The Unchosen One / Literature

Unchosen Ones in Literature.

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• In The 39 Clues:
  • Amy and Dan Cahill belong to the Madrigal branch of the family, founded by the fifth Cahill child, Madeline, who was born after the fire that caused the family to split up. She never got a serum, so her descendants are not blessed with Superpowerful Genetics like the four main branches.
  • In Into the Gauntlet, Amy and Dan theorize that William Shakespeare was a Janus (the 'artistic genius' branch of the family). He wasn't, he was a Madrigal.
• In Animorphs, it's eventually revealed that the Ellimist subtly manipulated events to ensure that Cassie^note a "sub-temporally grounded anomaly," who's existence disrupts attempts to change space-time, Marco^note the son of Visser One's host body, Tobias, and Ax^note the time-displaced son and dutiful younger brother (respectively) of Andalite war hero Elfangor would be part of the six-person group. This leaves Jake and Rachel unaccounted for. As Rachel dies, the Ellimist admits that he didn't pick her, and that she was "a happy accident" — but no less important for it.
• Beast Tamer: Discussed. After finishing Arios's request at the Lost Forest, the girls ask Rein to explain an earlier statement that Arios was the only one who could defeat the Demon Lord. Rain explains that Arios is descended from a hero who was given the power "Limit Breaker" by the gods. This allowed the Hero, and by extension Arios, to continue to get stronger and stronger, unhindered by the "Growth Limit" that all other mortal beings are subject to, and this is needed to match the Demon Lord. Upon hearing this, Sora suggests the possibility that Rein also has no Growth Limit, as his Power Copying makes him stronger with every contract he forms. This prompts Kanade to ask if this means Rein would be able to defeat the Demon Lord instead of the divinely chosen, but very arrogant, Hero. Rein is not against the idea, but is hesitant and asks to be able to give it some thought.
• In the BIONICLE Adventures books, this is Subverted. All this time, the Toa Metru believed they were the chosen Matoran of Metru Nui, hence why the former Toa, Lhikan, had arranged for their transformation into Toa. Then, they found evidence that six other Matoran were meant to take on the role, and their becoming Toa was only due to Makuta's tampering with Lhikan's mind. This chimed with their initial failings as Toa heroes. In reality, Mata Nui anticipated Makuta's trickery, so he re-arranged the stars over Metru Nui, thereby changing the prophecies about who should become Toa. Thus, when Makuta tried to foretell these prophecies, and then attempted to prevent their fulfillment, he deliberately planted the names of the most unlikely Toa candidates into Lhikan's brain. That is to say, the names of those exact Matoran that were supposed to become Toa.
• When the chosen one dies in Cannon Fodder, the soldiers who were supposed to be his escort, Kelsey and Bobbin Pike, get stuck with his mission as punishment.
• Taran, the protagonist of The Chronicles of Prydain becomes involved in a war for control of his homeland because he went chasing after a runaway pig and came face to face with the series' resident Supporting Leader, Prince Gwydion. He slowly works his way up from being a Tag Along Kid to a Bad Ass Normal warrior and the equivalent of a general and eventually the High King of Prydain because he heeds the advice of his mentors and refuses to give up on causes he believes in.
• Discworld:
  • In I Shall Wear Midnight Tiffany is told that apparently, the only thing she was born with was a natural gift for making cheese. Seeing old Mrs. Snapperly cast out of her home and allowed to freeze and starve to death by people who thought she was a witch made Tiffany determined to make sure it never happened again — what better way to do that than by becoming a real one?
    I said you weren't born with a talent for witchcraft: it didn't come easily; you worked hard at it because you wanted it. You forced the world to give it to you, no matter the price, and the price is and will always be, high. [ ... ] People say you don't find witchcraft; witchcraft finds you. But you've found it, even if at the time you didn't know what it was you were finding, and you grabbed it by its scrawny neck and made it work for you.
  • In Lords and Ladies Granny Weatherwax makes it clear that she decided to be a witch, she didn't depend on an elder witch seeing potential in her. And she went on to be the toughest witch around.
