Kantor said:
I would be inclined to agree with you. But I don't think he should have died. He should have stayed in the Rand body and gained the powers that he managed to gain. He is essentially the avatar of the Creator in the mortal world. |
But as avatar of the creator his purpose was accomplished. If Rand had stayed around, he would upset the balance of power in the world. He was way too powerful, especially with his ties to Mat, Perrin, and Elayne, he would essentially be ruling the world.
Besides, in order to truly make his act of defeating the dark one monumentous, sacrifice was needed. The way the story is written, that sacrifice was that of Egwene... but that isn't nearly as powerful as if he had sacrificed himself. Fact is, from the 8 original characters that left edmonds field in the first book, only one died...
