Gen's height

[madclairvoyant.livejournal.com]

Sorry for this random thing, but I thought it rather interesting.


In the Greenwillow edition of The Thief, page 31, there is the following passage:

We all slid to the ground, and Pol was quickly beside me with one hand firmly on my shoulder. It was an easy business for him; my shoulder came only to his chest. Sometimes it bothered me that I am so small.

This, I believe this is a rather important thing about Gen. In the olden days, people were generally not very tall, because often they do not consume the needed nutrition. Hence even as the captain of guard to the prince, I don't think that Pol would be exceptionally tall, especially because the Magus is mentioned to be taller than average, but Pol is not, and the Magus is even shorter than Irene. At least, I always got the impression that Pol was more stocky than tall. Which means that Gen is really short, like he thinks, if he only gets up to the chest of Pol; typically, the top of the head to the chest is about 30cm, or more. Therefore, if Pol is 180cm, which would be unlikely because it would mean that Irene would be very very tall, then Gen is only 150cm. This would provide us a good gauge of his rough age, unless he has a medical disorder. Thus, he probably cannot be more than thirteen, as I know that in my class of thirteen year old girls, the shortest are at least 155cm. Really, no matter how much genetics can influence us, I don't think that a fifteen or older boy would be that short.


Any thoughts?

Comments

[ladyofastolat.livejournal.com]

If Gen's shoulder comes up to Pol's chest, I see it as a noticeable size difference, but not ginormous one. Plus, if Gen was still a child and therefore fully expecting a big growth spurt over the next few years, would he be bothered by being noticeably shorter than a fully grown man? The fact that he's bothered suggests to me that at least some other boys his age are of a similar height as Pol.

Also, boys tend to reach their adult height a lot later than teenage girls. Girls have usually finished growing by 13 or 14 - I finished at 11 - but boys don't normally finish growing until 17 or later. Although that's in the real world of nowadays, of course. In a world in which gods walk the earth, who knows? :-D

[freenarnian.livejournal.com]

I remember learning in high school that the average Roman soldier was my height (5'6"). That's pretty short for a guy, in my experience at least. So if we're assuming 5'8-9" would be considered a decent height for man in Gen's world, I could see Gen being 5'4-6" and feeling a little on the small side. That's all speculation, of course. Also, I've known more than one guy who grew as much as 2-3 inches taller after his 20th birthday, so Gen could still be growing even in KoA (if our age estimates are right). That's kind of a funny thought though, and I don't recall any mention of him looking taller in the later books. On the flip-side, there was a guy in my driver's ed class (so he would've been about 16 at the time) who was barely 5'0", and he neither came from a short family nor had any known medical conditions. He was just short! :) He maybe even looked a little like Gen...

[ninedaysaqueen.livejournal.com]

155 centimeters is about 5 ft. 1 in. Correct? Well, as a twenty-one-year-old who is a quarter of an inch below 5 feet (about 150 centimeters), I can tell you that there are some very short adults, and since I wasn't my full height till I was fifteen, I was even shorter when I was thirteen. :)

Gen is actually about fifteen in TT, because we know he was ten when Helen became queen (according to the short story, Thief!) and on page 270 of TT it says in regards to Helen...

In her five-year reign she'd won the loyalty and love of her subjects.

So, that makes Gen about fifteen at the very end of TT, which would make sense that he was bothered by his small size, because boys usually hit their growth spurt at fourteen or fifteen. Irene observes in the boat scene during QoA that Gen was taller since the last time she'd seen him, and QoA covers about two years.

He'd grown, she realized. Boys did often grow in one last leap just as they became men... - QoA p-235

Therefore, Gen simply hit his growth spurt late, at about seventeen. My brother wasn't fully grown till he was twenty-one, and it's more common for boys to grow even after they're adults.

We also have to remember that the QT characters aren't exactly Caucasian. They're Greek or Roman, so the average height rules in regards to Caucasians don't apply. For example, Asian's and Hispanic's average height can differ by about as much as 6 inches or 16 centimeters from Caucasians. And having the experience of working on a reservation last year, some Native American boys in their late teens I worked with were my height or just a bit taller.

Google tells me that average height for Ancient Greek men was 5 ft. 6 in. so if Pol was average height, and Gen was several inches shorter, that would make him about 5 ft. 2 in. which is quite short for a fifteen-year-old boy. He does grow in QoA, but he's still shorter than Irene in KoA.

