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magicaththedemigod · 3 years

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an extensive analysis of “the song of achilles” by madeline miller

Or: things I noticed and couldn't keep to myself.

Because I just finished reading it and have many feelings about it, I've decided to compile all of them into a very lengthy Tumblr post.

This will be broken up into three parts:

1. Foreshadowing

2. Dramatic (and regular) Irony

3. Fatal Flaws

1. Foreshadowing

Miller does such a delightful job with foreshadowing. The number of quotes I could be spitting at you right now... but I digress. The main job of foreshadowing, especially in a tragedy like "The Song of Achilles," is to set the characters up for their tragedy.

What I like most about how Miller goes about it in this book is that she doesn't attempt to pull a shocking twist out of nowhere; instead, she takes an approach which allows the reader to fully marinate in their despair.

For example, this quote:

Achilles shook his head, impatiently. "But this was a greater punishment for her. It was not fair of them." "There is no law that gods must be fair, Achilles," Chiron said. "And perhaps it is the greater grief, after all, to be left on earth when another is gone. Do you think?"

Let's take a moment and unpack some of this. For context, this is a conversation between Patroclus, Achilles, and their mentor Chiron. They're discussing the tale of Heracles, who's driven to madness and ends up killing his own wife and kids.

From reading the book, (SPOILER ALERT) you know that Achilles' own pride and honor end up forcing Patroclus to impersonate him in order to save the Greek army, and in doing so is killed by Hector. The fact that Chiron directs this question, "And perhaps it is the greater grief, after all, to be left on earth when another is gone. Do you think?" to Achilles, who is left behind after Patroclus' death is such delightful foreshadowing that I almost threw the book across the room when I first read it.

Achilles slumps into such a depression after Patroclus dies (really, after he kills Patroclus with his own fatal flaw), that he even loses the ability to care about his fame or honor anymore. He feels the greater grief, so to speak.

Even after he dies, Patroclus is left behind, unable to rest properly because they never put his name on the tomb. In that sense, Patroclus is then the one left behind, experiencing loneliness and grief.

The book is full of little hints like this, and that's part of why it's almost torture to read as someone who knows how the Iliad goes. As I said before: the foreshadowing in this book is meant to have the reader in pain from the beginning because you know nothing is going to work out in the end.

2. Dramatic (and regular) Irony

Yes, that's right. I'm about to rip into your soul.

Probably one of the biggest parts of classical Greek myths is dramatic irony (the audience knowing something the characters don't). In plays, the ending is almost always announced before the play begins. In fact, the audience most likely already knows the story from previous tellings or just general knowledge. It makes sense that it would be one of the biggest players in "The Song of Achilles."

As usual, let's start with a quote:

His eyes opened. "Name one hero who was happy." I considered. Heracles went mad and killed his family; Theseus lost his bride and father; Jason's children and new wife were murdered by his old; Bellerophon killed the Chimera but was crippled by the fall from Pegasus' back. "You can't." He was sitting up now, leaning forward. "I can't." "I know. They never let you be famous and happy." He lifted an eyebrow. "I'll tell you a secret." "Tell me." I loved it when he was like this. "I'm going to be the first." He took my palm and held it to his. "Swear it." "Why me?" "Because you're the reason. Swear it." "I swear it," I said, lost in the high color of his cheeks, the flame in his eyes. "I swear it," he echoed. We sat like that a moment, hands touching. He grinned. "I feel like I could eat the world raw."

First of all: cute. Second of all: wow, so much pain.

As you know, Achilles is the opposite of happy at the end of the book (well, maybe after they die, but we'll get to that later). Though he swears it here with Patroclus, the two of them make decisions that ultimately lead to their downfall: Achilles decides to abandon the Greeks after they slighted his honor, Patroclus decides to help them even if it means risking his life, and Achilles lets him do it.

So let's talk about dramatic irony. The irony here is that you know, maybe just from this exchange alone, that Achilles isn't going to be the first happy hero. You know there is a war coming, know that Achilles and his famous heel will get himself killed. You might also know at this point that Patroclus will die first and send Achilles spiraling into grief before that happens.

It's painful, truly. Achilles spends his last days in utter agony, wanting to die but unable to kill himself, and Patroclus can only watch on as a ghost (spirit?). Even when Achilles does die and his ashes are put into their urn (seriously, how did any scholar ever think they weren't lovers?), they still have to wait to be reunited.

But there's still more. Consider these lines:

Hector's eyes are wide, but he will run no longer. He says, "Grant me this. Give my body to my family, when you have killed me." Achilles makes a sound like choking. "There are no bargains between lions and men. I will kill you and eat you raw."

Sound familiar? That's right: "I will kill you and eat you raw" sounds an awful lot like "I feel like I could eat the world raw," doesn't it? Another parallel from Miller: one from a time of happiness, the other from a time of extreme grief. However painful it is, I really live for connections like that.

And I've got one more for you:

Achilles shook his head. "Never. He is brave and strong, but that is all. He would break against Hector like water on a rock. So. It is me, or no one." "You will not do it." I tried not to let it sound like begging. "No." He was quiet a moment. "But I can see it. That's the strange thing. Like in a dream. I can see myself throwing the spear, see him fall. I walk up to the body and stand over it." Dread rose in my chest. I took a breath, forced it away. "And then what?" "That's the strangest of all. I look down at his blood and know my death is coming. But in the dream I do not mind. What I feel, most of all, is relief." "Do you think it can be prophecy?" The questions seemed to make him self-conscious. He shook his head. "No. I think it is nothing at all. A daydream." I forced my voice to match his in lightness. "I'm sure you're right. After all, Hector hasn't done anything to you."

See where I'm going with this? I don't think I need to explain this one.

