Supernatural meets Classical Myth
Apr. 25th, 2006 05:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
inmyriadbitsI had a thought about Supernatural. Therefore, I'm sharing. .
My Classical Myth professor--first of all, she's awesome. She truly deserves the adjective erudite; she's also eloquent, precise, and often witty. Anyway, she has this one theory about Greek and Roman mythology that she's repeated a few times: the only fathers are dead ones. And by that, she means the only good fathers are dead ones, and that the fathers usually end up dying if they don't start out dead. One rationalization she's given for this prevalence of dead fathers is that a hero can't fully realize his (and in classical myth, it's always "his", not "her") potential. The latest example I can give you from the class is Aeneas being held back by Anchises (this is from the Aeneid, non-classics people), who persists in looking to the past. Anchises has to die in the story for Aeneas to step into a leadership role, and for him to look to the future so he can lay the foundations for Roman civilization.
This theory leads me to a worrying thought about my current obsession of a TV show. If you think about it, Dean and Sam are in the same boat as those virile, muscular, angst-driven classical heroes that they resemble so much. (Mmm...can you imagine them in the leg-baring get-ups the Greeks wore in battle?![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
researchgrrrl, you feel me, right? They're so tall and built...*happy thoughts*) Which is a problem for Daddy Winchester, you see. Because that means he's going to have to DIE for his sons' own stories to be realized, according to my professor, and Dean just had to bring up the "What if Dad dies?" question in "Dead Man's Blood", didn't he? Oh, Dean.
Whether they resent it or not, both his sons are being held back by the father. Dean follows his orders, and his mission, without questioning. And Sam rebels against him without question--by which I mean, it's almost reflex for him to argue with his father about everything now, although I feel like he's not as averse to "this life" as he claims. I think if his father were removed from the equation, Sam would probably realize that his commitment to the hunt goes deep into his psyche, rather than merely being something John imposed upon him. I keep going back to this, but Sam was pre-law. He has a deeply-rooted sense of justice and need to protect people, whether he's doing it by killing evil beings or not.
As for Dean...the point has been brought up again and again in this show that he follows his father's orders like a good little soldier. Because of the way his father directs his life, Dean's never really questioned the way things are. He wants his family back together, but I get the sense he wants it back the way it was before Sam left, and Sam was right when he told him it would never be that way again. What will happen to him if the person who has directed his life so far goes away (i.e., dies)? I mean, besides even more issues to pile on the ones Dean already has? He's going to be pretty lost, and not in a good way.
In other news, yesterday was a good day. This was surprising, because I went to sleep at 5:30 in the morning for absolutely no reason. LJ. Email. Watching things. Not doing any homework AT ALL. And then I actually woke up for my 9:10am class, took a short nap, and went to my other two classes. Then, I joinedladyjaida and orangeaddict and watched (re-watched, for me) three episodes straight of Supernatural ("Shadow" through "Something Wicked"). They were both lovely and friendly and amusing, and I had a lot of fun. That was followed by another nap, dinner, and then the glorious movie It Happened One Night for my seminar. And then I went to bed *gasp* before midnight. That hasn't happened in a really, really, ridiculously long time. So, good day.
My Classical Myth professor--first of all, she's awesome. She truly deserves the adjective erudite; she's also eloquent, precise, and often witty. Anyway, she has this one theory about Greek and Roman mythology that she's repeated a few times: the only fathers are dead ones. And by that, she means the only good fathers are dead ones, and that the fathers usually end up dying if they don't start out dead. One rationalization she's given for this prevalence of dead fathers is that a hero can't fully realize his (and in classical myth, it's always "his", not "her") potential. The latest example I can give you from the class is Aeneas being held back by Anchises (this is from the Aeneid, non-classics people), who persists in looking to the past. Anchises has to die in the story for Aeneas to step into a leadership role, and for him to look to the future so he can lay the foundations for Roman civilization.
