]

 

 

Egwene may not have had friends her own age who hung around her as much, but she had plenty of more mature people. She had Leanne as Siuan, the Wise Ones, etc.

I don't think Egwene is friends with the Wise Ones or Siuan.  She has very little interaction with the Wise Ones post tFoH, her only real interaction being when she tries to arrange an agreement between the White Tower, the Wise Ones, and the Windfinders, and in this situation they don't behave as friends.

 

As to Siuan, she sees Siuan as a mentor, but not a friend.  The way she speaks to Siuan following her rescue (whether you think she was right or wrong to dress her down so severely in public) is not the way anyone speaks to a friend.  Especially as there is no apology in private afterwards.

 

Ummm... Egwene has tons of interactions with the WO after she leaves them, including one scene where she says she thinks that approaching Amys is like approaching her mother.

 

Similarly, there have been statements from both Egwene and Siuan where they state that while they had a mentor-student relationship, and a leader-advisor one, they also felt friendship for each other.

 

As for how Egwene reacted to Siuan's obvious disobedience to an explicitly given order, that is precisely one point where she couldn't treat Siuan as a friend. How does that say anything about their general relationship?

 

The scene with Amys is in TAR, where Egwene is approaching her dream.  The quote is: "...she approached a third womans dream.  Gingerly. So much lay between her and Amys that it seemed akin to approaching her mother."  Then Egwene talks about wanting Amys' respect.  I personally don't see that as friendship.  I think she is nervous at approaching Amys' dream as a mentor-mother figure. 

 

And I really don't think Siuan and Egwene are friends.  Siuan even says that she doesn't like Egwene.  They have immense respect for each other, but their relationship is a business one.  We never see them just chatting to each other, or seeking out each others company without a reason.

Edited April 25, 2013 by Rhienne

[lilltempest]

 

The scene with Amys is in TAR, where Egwene is approaching her dream.  The quote is: "...she approached a third womans dream.  Gingerly. So much lay between her and Amys that it seemed akin to approaching her mother."  Then Egwene talks about wanting Amys' respect.  I personally don't see that as friendship.  I think she is nervous at approaching Amys' dream as a mentor-mother figure. 

 

And I really don't think Siuan and Egwene are friends.  Siuan even says that she doesn't like Egwene.  They have immense respect for each other, but their relationship is a business one.  We never see them just chatting to each other, or seeking out each others company without a reason.

 

 

That's because Egwene doesn't have friends, if you look at the true definition. She has subjects (all Aes Sedai, including Siuan), allies (the WOs), enemies (Seanchan) and "problems" (people who won't submit to her, like Rand). But Egwene does not define friendship the same way we do. Perhaps she did, at one point, but once she embraced the trappings of power, that went out the window (and for those who say it's impossible, Siuan was friends with Moiraine, eve as Amyrlin, so it's not impossible, it just takes the willingness to stop being a total controlling bitch for a short time and not insisting everyone prostrate themselves before you every time you walk into the room).

 

From her POV, however, she does consider certain people to be friends...if they are completely submissive to her. I mean, look at her attitude about Gawyn - she treated him like garbage (he was a douchebag, too, to be fair) and, even after he saved her life, she allowed him to apologize to her for "disobeying" her and saving her crappy little life instead of admitting she should've listened (she had even thought to herself when she believed him to be dying that she was wrong). After she bonded him, she thinks that she would've done it sooner if she had known how 'dedicated' (i.e., submissive and subservient) he was to her. When she thinks of him beforehand, she angrily thinks that he and Nynaeve, of all people since they claim to be her friends, should exist only to see her will done. Excuse me?? It's funny how everyone goes on and on about how Rand shouldn't expect people to mindlessly go along with whatever he wants ("he's the Dragon Reborn, not the Creator!") but those same people have no problem with Egwene expecting her friends to be mindless sycophants, at best, slaves at worst.

 

The bottom line is that Egwene had what she wanted, so it's a bit absurd to feel sorry for her for being "alone". She didn't want real friends in the sense that most people do. She wanted people to obey her without question and to not argue with her or object to anything she did or wanted. She wanted to manipulate and dominate, and feared (I think this was truly her only real fear) that she would lose face or authority if she allowed even one person to address her as a person instead of as some sort of Creator-chosen goddess whose authority outweighed all, even behind closed doors. She felt the need to make it clear to everyone that she was above them, but she especially felt that need with Nynaeve and Rand...with them, it was always more a rivalry than a friendship.

