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MetaFour
MOD
(Old Master)
2024-08-01 16:19:19
Other tropes on the edges of this idea:
- The Cuckoolander Was Right: when a character everyone else dismisses as crazy turns out to be correct on some important point.
- Narrative Filigree: details that a story mentions just to make the world feel more fleshed-out, or to help hide which details will become relevant later.
eroock
Since: Sep, 2012

When a character, especially an elderly one, rambles on so much that the other characters (and the readers) gloss over the rambling, but it turns out if you do pay attention is has important clues to the mystery.
Two examples I can think of off hand are Miss Bates from Emma, and one of the older monks the The Name of the Rose.
Wall of Text and Rambling Old Man Monologue are often part of this, and it results in clues that are Hidden in Plain Sight, but I am not aware of a trope where the rambling is the method of obscuring the clues.
Edited by aerojockey