Month: July 2015

General · reading · Writing

The Belly of the Whale: The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Chapter 1.5

Sonia Lal2 Comments

The Belly of the Whale

The hero has heard the Call to Adventure, accepted it (the hero may have rejected it first) and has also gotten through the First Threshold. Now our brave hero is in the Belly of the Whale.

Chapter 1.1 was about the Call to Adventure.

Chapter 1.2 was about Refusal of the Call to Adventure.

Chapter 1.3 was about Supernatural Aid.

Chapter 1.4 was about Crossing of the First Threshold

This section about the Belly of the Whale concludes the first chapter of the The Hero with a Thousand Faces. It is called Departure and I imagine it means the hero has finished departing and is well into the adventure.

The book has this to say about The Belly of the Whale:

The idea that the threshold is a transit into a sphere of rebirth is symbolized in the worldwide womb image of the belly of the whale. The hero, instead of conquering or conciliating the power of the threshold, is swallowed into the unknown, and would appear to have died.

To me it sounds like the hero is trapped somehow, maybe by the enemy, maybe by the world itself. Maybe the hero was kidnapped or betrayed into the hands of the enemy. Maybe the enemy has trapped him some other way and he has to shoot his way out.

I am less sure about the rebirth bit of this quote. I think it means being trapped changes the hero somehow, in some fundamental way. Traumatic experiences do change people, but usually not in a good way. A traumatic experience can also turn you into a better person, or at least a more empathic one, so it could go both ways.

In Star Wars (Episode IV: The New Hope) this is when Luke and company are trapped on the Death Star. The point where they jump into the garbage disposal place is the moment when they are in abdomen of the Death Star.

Harry Potter . . . Harry Potter is harder to say. I think this is when he gets past  Fluffy (the three-headed dog) and goes through that trapdoor. They play that  game of chess. Well, this or there isn’t a Belly of the Whale in the first Harry Potter book. What do you guys think?

As for how they change . . . Luke watches his mentor as they fight free of the Death Star. Harry learns something about himself, but after the chess scene, so I am not sure it counts. Because the things that learns about himself could also be another part of the hero’s journey.

Anyway, at the end, I think the Belly of the Whale section is about the hero getting trapped somehow. It doesn’t have to be by the enemy, though it usually is. Cultural norms and things like that could also play a part. The hero’s own emotions could also a play part in trapping him.

science fiction

Star Wars Droids Keep Going and Going and Going

Sonia Lal1 Comment

I was watching Star Wars a few days ago (episodes IV and V) and the droids (C-3PO & R2-D2) just keep going and going and going.

C-3PO at least shuts down sometimes, but I don’t think R2-D2 ever does.

I wish my phone had batteries like that.

And, hey, if electric cars had batteries like that, I bet gas fueled cars would go the way of the dodo. All gas stations would turn into battery stations.

reading · science fiction · Teaser Tuesdays

Teaser Tuesday: Leviathan Wakes

Sonia Lal22 Comments

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of A Daily Rhythm. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

My Teaser:

“It’s the beacon we followed. Jesus. The ship’s beacon never even turned on. Someone made a fake one out of that transmitter and hooked it up to a battery,” Holden said quietly, still fighting his panic.

– Leviathan Wakes by James S.A. Corey

reading

Have you ever made a new friend because of a book? (or books)?

Sonia Lal3 Comments

Have you ever made a new friend because of a book? (or books)? (http://adailyrhythm.com/ asks this random question today and I’ve decided to answer it.)

Yes, I have. 

My book club is filled with new friends.

So is twitter! Well, all my twitter friends were new once and most of my twitter is filled with book talk.

So, yeah. It’s really nice to have friends to discuss books with!  *waves hello to all of them*

reading · Writing

The Crossing of the First Threshold: The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Chapter 1.4

Sonia Lal9 Comments

The Crossing of the First Threshold

At this point in the Hero’s Journey, the hero has accepted the Call to Adventure and is on his way. The hero has perhaps acquired some Supernatural Aid.

Chapter 1.1 was about the Call to Adventure.

Chapter 1.2 was about Refusal of the Call to Adventure.

Chapter 1.3 was about Supernatural Aid.

The book says this on the First Threshold:

With the personification of his destiny to guide and aid him, the hero goes forward in his adventure until he comes to the “threshold guardian” at the entrance to the zone magnified power. Such custodians bound the world in the four directions – also up and down – standing for the limits of the hero’s present sphere, or life horizon. Beyond them is darkness, the unknown, and danger; just as beyond the parental watch is danger of the infant and beyond the protection of his society danger to the member of the tribe.

