Chapter Three: Archetype In Modern Storytelling

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:45

Chapter 3. Myth and Archetype and Modern Storytelling. The first day of my visual development class, I conduct an exercise to set the tone for the term ahead. The spirit of a class in which students will bring an intellectual property to life visually. We can do a version of the exercise here, and I encourage you to participate. It will work best if you resist skipping ahead and write your responses on paper rather than logging them mentally. For the numbered words below, please write two or three words denoting what you think each image might symbolize universally. In other words, the words in the list represent percepts, things you can see, hear, touch, or feel. You are to write down the associated concept or intangible idea. In class, I generally say little more beyond, don't think too much. Just write what you think the symbol might represent. Having said that, please don't do simple word association. If the percept is cat, please don't simply write hat.

SPEAKER_01 1:45

You get the idea. Number one, tree. Number two, cliff. Number three, bridge. Number four, horizon. Number five. Number six. Number seven. Number nine. Number ten, circle. Number eleven, triangle slash pyramid. The exercise always goes quite well.

Universal Meanings And Cultural Twists

East–West Aesthetics In Animation

Power, Context, And The Eagle

Instinct, Intuition, And Formal Properties

Light, Dark, Gravity, And Fear

Jung, Dreams, And The Collective Map

Archetypes Defined And Debated

SPEAKER_00 2:45

Responses are fluid and bountiful, illustrating the point I intend. Though not particularly earth-shattering, that point is not always what students might think. Over years of conducting this exercise, the responses generally boil down to a list of usual suspects. Sometimes a fluke or a red herring infiltrates the proceedings, but there's a surprising degree of consistency from term to term. Responses gravitate toward a fairly predictable list of associated concepts, with variations on them quite often representing polar opposites. Here's a loose sampling of what I hear time and again, term after term. Tree, life, knowledge, ancestry, growth, renewal, shelter, endurance, protection, cliff, peril, danger, point of no return, decision, ultimatum, dilemma, adventure, acute danger, bridge, connection, strength, integrity, communion, passage, communication, unification, transition, and agreement, horizon, destiny, future, fate, possibility, goal, uncertainty, clarity, adventure, potential, capacity, eternity, perpetuity, stability, and orientation, red, blood, war, conflict, passion, family, lineage, alarm, alert, warning, love, lust, communism, snake, temptation, evil, deception, lowly, servile, punition, rebirth, renewal, eagle, freedom, liberty, and regality, dignity, beauty, depredation, and aggression, black, authority, austerity, death, nothingness, mystery, and danger, cheap, conformity, wandering, sacrifice, innocence, helplessness, martyrdom, fluffy and tasty, circle, continuity, wholeness, holism, perfection, benign, non-threatening, safety, completion, and appealing, triangle slash pyramid, stability, hierarchy, strength, awe, power, upliftment, inspiration, illuminati, and Egyptians slash aliens. I am acutely aware one of the defining values of youth is individualism, to the point that entire generations needlessly rebel against conformity and the status quo at all costs. Uniqueness is highly valued in youth, as is reinventing the wheel by policing generalizations on the daily. Never mind that conventional wisdoms may in fact possess a grain of tried and true, well, wisdom. Artists, God love them, take this knee-jerk rejection of institutionalized conformity to the extreme. Oh, I'm no exception. I was a rebel without a cause in my youth. For this reason, during the above exercise, I delicately issue the following caveat in my class. Any consistency in our answers is not meant to render us all walking cliches or to suggest that any one of us is highly unoriginal. Only to illustrate that there is an inherent universal symbology to the percepts offered, an inherent symbology to life. Cultural relativity, of course, plays a part in the consensus, forging divides in otherwise arguably universal innate responses. One could make a solid case that Judeo-Christian mythology is behind the association of the percept sheep with the concept of sacrifice. It's logical. Snake as a symbol for temptation and deception is clearly biblically based, whereas the shedding of a snake's skin made it the symbol of rebirth in cultures such as Bronze Age Minoan civilization. All replies are conglomerations of arguably innate instinctual responses to formal properties, more in a moment, with historical reinforcement of tropes via social conditioning. It's often said that the world is a smaller place than ever. I cannot disagree in some respects, but in others, I argue that the world can also seem more overwhelming