3. Fatal Flaws

That's right, one of the most essential pieces for a tragedy: hamartia. For those who might not know, hamartia is the fatal flaw that ultimately leads to the downfall of a tragic hero or heroine. In every single piece of classical greek writing, if the story is a tragedy, the main character will have a fatal flaw that makes it so.

Take Achilles:

I looked at the stone of his face, and despaired. “If you love me-”

“No!” His face was stiff with tension. “I cannot! If I yield, Agamemnon can dishonor me whenever he wishes. The kings will not respect me, nor the men!” He was breathless, as though he had run far. “Do you think I wish them all to die? But I cannot. I cannot! I will not let them take this from me!”

You probably already know what his fatal flaw is: pride. He needs the fame, needs the glorious memory of his deeds to live on forever, so badly that he is willing to sacrifice his life and what might’ve been a fulfilling and long life with Patroclus out of the limelight. His fatal flaw is what spurs each of his actions in the later half of the book, including the moment where he decides to leave the Greeks to their deaths for slandering him.

Even Patroclus has a fatal flaw: his love for Achilles.

That night I lay in bed beside Achilles. His face is innocent, sleep-smoothed and sweetly boyish. I love to see it. This is his truest self, earnest and guileless, full of mischief but without malice. He is lost in Agamemnon and Odysseus’ wily double meanings, their lies and games of power. They have confounded him, tied him to a stake and baited him. I stroke the soft skin of his forehead. I would untie him if I could. If he would let me.

Though riding into the center of the fighting, especially dressed as Achilles, will make Patroclus the prime target, he decides to do it anyway. And not out of fear for Achilles’s life; he knows how important his pride and reputation is to him, and out of desperation will do anything to keep Achilles from being devastated when it doesn’t work out for him.

(Honestly, this is the part where I start to hate Achilles for doing this to Patroclus... it’s like he doesn’t even consider Patroclus his equal and does everything without consulting him.)

Of course, Agamemnon has a fatal flaw as well. He is like the mirror image of Achilles, so proud and stubborn, righteous and arrogant. However, he is the darker image, the one that revels in taking things by force and, of course, raping women like Briseis. He serves as a poignant foil for Achilles, highlighting all the ways the traits they share can easily become corrupted. It’s part of why this novel works so well.

I hope you all enjoyed this book as much as I did. Truthfully, I did have a few problems with it, but I wanted to trying picking it apart anyway. And if you haven’t read the song of achilles... what are you doing reading these spoilers??

#why can you visibly see where i get tired #achilles #greek myth aesthetic #analysis #patroclus #song of achilles #greece #greek posts #not the language though #this is so long #effort #first time ive ever wanted to write an essay #dark academia #dark acadamia aesthetic #this took me three days #greek mythology #iliad #homer

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butchgwenwhyvar · 4 years

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The Star Wars Prequels are a Greek Tragedy

Ok folks, buckle in because this classics nerd has made some Connections™

One of the main themes in the prequels (and by extension, the clone wars) is the inevitability of it all – I know it’s because it’s a prequel and as such, we know their fate, but that’s why it works.

(For the purpose of this meta post, please assume that when I say ‘the prequels’ and proceed to talk about Ahsoka or Rex, I mean ‘the prequels and the clone wars’ – it’s all part of the same story)

(Important fact that relates to this meta post but doesn’t have much bearing on the actual argument #1: Anakin’s name comes from the Greek Goddess of inevitability, Ananke.)

But the main argument is this: the prequels follow the format and pattern of a Greek tragedy. A Greek tragedy always has the audience take part in the form of the ‘chorus’ on stage – the chorus keep the story going and tell the audience what’s up, but they also provide an insight into the characters and question the characters on behalf of the audience (most tragedies are set in populated cities and palaces but a theatre troupe was traditionally around 5 people, so they had to get creative with extras and stuff). In the prequels and the clone wars, the role of the chorus is directly on the audience because we know what’s going to happen. We know about order 66 thanks to the start of season 6 and the end of season 7. We know that the sweet nine year old we meet in the phantom menace will become Vader. We know that Padme will die and that the Republic will fall and Palpatine will take power.

To us, the chorus, it’s inevitable. But we also know the future of the characters, so there’s a thread of dramatic irony woven in (dramatic irony is a central part of the format of a Greek tragedy) because we know about the original trilogy and the fact that Luke will save Vader and the Empire gets royally fucked up by the rebels.

In Greek tragedy, the dramatic irony is a little less on the nose though. In Oedipus the King (Oedipus Rex in Latin), the chorus and the audience know what’s going to happen from the start. By the time Sophocles had written down the play it had already been performed at least once at the Dionysia, an Athenian play festival where everyone got very drunk and people ran play contests – Sophocles was a common contributor to the contests, and it was recorded that he never got below second place. So as this play is being performed in the late third century BCE, it’s been around for around 100 years. The audience knows what’s up – they know that Jocasta is actually Oedipus’ mother, they know that Oedipus is actually the one that killed Laius and is bringing down the gods’ displeasure on Thebes. So when Oedipus and Creon are talking to Tiresias and saying ‘well, someone has to be cursed because that’s the only way we’ve pissed the gods off enough,’ the audience (and to an extent Tiresias, because he was a prophet) get a sense of dramatic irony. It’s similar to the scene in Attack of the Clones when Dooku’s talking about the sith in the senate – we as the chorus and the audience go ‘It’s Palpatine!’ because we’ve seen the originals and we know about the fall of the republic.

The sense of dramatic irony really helps to build the inevitability of it all because as the chorus, we know the future of these characters.