This theory leads me to a worrying thought about my current obsession of a TV show. If you think about it, Dean and Sam are in the same boat as those virile, muscular, angst-driven classical heroes that they resemble so much. (Mmm...can you imagine them in the leg-baring get-ups the Greeks wore in battle?
researchgrrrl, you feel me, right? They're so tall and built...*happy thoughts*) Which is a problem for Daddy Winchester, you see. Because that means he's going to have to DIE for his sons' own stories to be realized, according to my professor, and Dean just had to bring up the "What if Dad dies?" question in "Dead Man's Blood", didn't he? Oh, Dean. Whether they resent it or not, both his sons are being held back by the father. Dean follows his orders, and his mission, without questioning. And Sam rebels against him without question--by which I mean, it's almost reflex for him to argue with his father about everything now, although I feel like he's not as averse to "this life" as he claims. I think if his father were removed from the equation, Sam would probably realize that his commitment to the hunt goes deep into his psyche, rather than merely being something John imposed upon him. I keep going back to this, but Sam was pre-law. He has a deeply-rooted sense of justice and need to protect people, whether he's doing it by killing evil beings or not.
As for Dean...the point has been brought up again and again in this show that he follows his father's orders like a good little soldier. Because of the way his father directs his life, Dean's never really questioned the way things are. He wants his family back together, but I get the sense he wants it back the way it was before Sam left, and Sam was right when he told him it would never be that way again. What will happen to him if the person who has directed his life so far goes away (i.e., dies)? I mean, besides even more issues to pile on the ones Dean already has? He's going to be pretty lost, and not in a good way.
In other news, yesterday was a good day. This was surprising, because I went to sleep at 5:30 in the morning for absolutely no reason. LJ. Email. Watching things. Not doing any homework AT ALL. And then I actually woke up for my 9:10am class, took a short nap, and went to my other two classes. Then, I joined
ladyjaida and orangeaddict and watched (re-watched, for me) three episodes straight of Supernatural ("Shadow" through "Something Wicked"). They were both lovely and friendly and amusing, and I had a lot of fun. That was followed by another nap, dinner, and then the glorious movie It Happened One Night for my seminar. And then I went to bed *gasp* before midnight. That hasn't happened in a really, really, ridiculously long time. So, good day.
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Date: 2006-04-26 06:37 am (UTC)And don't undervalue your writerly skills. You may not write things out in the way I do, but it all ends up in the stories you tell. I may be able to spin out a theory academic-style, but the way you put forth your ideas is, IMO, more effective. Stories have all these things embedded inside them, and they almost always mean more to people than academic examinations of the same ideas, because stories cultivate an affection or fascination that supercedes analytical admiration. Analysis is important for teasing out those ideas, but the ideas themselves shrivel and diminish away from the whole. We don't squee like we do because they air an academic essay on the things I've been blathering about on the WB every week. We squee because we love the characters, and have formed this powerful attachment to and investment in their story. You create that same kind of attachment to the characters you write, and the ideas that drive the story are by no means missing. I can't tell you how many times I'll read something (and this has definitely happened while reading SBP) and it will just smack me upside the head and clarify something in a way that never would have happened otherwise. And I can sometimes write thinky thoughts about that moment, but I can't make the magic happen. You can. Sometimes I really can't say the things that are said in stories in my analytical way. Example: My seminar class, a couple weeks ago. We were discussing Beckett's Endgame; I was trying to say something about time and memory and how we experience life, but what I really wanted to say was everything Remus says in his big speech at the end of the gillyweed chapter in SBP. I could sort of tell everyone the ideas, but they'd lost all the magic in the process. It was frustrating, because I felt like I was just sucking the life out of something beautiful and not doing it justice in the slightest.
So. In conclusion, to quote House: "So between us, we can do whatever we want. We can rule the world!" Don't feel put to shame by this post, use it to help you do what you do--write beautifully!
Seriously.
(God. Why can't I use my powers for good (i.e., writing my damn paper)?)