The Fool (spoilers for all RotE books, including LST)

[Farseer]

I think we might really be over-analising this and maybe we should just take things as they are, for fear of ruining our enjoyment of the books.

I think I over-analyse every THING in every ONE of Robin's books but, for me, that's half the fun. In fact, I'd really rather look for already-penned, hidden riddles and references than wonder what happens next !

Going on from that, and for an almost complete change of subject, though still on the Fool...what is the significance of the baby etc in Fool's room at Buckkeep (mentioned in AA when Fitz went in there, against Fool's wishes)?

"A baby. I...knelt beside the basket that cradled it. But it was not a living child, but a doll, crafted with such incredible art that almost I expected to see the small chest move with breath. I reached a hand to the pale, delicate face, but dared not touch it. The curve of the brow, the closed eyelids, the faint rose that suffused the tiny cheeks, even the small hand that rested on top of the coverlets were more perfect than I supposed a made thing could be. Of what delicate clay it had been crafted, I could not guess, nor what hand had inked the tiny eyelashes that curled on the infant’s cheek.

I still haven't worked it out from my countless re-reads of all books and it makes me crazy not being able to find a Fool/Amber/Lord Golden/White Prophet link or a clue as to why it would be there !! The only reference to it after the event, that I can find, was when Fool finally answered this question from Fitz in RA, "Whence comes the Fool and why?"

Fool talked about how much he had been loved as a child and Fitz "...remembered the time I ventured into his room, and the exquisite little doll in its cradle that I found there. Cherished as the Fool had once been cherished."

It intrigues me because it sounds like an Elderling-wrought form of artwork. Before he saw the baby, Fitz even said, "I tried to imagine the pale cynical Fool in the midst of all this colour and art."

Not to mention the loom with all of its bright-hued threads in the corner (a reference to or even a physical manifestation of the tapestry threads of Fate he wields as the White Prophet and speaks of at times to Fitz?!), I wonder if the baby simply denotes the future Farseer heir, or could it be something more personal to Fool?

Also, what do you make of Fool's ability to just 'appear' and 'disappear' as he often did/does, particularly so in the Farseer trilogy when he would suddenly be in Fitz's room or left abruptly without Fitz knowing, seemingly without having opened the door? I know that Fitz couldn't sense him via the Wit but often it was written as though Fool had come and gone in an almost ghost-like fashion?

Another example of this type of thing would be when Amber disappeared all of a sudden in the middle of her one and only conversation with Wintrow. What to make of it all?!