than ever due to the access technology has gifted us. What is clear is that tropes once considered regional are now shared, more than ever, in media and pop culture. A large percentage of my art center students are international students. Among that population, most are East Asian, Korean to be specific. Still, the responses to this exercise are consistent. Despite the historical East-West divide in underlying ideology and philosophy, the vastly different mythology informing modern-day storytelling. Since my class is animation-oriented, I suggest that the exchange between traditions of visual representation, art direction of animated filmed entertainment in particular, is as old as animation itself. Although Disney first perfected the production pipeline for animation, thereby dictating the conventions and traditions adopted by animation companies across the board, Eastern graphic design sensibilities have made their way into American animation since its inception. All one need do is watch an episode of Speed Racer or Godzilla from the early 60s to see that anime served as an influence long before Ariel or Aladdin sported enormous anime eyes. Surely you noticed the wide disparity of responses to the word eagle. There is a stark contrast between idealized concepts like freedom or liberty and more negative associations like predation and aggression. The common thread between the opposing responses would seem to be power. As with all things, however, context and connotation can skew a word toward positive or negative associations. Given the implications of these nearly polarized outcomes, I find it noteworthy that the eagle has been adopted and used most famously by the capitalist experiment that is the United States, and, well, the Nazi Party. It's also worth mentioning that in the case of the Lamb prompt, the red herring is most often the word tasty. I include it here for the sole reason that, along with Fluffy, it comes up at least once per term. There is no enormous significance to this fact, other than my students are largely one starving artists, two starving students, or three both. Enough said. Although I can't be sure, the regular inclusion of the Illuminati and gray aliens in association with pyramids leads me to suspect there is a significant conspiracy theory contingent among my students as well. Raised in a barn? During the height of supremacy, anthropocentrism cemented man's superiority to the rest of the animal kingdom. Though we're quick to acknowledge instinct in animals, we humans fancy ourselves exempt from it. Above it, thank you very much. In truth, what we simply call intuition, the connecting of dots independent of cognition, drives a large proportion of human behavior. Modern epigenetics acknowledges that our sphere of innate responses is ever adapting and evolving, and that which best serves our propagation is what's passed on to future generations. When we look beyond the perpetuation of tropes inherent in social conditioning, a reserve of innate survival-based responses to formal properties may account for the universality in symbology. In our exercise, notice that the responses typical of the color red could just as easily have accompanied the word blood. This is not a huge leap for most of us. Also notice that the latter percepts on our list are not figurative but abstract. There are design elements, shapes or colors one might employ in visual representation. Their inclusion was by design, of course. The mental concept of a bridge might subconsciously elicit a feeling of strength for a variety of reasons. The most literal among them is the structural integrity necessary for a bridge to function. Reducing bridge to a simple abstract shape, an arch, yields a yet more vivid example of the forces at work. An arch is the most structurally sound shape an architect or engineer could employ. Similarly, a pyramid simply cannot be toppled. Hence the typical attributions of strength, stability, and power. We sense a pyramid's strength in a composition without analysis, attributing power, strength, stability, or awe to the content represented. The pyramid can be literal representation, what we call content, or it can be implied via the gestalt perceptual phenomenon known as completion, the human compulsion to perceive a shape by mentally grouping like objects. There is a reason that pyramidal composition featured prominently in centuries of Renaissance painting. Universally, the color white, or the non-color, depending on who you ask, is experienced as a positive or good, while dark suggests negative or bad. Up is generally considered good and down is generally bad. Western culture is especially adept at creating polar opposites that exist on gamuts, whereas Eastern tradition embraces the value of complementary relationships like yin and yang. But underlying philosophy aside, consider that gravity may be the simple reason for our instinctual negative associations with down. If any one of us falls off a cliff, bad things happen. The same is true of dark or black