This morning I had to leap out of the shower three times and dash across the house, freezing my butt off.
Once, I realized I had no towels or washcloth because I forgot to replace after laundry yesterday. Once more, when I realized I had no soap. And the final time when I heard what I believed to be a panicked knocking at the door sounded. I leaped from the shower, threw on some clothes, and dashed to the door, thinking I needed to answer to see what it was all about.
This last turned out to be nothing. Or, more specifically, my dog barking at nothing but running across the hardwood floors to the door so fast that it sounded like someone knocking.
Sigh.
All of this is to say that my morning today was a very fitting tribute to an unusual holiday that adorns the 9th of November. Chaos Never Dies Day.
While no one is sure who exactly the originator of Chaos Never Dies Day was, the holiday has a pretty simple premise. Mainly, to accept that chaos and unpredictability will always be part of life, and celebrate surviving and thriving despite that fact by treating ourselves to our favorite de-stressors.
Precisely why, after finishing this post and my other work for the evening, I will be treating myself to a Robert Jordan book in a bath. Probably with bubbles. From which I will, fingers crossed, not have to leap out and dash across the house in a panic.
And tea, of course.
Now, chaos can take many forms in our lives and art, and I think it’s only fitting that we celebrate this holiday with a look at three of the places that chaos has cropped up in fantasy.
- The Magic of Recluce
Now, I haven’t personally read these, but they are on my list, and one can hardly discuss order and chaos in fantasy without mentioning Modesitt’s Recluce books. The magic system is directly centered around chaos vs. order, after all.
From what I’ve read about the series, the books often involve individuals growing into their skills and confidence. In the first book, the emotional journey plays out through a character’s developing wood working skills.
The above is an important takeaway for a holiday like today. Real growth may be slow and painful, just as bringing order out of chaos can be. Finding the joy in your order or your chaos, whichever you have at the moment, maybe daunting. But you will likely be better for it in the end.
- Lord of Chaos
The sixth book in the Wheel of Time series showed Rand al’ Thor growing in power in tandem with the Dark One, as the seals on the Dark One’s prison grow ever weaker. In the opening chapters, a conversation between one of the Forsaken and the Dark One always struck me as odd.
In that dialog, the Dark One instructs to “Let the Lord of Chaos rule.” This implies that, despite what one might assume from the title, the Dark One himself is not necessarily the titular Lord of Chaos.
This is the book where the protagonist Rand starts to shake up society’s long-established systems, founding the Black Tower to train male channelers and the like. True, the Dark One is the one messing up the climate and causing bubbles of evil to make crazy things happen all over. Still, in many ways, one can argue that Rand is, in fact, the Lord of Chaos.
Perhaps the real takeaway is that the struggle between good and evil is the real Lord of Chaos. Whatever the case, this book definitely had chaos to spare and is a perfect choice for this holiday.
- Armageddon’s Children
Terry Brook’s post-apocalyptic fantasy did more than tie two of the most popular fantasy series together. Did it give us a glimpse into a shocking near future and the ramifications of environmental disaster set against a fantasy backdrop? Yes, it did that too.
But you know what I’m driving at by now. This book brought us chaos—the chaos of the void. Oh, so, very, much, chaos.
What struck me about this novel at the time was how the Knights of the Word no longer saw visions of a nightmarish future they had to prevent, as they did in the Word and Void trilogy. Instead, they saw visions of the peaceful past that they had failed to save.
In theory, the Lady of the Word sent them these visions to motivate them as they continued to try and save what remained of humanity. Yet I think at times it had the opposite effect, merely demoralizing the remaining knights. A haunting reminder of how powerful a force regret can be in our lives, whether it motivates us to create order or beats us down into further chaos.
There you have it, three prime examples of chaos in fantasy. Somehow, reading these makes the chaos in my life seem a little more manageable. How about you?
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I believe I have a bath to get to.