Another thing that characterises the prequels as a specifically Greek tragedy is the use of fatal flaws and how they relate to the character’s virtues. Anakin’s main character traits are his general mistrust of authority, his sense of personal loyalty and his need to help others – he’s proven that he’d burn the galaxy down for his family and the people he loves, and there’s quite a few poignant scenes in the clone wars EU novels where he’s mourning the clones and generally caring a lot about them (if you want specific novels, Karen Miller’s ‘Clone Wars: Gambit – Stealth’ is excellent and is the source of that excellent ‘blind me and I’ll tell you who laughed’ quote, and Karen Traviss’ novelisation of the clone wars movie has lots of scenes with Anakin being a good bro to Rex and caring about the 501st). Padme’s main trait is her belief in human decency (we’re using human in this case because I’m relating it back to humans) – she cares deeply about seeing the good in people, up to her dying moments. Obi-Wan’s main trait is his dedication to the Order and their rules.

However, if you turn these traits on their heads, you get their fatal flaws and their ultimate downfall. Vader’s issues with authority and his need to save those he cares about lands him in the suit and as the Emperor’s attack dog. Padme can’t see the problems in the republic and all the things going wrong with Anakin until it’s too late because she’s so focussed on seeing the good in what’s left. Obi-Wan fails as Anakin’s mentor because he was too focused on the way things should have been (let the record show I am not shitting on Obi-Wan, this is just my thoughts about the narrative and this part of the Skywalker debacle).

In Oedipus Rex and Antigone (written before Oedipus, set after Oedipus – it’s about his daughter), the same thing happens. Oedipus’ loyalty to Thebes and his unwavering sense of duty makes him an excellent king – he listens to his people and takes their complaints into account. Creon’s ability to stick to the rules and provide a safe kingdom makes him the perfect second choice as king (this will make more sense when I talk about Antigone because Creon is a main character in this play as well – his character arc spans the two plays). Jocasta is kind and sees the best in everyone (I’m sensing a theme). But if you turn that on its head, all the ugly details come out. Oedipus has inadvertently committed one of the worst sins that the gods can think of a punishment for, and he’s promised the people of Thebes that whoever has cursed the land will be banished for life. When he finds out that his wife is also his mother and he murdered his birth father years ago, he blinds himself in shame but asks to stay in Thebes. This is where Creon’s flaw starts to appear – Oedipus asks to stay and Creon casts him out. Oedipus keeps his loyalty to the Thebans by maiming himself and marking himself as the cursed person, but he doesn’t think his actions through. If he’s banished, his four children will also be banished with him and will suffer for the rest of their lives. Staying is the only option. But Creon is too obsessed with placating the Thebans and the gods, so Oedipus and his children are cast out because of Creon’s determination to stick to the rules. Jocasta’s need to see the best in everyone leads to her denying that her husband is also her son, even once she’s put the pieces together – there’s a scene where she’s talking to her main and her maid asks and she refuses to acknowledge it. This leads to her killing herself in shame once the news has gotten out. It’s inevitable. The audience know and love this play. They know what’s coming.

And then Antigone happens. Antigone is Oedipus’ eldest daughter. Her siblings are Ismene, the youngest, Eteocles, and Polynices. Eteocles and Polynices have declared war on each other (Eteocles is fighting for Thebes, where Creon is the king now) and have killed each other. Eteocles is to be buried with full honours, while Polynices’ body is to be left in the dust (the Greeks believed that being buried in the dirt was the only way to get into the afterlife). So Antigone tries to bury Polynices over the course of the story – her main character trait is her loyalty and her persistence. Creon is still too wedded to the rules, but now he’s also stuck on his own idea of power – the king’s word above all else, even the gods.

The play ends with Antigone’s suicide after being banished to a sealed cave for the rest of her life (she keeps covering Polynices’ body in dirt until Creon gets sick of it and sends her to the cave). Her loyalty and her tenacity have become her downfall and led to her death (for those interested, Antigone’s death led to Creon burying Polynices properly). Creon’s virtues of being a rule-following king lead to him essentially going mad with power, which leads to his son killing himself after he hears of Antigone’s sentence, his wife killing herself after she hears of Haemon’s death, and Creon’s apparent suicide (he gets an open ending but it’s widely accepted that he dies as well).

Relating this back to Star Wars and the point I made earlier: the prequels are pretty much the only Star Wars media where the character’s virtues become their flaws. It’s very hubristic and I love it. Ahsoka’s virtue is in her persistence and her drive to survive while trying to do what’s right – turn it on its head and she’s unleashing Maul on a bunch of 66’d clones to escape. On first watch, Rex’s virtue seems to be his loyalty to the Republic, but that’s brought into contention in season 1. His actual virtue is his loyalty to his brothers but that’s turned on its head in episodes 11 and 12 when he’s forced to shoot and stun them and know that they’re going to die and there’s nothing he can do to save them, which almost leads to him giving up entirely in episode 12.

And that leads me back to my main point. George Lucas wrote the prequels and most of the clone wars like the archetype of the Greek tragedy on purpose, to show the inevitability of the story.

The main parts of a Greek tragedy are as follows: Hubris (personal pride leading to a downfall)

The Chorus and the use of dramatic irony

Virtues as fatal flaws

Catharsis

The main parts of the prequels are as follows:

Hubris (the Jedi and the Republic’s pride lead to their downfall, Anakin and Obi-Wan’s pride leads to Mustafar)

The Audience and the use of dramatic irony

Virtues as fatal flaws

Catharsis

Hope

Back to inevitability: the use of virtues as flaws leads to the inevitability of the tragedy of Anakin Skywalker. He can’t not be loyal and caring to the point of obsession, jealousy, and overprotectiveness. Padme can’t not deeply believe in the power of human kindness and their ability to believe in a better system. Obi-Wan can’t not be wedded to the rules far too much. To take all of this away from their characters is to leave them as completely different people. An Anakin that doesn’t care as much is an Anakin that’s closer to the ‘perfect Jedi,’ a Padme that doesn’t believe in a better system is a Padme that lets even more atrocities fly under the radar in the senate. An Obi-Wan that’s not wedded to the Code and the Order and the Rules is an Obi-Wan seen in the early Jedi Apprentice books – a Jedi always on the brink of snapping, falling, or expulsion from the Order. So you see these character traits and you see what’s coming and it’s inevitable because these virtues and therefore flaws are what makes the character them, which progresses the story.

