Peter Wiggin

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In the science fiction story Ender's Game and its sequels, Peter Wiggin is Ender's (or Andrew's) older brother. They and their sister, Valentine, are extremely intelligent and precocious. The three siblings represent ideals; Peter is ruthless and cruel, Valentine is empathic and kind, and in Ender, the traits are balanced.

Ender Quartet

In Ender's Game, Ender is sent to Battle School where he is trained to fight the alien Formics. Peter, at the age of 12, convinces Valentine to use their parents' network identities (and eventually their own) to submit to the world great and influential writings under the names of Locke (Peter) and Demosthenes (Valentine). Together they keep the world united, gain respect, and are paid handsomely for their columns. Peter is an unlikeable character at the beginning of the book, Ender's Game

After the buggers are defeated, Peter sends his brother Ender away; Valentine joins Ender, leaving Peter the only Wiggin child left. At the end of the novel, he has united the world under the office of Hegemon and is dying from a weak heart. He communicates by ansible and tells Ender what he did and tried to do. Ender writes the short story The Hegemon and signs it under the pseudonym Speaker for the Dead. This story, a frank account of Peter Wiggin's life, is later published as a single volume with Ender's The Hive Queen.

In Xenocide, Ender splits into three people: himself, Young Valentine, and Young Peter. Young Peter carries a OCD cure to the world of Path. Fragments and parts of Peter's rule of Hegemon are explored in this book. For instance, all of the Hundred Worlds had been settled (or had colony ships going) by the time of Peter's death, and Peter's organization, the Free People of Earth, had fallen shortly after Peter's death and was replaced by Starways Congress. At the end of the novel, Young Peter calls Hegemon "that book of lies" for cleaning the blood on his hands, and that "as long as I was alive, I wanted blood there".

In Children of the Mind, he travels to many of the Hundred Worlds with Si Wang-Mu. This is easily possible due to faster-than-light travel. Both of them are on a mission to persuade as many leaders as possible that the Evacuation Fleet constitutes a second xenocide. His efforts work, as the Fleet is averted. At the end, he falls in love with Wang-mu.

Shadow Quartet

Orson Scott Card writes the back story to Peter's rise to power, beginning in Shadow of the Hegemon. In that story, Bean provides Peter with information proving that Achilles kidnapped Ender's jeesh, which Peter reveals to the world through his Locke persona. Later Sister Carlotta and Bean convince Peter his path to power requires him to expose himself as the writer behind Locke and Demosthenes, and to decline the position of Hedgemon because of his age. Peter dislikes being told what to do, but recognizes that this is the only action he can take, as it is only a matter of time before Achilles, now pulling the strings in India, takes action to expose or kill him. He uses his influence to put Bean in a military position in Thailand, which he and Bean perceive to be the target of a future attack by Achilles' India.

Meanwhile, Peter does consultation work in Haiti to show his abilities and to have a nation’s protection from Achilles. Events during Bean's time in Thailand, the way in which India is conducting it's war, and information from Peter's contacts reveal to Peter and Bean that Achilles true goals are to create a massive Chinese empire through by betraying both India and Thailand. Bean and Peter disagree over the release of this information to the world.

Peter eventually reports the information to the World, just before Bean rescues a group of Battle School Students from India. The reporting of China’s plans precipitates the Chinese betrayal of India and Thailand. Both of these countries are so weakened by their war with each other that China manages a nearly bloodless conquest.

This new conquest of China’s frightens much of the rest of the world, and they vote Peter in as Hegemon in order to try and preserve peace, even as China, now ruling over a third of the world’s population, revokes it’s recognition of the position. At the end of the novel, Bean turn’s control of his small battle group over to Hegemon Peter. Afterwards, they argue over Peter’s refusal to report on China’s plans sooner. Peter justifies himself by saying that reporting sooner would have done nothing to stop it, as he would not be believed, and that even if he was, neither India or Thailand had the capacity to resist the Chinese aggression. By revealing the information when he did, he avoided a much bloodier war, and he cemented his reputation for prescience and as a man for peace. Peter sees himself as the only person capable of bringing peace to the warring world.

In Shadow Puppets, Peter invites Achilles to work for him despite the danger Peter is in. In the previous novel, Peter was the writer who exposed Achilles and forced him to abandon his plans for conquest. Achilles moves to subvert the Hegemony and forces Peter to go up into space. There, Colonel Graff gets suspicions that Achilles will attempt to kill Peter and his parents when they return to Earth. Graff sends a dummy ship that Achilles blows up; in doing this, Achilles all but seals his doom, since no nation will want to openly associate with him. Peter retakes the Hegemony.

Shadow of the Giant comes back to Peter's conquest to unite the world and shows his diplomatic and political maneuvering. He creates the Free People of Earth, a contract by all people who have ratified it. It begins slowly, but quickens when he uses Bean to swiftly defeat armies. At the very end of the novel, only the United States has not joined, but the world as a whole is united and peaceful. Peter helps Bean's wife Petra Arkanian raise her five remaining children, and later marries her. Together, they have five children. As previously shown in Ender's Game, Peter talks to Ender one last time before his death. This depiction is much more detailed; Peter apologizes to Ender for his behavior, and Ender seems to have forgiven him. He says, "I think I can write about you," and writes Hegemon.

Some loose ends have not been rectified, however. In Xenocide, it is revealed that the Free People of Earth collapsed soon after Peter's death and was later replaced by Starways Congress.

Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game series
Alai | Petra Arkanian | Admiral Chamrajnagar | Bean | Achilles de Flandres Hyrum Graff | Jane | Bonzo Madrid | Han Qing-jao | Si Wang-mu | Mazer Rackham Andrew 'Ender' Wiggin | John Paul Wiggin | Peter Wiggin | Theresa Wiggin | Valentine Wiggin
Books | Characters | Miscellanea