I think the threshold guardian is someone or something that represents the boundaries of the hero’s world. This could be (probably is!) related somehow to the hero’s culture, to the hero’s place in his culture. Or, it could be, the physical boundaries of his hometown. Maybe both. It could be something that is keeping the hero from moving forward.

Maybe someone is bullying the hero; maybe the hero is being hunted; maybe the hero needs to go get something for his people; maybe the hero needs to go somehow to further himself.

Anyway, beyond this first threshold, is danger. Only heroes brave this danger; non-heroes are happy not crossing this boundary. 

In Star Wars, this was probably when Luke left his home world.

Harry Potter is more difficult. There could be a lot of thresholds, I think. The letters, when Hagrid comes to find him, when Hagrid first takes him to Diagon Alley.

But I think Harry crosses the First Threshold when he gets on the train to Hogwarts. He has to find and cross the weird train station, the one everyone tells him doesn’t exist. Everyone that tells him so, the mere perception that this train station cannot exist is, I think, the threshold guardian. This is when he crosses over to the magical world all by himself! What do you guys think?

The book also says about what is past the First Threshold:

The pairs of opposite (ugliness, good and evil, and all the other polarities that bind the faculties to hope and fear, and link the organs of action to deeds of defense and acquisition) are clashing rocks (Symplegades) that crush the traveler, but between which the heroes always pass.

The Symplegades (http://www.mythweb.com/encyc/entries/symplegades.html) is a Greek myth where two rocks come together to smash anything that passes between; Jason and the Argonauts had advice on how to pass through (ah! Supernatural Aid!) and they did so successfully.

Here, the clashing rocks are a metaphor for the pairs of opposites that can crush the hero. I think they could be physical things, actual dangers to life and limb. But, also, conflicting desires. Hate and love, justice and revenge, greed and generosity, life and death, conflicts of interest, bravery and fear, things like that. Basically, all the trials and tribulations the hero will face past the First Threshold.

Basically, I think this is the beginning of the adventure and danger should quickly follow, along with a way to use the (perhaps unobvious) Supernatural Aid the hero has previously received.

Also, I think this might be end of the Act 1 (if you’re following the Three Act structure, when the hero cannot turn back and is fully committed).

Others Blogging on This Topic:

  1.  Thoughts on Mythic Structure: Crossing the First Threshold from Debbie
  2. back to basics: the hero’s journey, stage five from Brooke Johnson
  3. The Crossing of the First Threshold: Confronting the Guardians from Living Joyfully
  4. Hero’s Journey: Crossing the First Threshold: The Unknown Place from Rainbow Gryphon
  5. Step 4: Crossing The First Threshold from Down The Rabbit Hole and Back
General · reading · Teaser Tuesdays

Teaser Tuesday: Casino Royale

Sonia Lal38 Comments

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of A Daily Rhythm. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

My Teaser:

Bond knew exactly where the switch was and it was with one flow of motion that he stood on the threshold with the door full open, the light on and a gun in his hand. The safe, empty room sneered at him.

– Casino Royale by Ian Fleming

reading · Writing

The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Chapter 1.3: Supernatural Aid

Sonia Lal6 Comments

Chapter 1.3: Supernatural Aid

This is after the hero has accepted the Call to Adventure! Maybe he refused it first, but he has

accepted it now. So the hero’s journey continues!

Chapter 1.1 was about the Call to Adventure.

Chapter 1.2 was about Refusal of the Call to Adventure.

This section is about supernatural aid. That is:

For those who have not refused the call, the first encounter of the hero-journey is with a protective figure (often a little old crone or old man) who provides the adventurer with amulets against the dragon forces he is about to pass.

So the hero finds a helpful figure, someone to give him things to help survive the trials and tribulations ahead. Things like amulets as mentioned in the quote above; knowledge probably counts, too; maybe weapons and trinkets as well.

I guess the helpful person could be the mentor figure. Like Obi-Wan in Star Wars and Dumbledore in Harry Potter. Luke gets his light saber from Obi-Wan. Harry gets advice.

Frodo’s ring probably counts as an amulet, too. But he gets from Bilbo; does that make Bilbo the helpful figure? He also gets advice from Gandolf. Maybe both Bilbo and Gandolf are helpful figures.