The use of dramatic irony also highlights the inevitability within the stories of the prequels and the tragedies. The audience of the films and the chorus/audience of the plays know what the characters don’t. They know that Oedipus is Jocasta’s son. They know that Antigone and the rest of Creon’s family will kill themselves. We know Anakin will fall. We know Padme will die. We know about the fall of the Republic and the rise of the Empire. But they don’t and that’s why the dramatic irony works so well. We’re on the edge of our seats, waiting for the moment when it all clicks – when someone listens to Fives about the chips and takes action – when Anakin gets help – where Padme survives – where Obi-Wan puts aside the Order and tries to help Anakin and reassures him. But it never happens, and we know that.

Every time we watch the prequels or the clone wars, we think ‘maybe this time it will turn out alright’ but it’s inevitable that it won’t because it’s written like a Greek tragedy and those always end in the darkest possible way.

There’s another common thread between the prequels and Greek tragedy as well – catharsis. It’s the breaking point and the aftermath, where consequences are dealt out. The catharsis in Oedipus is obvious – it’s when Oedipus blinds himself and is banished. The catharsis in Antigone is subtler but infinitely more painful. Creon is punished for disobeying the gods and as his punishment, Antigone (his son’s fiancée), Haemon (his son), and his wife are all dead, all by their own hand. This brings him shame and it’s widely accepted that he goes off and kills himself, which is even more of a punishment (suicide was not welcomed in the Greek afterlife – they’d often go to the Fields of Punishment or the Fields of Asphodel). The catharsis in the prequels is glaringly obvious in comparison. Anakin faces massive consequences for his actions, which stay with him for the next 25 or so years. He can’t go back to the way everything was, because he’s burnt it all down around him. He’s punished psychologically and physically until his death, as punishment for his mistakes and his actions. The audience feels catharsis here as well, as Anakin doesn’t get away with his actions. His end is especially cathartic, not just because he got his comeuppance, but because he dies to undo a little bit of the horrors he’s committed.

So the prequels and a Greek tragedy always end in tears, and the quote at the start of the Revenge of the Sith novelisation (thank you Matthew Stover) sums this up perfectly. ‘This story happened a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. It is already over. Nothing can be done to change it. The inevitability of all of these stories I’ve talked about is woven into it’s very fabric, and nothing can be done to change it.

However, there is one way in which the prequels are different to a typical tragedy – the prequels end with a shred of hope. Tragedies have to finish with the catharsis and complete and utter bleakness and the destruction of a heap of lives – Creon’s family dies, Oedipus loses his wife and his sight, Anakin and Palpatine destroy the Jedi – it’s one of the hallmarks that makes it a tragedy and not just ‘some play by Sophocles.’ The prequels finish with Bail and Breha and Leia in the palace on Alderaan. They finish with Luke with Beru and Owen on Tatooine, where Shmi and Anakin were from. They finish with hope, which is a complete turnaround from the tragedies that the story is written to fit in with.

#lee writes #star wars #prequels #tcw #meta #anakin #padme #obi-wan #rex #ahsoka #I need a classics tag

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mentallydatingahotcelebrity · 6 years

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Rreading posts today from various people I learned that Taika Waititi, director of Ragnarok, has no idea why Loki is a tragic character. Loki’s story alone and from his POV is, actually, a tragedy. But to someone who doesn’t really understand the definition of what makes a character, setting, novel, or film a “tragedy” the idea that Loki is a tragic character sounds utterly ridiculous and overdramatic.

So here’s a definition of the tragic character/a tragedy as written by E. B. Greenwood in 1994/95 for the introduction to Anna Karenina for anyone curious as to WHY I call Loki a “tragic character”. I’ve changed some words so that it fits my topic.

“What do I mean by saying that it is, in substance, a tragedy? [...] It has the substance of tragedy in that in it, as Aristotle required, a person neither of superlative goodness nor repellant wickedness (i.e. a character whom we can sympathise with, even love) makes a mistaken choice or set of choices. Aristotle called this hamartia. When this choice leads to a situation from which there is no way out but suffering, we have tragedy. Both Greek and Shakespearean tragedy involve poetic stylisation and elevation and actions out of the ordinary. Loki’s tragedy comes much closer to the type of tragedy described by Tolstoy’s favorite philosopher Schopenhauer in Section 51 of The World as Will and Representation:

Finally, the misfortune can be brought about also by the mere attitude of the persons to one another through their relations. Thus there is no need either of a colossal error, or of an unheard-of accident, or even of a character reaching the bounds of human possibility in wickedness, but characters as they usually are in a moral regard in circumstances that frequently occur, are so situated with regard to one another that their position forces them, knowingly and with their eyes open, to do one another the greatest injury, without any of them being entirely in the wrong. This last kind of tragedy seems to me to be far preferably to the other two; for it shows us the greatest misfortune not as an exception, not as something brought about by rare circumstances or by monstrous characters, but as something that arises easily and spontaneously out of the actions and characters of men as something almost essential to them, and in this way is brought terribly near to us. . . We see the greatest suffering brought about by entanglements whose essence could be assumed even by our own fate, and by actions that perhaps even we might be capable of committing, and so we cannot complain of injustice. Then, shuddering, we feel ourselves already in the midst of hell. In this last kind of tragedy the working out is of the greatest difficulty; for the greatest effect has to be produced in it with the least use of means and occasions for movement, merely by their position and distribution.

