Thought experiment: Wickerbottom's insomnia

[minespatch]

Question: Is there any theories to Wickerbottom's insomnia? Could it be a jungian metaphor is there something else going on?

[OMGkawaiiAngel]

Perhaps she can't sleep because she may have read terrible stuff from the forbidden knowledge she knows?

[minespatch]

2 minutes ago, Charlie Dark said:

Perhaps she can't sleep because she may have read terrible stuff from the forbidden knowledge she knows?

I hope there's a metaphorical reason behind it besides your observation which makes sense.

[Yuuko]

What if they just gave her narcolepsy in her rework?  Have some pills she can craft that will stabalize her, allow her to sleep at night and stay awake throughout the day, but if she doesn't take her pills she will be unable to sleep, and might get groggy (like when the lunar ghosts hit you), and possibly fall asleep for a little bit if you don't get your pills.  Pills would be a daily thing.  Take 2 in the morning and be good all day.  She can start with a weeks supply and use something like seeds and nitre or gunpowder to craft more.

[OMGkawaiiAngel]

Just now, Shosuko said:

What if they just gave her narcolepsy in her rework?  Have some pills she can craft that will stabalize her, allow her to sleep at night and stay awake throughout the day, but if she doesn't take her pills she will be unable to sleep, and might get groggy (like when the lunar ghosts hit you), and possibly fall asleep for a little bit if you don't get your pills.  Pills would be a daily thing.  Take 2 in the morning and be good all day.  She can start with a weeks supply and use something like seeds and nitre or gunpowder to craft more.

[Blueleaf12]

I always thought her insomnia was from previous trauma she experienced before the Constant. Possibly nightmares from the library fire she was (likely) in, or losing a spouse and functional depression manifesting as insomnia. She is also a lot older, so could also be from menopause; insomnia is a common menopause symptom. I'm not sure what kind of metaphorical reason there could be, though. 

[Scrimbles]

Its probably just a classic lovecraft situation, shes got some forbidden knowledge and sleeping probably gives her nightmares.

I hope Klei plays around with that idea with her refresh, she could really use some more depth, and a proper downside.

[Toros]

On 5/23/2020 at 4:34 AM, Shosuko said:

What if they just gave her narcolepsy in her rework?  Have some pills she can craft that will stabalize her, allow her to sleep at night and stay awake throughout the day, but if she doesn't take her pills she will be unable to sleep, and might get groggy (like when the lunar ghosts hit you), and possibly fall asleep for a little bit if you don't get your pills.  Pills would be a daily thing.  Take 2 in the morning and be good all day.  She can start with a weeks supply and use something like seeds and nitre or gunpowder to craft more.

Thing is, sleeping is not a good strategy for anyone.  If everyone else doesn’t sleep without getting groggy, so why would she?

[Yuuko]

1 hour ago, Toros said:

Thing is, sleeping is not a good strategy for anyone.  If everyone else doesn’t sleep without getting groggy, so why would she?

narcolepsy is your body's inability to control when to sleep or not.  This includes both sudden onsets of drousiness and inability to sleep.  I don't propose she would "need" to sleep, rather she would need to take pills.  When she's taken these pills she could sleep in a tent or bedroll, and she wouldn't suffer any sudden drousiness.  If she misses her meds these would both become issues.

Why give her the ability to sleep?  Lets be honest - she can't get presents during winter feast and its not fair!! T_T

idk if its a good idea, I'm just spitballin XD Narcolepsy is an interesting disorder.

[ArubaroBeefalo]

if she cant sleep with days without sleep a mind can goes crazy so for me fits that her sanity could drop until she use some drug to force sleep

obv klei can make something more elaborate 

[kiwikenobi]

If you're looking for some in-quotes, literature class "meaning" behind Wickerbottom's inability to sleep, perhaps it represents some deep-rooted unrest within herself. It's not just that she learned about terrible, dark things. Perhaps she actually did them. Perhaps her dark deeds are unrelated to magic or the Constant, and are "only" mundane atrocities committed in the real world. And her guilt haunts her, and she can't ever find enough peace within herself to sleep.

Or perhaps the lack of sleep can also be seen as a lack of dreams, and, by further extension, a lack of creativity and imagination. She might be really book smart, but she might not have the ability to come up with new things. Her insomnia could be interpreted as the loss of her imagination, or the absence of it, if she perhaps never really had it, or at least never developed it.

Or, to really reach for a metaphor, perhaps sleep can be representative of death, and perhaps she's terrified of death, and she's getting older, so she may be more keenly aware of her inevitable end than before. And her fear of death manifests in an inability to even "feign death" by sleeping.

...I could probably keep going, but is this even the kind of thing you were asking about? ^o^;>

[minespatch]

2 hours ago, kiwikenobi said:

is this even the kind of thing you were asking about? ^o^;>

Yes.

Sad react cause those were dark but reasonable takes.

[kiwikenobi]

Ah, you'd like me to come up with some that aren't quite so dark? Challenge accepted.

Hmm... She always struck me as being the leader type, wanting to take charge of things. Her insomnia may perhaps be a refusal to sleep rather than an inability. Others can rest, but Wickerbottom is busy keeping things running smoothly, being the hyper-responsible one, the Team Mom, perhaps.

Or perhaps she's just so interested in this new world that she's in that she wants to study everything. Why should she waste time sleeping when there are still so many new things for her to learn about all around her? Her lack of sleeping could represent her alertness and curiosity.

Or maybe her insomnia is a hint that she's not quite human. And not necessarily because she got warped by dark magic or anything. Maybe she's just a magical being that doesn't need sleep, which also looks very much like a human, but isn't one. She's the only one who can use magic books other than Maxwell, after all. Maybe she's some kind of mage from another dimension. We assume she's from the same world as Wilson and everyone else, but maybe she's from an entirely different place where magic is common and sleeping isn't necessary.

But this is starting to become more "reasons Wickerbottom has insomnia" than "what does not sleeping represent thematically?" I suppose because not sleeping is an unnatural thing, so anything that it could represent is more likely to be something negative.