[Question about reading, research, sources, influences.]
It’s hard really for a figure that I’ve been researching for the Wheel of Time. I see things, I notice things. I realize, “I can use this.” An example I’ve used to you before, but it’s a good one, is that [after leaving Tanchico, Nynaeve and Elayne needed] traveling companions. I wanted them to travel with some people, rather than by themselves. I wasn’t too sure exactly what sort of group I was going to use. And I happened to go to the circus.
And the circus happened to have a lot of acts that… (were) from Asia. I don’t know why they seemed to have such a disproportionate number of acts from Asia. They were much different than most European circus acts and American circus acts, which are very similar to European circus acts. And when I went to my desk the next morning, I realized I knew exactly how Elayne and Nynaeve were going to travel. With Valan Luca’s show.
I have read for close on to fifty years, everything I could get my hands on. Various bits and pieces have been stuck in my head. And I use them. And sometimes…and if I see anything that’s interesting, and a lot of things interest me, cultural anthropology, development of cities, how a windmill works, how does a waterwheel work? these things interest me, as much as how a modern day skyscraper is built, or how do you go about building a base on the moon?, or how do you go about building an industrial facility in an L5-point? Sometimes I do research and then… Well, I know nothing about blacksmithing really…[followed by that story you’ve heard before] No matter what you know, if you’re an expert blacksmith, I want you to read right past that blacksmith scene, and believe it. And of course very few people will be expert blacksmiths, but that’s fine. Because no matter what the scene is, I want you to believe it. No matter what your own knowledge is.
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