When I read all of the above upon purchasing Anna Karenina, I was quite surprised at how fitting it was of Loki’s role and an explanation of why he is a tragic character. Because, in a most ironic turn of events, the god who declares ‘there are no men like him’ is, in fact, utterly and completely like the men he seeks to dominate. He’s relatable, identifiable, lovable; because he’s flawed, and hurting, and desirous of the same emotions all human beings want:

Recognition, adoration, affection, support, protection, love, companionship.

The reason why I included that excerpt from Schopenhauer is because I think that fits Loki too-- in his universe, the things that happened to him frequently occurred, but they built and built until he snapped beneath the weight of them; something everyone who came to adore Loki recognized and found utterly relatable, to the point of being distressed for Loki.

He’s not a villain, he never was, he’s just a tragic character.

And the problem with this is that tragic characters are not absolutely good nor utterly evil, they’re a bit of both and completely relatable from the audience’s point of view. That’s the reason why Marvel couldn’t figure out how to adapt him or develop him, because a tragic character is, always, fated to die.

Hamlet, Anna Karenina, Romeo, Juliet, Loki-- their roles are to bring to the foreground that the typical nature of humans is to destroy themselves for a motive they think in their own minds will help them while meanwhile the reality of it is that guides them toward their eventual end. We are all heroes in our own minds where we tell ourselves how much good we’re doing; but our actions make us deplorable to the people looking on. The Tragic Character role in all forms of writing is to wake up other characters to the realization that they need to change how they act if they want to prevent the same end.

[Which is what happened in the end of Thor. Thor realized that anger can lead to self-destruction, and Odin learned that not mentioning his love for his sons can lead to their downfall]

The problem is that in order to continue to make Thor and Loki interesting, new and unique storylines would have to be created-- risk would have to be made. Loki would have to keep on being a tragic character and he’d have to die. Which he was going to do in The Dark World. But with Marvel, as with most things in this day and age, Loki’s name goes synonymously with money. He’d been making them money, he generated interest. Look how massive Ragnarok’s box office income [or whatever that’s called?] was on day one alone.

Yeah, sure, there were people there because their interested had been piqued by the [bad] trailers for the film, and they also came because a large majority of people love Thor-- but who hadn’t been seen living, breathing and walking around for 4 years?

Loki.

People wanted to know what happened to Loki more than Thor-- sucks for Waititi and Hemsworth, but it’s the truth. We’ve been seeing Thor in basically every Avengers film except Captain America: Civil War. We know that he’s alive, how he’s doing, how things are going for him. But no one knew about Loki. Because Loki is the tragic character, the human one in a sea of unhuman, “good” characters (Thor, Odin, Frigga, Sif, Volstagg, Hogun, Fandral, Heimdall), if you will. He’s the one we look to and go “I wonder what he’s thinking” “I wonder how he’s feeling” because as soon as we see it:

“Trust my rage”

“Because I’m the monster parents tell their children about at night?”

“The humans slaughter each other in droves while you idly fret”

We can RELATE to what he’s saying, we GET what he’s saying. Yes, we all think with a grin at one another, Thor really is going on about nothing, wish he’d stop some of our wars. Yes, TRUST RAGE, because when we’re angry the truth comes out ungilt with fancy falsehoods and pretty pretendings. Yes, we all sometimes feel we’ve become what our parents warned us against when we were younger--no wonder it seems as if their love for us has diminished into nothing, they hate what we’ve become.

This is, 100%, a tragic character. People either love them or hate them because they remind us of who we are and what we’re capable of. Murder? Yes. Hatred? Yes. Rage? Yes. Self-doubt? Yes. Fear? Yes. Self-loathing? Yes. The capability to be good or bad or both in turns? Yes.

And the fact that the person who plays this role is someone who studied roles like this (among others) for his higher education? Well, it (quite literally) can’t get any better than that. Not only is Loki a tragic character, but he’s played by an actor who understands the method of performing tragedies, who understands how those characters have to be played out, and who can relate to them at the same time to make that performance dynamite.

The reason why Ragnarok!Loki is so appalling is because he’s played in the same method as Thor, however not in the role of “Morally Good” character but rather in the role of Touchstone the Jester. He says some clever things amidst his largely joksy lines. But he’s really just there for giggles [also as a foil for the main characters to bounce sage-sounding lines or soliloquies off of], and not much else.

And we, as fans, hate that because that’s not Loki’s role. He isn’t the god of jokes. So I’ve taken to looking at this whole Gagnarok problem as an attempt at erasing the Tragic Character That Is Loki because he’s very difficult to write. It was difficult for Tolstoy to write Anna Karenina in the beginning because of how human the characters were, how easily their actions could very well become his own. There’s a reason it took him some three years to complete that novel: writing Tragic Characters is hard. In the process of creating them, writers have to admit things about themselves that all human beings would rather shove into little dark places in our hearts and ignore.

Or there’s another reason they have to crush his beautiful writing into the garbage chute:

He’s

a) going to turn up alive and well but just for shits and giggles in A4

b) going to turn up alive and well and hatefully backstabbing in A4

I’m voting on the latter instead of the former. I’ll be really pleased, however, if he has a proper Tragic Character ending. As in, he comes back, helps the Avengers out, and then agrees to die anyway to save the “better” characters. Or dies in the process of actually saving one of the “better” characters. Because that crap at the beginning of Infinity War will never please me, I’m sorry. Tom’s acting: lovely. Loki’s role before kicking the bucket: garbage.