    Nanny Ogg: You mean you weren't Chosen?
    Granny Weatherwax: Me? No. I chose.
• Kavi and Jiaan both from the Farsala Trilogy operate under the name Sorahb, who is supposed to be reborn in a time of need according to their country's legend. There is no Sorahb reborn, and if the legend they create is anything to go by, there probably never was an original.
• Harry Potter:
  • Played with for the titular character. There is a prophecy indicating him as the Chosen One who can kill the Big Bad, but Dumbledore makes a consistent effort to remind Harry that there are many fundamental problems with prophecies; even if they can be proven to be real, they tend to either be very misleading or self-fulfilling, pointing out that it was only because Voldemort himself believed the prophecy about Harry causing his downfall to be true, that he ended up attempting to kill the infant Harry, which backfired and caused his first downfall. He also reminds Harry that he always has the option to Screw Destiny when it comes to making a final confrontation with Voldemort, but points out that both he and Harry himself know that at his core, Harry is simply too heroic to go through with this: he cares too much about the safety of his friends and avenging the deaths of his parents to ever be seriously tempted into backing down from fighting Voldemort, so him continuing to challenge Voldemort is more down to him making the choice to fight him than fighting him just Because Destiny Says So.
  • Neville also applies — though he was one of two possible candidates, he'd never heard the prophecy, nor was he marked as Voldemort's equal, but he still manages to turn Dumbledore's Army into a pretty badass rebellion force, openly defy Voldemort even when it appeared all hope was lost, and kill the snake to thus render Voldemort mortal.
• Katniss from The Hunger Games is a quintessential example of this. The revolution had already been brewing for decades, the rebels just needed their symbolic “Mockingjay”. Katniss happened to be in the right place at the right time.
• Ben from Legend of the Animal Healer has no magic, but he helps Martine on nearly all of her adventures because he's her friend and wants to do the right thing as much as she does. This is fortunate, because he has patience and survival skills that she lacks.
• Sam in The Lord of the Rings. While it was Frodo who was chosen to carry the ring, Sam decided to join him, stick with Frodo to the end, and even carried the ring for a while when Frodo was taken in Return of the King. He's also the only character shown to completely resist the ring, and that was where its lure was strongest (the fact that it couldn't actually contribute to anything he wanted was a big part of it).
• Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn trilogy just loves to play with this trope. Kelsier, Vin, and Elend were just the people around who were able to do the job. And, of course, were helped by the Big Bad. In fact, just about every good guy in the trilogy could be said to be an Unchosen One with the exception of Sazed.
  • Played straight in that Vin was literally born and groomed by both Ruin and Preservation, her powers, her sister, and her spike being part of a centuries series of manuvers by both Shards
  • Also played with in the rest of The Cosmere especially in The Stormlight Archive where The Chosen Many is at play, and those that appear to be the Chosen One typically are just the first ones to survive long enough to be recognized.
• In My Brother is a Superhero, the protagonist, Luke, is obsessed with superheroes. Unfortunately, he happened to be in the bathroom when an interdimensional alien suddenly shows up and gives superpowers to his geeky older brother, Zack. The first chapter is even called "The [Not] Chosen One." Naturally, he takes it upon himself to help Zack and often winds up saving the day, even as it becomes a Running Gag that just about everyone but Luke gets some cool power or ability.
• Percy Jackson himself is in fact not the hero he had heard in the prophecy in Percy Jackson. Instead, the prophecy was referring to Luke who would sacrifice himself to destroy Kronos.
• The Rise of Kyoshi, a tie-in to Avatar: The Last Airbender: After fourteen years of being unable to find Avatar Kuruk's reincarnation through the usual methods, his old companions discover a street kid named Yun, who is an amazing earthbender and so similar to Kuruk that they conclude that he must be the new Avatar. And for two years, Yun proves amazing at the diplomatic and spiritual aspects of the role...but can't bend the other elements. Of course, anyone familiar with the show knows that Kyoshi, his servant/friend, is the real Avatar. After this is revealed, Yun dies, then turns out to be alive, then turns into the Big Bad of the sequel.