Then there is this line in the book:

What such a figure represents is the benign, protecting power of destiny.

So . . . is the helpful figure assigned to the hero by fate? By god? I don’t know. But I think this  means the helpful figure is a cheering squad, reassuring the hero and telling them can do this, no matter the odds. Maybe the helpful figure even shows them how to do whatever they need to do.

Protective and dangerous, motherly and fatherly at the same time, this supernatural principle of guardianship and direction unities in itself all the ambiguities of the unconscious – thus signifying the support of our conscious personality by that other, larger system, but also the inscrutability of the guide that we are following to the peril of all our rational ends.

I take this to mean that the helpful figure is basically like a parent and does a lot to sooth the insecurities of our hero.

And look! The guide, that thing that marks a new period in the hero’s life is here, showing the way to the end.

The book also says this about the helpful figure:

Not infrequently, the supernatural helper is masculine in form. In fairy lore it may be some little fellow of the wood, some wizard, hermit, shepherd, or smith, who appears to supply the amulets and advice that the hero will require.

Most of the helpful figures in the examples the book gives are actually female. I thought about ignoring this, but yeah. Although in the stories I was thinking of – Harry Potter, Star Wars – the figures are male. So there you go.

Really, I think the most important thing about this section is that hero finds someone to help the hero survive the adventure, usually by providing helpful objects or advice.

Others Blogging on This Topic:

  1. Adapting The Hero’s Journey for a Heroine from Kristen Pham
  2. Step 3: Supernatural Aid from Down The Rabbit Hole and Back
  3. Supernatural Aid: Looking for Guidance on Our Unschooling Journey from Living Joyfully
  4. What is the ‘Supernatural aid’? from frankindischleck
reading · science fiction · Teaser Tuesdays

Teaser Tuesday: Diplomatic Immunity

Sonia LalQuote22 Comments

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of A Daily Rhythm. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

This is a reread and one of my favorite books ever.

My Teasers:

They had long agreed they would celebrate the date by starting the children in their uterine replicators. The debate had never been about when, just how many. He still thought his suggestion of doing them all at once had an admirable efficiency. He’d never been serious about twelve; he’d just figured to start with that proposition, and fall back to six.

– Diplomatic Immunity by Lois McMaster Bujold

science fiction

Fan Art: Ancillary Justice

Sonia LalLeave a comment

I can’t draw, but I like looking at other people’s drawings, other people’s ideas of scenes and characters from books.

I found this on deviantart. It shows a scene in the beginning of Ancillary Justice. It is called  A Ship Walks into a Bar by Malicious-Monkey.

I think it is an amazing likeness and pretty much the way I pictured it myself.

reading

The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Chapter 1.2: Refusal of the Call

Sonia Lal5 Comments

Chapter one was about the Call to Adventure.

Chapter two is about what happens when the hero refuses the Call.

The book says this:

Refusal of the summons converts the adventure into its negative. Walled in boredom, hard work, “culture,” the subject loses the power of significant affirmative action and becomes a victim to be saved.

Basically, after hero refuses the Call to Adventure, life becomes a dreary bore. The hero loses all forward momentum, maybe gets into trouble, maybe gets into trouble and becomes a literal victim.

I mean, in the first Harry Potter movie, after his uncle refused to give him the letters, the whole family ended up in a little lighthouse by the shore. Little Dudley ended up with a pig’s tail. But only the people denying Harry the first book adventure got into trouble. I don’t this counts as a refusal. Well, not by Harry, but I don’t think his uncle can’t refuse for him. (Did Harry Potter have a refusal?)

The book also says this:

The myths and folk tales of the whole world make clear that the refusal is essentially a refusal to give up what one takes to be one’s own interest. The future is regarded not in terms of an remitting series of deaths and births, but as though one’s present system of ideals, virtues, goals and advantages were to be fixed and made secure.

I guess this is why Harry never really refused to be a wizard; it was never in his best interests to refuse such a thing. Never any way to make a refusal seem like a real good idea.

And also why in The Hobbit, Bilbo refused the Call to Adventure, only to be inundated by dwarves.

I think in The Belgariad by David and Leigh Eddings there was an actual refusal of the Call to Adventure sometime in the second or third book – I don’t remember. Refusing turned out badly for Garian, poor thing.

I guess the second line in that quote about the future is how the characters sees their values and goals as fixed, unchanging. They think: what’s good for me now will always be good for me. But who doesn’t? Who thinks their values might change someday?