The Alloy of Law

Brandon Sanderson’s The Alloy of Law is set in a world mirroring the societal and technological shifts of the late 19th and early 20th-century United States. This period was defined by the tension between two quintessentially American landscapes: the mythologized, lawless frontier of the “Old West” and the rapidly industrializing, stratified society of the modern city. The novel directly maps this dichotomy onto its setting, contrasting the frontier justice of the Roughs with the urban complexity of Elendel, a metropolis featuring skyscrapers that threaten to “rise higher than the mists themselves” (16). This historical parallel is crucial for understanding the novel’s structure, as Sanderson draws heavily from the literary genres born from this era. The American Western emerged from the frontier experience, focusing on rugged individualism, the struggle to impose order, and the clash between wilderness and civilization. This is embodied in Wax’s past as a lawman in the Roughs, a role reminiscent of historical figures like Wyatt Earp or the Pinkerton detectives who brought order to boomtowns and protected burgeoning industries like the railroad. Conversely, the rise of industrial cities like London and New York gave birth to detective fiction, where figures like Sherlock Holmes used logic and scientific observation to solve crimes rooted in urban anonymity and social decay.