Random Thought: Gods, Monsters, Heroes.

No one chooses who are they are in this life.  

It's a matter of discovery.  Tales and stories can sometimes illuminate the path.  But in truth, the quest of finding oneself is something one can only do for themselves.

There is always a warning that comes with that quest.  A singular danger.  An instance of warning.  Do not fail to know thyself.

This is where one can see the divergence between hero and villain.  Tales, legends and myths separate Monsters and Heroes.  Those who know who they are, or are trying to find out, they are the heroes.  The monsters are those who've lost themselves.  Or worse, Monsters are those who ignore who they are for the sake of their wants.

I believe three kinds of figures make up history: heroes, monsters and gods.  History isn't accurate- it can't be.  But what role people are cast in, it's one of those three roles.   Why?  Because that's how myths write themselves.  History is those myths intended to carry truth.

Heroes either know who they are, or are looking for themselves.  Monsters choose their own wants over who they are.  Where are gods in this?  How does identity strike them?

On The Divine Kind.

Gods are concepts.  They aren't persons with identities.  Gods represent.  They are ideas, never more than that.  Even with their faults, gods still represent things greater than themselves.  If my take on history is true, who is a god from history?

Washington.  Lincoln.  Roosevelt.  Reagan.  Martin Luther King Jr.

Yes, they were men.  But most histories tend to treat them more like the concepts they represent.  They are ideas, not the people they were when they were alive in the popular conscience.  Even when people read details of their lives, it might shift them into the roles of heroes.  Or people just find things that let them identify with the ideals they adore.

In our fiction, characters tend to follow these themes.  But we all want characters to be more than that.  We like to think our histories are accurate and that the people in them were real.  We want real characters in our fiction.  Yet I still think characters tend to be heroes, monsters or gods.

In a narrative, it's easy to cast people and characters into these roles.  Hitler was a monster who killed millions.  Washington a God who founded a nation.  Galileo the hero who stood against the Church.

Are those true assertions?  Or is it better to think, how does the audience know who is the hero?  How do they know who they are?

Self And Maralda

At the moment, I keep writing pieces for Maralda.  I love her as a character.  Part of the reason is that she wants to know so much in the world.  She's a writer, a Bard.  She loves stories, and she knows

this part about herself.

She is conflicted about other parts of her identity.  I wonder, is Maralda hero turning into a monster?  Or can she avoid that?

I think I need to try my hand at a longer comic.  Maralda feels like the best character to put at the center of it.  She has some choices to make, and I like the idea of exploring Crux through comic imagery.

The question for Maralda then, is about herself.  Are stories the most important thing about her?  Or will she stop running from her father's heritage?  Who is Maralda, or is she just someone who hides to see stories from shadows?

IDK.  Still working on it.