and its negative associations. Darkness, whether due to nightfall or having simply ventured into a cave, represents mystery and danger for the simple reason our senses are not equipped for low-light situations, making us more vulnerable to predators and the aforementioned gravity. In a moment, we will explore the Jungian concept of archetypes, a postulated inborn reservoir of symbolic imagery that we can access via the collective unconscious. Given that the world, and education in particular, has grown infinitely more empirical and materially oriented, such notions are easily dismissed these days in lieu of other explanations for universal response. It is more comfortable for educators, even artists who speak the language, to refer to archetypes simply as tropes perpetuated by social conditioning rather than anything inborn. For the staunch empiricists among us, consider this. A developmental psychologist like Piaget would posit there is a reason sharp angles in a composition represent danger to the psyche when viewing a design. He would say that at a certain point in child development, the generalizing function of the brain steps in. A child need not prick his finger on a knife, a shard of glass, a tooth, and an icicle to learn that sharp objects represent pain or danger. The brain simply generalizes one or two experiences and encodes a symbol. I call this phenomenon in general, innate response to formal properties. The baby in the bathwater, the chicken and the egg, and other mixed metaphors. I never water down my teaching due to shifts in the climate of academia. An artist who cannot speak of archetypes is as stilted as one who cannot utter the word soul. Still, in the same way, I soften my usage of the word spirituality by qualifying it as op spirituality and therefore non-threatening. I regularly over-preface my introduction of Jungian archetypes and the collective unconscious. I ask my students to consider that pre-language, our reverie was not dominated by narration. The constant mental chatter that runs on a loop in modern brains simply did not exist. It's hard to wrap one's mind around, so addicted are we to this mental chatter. Traditions like chanting and meditation are meant, among other things, to limit the noise so that we may tap into our core consciousness without the interference of mind and ego. Language evolved long after humans existed on this earth. It should not be a huge leap to imagine that before this juncture, our brains functioned similarly in their subconscious germination on the day's events. Likely the fruits of that germination were offered up to us as insights most germane to our survival. We call these offerings dreams. Pre-language, we dreamt in images, not words. This alone explains a postulated reservoir of imagery with metaphorical meaning. The function of metaphor, and therefore symbology, in survival-based learning has been dissected in no uncertain terms in chapters one and two. All we're adding here is that a collective mapping of all man's learned responses results, the same way a map of our highly emotional experiences, what we call a value system, results on the individual level. Both databases, the micro and the macro, are wired into our DNA and passed on via epigenetics. Epigenetics is proving more and more that DNA is a mere blueprint, subject to a great deal of cellular self-creation. Local and non-local influences determine how that blueprint expresses itself. It's becoming ever clearer just how malleable our genetic codes truly are during the course of a lifetime. Most compelling of all, it's the genetic content crafted by our lifestyle choices, habits, thoughts, and feelings. Getting our hands in the clay that's passed on at the moment of conception. There's a reason athletes' personal bests improve with each generation. The linear perspective that Renaissance artists like Da Vinci mastered with great effort comes much more easily to modern art school students and is ideally carried further. The cutting edge is always advancing. Such is the power of cellular memory. When it comes to the true nature of innate responses to formal properties and archetypes, what I tell my art center students is this: do not get hung up on semantics if you wish to empower your work. Whether you subscribe to the characterizations of Jungian philosophy or reject them for more comfortable notions like the parlance of developmental psychology or evolutionary theory, it is still wise to get to know the classic archetypes. Whether you believe in a collective unconscious or attribute all seemingly innate responses to social conditioning alone is irrelevant. It still behooves you to investigate Jung's original premise and the branches of Jungian psychology that spun out of it. For the collective unconscious is where these images live and breathe, and this is the language we speak as artists. The below definitions, per the usual, derive from the Oxford, Cambridge, and Merriam-Webster dictionaries. Archetype. 