despite being a book that features magical forests, dreams being brought into reality and demons among other fantastical elements, the least realistic thing about the raven cycle is ronan not attending adam’s graduation. a major theme during the four books that make up the raven cycle is the development of the relationship between the two boys and the ways in which they come to support and lean on each other; the narrative choice to have ronan not attend in support of adam is at odds with this. during the books we are shown the many ways in which they open up to each other and come to depend on each other, examples of which are ronan’s continued defence of adam and his help in securing the apartment at st agnes as he knows the importance of independence for adam. we see adam reciprocate this support and understanding; he is the first person to find out that ronan dreamt cabeswater and is who ronan turns to for help with both getting rid of greenmantle and solving the issue of how to wake dreams up. when ronan loses his mother it is largely adam who supports him. given that adam has worked so hard to reach graduation and the event is of great importance and significance to him it is unbelievable that ronan wouldn’t want to be there to cheer him and his accomplishments on. furthermore, as we know that adam invited his parents there especially appears to be a contradiction in ronan’s decision to bypass the event. previously we have seen how protective ronan is of adam with regards to his parents, evidenced when ronan beats the living shit out of robert parrish, his attendance in court, and later his displeasure when adam inadvertently directs them back to the trailer park and we learn of ronan’s anger towards robert’s lack of punishment for hurting adam. it therefore seems unlikely he wouldn’t want to be there on the off chance adam’s parents did decide to attend, even if it was an unlikely scenario. in this essay i will
ok buckle up kiddos it’s conspiracy™ time: due to the consistent use of the dative case throughout the raven cycle gansey can be considered a raven king in the series, directly paralleling owain glyndwr. in this essay we will (actually give you an essay i said buckle up)
According to the great source of knowledge that is wikipedia, Glendower used to serve in King Richard’s army (in August 1385, but that’s not really relevant to this).
Because I know so much about Latin (this is a bold faced lie I know nothing about Latin so the following is credited to Dan @josephkavinskys).
Dan speaks here hi henlo (just for the record I verified all of this with my Latin teacher (who has a degree) so dont @ me if it’s wrong I’m trying my best):
“Rex Corvus, parate Regi Corvo”, which has been translated to ‘make way for the Raven King’ could instead be ‘King Raven, prepare for the Raven King’, or even ‘The King Raven is preparing for the Raven King”. The Latin ending ī is reserved for second declension* plurals and dative cases** so it is saying “for the Raven king” when it says “Regi Corvo”. but “parate” (prepare the, or in this case, prepare for the) is not necessarily dative which means it is also able to be part of the subject, “Rex Corvus”. Latin also does not require definite articles like “a” and “the” — therefore, ‘Raven King, make way for the raven king’.
In that case then: was Glendower making way for Gansey aka Glendower was supposed to serve Richard Gansey aka King Richard? Did Maggie name him Richard because of this? And what if those birds were telling Glendower to make way for Gansey? Did Glendower make way for Gansey by dying?
Not only that, but the Latin grammar of “Rex Corvus, parate Regi Corvo” is actually not completely correct. The correct dative form of rex is regi, and corvus would be corvo. This is a common mistake with young Latin students according to my Latin teacher, which would lead me to believe that it could feasibly be made by Ronan because according to Jenna he is “just a Latin student who really just speaks tree” and that’s valid, which leads us to this: Could Ronan be the one who dreamed the signs of Glendower, likely to satisfy Gansey, just like he dreamed Cabeswater? MAYBE SO.
Also worth noting that while Adam and Gansey’s translation of this is written, it is not read, it is spoken. This means that while the comma is written, it may not be officially “there” due to the relatively unreliable POV of a bunch of high schoolers.
Also, there is a consistent theme of parallelism throughout the series, with repeating motifs like the hubcap in the lake by Cabeswater and Cabeswater’s strange flux on time. It makes perfect sense to us that Maggie would do her research and throw in this little easter egg, along with all the other symbolism behind Gansey’s being Glendower throughout the series.
*(Latin words whose nominative singular noun form ends in -us, i.e. corvus) **(A specific conjugation of a Latin noun that indicates an indirect object, or giving something to/doing something for someone)
tl;dr: Glendower had to die to make way for Gansey to live and therefore Gansey is the Raven King.
i have… so many feelings about the demon possession part in trk and specifically chapter 62 and it’s nothing that hasn’t been said before but i was rereading that part after a long time, so here’s just a word vomit of adam parrish emotions
in the dream Adam and Ronan share in The Raven King, where Cabeswater is being unmade and they find Aurora, they also find the albino night horror:
Here was Ronan. Finally. Finally.
Ronan was circling something in the burned-out grass between ruined trees; when Adam drew closer he saw that it was a carcass. It was hard to tell what it had first looked like. It seemed to have chalky white skin, but deep slashes bit through the flesh; the edges of them curled in on themselves pinkly. A snarl of intestines roped out from under a greasy gray flap and hooked on a red-tipped claw.
Mushrooms burst through parts of all of it, and there was something terribly wrong about them; they were difficult to look at.
“No,” Ronan said. “Oh no. You bastard.”
“What is it?” Adam asked.
Ronan’s hand hovered over two parted beaks, side by side, both rimmed with black and something purple-red that Adam didn’t want to consider too deeply. “My night horror. God. Shit.”
it died defending Cabeswater from the demon, because:
“Why would it be here?”
“I don’t know. It cares about what I care about,” Ronan said.
the albino night horror was the first nightmare Ronan pulled from dreams that didn’t want him dead, that wanted to protect him and his dreams and his loved ones. it was the first time Ronan’s self-hatred manifested into self-acceptance, a symbol of living with your trauma yet not wanting to die. and it cared about Ronan deeply enough to fight to the death. and that’s why i’ll always remember it.
you guys ever think about in trk when ronan was being unmade how adam noticed declan was calling ronan’s phone and that meant something terrible was probably also happening to matthew. you guys ever think about how declan was helpless watching one of his brothers die and knew it meant ronan was dying too and he would be the last living member of the family he had given everything to protect. you guys ever think about that
bullshit central 