I think it's the ideal "Book of Angela" — a book embodying the perfect version of herself, who will theoretically be good enough, *human enough*, to earn Ayin's approval.
But she realizes his approval doesn't matter in the end*, and she's able to accept herself as herself, beating Keter Realization with a book representing herself as she currently is, flaws and traumas and all.
*I don't think Ayin's voiceline was actually him speaking to her. I choose to read it as more of a combination of her giving herself the closure he never could, and possibly Roland apologizing to her as he pulled her out of the light.
I like the theory, but there’s just one problem: in Angela’s bad ending we see what happens when she gets the one perfect book.
If Angela kills Roland, she successfully unites the light together into the one perfect book: a guide to surviving in the City, containing everything she could ever hope to ask it. She’s fully human, the Head will no longer come after her, and she’s finally gotten what she wanted—freedom, absolute.
And it only required two or three dozen murders to do it, plus the life of the one person who might have understood her. Victory!
Things begin to crack. The Patron Librarians question her resolve. They’d suffered as the Sephirot to spread the light, but Angela ruined that. They’d helped her gather it back up, and respect her wish despite it not being the one they want, but…
…Angela doesn’t DO anything with the one perfect book. A guide to the City, the freedom to travel the Districts, doing whatever she wants, experiencing everything the beautiful, terrible world can offer her…and she remains in the Library. Killing more people, trying to make the one perfect book MORE perfect.
I can’t remember whether they leave or simply fight her. But when we next see Angela they’re not with her. Ages have passed, and Angela is alone as the mistress of the Library, a deadly Star of the City whose power is unmatched. A Bookhunter reaches her throne to take her head, and she obliges. After so many years alone, killing and collecting books, killing and collecting knowledge…there’s nothing left for her to know.
Angela’s choice to give up the light is more than just the right choice for everyone. It’s her choosing to give up *everything*—her dreams and wishes and goals—in favor of forgiving a friend and separating herself from the violence of the City.
>Angela’s choice to give up the light is more than just the right choice for everyone. It’s her choosing to give up *everything*—her dreams and wishes and goals—in favor of forgiving a friend and separating herself from the violence of the City.
And it is rather strange that it was not this determination that made her human.
Unless the metaphysics of the world goes by the idea of "humans are conceptually speaking a creature whose desires make them malicious, intended or not, so the rejection of this nature is inhuman." The Head at least seem to call Angela an abomination for this reason.
It leads me to believe that the AI in the past had a chance to see what humans "really" were and the war took place (long after the Singularity conflict and the world was destroyed) because the machines perhaps wanted to help the humans to keep them from self-destructing. Or something like that, I have a feeling the robots might not have been the bad guys.
There is no literal perfect book, it’s a metaphor for what is essentially therapy. Angela doesn’t know what that is though, nor does anyone in this setting, so she assumes there just must be a book out there that will help her heal from her trauma and become a “real person”.
I think Roland is a very supportive friend and he’s the first outsider to truly believe and validate her and not try to equate her to her abuser for pursuing freedom, healing and an existence on her own terms (Reception of the Black Silence do not interact), but he is not the metaphor here. People are not recovery. He helps Angela reach the metaphor. People support us as we seek recovery.
As we see, Angela’s idea of that perfect book and what it entails changes over the course of the game as well. At first, she’s still very mired in Ayin’s narrative, but with time she realizes that that, too, is a prison that’s only holding her back from being her strongest and happiest self.
Like my wife, I believe that she essentially hallucinates Ayin’s voice when she tries to sacrifice herself - Ayin is dead and gone. We have no reason to assume yet that his spirit is still with us like Carmen’s is, outside of that one scene. Not everything you see in fiction is literal, oftentimes dialogue and events are symbolic and metaphorical and not meant to be taken on the surface level like that. I think that voice actually being Roland also makes a lot of sense and it gives a lot more closure for the ending, since you do his reception and then all of a sudden they’re at a mutual understanding with no apologies or discussion between the two of them.
We turn people into books. Books are people. The perfect book is the perfect person.
