Analysis of Magic (partial)

Here is some.

I'm so pleased to have actually gotten 3 responses! ^_^

Magic looks interesting. I would really like to say more about Magic and Fate-Stay Night but not having read them I can't do a whole lot with a partial outline - the climax and your commentaries on why you picked these works are two of the most important parts.

Quote: Original post by Jastiv
My outline of Arrows of the Queen by Mercedes Lackey is here.

OMG how did I miss this post? 4 responses! ^_^ *dances*

Lackey is an author I have loved for many years. I agree with your assessment that the plot is more a series of episodes than a strong overall structure - she got better at that as she went on (for example Storm Warning has a strong, admirably well-woven multistrand plot), but AotQ is one of her earliest books.

What Lackey really excels at is making books that are readable and loveable. This is partly a result of her character creation and development (including using humor to show that all of her characters are human and sympathetic) and partly a result of her clothing mythic archetypes in more everyday details to achieve a result that feels both familiar and transcendent. (For example companions are unicorns minus the horn, subjected to humorous everyday problems like needing to exercise more. And other subjects of her books are princesses and powerful mages getting annoyed by being required to wear fancy clothes, getting a little drunk, dealing with conniving merchants and intolerable in-laws, and getting drenched and half-frozen by inclement weather.)

Here is the complete overview of Magic.
completed version

I chose Magic because it is fantastic demonstration of Jung's concept of the shadow (in action). It is what potentially can happen when we disown parts of self and hide them from ourselves. I also like novels that tend to be introspective and existential in nature. Although not so fantastical as Corky but Raskolnikov is just as illusionary in Dostoevesky's Crime and Punishment. Its opposite the Idiot fit within this motif as well as his shorter work, The Double.

Daphne Du Maurier's the Scapegoat is a variation of this theme wherby a look-a-like stranger is made unwittingly and ,at first, unknowingly to exchange places. Although, the story focuses only on one of them.

Daphne's Rebecca, although not quite the same theme (but probably also classified at least by some as a psycho drama) is another fascinating look inside of Rebecca's mind. The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger is yet another variation on this theme where one meets oneself coming and going in time. Structurally, it is a more difficult and not as in depth a psychological exploration. Du Maurier's The House on the Strand is a similar attempt but I couldn't quite get into that novel. Which leads to of course, the classic Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde which can be viewed from this perspective.

Although I am not sure if there is a novel, the film Memento is an intriguing and unique arrangement of plot. The film, Chocolat, captured my attention; although, this really focuses on cultural traditions and attitudes - conflicts between the individual and society. Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold did not hold my interest.

Vonnegut's SlaughterHouse Five has elemnts of both the psychological and sociological that demonstrates splits/psychic schisms due to experiencing unbearable "psychic" pain - in this case from the Dresden firestorm(bombing).

That's enough for the moment.

Hey ShadowRancher, just noticed you're in Erie - I grew up there. :)

Anyway, Magic... I have to say that personally I don't really understand this type of novel. I mean, I do understand that it works by showing how lies/insanity snowball bigger and bigger until it all comes crashing down. Generally the background is a real world which the main character suffers from and cannot tolerate, and the lies/insanity start as attempts to protect the person from the world. A few of these stories end with the character coming clean, reevaluating what is important, giving up on dysfunctional ambitions, and finding a new non-painful way to relate to the world. But the ones which end in tragedy, I'm not sure where the moral is. Where in this story is the right path which Corky ought to have taken shown? Maybe through the Postman?

Quote:
Anyway, Magic... I have to say that personally I don't really understand this type of novel... But the ones which end in tragedy, I'm not sure where the moral is. Where in this story is the right path which Corky ought to have taken shown? Maybe through the Postman?

The "right path" which is, in my opinion, Corky letting go of Fats is exactly what he *cannot* do. This is what makes the story a tragedy. We see the circumstances and life events that resulted in Corky's decision to live vicariously through the dummy, Fats. [Perhaps Goldman may have named the dummy Fats given it close spelling to Fate - just a flash conjecture] Moreover at the end, he achieves anagnorisis (a knowing, an awareness of his tragic flaw/mistake/misjudgment - harmartia). It is through this and the reader's intimate emotional experience that Corky's suffering was so much greater than his inexorable mistake given his life circumstances that our identification with him occurs. In my opinion this is the only satisfactory denouement given the events, the character's life path and decisions. He finally get "on the mark" when he takes his life into his own hands (by ending his life) and achieving awareness. From an audience member viewpoint, one learns that this too can be his/her fate if one does not abide by the warnings that the story displays and the emotions it evokes. I believe that most people can empathize or at least sympathize with Corky. It is this identification with the character that allows the tragic conclusion to work. In other we have a catharsis of our pity and fear.

Tragedies do not seem to be very popular in the US. My guess it stems from our culture of optimism, rugged individualism, overcoming mistakes by picking yourself up from our bootstraps, and our hubris. We tend to believe that we can overcome anything be it through hard work, capitalism, individual application or science. On average, we elevate pride to a positive trait. Thus, typically, tragedy does not seem to be a significant part of our cultural "interpretation" of our individual experiences or group history.

The "Death of a Salesman" by Arthur Miller is probably the ultimate American tragedy and "The Iceman Cometh" by Eugene O'Neil as the penultimate.

It seems to me many tragedies are born of the splitting and isolation of one part of the person from another. It is an interesting aside that Razkonikov in Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment root derivation means schism or split in Russian. Of course Shakespeare had many tragedies. This may highlight some of the difference between the American vs the British experience.

Tragedy comes from the Greek word meaning goat-song which is thought to come from the sounds of the goat going up for slaughter to the gods as the ultimate sacrifice to appease the gods and save others from like fate. Another quick "aha", perhaps the "baaing of the sheep" that is such a vivid reference in Thomas Harris' The Silence of the Lambs relates to this. Perhaps its a stretch, tSotL may be a tragedy or at least an unhappy ending. Hannibal, the villain is free, while the hero, Clarice, still has to hear the "baaing of the lambs going off to slaughter.

Is it a tragedy that Clarice, in spite of saving innocent victims, still has to live with the echoing of the lambs?


Other comments?