 

If there is any female character in the series that needs sympathy for never having a friend or "sister", it's Nynaeve. She was an outcast from the start. At least, in the end, Rand was her friend. And she had Lan. But female friends? Elayne tolerated her, but even though she had said she wanted Nyn as her adviser, she didn't seem to like her as a human being. And Nyn was the softest-hearted character in the whole series...Egwene was, quite possibly, the most hard-hearted when it suited her.

[Suttree]

*slow clap*

 

That was impressive, even for you. I rate it 8/10 on the tempest Egwene rant scale.

Edited April 26, 2013 by Suttree

[bathedinthelight]

Llltempest, it goes without saying that I whole heartedly disagree with you and I think the text supports my thesis that Egwene was no a cold hearted bitch who deserves little more than a dark friend or Padan Fain, perhaps.

 

That said, you win, because BS clearly agrees with you and he is the one who got to finish the book and kill Egwene.  You and all the others like you must have loved it and reveled in every moment of her pain, anguish and largely unmourned and unnecessary death. So, it must be nice. 

 

For me, the time and effort I spent reading, knowing and loving all the characters has come to a very bitter sweet somewhat empty end for me.  And I will never feel satisfied with Egwene's arc.  As it was clearly written by one who thinks the same as you do, dear Lilltempest.

[Rhienne]

That said, you win, because BS clearly agrees with you and he is the one who got to finish the book and kill Egwene.  You and all the others like you must have loved it and reveled in every moment of her pain, anguish and largely unmourned and unnecessary death. So, it must be nice. 

I wouldn't classify myself as an Egwene-hater - I disliked her a lot up until LoC, but I thought she really grew from there on up until TGS, and I really liked her over this part of the series.  She took a big dip for me in ToM, but I actually found her arc in AMoL to be very redemptive for her (not in the sense of her character, but in my opinion of her).  I thought the way she behaved on the battlefield, up to and including her death, was noble, selfless and brave.  Yes, she didn't really get mourned, and it seemed bizarre than no one commented on her death (apart from a very brief mention by Perrin and Nynaeve), but she wasn't the only character who didn't get much reflection after the last battle.  Most of the cast suffered this way.

[lilltempest]

Llltempest, it goes without saying that I whole heartedly disagree with you and I think the text supports my thesis that Egwene was no a cold hearted bitch who deserves little more than a dark friend or Padan Fain, perhaps.

 

That said, you win, because BS clearly agrees with you and he is the one who got to finish the book and kill Egwene.  You and all the others like you must have loved it and reveled in every moment of her pain, anguish and largely unmourned and unnecessary death. So, it must be nice. 

 

For me, the time and effort I spent reading, knowing and loving all the characters has come to a very bitter sweet somewhat empty end for me.  And I will never feel satisfied with Egwene's arc.  As it was clearly written by one who thinks the same as you do, dear Lilltempest.

 

Personally, I think BS liked her to the point where other characters suffered in aMoL for it. I mean, think about it...Egwene basically single-handedly fought and the AS were nothing but her backup. No one else got to "shine" on the battlefield she commanded. She didn't let anyone else touch her sa'angreal and was channeling almost constantly, with only small breaks (during which she had her sa'angreal and didn't let anyone else touch it). She never bent her neck and was never forced to (whereas all of the other characters were humbled, some - like Rand and Nynaeve - far more than others, to the point of complete humiliation). Rand even commented on it during his soliloquy to the DO. She got to stay prideful and arrogant until the very end.

 

Honestly, I think the reason she was killed off was because RJ intended her reign as Amyrlin to end with TG. Whether or not RJ specified she should die may be something we never know, but it's clear he specified that Cadsuane was to be Amyrlin...that was in his notes. It might have been BS's decision to kill Egwene off, for all we know, and if it was, I think he likely saw it as doing her character a favor - if she survived, she would have been burned out, we saw that from her POV right before she crystallized herself. I think that, in his eyes, she would not have been able to deal with not being able to channel anymore (chances are that being burned out cannot be Healed, unlike being severed, since severing is a "clean" cut and burning out is something else entirely). IMO, if that was his reasoning, he was correct. As ambitious as Egwene was, skyrocketing to the top only to find herself without power - both figuratively and literally - would not sit well with her at all. She could've gone with the Wise Ones', I'm sure, since they all but worship her, but she would not necessarily have been their "leader", which would not have sat well with her at all (especially the first time they decided against whatever she wanted).Rand was far more suited to take that loss than she was, and he will be happy living a life of anonymity (as long as that lasts), whereas that would not have suited Egwene at all.