• Subverted in Sir Apropos of Nothing, where Apropos thinks he is this and hijacks the call, only to find... he was the Chosen One after all. It's complicated.
• In A Song of Ice and Fire, Rhaegar Targaryen once read a prophecy that convinced him he was The Chosen One. Later in his life, he changed his mind and thought the Prince That Was Promised was his son Aegon — or rather, that The Chosen Many were his children, since he claimed that "the dragon must have three heads". It could have been a huge plot point since it's revealed that his wife couldn't get pregnant again after the second child, so this could have been the reason for his abduction of Lyanna Stark. It's rather ironic that he could have been cheated by prophecies once more if The Chosen One was his child with Lyanna all along, or his yet-to-be-born sister.
• The Traveler's Gate:
  • Unlike Alin, Simon is just a random boy who had some bad experiences with a few Travelers. He has absolutely no connection to any of the Territories, which he would normally need to become a Traveler. Thankfully, Valinhall doesn't need a connection; all you have to do is pass the tests, and you gain the powers.
  • In the Avernus short story, it turns out that Simon was subject to a small but important prophecy. An Avernus girl told Denner that one day Kai would have a choice whether to take an apprentice or not, and it was very important that he take him. It was Denner's recommendation that convinced Kai to take Simon.
• Tree of Aeons:
  • Lausanne, as a young girl, hears stories of the heroes chosen to defeat the demon king, and resolves that she'll become a hero too — except that she doesn't have the divine blessings that let them gain levels unnaturally quickly and wield "star mana". With TreeTree's help, she still becomes impressive in her own right, reaching an unusually high level at a young age, and having a special magical familiar to enhance her abilities. When she meets the actual gods-chosen heroes, though, she's discouraged by how they're able to surpass her efforts in mere days or weeks. Nonetheless, she achieves a tremendous amount of good in the world. She loses some of her ambition during the 20 years that he's dormant after Demon King Sabnoc, however, and later turns down his offer to help her grow further.
  • Since Aeon doesn't want to rely on the gods sending heroes forever (and he eventually learns that they will have to stop in a century or two), he puts a lot of effort into training up people he trusts to achieve comparable levels of power without relying on divine blessings. It's much slower, and they don't have the star mana that is super-effective against demon kings, but with enough Experience Boosters and high-level dungeons for faster Level Grinding, his top lieutenants are able to rise to level 150 and above and gain the power to make a meaningful difference in a demon king fight.
• The Trope Namer is China Miéville's Un Lun Dun, in which the heroine Deeba was listed in the Book of Prophecy as the "Funny Sidekick" to Zanna, the real Chosen One. When Zanna is injured and sent home, Deeba returns to unite UnLondon against the Smog and gets named The Unchosen One by UnLondon's residents. The odd thing about this is that the Book always turned out to be right about the things it claimed were wrong. It later realises this, and is pleased. Also, Deeba realizes that as the Unchosen One, she gets to ignore the parts of the prophecy that requires her to go on ridiculous sidequests.
• Tad William's novel The War of the Flowers features Mud Bug Button, the unassuming sage who explains carefully to the hero that he was not chosen, his family was not killed by the Big Bad, and he did not have a heroic epiphany after seeing an innocent child killed. He just thought carefully about the situation and decided that leading a revolution was something that needed to be done.
• The Wings of Fire series opens with one of the five eggs that was supposed to hatch into the chosen ones being destroyed. Unable to find another Skywing egg in time, the Talons of Peace decide to steal a Rainwing egg as a replacement even though the prophecy called for a Skywing. The egg hatches into Glory, who ends up suffering a ton of abuse from the chosen ones' caretakers for being the wrong species. When the Nightwing who foretold the prophecy finds out, he orders her to be killed, setting off the plot as the chosen ones decide to escape to save Glory's life, which ends up completely derailing the Nightwings' plans. The Nightwings and The Talons of Peace try to get the prophecy back on track by having a backup group of dragons who are all the correct species but didn't quite fit the other requirements replace the chosen ones but it doesn't go well due to the imposter chosen ones being far less competent and all disliking each other.

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