Annnnnd I think I’m done for the evening. I hope this made sense-- I’m sick so I’m doped up by the doc to the point of constantly feeling drowsy and half-lucid. If anyone wants to have further conversation on this, reblog the post or message me or ask me.

#Loki #Marvel #the problem with loki #Gagnarok and Infinity War Loki #tragic characters #Anna Karenina and Loki Laufeyson #Tolstoy and Tom Hiddleston #writing tragic characters #god of jokes vs god of mischief #silvertongue vs slapstick

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grejedi · 6 years

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Luke Skywalker and His Role as a Sophoclean Tragic Hero

In JJ Abram’s and Rian Johnson’s take of the familiar Star Wars universe, we are introduced to an aging Luke Sywalker not as an infallible morally superior hero, but as a flawed and emotionally wounded man. Luke, having played a major role in the toppling of the Galactic Empire thirty years prior, has cloaked himself in a mysterious retreat, away from the new galactic conflict between the First Order and the New Republic. He is not the same Luke Skywalker the audience saw during the Galactic Civil War: steadfast, bright eyed, and unwavering in certainty. Instead, we are presented with a Luke Skywalker that is cautious, wary, and wracked with guilt. This character progression is not new to mythology. In fact, Johnson has used one of the oldest forms of storytelling, stemming from Athenian theater: the Sophoclean tragedy.

As a brief overview and history lesson, Sophocles was a celebrated playwright who invented an entirely new form of drama. His tragedies borrowed characters and events from established mythology such as the Iliad and transformed them to fit the morals and themes of a new enlightened Greece. Whereas in archaic myths, we were given one-dimensional heroes like Herakles, Sophocles brought them into a world where their brute strength and moral absolutes were now weaknesses. Sophocles essentially wrote about what happens when warriors do not die in battle, have no more wars to fight, and what it means for them to return home and live among society.

A tragedy of Sophocles has the following characteristics:

It is based on events that already took place and with which the audience is familiar.

The protagonist is a person of noble birth and stature.

The protagonist has a weakness and, because of it, becomes isolated and suffers a downfall.

Because the protagonist's fall is not entirely his or her own fault, the audience may end up pitying him or her.

The fallen protagonist gains self-knowledge. He has a deeper insight into himself and understands his weakness.

The audience undergoes catharsis, a purging of emotions, after experiencing pity, fear, shock and other strong feelings.

The drama usually unfolds in one place in a short period of time, usually about a day.

(Characteristics of Sophoclean Tragedy and the Role of the Chorus)

We might apply several of these narrative factors to other protagonists of the sequel trilogy. The audience, if the duo writers have done their job correctly, does feel pity for Kylo Ren. Rey gains a level of self-knowledge that she did not have in the beginning of her character arc. Poe Damaron suffers a downfall due to his own personal character flaws. However, there are two important aspects that pertain to Luke and Luke alone: (1) The audience is already familiar with Luke and his characterization from previous media and (2) Luke is a Hero in the established universe. Although the audience understands that Luke is a hero because of his deeds in the Galactic Civil War, let us delve into what makes a character a hero in the context of archaic Greek mythology.

An archaic hero, above all else, is “god-like”. In other words, they are exceptional in one way or another. Heracles was the strongest man alive, Achilles was the most skilled warrior, Odysseus was the most cunning, etc. But they were still mortals, and, in the end, were meant to die a mortal death. In addition, in Professor Nagy's list of the characteristics of the prototypical Greek hero, he writes that the hero was “un-seasonal”. This basically means that the greatest heroes were born into dire circumstances of some kind. The archaic hero is born to use his God-given gift for a specific grandiose purpose, and then, completing his task, dies a noble death. (What makes a Greek hero?)

Does this synopsis sound a lot like Luke Skywalker’s journey in the original trilogy? There is an exceptional power shown by our protagonist, the power to wield and manipulate the Force. From the beginning of A New Hope, the audience is privy to this: Luke senses through the Force that he should intercept R2-D2, he senses trouble on his uncle and aunt’s farm, and we see he is incredibly empathetic, intelligent, and strategic. Though Obi Wan and Yoda try to teach him the Jedi ways, Luke essentially learns the ways of the Force on his own, which in itself is incredibly impressive. The most outstanding moment is certainly the destruction of the Death Star via a single blaster shot by Luke, who summoned the Force to guide him. Through the prequel trilogy, we learn that he is also born in a time of disquiet in the galaxy, with powers beginning to stir that will destroy the Republic.

So Luke Skywalker is a legend. This is an established fact going into The Force Awakens. But what happens to legends when their acts of heroism are over and done with? This is what Sophocles delves into with his various Athenian tragedies, and what Johnson plays with going into The Last Jedi. From archaic one-dimensional hero to a flawed man, the natural progression of Luke Skywalker’s character is his inevitable downfall and then catharsis, as we have seen in some of the oldest written fiction known to mankind.

Beginning with bullet #3 in the earlier list of Sophoclean characteristics, the audience immediately learns in The Force Awakens that Luke Skywalker, in fact, has human weaknesses, and has suffered a downfall due to this weakness, and has isolated himself due to shame and regret. This, we then learn, is his moment of weakness regarding Ben Solo. In a moment of human fear toward his conflicted nephew, who had been feeling the tug and pull of the Dark Side of the Force since infancy, Luke ignites his lightsaber and contemplates simply snuffing out the threat before it fully forms. This is where the greatest backlash regarding Luke’s characterization occurs. The Luke Skywalker the general audience knows and adores was a beacon of goodness who threw away his weapon rather than fight his own father, Darth Vader, a barely-man that had fully succumb to the Dark Side and who was viewed by every other character as fully gone. But, as we have seen, that particular characterization of Luke was an archaic hero, while the Luke in this sequel trilogy is an entirely different breed.