 

Dom, over at RAFO, had written quite a long post about why Egwene was not suited to be Amyrlin after the war and I think he was mostly on the money. I've included a link below, if you would like to read what he said. I always felt that, should Egwene be Amyrlin once TG was over, the world was in for a hell of a battle with her unless everyone submitted to the WT's (read: Amyrlin's) authority. I don't think there could have been real peace with her as Amyrlin, at least not for a while, because she was too determined to make the WT all-powerful again. What Dom said about balance made sense, though I doubt he and I see it in quite the same context. Without Rand taking a huge part in the world's affairs, Egwene was too dangerous to have as Amyrlin because there was no one else with the spine, or the means, to balance her out.

 

So the bottom line is that RJ stated Cadsuane would be Amyrlin, which meant Egwene had to be removed, one way or another. Personally, I think she was given the easy way out and handed, on a silver platter, recognition as a 'legend' instead of being forced to live a life without the power she had come to enjoy. And, no matter how much the AS came to revere her (part of which was self-preservation on their part - it's much easier to credit someone who cons you time and again as being brilliant than it is to admit you're a freaking moron), they would have taken her stole and ring once she was burned out. She did not have to suffer that humiliation, and she did not have to face living as a regular human being again. for her character, that was a gift. Death is lighter than a feather, after all...

 

Edited to add the link to Dom's post:

http://www.readandfindout.com/wheeloftime/messageboard/271649/

Edited April 26, 2013 by lilltempest

[Suttree]

That is a great link liltempest. Bottom line all of the channelers were almost criminally underepresented in the LB. Not just AS but all of the ones simply dropped from the story as well.

[sleepinghour]

I think there's a good chance it was RJ who decided her death a long time ago, maybe even as far back as TEotW. Egwene suffered a similar fate as Eldrene, had a similar name, and was the only one in the Two Rivers group to recognize Eldrene's husband's warcry when Mat used it.

 

“When you shouted, I thought—just for a minute—I thought I understood you. But it’s all gone, now.” [Egwene] sighed and shook her head. “Perhaps you’re right. Strange what you can imagine at a time like that, isn’t it?”

 

“Carai an Caldazar,” Moiraine said. They all twisted to stare at her. “Carai an Ellisande. Al Ellisande. For the honor of the Red Eagle. For the honor of the Rose of the Sun. The Rose of the Sun. The ancient warcry of Manetheren, and the warcry of its last king. Eldrene was called the Rose of the Sun.” Moiraine’s smile took in Egwene and Mat both, though her gaze may have rested a moment longer on him than on her.

 

In the earlier books, there are a number of possible foreshadowings of Egwene's death, most notably "the Year of Four Amyrlins" quote from TPoD.
 

“Is the Hall always this bad, Siuan?”

 

Siuan nodded, shifting slightly to try to find a better balance. No two of her stool’s legs were the same length. “But it could be worse. Remind me to tell you about the Year of the Four Amyrlins; that was about a hundred and fifty years after the founding of Tar Valon. In those days, the normal workings of the Tower nearly rivaled what’s happening today. Every hand tried to snatch the tiller, if they could. There were actually two rival Halls of the Tower in Tar Valon for part of that year. Almost like now. Just about everyone came to grief in the end, including a few who thought they were going to save the Tower. Some of them might have, if they hadn’t stepped in quicksand. The Tower survived anyway, of course. It always does.”

 

Two rival Halls, four Amyrlins in one year, and "just about everyone came to grief in the end." Sound familiar?

 

Gawyn's death was also more than likely, since Egwene dreamed of it in ACoS:

 

In the way of dreams she floated above a long, straight road across a grassy plain, looking down upon a man riding a black stallion. Gawyn. Then she was standing in the road in front of him, and he reined in. Not because he saw her, this time, but the road that had been straight now forked right where she stood, running over tall hills so no one could see what lay beyond. She knew, though. Down one fork was his violent death, down the other, a long life and a death in bed. On one path, he would marry her, on the other, not. She knew what lay ahead, but not which way led to which. Suddenly he did see her, or seemed to, and smiled, and turned his horse along one of the forks...

 

There were other uncertain viewings involving Gawyn and Egwene. In LoC, she dreamed of Gawyn "swinging a door closed on her, and she knew if that narrowing gap of light vanished, she was dead." In ACoS, Egwene dreamed that "straps at waist and shoulder held her tightly to the block, and the headsman's axe descended, but she knew that somewhere someone was running, and if they ran fast enough, the axe would stop."

 

It doesn't seem like RJ's style to add so many ominous viewings about Gawyn and Egwene unless he meant for at least one to end badly. As it turned out, Gawyn married her AND got a violent death. If Egwene had survived AMoL, it still wouldn't have been a very happy ending for her. I think Egwene dying in a blaze of glory was in many ways a kinder fate than Egwene surviving.