The queen was several inches taller than Eugenides, and he leaned back to counter her spin. KoA p-101

So, if Gen grew a few inches in QoA, and was say... now 5 ft. 5 in. and if the magus is tall and Irene is even taller, that would make her about 5 ft. 9 in. and the magus about 5 ft. 8 in. Give or take...

I like talking about this way too much... XD

(Edited to fix typos.)

[agentmaly.livejournal.com]

So if Gen grew a few inches in QoA, and was say... now 5 ft. 5 in. and if the magus is tall and Irene is even taller, that would make her about 5 ft. 9 in. and the magus about 5 ft. 8 in.

Yep! I was just talking to my friend Emily about this on Monday; it's neat how in-person and online conversations are coinciding. I agree with you: I think Gen at his final height is 5'5" or 5'6" and Irene is about 5'9". Emily thought their height difference was smaller than that, but I would argue that the fewest 'several inches' could be is three.

One of the reasons I liked Gen so much when I first read The Thief (at age 16, and I believe I was about 5'3" at the time) was that I had been getting a lot of flak over the past few years for being short (mostly from adults, which I think is over the line) and here Gen was my age, and my size, too, and he was a boy! And it actually made him more capable as a thief. Small size can absolutely be an advantage: I went to Disney World with a couple of friends over spring break this year, and the friend who was leading the group was decidedly the smallest. She kept slipping through tight spaces in the crowds and then wondering why we couldn't keep up.

[ninedaysaqueen.livejournal.com]

The last time I checked, average height for a Caucasian woman (I'm assuming you're Caucasian) was 5'5'' so 5'3'' is hardly that short! How annoying! XD

I had similar feelings about Gen when I read the books at fifteen-years-old. I tend to be partial to protagonists on the shorter side, because I can easily commiserate. (I'm also partial to Katniss from HG for that reason.) As a kid, I got flak (mostly from adults) about why I wasn't growing. As if there was something I could do about it... XD

However, as an adult, it can work to your advantage. I hear people grumbling when they see me walking right under hanging potted plants and under open upper cabinet doors, and it's very easy to slip right through narrow spaces and large crowds. It's also funny how people don't always notice I'm standing right next to them. I was on lunch break outside at work last week (I work at an art gallery that also has garden sculptures, and we're allowed to eat at the benches outside), and a few costumers we're in the yard shopping for several minutes before they noticed me. When they did, they jumped a mile, and were like, I didn't see you there! //snicker

Also, I think its easier to be stronger when you're small, because one is always lifting things over one's head. Gen is suppose to be quite strong, so his height hasn't affected his strength.

[1221bookworm.livejournal.com]

I'm also considered short, even a bit shorter than you, Lady Jane, and sometimes it is a real pain in the neck. We have a couple friends who are also short, and we complain about the "petite" sizes being placed on the top shelf! However, as my mom says, it's a great way to meet guys, 'cuz you can always ask them to reach up and get the stuff off the top shelf!

[checkers65477.livejournal.com]

it's a great way to meet guys, 'cuz you can always ask them to reach up and get the stuff off the top shelf!

This is totally why I married mr. checkers. That, and his willingness to kill spiders (sorry, Willow).

[agentmaly.livejournal.com]

I am indeed Caucasian; you assume correctly. :) Now I think I'm closer to 5'4" (my posture has improved significantly; I need to get myself measured and see if I make it), so I really get annoyed when people rag on me for being short. It seems these days to be mostly tall young men who for some reason think that I will find this endearing behaviour on their part. Do you get that, too? I really don't understand the mindset that women naturally appreciate men treating them as dainty, doll-like, little, delicate, or anything else in that semantic field.

Is Katniss supposed to be short? If so, I completely missed that...

Yes, stealth! This no doubt aids Gen as well. I want to say that it's easier to move quietly when you weigh less, but one reads a lot about large people and animals moving surprisingly daintily, so perhaps I'm wrong.

It depends on someone's overall proportions and body composition, not simply their height, but it is definitely easier to build visible muscle mass when you're a shorter person. You have shorter limbs, and so your muscles are more compact to begin with. I really prefer it to being lanky - tall, long-limbed people have a heck of a time trying to build real muscle mass.