The audience, knowing Luke’s struggles and his prevailing goodness, realizing that his actions were made in an effort to protect those he loves and the entire galaxy from a forming evil, feels great pity for him. After all, it was a single moment of human vulnerability, one that Luke did not even fully act upon. If Ben had not woken up to the image of his uncle standing over him, weapon drawn, that moment would have only haunted Luke in the recesses of his own mind. But Ben did catch Luke in this floundering moment, and, in doing so, Luke may have solidified the tyrant and kinkiller than became Kylo Ren. Just from one small human moment of weakness.

The Last Jedi is framed by the struggles of Rey and Kylo Ren, the Force users, and the Resistance, the quickly dissipating militia facing down the First Order. But among these struggles is a poignant struggle within Luke himself. Through training the strong-willed Rey, through Rey’s Force interactions with Kylo and her following interrogations of Luke regarding his most regretted, lowest, moment, Luke gains self-knowledge. The audience follows his path of self-resentment, of utter ruin and guilt, of bitterness towards the entire Jedi Order, until we see him reach a moment of epiphany during his conversation with the Force ghost of Yoda. We see him come to understand that his failures do not define him, at least not any more than his accomplishments do. We come to understand that Luke Skywalker is not infallible, as he comes to understand it himself.

This leads to the monumental face-off with Kylo Ren on Crait, which is as action-packed as it is deeply emotional. Luke is reunited with his sister, he takes up the role of Galactic Hero once more, and apologizes outright to Kylo Ren for his failures. There are very strong intermingling feelings throughout this segment of the movie. The audience feels what Luke feels: his apprehension, his regret, and, finally, his hope. His hope for peace within the galaxy and within his nephew. We follow him back to Ach-to, where Luke gazes upon his last binary sunset. We feel that, while the interplanetary war rages on, Luke himself is finally at peace, and it is a cathartic moment for the audience and for our hero both.

In this way, Rian Johnson takes us through the character arc of a Sophoclean tragic hero effortlessly. A hero in Greek muthos is never meant to return from war. The hero is born when he is needed, performs his spectacular feats in the face of turmoil and adversity, and dies a grandiose gallant death. When a hero lives, when a hero returns to civilian life with the same awe-inspiring powers and wartime mentality that they have needed their entire lives, that is when morality becomes grey and characters become multi-faceted. The archaic hero that was Luke Skywalker has no palace in the morally ambiguous realm of The Last Jedi. But from that character, the audience is able to meet a new evolving hero who is struggling, who has made difficult decisions, has felt regret over those decisions, and who walks through fire to emerge on the other side stronger and more relatable for it.

SOURCES

Characteristics of Sophoclean Tragedy and the Role of the Chorus [PDF]. (n.d.).

What makes a Greek hero? (n.d.). Retrieved December 24, 2017, from

http://ancientheroespodcast.com/blog/what-makes-a-greek-hero

#the last jedi meta #the last jedi #luke skywalker

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dweemeister · 6 years

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The Blue Angel (1930, Germany)

With the silent era at its conclusion and the rise of Nazism upcoming, German cinema’s brief early sound era shows the visual mastery of what might have been. The Blue Angel is Germany’s first feature-length synchronized sound film and is helmed by Austrian-American Josef von Sternberg in his only German-language production. Von Sternberg had directed a handful of films for Paramount prior to The Blue Angel, including The Docks of New York (1928) and The Last Command (1928). Thematically, The Blue Angel – produced by Universum Film AG (UFA) and distributed in the United States by Paramount – is a departure from von Sternberg’s previous films, while also adopting the aesthetic influences of German expressionism. In these precious few years following the heights of German silent film glory, the audience is treated to a talkie that always feels like a silent film. That incongruity never distracts, and only serves to demonstrate how remarkable The Blue Angel is in an experimental period of filmmaking – a period where few filmmakers could balance the needs of image and sound.

In Weimar Germany, disciplinarian professor Immanuel Rath (Emil Jannings) is the target of pranks and barbed words from his students at an all-male college prep school. One day, he is particularly annoyed by the boys passing around photographs of cabaret performer Lola Lola (Marlene Dietrich). Lola performs at a local nightclub called The Blue Angel, and Rath visits in hopes to catch his students there. His students are present, but Rath is overcome by lust after watching Lola perform. Returning the next night with a pair of her panties (that one of his students smuggled into his pocket), he spends the night with her. Rumors spread like the flu, Rath is dismissed from his professorship, and allows himself to be humiliated for what he thinks is love. His downfall is sealed.

The Blue Angel is a tragedy, but has more to do with Greek drama than Shakespeare – the former emphasizes the inescapability of divine fate and the role of human hubris in believing predestination can be overcome; the latter is dictated on the free will of an individual and how their character flaws result in their demise (the flaw need not be hubris, but it is often invoked by Shakespeare). According to von Sternberg, The Blue Angel is making no attempts at political allegory, so his intentions are purely personal. As Rath, Jannings plays his character as a rebuke to the besotted silent film romances seen across Western cinema. Unlike Heinrich Mann’s novel on which this film is based on, The Blue Angel never allows Rath to change himself over the course of his relationship with Lola. Maybe the audience should have sensed this earlier: his personality, his sense of order in the classroom was of strict control. Believing in his intelligence and ability to control his emotions and the situation, he stumbles upon Lola, holding her up to an image of perfection, and believing in that image steadfastly until he finally sees otherwise.

As the film’s seductress, Lola is a charismatic fantasy that men desire (permit some heteronormative language in respect to what the film depicts). But what people desire and what they need are distinct – something that neither Rath nor Lola ever understand. In her introductory scene, Lola is performing onstage, essentially opening herself to the unprocessed feelings of lustful men (young and old). She purrs, “... I have a pianola / that is my joy and pride. / They call me naughty Lola; / the men all go for me. / But I don’t let any man / lay a paw on my keys.”

