Saga When did Leia learn she was adopted?

We know from ROTJ that Leia was aware that the Organa's were not her biological parents. Do we know when she discovered this?

 

Given that it was widely known that Breha and Bail were trying to have a child and failing- it was possible that it was common knowledge on Alderaan that Leia was adopted- and that she learned it as a child. The EU never gives a specific date for her learning it, as far as I am aware.

 

Nope, it isn't ever said when Leia knew that she was adopted. Much less how she found out. It is possible that Bail told her when she was old enough to understand, but he never went into great detail about it.

 

Wasn't it mentioned in the ROTJ novel?

 

There is no reason to believe she was raised without knowing she was adopted. She isn't surprised at all when Luke refers to her "real mother".

 

That's what I thought, that Leia grew up always knowing she was adopted. She always seemed very secure in her adopted family, we never really get any impression that she feels any less connected to the Organas and Alderan because she was adopted. I do wonder what she was told about her birth parents. She clearly knew something about her birth mother, but I wonder what story she was told, since I wouldn't think she'd have known that Padme was her mother.

 

Well since it was never mentioned in the films of Leia being adopted, it makes Luke asking her about her real mother all that much stranger. Leia never mentions or implies ever being adopted. Luke learns that she is his sister and Vader is his father before going to tell Leia that he was her brother. So going on films alone, why would Luke ask Leia about her real mother? And he asks before he tells her about them being siblings.

 

Yeah, but there's potentially a lot of "off screen" moments that have happened between the Big 3--especially when you consider the amount of time that has elapsed between ANH and ESB. It's entirely possible that Leia's had conversations with Luke about being adopted. Otherwise, Luke just popping out with "Do you remember your REAL mother?" would be kind of insensitive, if he wasn't even sure if Leia knew the truth about all that yet.

 

I understand that. But from a movie perspective, It is never said or shown. Off screen is always a possibility. But, for a major event like knowing they were adopted would be reason to be at least showed on screen. Luke finds out by Ben on Dagobah about the father and sister revelation. It is the way he asked her about her real mother that is very strange as if were supposed to know she was adopted. Though off screen there was a lot of time that did occur.

 

Well, we all know the real reason for that--the almost last-minute decision to make them sibs. But in my opinion it's not really problematic or a "plot hole" because we were never told straight out she *wasnt* adopted. For instance, if there had been a scene in ESB with Han and Leia having a heart-to-heart about their backgrounds and families and Leia didn't bring up she was adopted, that would be very strange. But that never happened. As it stands, it's not such a leap to assume they must've discussed it at an earlier time.

 

Personally I never use the term "plot-hole" So I just see this as hey it happened off screen somewhere. No biggie. Just the scene seems a little out of place, but nothing SOD can't handle!

 

This issue is something which has always intrigued me since the OT era, and I always wondered if there was further development on Leia being adopted in some earlier source (perhaps an interview with GL, a line in one of the radio dramas or novelisations, even something in the Marvel comics), but it's completely out of the blue in ROTJ when Luke & Leia's dialogue makes it clear that not only is she adopted, she knew about it. Apart from the 'Sister Leia' revelation in ROTJ itself, nothing up until then suggested it. What very little we knew about Leia's background on Alderaan is from the various versions of SW/ANH, in which she refers to Bail Organa as her father. The SW radio drama does involve several scenes between Leia and her father (he's never called 'Bail', just 'Father', 'Senator Organa' or 'Viceroy', IIRC), but there's nothing at all about her being adopted. I don't think there's any mention of her mother, either.

However, post-ESB, GL was clearly doing a LOT of shuffling when it came to backstories, due to the gigantic twist of Vader being Luke's father, and although little of it made it through to the finished film of ROTJ, a few tidbits regarding what was meant to have happened in the PT (circa 1982) made it through to the public via the novelisation and the screenplay.
The volcano duel between Anakin/Vader and Obi-Wan had been common knowledge since GL described it in a 1977 Rolling Stone interview, and it was referred to in the ROTJ novelisation, indicating that it was still part of the plan. The shooting script and novelisation of ROTJ also introduces a new familial twist which didn't make its way to the film and was later retconned by the PT itself - Owen Lars wasn't Luke's biological uncle, he was Obi-Wan Kenobi's brother.
And regarding baby Leia's fate, we have this from the shooting script:

(This was also included in much the same way in the novelisation of ROTJ)

What this dialogue points towards is a once-existing backstory that was eventually discarded for the PT when GL decided that Padme would die in childbirth. It seems to fit with ESB-era comments from GL that Luke Skywalker would be seen in Episode III at the age of about three years old - maybe in an epilogue, or perhaps the story itself would have continued a few years past the point ROTS ended.

As far as Leia's backstory is concerned (and her mother's), Mother Skywalker died or disappeared at a later date than shown in ROTS, and taking the dialogue between Luke and Leia into consideration, it seems to imply that although Leia's adoption wasn't public knowledge ("no one knew she'd been adopted, of course"), it's not much of a stretch to assume that it was probably known amongst the most trusted friends of the family and revealed to Leia at some point, even if the full truth of her heritage wasn't. She might have told Luke about her being adopted herself.
(Or perhaps she actually remembered that her real mother was someone other than the Queen of Alderaan - not unbelievable if they were separated when Leia was as old as three)

Despite this rather strange contradiction, requiring a fair bit of rationalisation, the dialogue where Luke asks Leia about her "real mother" still appears to have been written with this now-excised dialogue from Obi-Wan in mind, or something resembling it - perhaps an earlier version. Leia's adoption seems to be a remnant of a long-redundant storyline which simply slipped through to the finished film and has remained ever since.
I suspect that had it been known at the time of shooting ROTJ that this reference to the backstory would not only be cut from the film, but changed altogether when the PT was made, the dialogue between Luke and Leia would have been altered to remove any suggestion that Leia had any knowledge of having been adopted altogether.

It's a very odd, out-of-place, unexplained and ultimately unnecessary little detail.