[1221bookworm.livejournal.com]

I wanted to add that both Books and I are partial to shorter protagonists. One of the things that endeared me to Gen in the first few pages was that he was short, and that he got tangled in his chains while he was trying to look all cool, calm, colleted, and coordinated. It felt like real life!

[freenarnian.livejournal.com]

Wow, how did I completely forget about the scene in which Attolia realized he's gotten taller? This can only mean one thing... Time to re-read the books! Again! YAY!! *tosses all other books aside*

[sgwordy.livejournal.com]

I don't have anything useful to add to the details already listed, I just think it's a fun coincidence that I just started re-reading The Thief last night and so read this exact passage last night and was doing all these mental calculations just last night. (so, to review, last night!)

:)

[(Anonymous)]

Irene would be rather tall then, for a woman especially, and not a Caucasian. On the other hand, I know that in a class of asian thirteen year olds, the average height is about 153cm.

Gen would have better balance and agility than average, because he has a lower center of gravity.

[checkers65477.livejournal.com]

Actually, it says in TT that Attolia was as tall as the Magus.

Hmm, does Gen have a Napoleon Complex? "Named after the French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte who was said to have compensated for his height by seeking war, power and conquest."

[booksrgood4u.livejournal.com]

Hmmmm.......I don't really see Gen as having a Napoleon complex, in fact I think he so much associated with the role of the Thief of Eddis, that he probably considered his small size an asset that made him more dangerous. ALso, MoW is described in QoA as slightly taller than average, so Gen, with his desire to be as totally different his father as humanly possible, may also have felt h is height showed his realtion to the Thieving side of the family, not the soldiering side.

[hazelwillow.livejournal.com]

In The Thief, it mentions Gen's ambivalent attitude towards his height. I don't remember the quote exactly (my book is many miles away), but it says that most of the time he doesn't mind his height (and maybe even considers it an advantage?) but sometimes it does bother him. Like when Ambiades is sneering maybe.

ETA: wait, someone's posted it right below. Lol. "Sometimes it bothered me that I am so small." And it's also above. Well, I feel observant...

I can't remember if there was more to it, if it went into when he doesn't like it.

:)

[ninedaysaqueen.livejournal.com]

Actually, the idea that Napoleon was short is a modern concept. Napoleon was 5'7'' which was average height for his era. Horrible Histories's Bob Hale will tell you all about it. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gC00avITj0) :)
And for extra laughs, check out why Napoleon really lost at Waterloo. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ExuGTrkGNkg) XD

[pico-the-great.livejournal.com]

Hang on, though. Reread the very passage you posted:

We all slid to the ground, and Pol was quickly beside me with one hand firmly on my shoulder. It was an easy business for him; my shoulder came only to his chest. Sometimes it bothered me that I am so small.

my shoulder came only to his chest.

Gen's not head-as-high-as-Pol's-chest, he's shoulder-as-high, which means he's got at least eight inches on your estimate.

I have to add, yes, 15-year-old boys can totally be that short. Modern people in the West forget (or don't know) how much is accomplished by consistent good nutrition and medicine, and tend to assume anyone less than 5'6 is short. Check out Wikipedia on this (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_height) - 5'6 is pretty average. I'm 165cm/5'4 and living in China; my students (20/22-year-olds) average about my height, with a few glaring exceptions on either end in both genders. So, in sum, I can totes imagine Gen being 150cm at 15, and a bit taller later.

(Finally: I have nothing against imagining Gen as short, since I am one of the apparently like a dozen females ever who actually likes shorter dudes ... so uh. reader appeal :D )

[hazelwillow.livejournal.com]

I have nothing to add, except to say Gen's shortness is one of his defining physical characteristics in my imagination. Even after he grows in QoA, I still imagine him as comparatively small and lithe (only now small for a man instead of for a fifteen year old boy). And his smallness gives him an ease of motion and a grace that other people don't have.

I seem to remember a description in KoA of him and Teleus facing off, with Gen "like a cat standing its ground to the barnyard dog". (or something. too lazy to get my book). At a couple inches shorter than the Queen, he'll definitely be shorter than most of the other men around. In CoK for the first time he'd have to look up to meet Sophos's eye. (Sophos being taller than him is somehow adorable to me).

[freenarnian.livejournal.com]

Any mental image I compose of Sophos, from any of the books, ends up being totally adorable. Scars not withstanding! I think adorableness is just one of Sophos' defining characteristics, like Gen's shortness.