What does Lola see in Rath that makes her want to be with him? They marry and it is implied that they become intimate. Her side of the relationship alternates between fits of passion and vitriol; intimacy and unfaithfulness; attention and apathy. Amid a society where cabaret performers like Lola could be seen as flighty and licentious, in Rath Lola sees someone who thinks otherwise. But instead of attempting to understand Lola’s anxieties and weaknesses – the viewer senses that, beneath her erotic public performances, there is more to this character that is never depicted – Rath views her as a romantic nonpareil. His ability for critical thought disappears when it comes to this sort of relationship he might never have experienced; his ability for self-reflection tainted by an unbending, stern, studious approach to his students. For her, Rath presents an opportunity to be accepted as something magnificent, something pure that which she nor anyone ever will be.

The film’s sensitivities are with Rath, not Lola. Even in Rath’s most despicable moment, von Sternberg and fellow co-screenwriters Carl Zuckmeyer, Karl Vollmöller, Robert Liebmann ensure that The Blue Angel remains within the tradition of Greek tragedy (with a twist). Where in the original novel Rath embarks upon exacting revenge against the authoritarian society that has shaped his interactions with students, there is no such redemption here. Rath is punished for his dangerous lustfulness – as he should be. Curiously, the predatory Lola – despite becoming a victim of attempted violence in the final minutes – escapes punishment of any type. In Rath’s tragedy, she has discarded what she no longer wants and has gained something/someone she presently desires. No remorse is present, nor does there appear to be any emotional trauma from ending her relationship with Rath. Perhaps the audience should have expected this, given the lyrics to the memorable “Falling in Love Again”, sung by Dietrich twice with music by Friedrich Hollaender and lyrics by Robert Liebmann (these lyrics are from the English-language version of this song; Hollaender adjusted the songs to accommodate Dietrich’s limited, but effective, vocal range):

Love's always been my game, Play it how I may, I was made that way, Can't help it.

If The Blue Angel had been produced primarily in the United States later in the 1930s, this ending could not have been upheld by the censors. Love (or romance or whatever you wish to call it), to Lola, is a fun game to play. And playing by her rules, she has always won. Where Rath experiences a tragedy befitting a German expressionist protagonist, Lola’s inconclusive fate feels contemporary regardless of the film’s Weimar morals.

The film collapses without the performances from its two central stars. Before release, Jannings was the lead if one looked at the billing. He had just won the inaugural Academy Award for Best Actor in von Sternberg’s The Last Command and 1927′s The Way of All Flesh (actors were listed for multiple movies at the first Oscars) – this film was to be his nominal pinnacle. Jannings excelled in playing tortured, disgraced characters and could do no greater here with his physical acting. His performance would be just as spellbinding if The Blue Angel was a silent film. However, Jannings is upstaged by Dietrich the moment she appears on-screen. Dietrich, playing an intemperate woman, became an instant sensation to European and American audiences in this, her twentieth film (and first talkie). But her success in The Blue Angel also served to typecast Dietrich into roles unscrupulous and indiscreetly erotic – pursuing sexual satisfaction at the expense of others’ needs. Von Sternberg doted on Dietrich during production, sparking the ire of Jannings (who entered production hoping to become next Hollywood star, but instead saw his career plummet afterwards due to his heavy German accent and subsequent work Nazi propaganda films) and von Sternberg’s wife (who filed for divorce after the film’s release). Her sensuality defined this film, whether or not the cameras rolled.

Manning the cameras was veteran cinematographer Günther Rittau (Die Nibelungen saga, 1927′s Metropolis). Rittau captures the smoky interior of The Blue Angel nightclub and the seedy nighttime of this unnamed German town to convey a sense of enclosure. Art director Otto Hunte (Die Nibelungen saga, Metropolis) employs distorted geometries – early shots of angled rooftops and jagged roads primes the imagination for the unconventional story to come – and exaggerated shapes and lighting to assist Rittau in achieving the film’s wondrous atmosphere.

This film, like many in the early years of synchronized sound, was shot in two different languages – German and English (yes, the actors had to shoot every seen and recite their lines twice). The above has been written based on the 107-minute uncut German-language version distributed by Kino International, licensed by the Murnau Foundation, and aired on Turner Classic Movies (TCM). Consensus says that the German-language version is superior to the English edition.

Predictable though it might be, The Blue Angel is a forceful statement of German filmmaking – it is a film honoring the expressionist past while showcasing its future (a future where many of its innovators would flee the Nazis and work in Hollywood). It would also be one of UFA’s final classics – the studio also released Robert Wiene’s The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), F.W. Murnau’s The Last Laugh (1924), and Fritz Lang’s visionary Metropolis. Von Sternberg’s film, reflecting the drama behind the cameras, is a romantic tragedy that sings of love even when its characters know little about it. The Blue Angel is a triumph that quickly became written into German cinematic history. Its rapid ascent into that history can be attributed to the political changes soon to uproot all that German filmmakers had nourished. This film could not have been made any better in any other time.

My rating: 9.5/10

^ Based on my personal imdb rating. Half-points are always rounded down. My interpretation of that ratings system can be found here.

#The Blue Angel #Josef von Sternberg #Emil Jannings #Marlene Dietrich #Kurt Gerron #Rosa Valetti #Hans Albers #Reinhold Bernt #Eduard von Winterstein #Gunther Rittau #Otto Hunte #Friedrich Hollaender #Robert Liebmann #Carl Zuckmayer #Karl Volllmoller #TCM #My Movie Odyssey

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