The Road to A Memory of Light: the Eye of the World

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The adventure starts off in a small town that has been disconnected from the rest of the world for generations, with the exception of the occasional peddler type. With very little exposure to the world, the village folk seem to have formed irrational fears of anything not Two Rivers born. Aes Sedai and the Tower are no exception to these fears.

The first impression we have of Aes Sedai is negative. It seems to be a common misconception that Aes Sedai "broke" the world and are servants of The Dark One. Whether or not these ideas are common in other rural areas is not examined at this time, but I think it is meant to illustrate just how remote the Two Rivers really is and how easily things can become confused when you lock yourself away from the world.

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Even when the village discovers there is an Aes Sedai among them, and she and her Gaidin saved them from an invading fist of Trollocs, many refuse to believe she could be anything but evil. Rand, a young man forced to go to her for help for his dying father, is willing to believe that she is not what he always assumed and puts his trust in her. Rand's friends Mat and Perrin also have to trust the Aes Sedai, Moiraine, enough to leave their home to go with her. Of all the villagers, it is Egwene, a young woman, who is the most eager to have an adventure and to believe in and trust the Aes Sedai.

Tiny village mindset aside, we do get the chance to see a slightly different viewpoint throughout the rest of the book. People seem to either believe in the honor of the Aes Sedai or have vast mistrust of them. Mostly because the Aes Sedai wield a power the average person does not really understand and that gives them a position of power over most anybody they meet. The three oaths are only touched on, and we get no strong sense of how these affect the group as a whole until later in the series, but even before we know much about them the Oaths direct Moiraine and her actions.

Other notable reactions to women of the Tower are pointed out in the town of Baerlon, where we meet our religious zealots, the Whitecloaks, for the first time. Their hatred of Darkfriends is absolute and it is made clear almost immediately that “Darkfriend” to this group means “anybody who does not defer to our authority and submit to our version of the world.” It is no surprise to find they feel these independent Aes Sedai are the very definition of Darkfriends.

We see another reaction to the Aes Sedai in Caemlyn, capital city of Andor, where many feel the same way as the Whitecloaks. However, there is a large contingent of people who have a good deal of respect and admiration for Aes Sedai as well. Their Queen has had an Aes Sedai advisor for many generations. In Caemlyn, we meet the only other Aes Sedai in the book, Elaida, and find her to be quite intimidating to our hero, Rand. In that moment we see how much influence an Aes Sedai can carry with the leaders of the world.

How many other rulers have an Aes Sedai sitting next to them, directing their actions? The reason for much of the hatred starts to become clear. As with any authority figure there will always be a good deal of mistrust from the common person, and the Aes Sedai have a double whammy of being able to wield magic as well. It is no wonder those that do not know them well would assume the Aes Sedai are out for their own benefit, but it is never fully explained why so many believe them to be Darkfriends. Even in later volumes, when we see that some are, in fact, Darkfriends, it is never explained how this mindset became commonplace in many regions of the world.