“ONLY THE WOUNDED MAY HEAL”–Speaker, of the Scorch

As it happens, I put this into the mouth of a plant in the third novel.

Sort of a plant, of course, is Speaker.

It is ambivalent. How else would a part lichen (a symbiosis of fungus and algae to start with) and a man, speak?

He has lost his country, his life, his name and most of his speech by the time he is discovered by the boy who will grow up to be Jesse Johnstone.

Does Speaker mean you have to be wounded yourself to be a healer?

Does he mean that without a wound that there is nothing to heal?

Does he mean that the entrance exam to becoming a healer is a wound?