Dear Ms. Vina Jie-Min Prasad:
Loose Endings by
Sriram Rajagopal
One
of my favorite series is the Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini. The
series focuses on a young man named Eragon. From his initial finding of a
dragon egg in the forests of the Spine through his journey through the lands of
Alagaesia, the story follows his life. Eragon and his dragon, Saphira fight
their way through armies and enemy Dragon Riders to the throne room of
Galbatorix, the evil rules of their land. Eragon’s meeting with the evil
Galbatorix marks the beginning of the ending, one of the best endings in my
recent memory.
The
ending of the story, and the series, both of which are neatly named
Inheritance, starts off like many endings, with Eragon, the hero, defeating the
dark and evil Galbatorix and restoring peace to the land. However, unlike other
stories, the end was not the real end. Even after the evil ruler was killed and
a new, more righteous queen was put on the throne, Eragon still had problems to
deal with and there was still so many loose ends and empty promises not
fulfilled. The story might be close to finishing but Eragon’s was just
beginning.
As
should be clear from the paragraph above, something that I really enjoy in an
ending is the presence of an even bigger story, something that is unfulfilled
even at the end of a 4 book, 4000 page series like Inheritance was. Eragon
still had to find a place to raise his new legion of Riders, he still had to
live his life out, and he still had much to learn. Eragon and Alagaesia’s story
was nowhere near to completion, even if our knowledge of their lives comes to
an end. A story with a purpose unfulfilled at the end leads a reader to
speculate and think deeper, allowing a reader to learn and not just mindlessly
follow along.
A
story with many loose ends untied at the end also holds true with me, and
encourages me to think outside the box and speculate. For example in the
Inheritance Cycle, Angela is a witch with immeasurable powers and an abundance
of magical knowledge. However, readers get no indication of who this mysterious
witch is, or even which race she belongs to. Readers are also left in the dark
as to many secrets hinted at in the series, including a floating crystal on the
small island of Eoam, an Urgal (monster) king and many mysteries at home in
Alagaesia. These loose ends do not, however, deter the reader but rather
encourages them to think for themselves and speculate. Speculate on who Angela
is, speculate on the future of Alagaesia, and most importantly, the future of Eragon
and his dragon(s).
All
in all, I believe the reason I am so enamored by the ending of the Inheritance
cycle is due to its ability to force me, or more lightly put, encourage me to
think for myself. Paolini forces his readers to speculate on topics that are
never touched upon and therefore creates an army of theory crafters, which puts
a whole new spin on his story as a whole. What isn’t answered becomes an
immediate topic of discussion, opening up a whole new world.
I
really love loose en-
Sriram,
ReplyDelete(I see what you did there.)
Endings are sticky wickets, for many reasons, not least of which is the fact that the very thing you like-- looseness and the ability to fill in imagined blanks -- would make certain readers bonkers with dissatisfaction. Perhaps the key is to find an ending that suits the kind of reader the author imagines they have been writing for all this time.
Best,
TT