Honor-Down: Let’s Analyze Hollow Empire

(I’ll tell you right now that I don’t have any grand conclusions. This is just for fun. Also SPOILERS.)

You ever read something and think about analyzing it through the lenses of poetic metaphor and conceptual blending theory? (please say yes). Well, that’s what I did with Hollow Empire by Sam Hawke. So here’s a brief analysis of some of the language. I’ll largely be using More than Cool Reason by Lakoff & Turner and The Way We Think by Fauconnier & Turner as the other sources. And by largely, I mean only cause I’m lazy and this is just for fun like I said.

Okay so, there are a bunch of metaphors we tend to glaze over because of how common they are. For example, GOOD IS UP, BAD IS DOWN. (Things are looking up! Don’t be so down on yourself.) Let’s explore a bit of this poetic metaphor first.

One of the most common phrases in the book is “honor-down,” which at surface level is just an interjection.

Honor-down, what are the chances of them pulling someone off the street who was sleeping with the Emperor’s daughter? Of all the people to have gotten caught up in this mess!”

Location 2182 in the ebook (emphasis mine)

A quick search shows that the phrase appears 69 times in the book.
…
So anyway, while it is certainly an interjection, I’d argue that it presents itself as a spatial/poetic metaphor of DOWN IS CONTROL or more specifically, GROUNDED IS GOOD. Why grounded specifically? Let’s talk about Kalina real quick. She isn’t that friendly with water. “Drowning, drowning in the river again, drowning in the air,” (Location 4327 of ebook, emphasis Hawke’s). Also, the air isn’t so fun either as we can see. She’s attacked by a birdlike creature for one. Compare her to the Prince who “crouched, then exploded into the air, like a bird taking flight” (Loc 8622). Antagonizing things are typically described as being up. “stir up trouble; raised an eyebrow [in confusion]; building tension dropped; riling each other up” (Hawke). That’s not to say every instance of UP is used this way. For example, there are mentions of things being cleared up or resting up. And there’s also talks of things being low, meant in a negative sense. However, the key word from before is GROUNDED. The protagonists, especially Kalina, are safest on the ground. That’s why it’s such a shock for Kalina to have the incident of nearly drowning on dry land. Her place of safety has become her place of horror. However, there’s a subtle reversal near the end. She falls into the water as the traitor is about to strike, but she is able to stand atop it. Thus, in a sense she conquers her fears — first helped by her kiss in the bathing pool earlier.

What does this have to do with “honor-down”? Each time the phrase is used, it’s in a way that mentally grounds the speaker or narrator. Let’s segue into conceptual blending theory. We’ve got different spaces. Very briefly: 2 input spaces, 1 generic space, 1 blended space. So while poetic metaphor can briefly show us that “honor-down” comes across as GROUNDED IS GOOD, reflected elsewhere in the book as aforementioned, conceptual blending theory can help explain it just a bit more. Let’s examine and define those spaces:

Input Space 1: Where the narrator/speaker is. The actual physical place.
Input Space 2: Where the situation is, generally in the metaphorical air. Wild. Out of control.
Generic space: the situation as a whole
Blended space: Here, the speaker is taking the confusion and bringing it down to their level, where it can be understood or more generally, tamed.

In the example given above, the speaker is expressing confusion over “them” taking someone off the street. By prefacing it with “honor-down,” they are attempting to ground the situation so that it’s under control. We see another form of this elsewhere: “Lazar slapped the table” (Hawke, Loc 8084) during an intense meeting with lots of talking and opinions flying everywhere. By slapping the table, Lazar seems to forcefully grasp one of the opinions and slams it down on the table. Immediately afterwards, he expresses, “Yes, yes…but isn’t that the key point?” (8084). This act of forcefully bringing ones hands, fist, or an object down on something also appears elsewhere: “Tain slammed his hands on the stone,” “I slapped the book down on the table,” (Hawke).

Are the characters consciously thinking about these input spaces and generic spaces, etc when they say “honor-down” or even thinking about the phrase “honor-down” as a sort of grounding mantra? Probably not. In fact, I’m comfortable with saying the answer is an emphatic no. However, we don’t (typically) think about it when we read the book either and comment to ourselves like we’re talking with the author.

So it’s fitting that this interjection of “honor-down” is used to ground and tame situations, especially since (as mentioned above) the antagonistic actions tend to be from above. Other examples include the scene where the traitor is literally standing above Kalina in the water near the end. There’s also the scene where the Prince goes up a mountain to wreak havoc on the people.

Anyway, I haven’t read City of Lies yet.