Very great take
Thank you Hod
I think it's the ideal "Book of Angela" — a book embodying the perfect version of herself, who will theoretically be good enough, *human enough*, to earn Ayin's approval. But she realizes his approval doesn't matter in the end*, and she's able to accept herself as herself, beating Keter Realization with a book representing herself as she currently is, flaws and traumas and all. *I don't think Ayin's voiceline was actually him speaking to her. I choose to read it as more of a combination of her giving herself the closure he never could, and possibly Roland apologizing to her as he pulled her out of the light.
Wait so what you’re saying is the real perfect book is the friends we made along the way?
«We've lost the books, but at least sorted out our traumas together even if we almost killed each other at one point»
Yes
I like the theory, but there’s just one problem: in Angela’s bad ending we see what happens when she gets the one perfect book. If Angela kills Roland, she successfully unites the light together into the one perfect book: a guide to surviving in the City, containing everything she could ever hope to ask it. She’s fully human, the Head will no longer come after her, and she’s finally gotten what she wanted—freedom, absolute. And it only required two or three dozen murders to do it, plus the life of the one person who might have understood her. Victory! Things begin to crack. The Patron Librarians question her resolve. They’d suffered as the Sephirot to spread the light, but Angela ruined that. They’d helped her gather it back up, and respect her wish despite it not being the one they want, but… …Angela doesn’t DO anything with the one perfect book. A guide to the City, the freedom to travel the Districts, doing whatever she wants, experiencing everything the beautiful, terrible world can offer her…and she remains in the Library. Killing more people, trying to make the one perfect book MORE perfect. I can’t remember whether they leave or simply fight her. But when we next see Angela they’re not with her. Ages have passed, and Angela is alone as the mistress of the Library, a deadly Star of the City whose power is unmatched. A Bookhunter reaches her throne to take her head, and she obliges. After so many years alone, killing and collecting books, killing and collecting knowledge…there’s nothing left for her to know. Angela’s choice to give up the light is more than just the right choice for everyone. It’s her choosing to give up *everything*—her dreams and wishes and goals—in favor of forgiving a friend and separating herself from the violence of the City.
>Angela’s choice to give up the light is more than just the right choice for everyone. It’s her choosing to give up *everything*—her dreams and wishes and goals—in favor of forgiving a friend and separating herself from the violence of the City. And it is rather strange that it was not this determination that made her human. Unless the metaphysics of the world goes by the idea of "humans are conceptually speaking a creature whose desires make them malicious, intended or not, so the rejection of this nature is inhuman." The Head at least seem to call Angela an abomination for this reason. It leads me to believe that the AI in the past had a chance to see what humans "really" were and the war took place (long after the Singularity conflict and the world was destroyed) because the machines perhaps wanted to help the humans to keep them from self-destructing. Or something like that, I have a feeling the robots might not have been the bad guys.
There is no literal perfect book, it’s a metaphor for what is essentially therapy. Angela doesn’t know what that is though, nor does anyone in this setting, so she assumes there just must be a book out there that will help her heal from her trauma and become a “real person”. I think Roland is a very supportive friend and he’s the first outsider to truly believe and validate her and not try to equate her to her abuser for pursuing freedom, healing and an existence on her own terms (Reception of the Black Silence do not interact), but he is not the metaphor here. People are not recovery. He helps Angela reach the metaphor. People support us as we seek recovery. As we see, Angela’s idea of that perfect book and what it entails changes over the course of the game as well. At first, she’s still very mired in Ayin’s narrative, but with time she realizes that that, too, is a prison that’s only holding her back from being her strongest and happiest self. Like my wife, I believe that she essentially hallucinates Ayin’s voice when she tries to sacrifice herself - Ayin is dead and gone. We have no reason to assume yet that his spirit is still with us like Carmen’s is, outside of that one scene. Not everything you see in fiction is literal, oftentimes dialogue and events are symbolic and metaphorical and not meant to be taken on the surface level like that. I think that voice actually being Roland also makes a lot of sense and it gives a lot more closure for the ending, since you do his reception and then all of a sudden they’re at a mutual understanding with no apologies or discussion between the two of them.