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Aziraphale's Entire Bookshop Is A Trauma Reenactment
This essay got so complicated. The main point is that Aziraphale's bookshop is a trauma reenactment and that's why he had to give it up.
This post of mine recently got a bunch of notes and I'm so glad people have liked it. For the unfamiliar: the gist is that Aziraphale wants. He wants books, he wants Crowley - but he can't let himself just desire things for their own sake or for his; he'll only allow himself to have what he wants if it serves a greater purpose. That's why Aziraphale has a shop full of books instead of just a collection of books. That's why Aziraphale always has some scheme for Crowley to get involved in.
However, I think that underneath the "purpose" of selling books and participating in the local economy, the shop has another purpose that Aziraphale hasn't faced. Instead of rewriting this, I'll partially copy over something I wrote after Season 1 and before we even knew Season 2 was a thing:
Aziraphale’s squirreling away of old books and erroneous Bibles, his hoarding of humanity’s misguided attempts at prophecy…he is roleplaying his relationship with Heaven, but with himself in a position of power. He’s gathering Knowledge and keeping it a secret while knowing all along that it’s inaccurate, so in that way, he is a lot like his superiors and God. Crucially, he gets to role play the entity powerful enough to have, but not share, his knowledge.
Note that also, in this scenario, the misprinted Bibles and vague or incorrect prophecies are highly prized. They are Aziraphale's favorites - just as you'd expect for a being who knows he's not what an angel is supposed to be but is desperately hoping God will favor him for exactly that reason.
So. The bookshop is a reenactment of Aziraphale's trauma in the same way that yelling at plants is a reenactment of Crowley's trauma. In both cases, the two of them are identifying with both their abusers and themselves. Crowley recognizes that his abusers are malicious and have only their own motivations, no drive toward the "greater good." That's why it's a sign of healing that he has started showing more attachment to his plants in Season 2 and seems to be treating them better: he is no longer acting the part of his own abuser.
Aziraphale is, despite his conscious efforts, still identifying with Heaven. Through his bookshop, he is trying to act like he thinks Heaven should, preserving (his books) and protecting (his books, Jim, Crowley) and orchestrating Good (the whole Ball fiasco). And each of these behaviors is for a Great Plan: running a bookshop, solving a mystery, throwing a ball. Everything he does has to align with a higher purpose, a grand scheme of some kind. Otherwise, how is he going to take on Heaven's role and do it better?
It's a twisted way of trying to make things right. Heaven has failed at its job. It's supposed to be the ultimate Good, but it hasn't been. Even in the Final 15 minutes when Aziraphale says "It's the side of truth, of light, of good," I'm more than convinced he's saying that because he wants it to be so rather than because he's sure of it. (Someone else pointed out this possibility, but it was many posts back and I'm not sure who. If I find the post again, I'll link it here.)
Aziraphale is stuck in a pattern of trying to play the role Heaven failed at. To be clear, this role is "motivating humans to do Good and keeping it all (the universe) running."
...But nobody should be doing Heaven's job. Nobody should be "orchestrating Good," not by trying to control other people. Nobody should be making grand plans for the universe. People should be allowed to just live out their lives.
I want to add, in case it's not obvious, that this is not a conscious process. With human beings, it typically is not. And as other people have pointed out, Aziraphale is smart, which is why he can end up in these patterns in the first place: he's good at rationalizing!
While his need for control is intensely unhealthy, it's reasonable that he would have ended up here. Aziraphale has never been in control in his entire existence. That's Heaven's form of abuse. I mean, I start having an existential crisis when I don't feel like I can say "no" often enough at work - I can't imagine being created with the same amount of free will but denied the knowledge to make any choices for millions of years.
(That's also where some of his most infuriating behavior comes from - another way of trying to exert control is through acceptance: to just insist on being happy even when things are obviously wrong. God is cruel? There must be a good reason we don't understand. Armageddon is coming? Well, it will all be lovely afterward, of course. The Metatron is being really persistent about trying to get me back in Heaven? That's great, actually! Now I can make a difference! Neil has commented that Aziraphale's favorite song with lyrics is "Spread A Little Happiness." Look up the lyrics. They are all about simply denying bad feelings.)
You know how we've observed that the bookshop is painted in Crowley's colors? And how Aziraphale left both of them behind at the end of the season? Well, also consider how Aziraphale and Crowley's relationship pattern has become unhealthy and codependent - Aziraphale genuinely loves Crowley, but the only model of love he's had in his own personal experience, outside of fiction, is this weird power-control thing Heaven has going on.
