I want to emphasize one of Edelgard’s motivations. The discussion often arises as to why she started a war instead of opting for a slower approach towards reform, like Claude (although him starting a war later certainly was a possibility). Edelgard’s urgency is often attributed to her shortened lifespan. After all, Lysithea specifically cites her shortened lifespan as a huge driver. While that is important, she is also powerfully and explicitly motivated by empathy: the desire that no one should suffer as she has.

Edelgard is an empath, someone who instinctively feels through empathy (rather than empathy being a chosen or deliberate mode of feeling). Empathy allows her to reciprocate kindness, softness, and intimacy easily. Unlike many depictions of empathy, however, we also get the other side. Empathy, exposed to trauma and suffering, produces rage and profound pain. Edelgard has suffered a great deal on her own account, but she also carries the suffering of those around her. Even as her own torture fades into the past, she is constantly exposed to new sources of pain. Conversely, no one, except CF Byleth, connects her with benign sources of empathetic emotion.

For some elaboration, human development studies identify a class of child like Edelgard, sometimes called “orchid children.” Most children can do ok in a wide variety of circumstances. They may not thrive without special nurture, but they will be ok. Orchid children are defined by the fact that they are highly sensitive. This elevated sensitivity gives them orchid-like characteristics. If they are nurtured carefully, they are able to become brilliant, kind, and genuinely unusual. However, if they are not deliberately nurtured, they wither. Sensitive children, often empaths, hurt much more from the absence of nurture. They have incredible difficulty becoming well-adjusted or overcoming trauma. It goes without saying that Edelgard has not been well-nurtured and we see that. Until she receives nurture, she is almost unable to express her true emotions and intentions, ask for help or support, or trust others.

Edelgard is proximate to the suffering that the Church, aristocracy, and TWS cause, having lost much of herself and her loved ones to them. Proximity is an important concept in all humanitarian efforts, but it impacts empaths more extremely. Edelgard knows that the longer she waits, the longer these organizations continue to victimize innocents and the further away her wish to end such things moves. The longer she waits, the more tempting her own privilege to ignore continued oppression becomes. (Quoting Edge of Dawn: “As I live out / Each peaceful day / Deep in my soul / Oh, I know I can’t stay” and “Open the door / And walk away / Never give in / To the call of yesterday”). Even if human suffering weren’t reinforced by her direct experiences, she would know empathetically know that the form of suffering she endured continues.

In particular, we have Edelgard, Lysithea, Annette, Dedue, Monika, and Tomas as direct victims of TWS, Ashe’s family and Hapi as direct victims of the Church, and Felix, Ingrid, Dorothea, Miklan, Mercedes, Jeritza, and Raphael as direct victims of the aristocracy. That so many people from the Officers Academy are victims speaks volumes about how much oppression must necessarily affect the poor classes. We see only a sliver, but we know that the body count is increasingly rapidly.

Every year Edelgard delays, she knows there are more children whose hair is bleached white. More families are broken. Edelgard is an empathetic character: she absorbs the suffering of those around her. It can make her soft and kind, if she has the right support, but to experience so much pain, to be conscious of ongoing evil, also makes one hard. Empathy, without positive contributions, in a world full of cruelty and suffering, is genuine torture. It has been observed in sociology that intense empathy can produce decision paralysis in some cases or, in others, such intense emotional identification with one party that the empath stops sensing the emotion of another group, usually due to rage.

I have focused on empathy as it works on her decision to declare war, but it operates throughout her character. Before I sign off, consider how she insists on equality in the house, how she mothers her peers, her emotional struggles in routes besides CF, why her relationship with Hubert doesn’t stabilize her, and, of course, her whole relationship with Byleth.

[Originally written 14 Feb 2020 for r/Edelgard]