Chatting With the Media
Dec. 10th, 2003 03:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jducoeurWell, that was interesting. This morning, I wound up having a long talk with a fellow named Chris Bergeron, from one of the papers in Worcester. He's doing a story on Lord of the Rings, and decided to play with the spiritual side of the story, and how fantasy and spirituality interact.
He contacted me as someone from the SCA. I wound up discouraging that particular line of inquiry a bit -- I prefer to emphasize the SCA's historical side, and made clear that it's not really about fantasy, at least not any more. I encouraged him instead to look into the LARP side of the world, as being more tied into fantasy. We'll see whether he got the point or not.
Regardless, it was an interesting talk. He was exploring the notion of Big Fantasy as a modern substitute for religion; I disagreed, instead arguing that it's more a substitute for myth. We chatted about the mythological value of a story like Lord of the Rings, especially the notion of myth as a teacher of basic morals and lessons. He's very interested in whether things have changed since 9/11, so we talked a bit about whether people are hungrier for good mythology than they might have been before.
He was interested in comparing and contrasting it with the Matrix trilogy, which I thought was an intriguing line of thought -- I think of the Matrix as a bit less compelling as mythology, in part precisely because its moral lessons are a good deal more ambiguous (if they are really there at all). That actually drove home a point that hadn't consciously occurred to me before: the latter two Matrix movies are less satisfying than the first precisely because they are poor mythology -- they're a good yarn, but they don't have much by way of lessons or (closely related) character arc. I also think it's a little too early to say whether the Matrix has the legs to really be considered mythology; you tend to find out what's really an effective myth by observing whether people do take it to heart over time.
He also asked about Harry Potter in that regard; my view there is that the jury is still out. When the story is complete, it'll be interesting to see if it's got the makings of good mythology.
Overall, an entertaining discussion. I look forward to seeing what the article looks like when it comes out...
(And I got him intrigued enough by the SCA that he's thinking about doing a later story specifically on us. He seems level-headed and intelligent, so that sounds like a good thing...)
He contacted me as someone from the SCA. I wound up discouraging that particular line of inquiry a bit -- I prefer to emphasize the SCA's historical side, and made clear that it's not really about fantasy, at least not any more. I encouraged him instead to look into the LARP side of the world, as being more tied into fantasy. We'll see whether he got the point or not.
Regardless, it was an interesting talk. He was exploring the notion of Big Fantasy as a modern substitute for religion; I disagreed, instead arguing that it's more a substitute for myth. We chatted about the mythological value of a story like Lord of the Rings, especially the notion of myth as a teacher of basic morals and lessons. He's very interested in whether things have changed since 9/11, so we talked a bit about whether people are hungrier for good mythology than they might have been before.
He was interested in comparing and contrasting it with the Matrix trilogy, which I thought was an intriguing line of thought -- I think of the Matrix as a bit less compelling as mythology, in part precisely because its moral lessons are a good deal more ambiguous (if they are really there at all). That actually drove home a point that hadn't consciously occurred to me before: the latter two Matrix movies are less satisfying than the first precisely because they are poor mythology -- they're a good yarn, but they don't have much by way of lessons or (closely related) character arc. I also think it's a little too early to say whether the Matrix has the legs to really be considered mythology; you tend to find out what's really an effective myth by observing whether people do take it to heart over time.
He also asked about Harry Potter in that regard; my view there is that the jury is still out. When the story is complete, it'll be interesting to see if it's got the makings of good mythology.
Overall, an entertaining discussion. I look forward to seeing what the article looks like when it comes out...
(And I got him intrigued enough by the SCA that he's thinking about doing a later story specifically on us. He seems level-headed and intelligent, so that sounds like a good thing...)
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2003-12-10 01:05 pm (UTC)Funny, that's more or less what Tolkien said in The Monsters and the Critics. We can be fairly sure that he didn't use fantasy as a substitute for religion, anyway.
The Matrix and Harry Potter, in my opinion, generally draw upon and reflect other mythologies (Potter's got a lot of Arthur in it, Matrix has sort of a jumble, primarily Christ in the first movie but muddier thereafter) rather than working to build an intentionally different mythos. There's nothing wrong with that approach, of course, but it may mean that they don't leave as strong a mark on our mythic culture.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-12-10 07:57 pm (UTC)Honestly, no relation.
Still, a good conversation. I wish I cold see the article when it comes out.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-12-10 08:37 pm (UTC)I was wondering. But he had a fairly thick local accent, so I figured you probably weren't related...
(no subject)
Date: 2003-12-11 01:57 am (UTC)Buffy.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-12-11 05:51 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-12-11 06:32 am (UTC)The fun part for me is to see how many different takes on a topic I can find.,,
(no subject)
Date: 2003-12-11 09:41 am (UTC)In some cultures, myths are taken as more or less literal truths; in others (like ours), they tend to be more metaphorical truths. But there's always this key concept that the myth is saying something true about the world, via a story.
So Buffy and Tolkein and the like are much closer to true myths, IMO, than generic ideas like "vampires". They may draw from common source materials, but that's nothing new -- cultures have been tossing mythological concepts back and forth, reusing them willy-nilly, pretty much from the beginning of human history. And the relationship between mythology and literature has always been rather complex and incestuous...