He needs to break out of the control pattern before he can admit that he loves books and Crowley for what they are.
This is why I think the definition of "goodness" isn't necessarily Aziraphale's final final boss. The narrative could go that way. But I have a strong feeling his final boss will have to involve control.
When people wonder "Why is it taking so long for Aziraphale to figure out that Heaven is bad," my personal suggestion is that good intentions are a red herring for both the audience and for Aziraphale himself. He needs to stop believing that Heaven's job is necessary at all. He needs to see that the whole existence of the institution is a problem, not merely the management. No, not even the really bad management.
On one hand, Aziraphale needs to figure out the same things that Adam Young figured out - that existence is meaningless when people don't get to make their own choices; there's no point in having friends who can't talk back, and there's no point in making people's decisions for them. It's very honorable to want to truly do Good. But you can't do it through control. Even if you completely ignore the moral issues with controlling people, it simply does not produce a worthwhile result.
Aziraphale technically knows all this already. He knows people need to have choices. He knows choices hold no meaning unless people make them freely. He just hasn't grasped that Heaven is, at best, creating unnatural consequences for people. Heaven itself is getting in the way of that ability to choose.
On the other hand, Aziraphale needs to figure out that he CAN make his own choices. He doesn't need Crowley to dance him into the right decision, and he doesn't need God to tell him what to do. Aziraphale has already done some of this in the past, under extreme pressure. He needs to get more comfortable with it. I think his realizations about control will help this part fall into place. Realizing that Heaven's role is a problem can more easily cascade into a healthier notion of his own boundaries - choices that are his and choices that are other people's.
Giving up the bookshop is actually a step toward healing because Aziraphale is stepping up to see the inner workings of his abusive institution head-on instead of reenacting the abusive actions with his bookshop, his neighbors, and Crowley. We know that in reality, people don't get over trauma thanks to one event, but for the sake of the story, realizing that individual or institutional control is not the way to Goodness might just be the breakthrough Aziraphale needs.
And then he can stop feeling compelled to put the things he loves through Great Plans in order to spend time with them, and he can simply love them, hopefully in a cottage where no one ever tries to buy books from him and Crowley will sleep soundly every night.
How this will come about in Heaven is anyone's guess. I think it might, again, happen the same way it happened for Adam Young: with Aziraphale getting his way only to realize it's not what he wants.
Of course, the bookshop deserves to live on. It was a safe place for so long. Like all of Aziraphale and Crowley's other respective coping mechanisms, it offered protection and comfort, and it's become an inspiration to Muriel.
That's why I have a strong feeling Muriel is going to formally inherit the bookshop - with Aziraphale's full permission and enthusiasm, for keeps, not as a coerced posting by an authority figure. I may be getting ahead of myself, what with the enormity of what has to happen first, but it feels right.
All this and the original post linked to here are really good. And to add on to it a bit based on my background...
When you're raised in a very religious fundamental evangelical environment where everything you do is supposed to be because of God's will and for God's glory, it often teaches you that you can't like things just because. They have to have that purpose.
You can't just do things because you want to do them, you have to make your hobbies have a higher calling, they have to be there to evangelize or to be your "ministry" etc. You can't just like a favorite fantasy story, it has to have a deep purpose and meaning pointing back to God and fulfilling God's will and purpose for your life. And even those things, you aren't supposed to like too much because that means you're obsessed which means you're putting it before God and that is a sin because you're making it an idol, therefore breaking the ten commandments. (Which is hell for a neurodivergent person with hyperfixations and special interests, but that's another post for another time.) If you like things too much, there's even the threat they'll get taken away, whether by your parents or your church or God.
Even relationships. Especially relationships. The more extreme the Christianity, the more so. To the point where it doesn't matter if you're in love anything except that you get married, have kids, and live The Godly Life all to glorify God, and fuck your feelings and happiness. Everything is for God's so-called glory and happiness. And if you don't follow the rules, you'll be cast out, kicked out of your church or your home.
So Aziraphale. He can't want books just because he wants books, it's to sell them to people, and a front for him living among the humans. He definitely can't want Crowley just because he wants Crowley. There has to be meaning, like an Arrangement that he can convince himself is actually serving the greater good, and in some roundabout way, God's ineffable plan. Which I think also plays into the many layers of his feelings and beliefs and his decision in the Final 15. And when you can't want things just because you want them, when everything you do in life has to be to fulfill this higher purpose of a plan you don't even understand or agree with, that really fucks you up.
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