 

It's also worth noting that Brandon and Team Jordan have given us many Aes Sedai answers over the years. Brandon saying he was instructed to make Cadsuane Amyrlin doesn't necessarily mean it was RJ who decided it. It was Harriet who decided Siuan's death (RJ left no notes on Siuan after TGS), and Bela's. So it could have been Harriet who made the call on Egwene as well. If that's the case, I wish they would tell us, but they clearly have no intention of giving us any further details at this point.

[mbuehner]

I think there's a good chance it was RJ who decided her death a long time ago, maybe even as far back as TEotW. Egwene suffered a similar fate as Eldrene, had a similar name, and was the only one in the Two Rivers group to recognize Eldrene's husband's warcry when Mat used it.

 

“When you shouted, I thought—just for a minute—I thought I understood you. But it’s all gone, now.” [Egwene] sighed and shook her head. “Perhaps you’re right. Strange what you can imagine at a time like that, isn’t it?”

 

“Carai an Caldazar,” Moiraine said. They all twisted to stare at her. “Carai an Ellisande. Al Ellisande. For the honor of the Red Eagle. For the honor of the Rose of the Sun. The Rose of the Sun. The ancient warcry of Manetheren, and the warcry of its last king. Eldrene was called the Rose of the Sun.” Moiraine’s smile took in Egwene and Mat both, though her gaze may have rested a moment longer on him than on her.

 

In the earlier books, there are a number of possible foreshadowings of Egwene's death, most notably "the Year of Four Amyrlins" quote from TPoD.

 

“Is the Hall always this bad, Siuan?”

 

Siuan nodded, shifting slightly to try to find a better balance. No two of her stool’s legs were the same length. “But it could be worse. Remind me to tell you about the Year of the Four Amyrlins; that was about a hundred and fifty years after the founding of Tar Valon. In those days, the normal workings of the Tower nearly rivaled what’s happening today. Every hand tried to snatch the tiller, if they could. There were actually two rival Halls of the Tower in Tar Valon for part of that year. Almost like now. Just about everyone came to grief in the end, including a few who thought they were going to save the Tower. Some of them might have, if they hadn’t stepped in quicksand. The Tower survived anyway, of course. It always does.”

 

Two rival Halls, four Amyrlins in one year, and "just about everyone came to grief in the end." Sound familiar?

 

Gawyn's death was also more than likely, since Egwene dreamed of it in ACoS:

 

In the way of dreams she floated above a long, straight road across a grassy plain, looking down upon a man riding a black stallion. Gawyn. Then she was standing in the road in front of him, and he reined in. Not because he saw her, this time, but the road that had been straight now forked right where she stood, running over tall hills so no one could see what lay beyond. She knew, though. Down one fork was his violent death, down the other, a long life and a death in bed. On one path, he would marry her, on the other, not. She knew what lay ahead, but not which way led to which. Suddenly he did see her, or seemed to, and smiled, and turned his horse along one of the forks...

 

There were other uncertain viewings involving Gawyn and Egwene. In LoC, she dreamed of Gawyn "swinging a door closed on her, and she knew if that narrowing gap of light vanished, she was dead." In ACoS, Egwene dreamed that "straps at waist and shoulder held her tightly to the block, and the headsman's axe descended, but she knew that somewhere someone was running, and if they ran fast enough, the axe would stop."

 

It doesn't seem like RJ's style to add so many ominous viewings about Gawyn and Egwene unless he meant for at least one to end badly. As it turned out, Gawyn married her AND got a violent death. If Egwene had survived AMoL, it still wouldn't have been a very happy ending for her. I think Egwene dying in a blaze of glory was in many ways a kinder fate than Egwene surviving.

 

It's also worth noting that Brandon and Team Jordan have given us many Aes Sedai answers over the years. Brandon saying he was instructed to make Cadsuane Amyrlin doesn't necessarily mean it was RJ who decided it. It was Harriet who decided Siuan's death (RJ left no notes on Siuan after TGS), and Bela's. So it could have been Harriet who made the call on Egwene as well. If that's the case, I wish they would tell us, but they clearly have no intention of giving us any further details at this point.

 

Well, say what you want about Gawyn but he certainly lived the old saying, "If you come to a fork in the road, take it."

[Rhienne]

I am pretty sure RJ decided on Egwene's death. I believe RJ wrote all the epilogue POVs apart from Cadsuane's, and in Perrin's POV he and Nynaeve discuss Egwene's death.