And the Shadow fell upon the Land, and the World was riven stone from stone. The oceans fled, and the mountains were swallowed up, and the nations were scattered to the eight corners of the World. The moon was as blood, and the sun was as ashes. The seas boiled, and the living envied the dead. All was shattered, and all but memory lost, and one memory above all others, of him who brought the Shadow and the Breaking of the World. And him they named Dragon.
(from Aleth nin Taerin alta Camora,
The Breaking of the World.
Author unknown, the Fourth Age)
The first book in a planned series of fantasy novels often do not contain all the elements which fans come to rely upon and love in subsequent novels. A series is a living, breathing organism that evolves over time. Despite that being so, however, The Wheel of Time is notable for the dependable recurring features that readers come to expect to always be there with the next installment actually having been in place from the beginning. This prefatory quote from a non-existent fictional ancient text in place before the first chapter is an example. Each of the books in the series will expand upon the library of ancient texts existing within the world created by the author. And each quote from those texts, like this, will serve as foreshadowing of the themes to be explored.
The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. In one Age, called the Third Age by some, an Age yet to come, an Age long past, a wind rose in the Mountains of Mist. The wind was not the beginning. There are neither beginnings nor endings to the turning of the Wheel of Time. But it was a beginning.
Check out that “Mountains of Mist” reference as it is of supreme importance. With each new entry in the series, Chapter One begins in exactly the same way. Well, not exactly. Minor alterations in language sometimes occur and there is always one major change: the wind always rises somewhere else in the geographical landscape of this invented world. In this case, of course, this particular opening helps to situate the fundamental concept of the series, that time moves cyclically like a wheel that has always been and will always be in motion.
"As the Wheel of Time turns," Moiraine said, half to herself and with a distant look in her eyes, "places wear many names. Men wear many names, many faces. Different faces, but always the same man. Yet no one knows the Great Pattern the Wheel weaves, or even the Pattern of an Age. We can only watch, and study, and hope."
Rand stared at her, unable to a word, even to ask what she meant…The other two were just as tongue-tied, he noticed. Erwin’s mouth hung open.
The reader may well be there alongside and the others. There is a lot of that going on in the novel, but don’t mistake it for a flaw in the work. It is a characteristic of the fantasy genre. People will often muse to themselves in contemplative manner about grandiloquent ideas that lead the “band” around them directly to such response. This is especially so in great big books that are part of extensive series. The fantasy genre, like all literary genres, are ruled by certain conventions and expectations. It is almost certainly the reason why that first fantasy novel that a person reads is often a make-or-break kind of deal. One tends to either be drawn like a magnet to those conventions or run screaming in terror with their mouths, like Erwin’s, wide open. Then there is also the other aspect of this quote which is capable of leaving one slack-jawed: Moiraine’s words sound like the introduction to a soap opera.