1. In behavior, historical psychology, and literary analysis, a statement, pattern of behavior, prototype, first form, or main model that other statements, patterns of behavior and objects copy, emulate, or merge into. 2. The Platonic concept of pure form, believed to embody the fundamental characteristics of a thing. In my view, though Plato's terms were intuited with an early limited understanding of the mechanistic world, they have startling resonance. Still, for our purposes, it will be more helpful to focus on the first definition as well as the following. 3. A collectively inherited unconscious idea, pattern of thought, image, etc., that is universally present in individual psyches, as in Jungian psychology. 4. A constantly recurring symbol or motif in literature, painting, or mythology. Let's stop here for a moment. For the purposes of this chapter, it should be noted that the concept of archetypes is used in vernacular contexts outside that of Jungian psychology. In media and the arts, one often hears the words archetype or archetypal to characterize anything from a character or a plot device to a literary motif or a story template. In the vernacular, the implication is that such a device resonates with deep-seated human experience, distinguishing it from a stereotype or cliche. The word archetype suggests universality over cultural relativity, timelessness over timeliness, and a profound resonance. The recurrent resonant archetypes referred to in this definition, those perpetuated in myth, legend, folktale, even religion, are those that empower modern storytelling to this day. This definition refers to the recurrence of characters or ideas sharing similar traits throughout various seemingly unrelated cases in classic storytelling, media, etc. This usage of the term draws from both comparative anthropology and Jungian archetypal theory. 5. From Wikipedia.org. Archetypes are also very close analogies to instincts, and that long before consciousness develops, it is the impersonal and inherited traits of human beings that prevent and motivate human behavior. They also continue to influence feelings and behavior even after some degree of consciousness develops. Jungian psychology has taken Jung's initial concepts of archetypes and the collective unconscious and fleshed out the cast of players. This is especially true of character archetypes, the most immediately recognized by the layperson. But let's start by taking a look at the original terms as coined in Jung's writings, including those compiled in Psyche and Symbol and his most famous work, Man and His Symbols. Jungian archetype, universal primal symbols and images that derive from the collective unconscious, as proposed by Carl Jung, they are the psychic counterpart of instinct. Etymology first molded from arc beginning, origin, first place plus typos, model, type, blow, mark of a blow, as in type. Collective unconscious, the unconscious mind and shared mental concepts. It is generally associated with idealism and was coined by Carl Jung. According to Jung, the human collective unconscious is populated by instincts as well as archetypes. As mentioned earlier, any number of devices, motifs, conventions, forms, or templates are referred to regularly as having an archetypal basis. But the archetypes that most people immediately recognize, those which resonate and ring familiar, are the classic character archetypes. We know them from books and movies, from operas and ballets and puppet shows, and even television commercials. We recognize them from life. I suggested earlier that pre language, our inner dialogue was comprised of images. Though we thought nonverbally, and any crucial survival based insights the subconscious mind wished to impart came in the form of images. As dreams. It is my premise and a widely embraced school of thought that the character archetypes populating story since prehistoric oral tradition derive from our dreams. For that reason, I began the verbal presentation of this chapter with a montage of nonlinear, dialogue-free snippets of cinema that seem to transport beyond words. Without dialogue, the gestures, facial expressions, and other forms of nonverbal communication play a much larger role, as do the shapes, colors, composition, film language, and scoring in the films I chose. In the way of Commedia dell'Arte, the exclusion of dialogue forges a poetic simplicity that is anything but cerebral. These are the kinds of films that intrigue me lately, those that engage viscerally, bypassing the intellect altogether. They hit audiences in the gut, transporting experientially. In philosophy, this circumventing of intellect, this direct line to the ineffable, is called mysticism. In the classroom, I often begin the conversation about familiar character archetypes by asking students to name the voice of wisdom in a movie they've seen, any movie from any era. Without hesitation, examples are rattled off, from Yoda and Gandalf to Disney's grandmother Willow, from Jiminy Cricket or Mr. Miyagi to the Oracle in the Matrix. We then agree that the term voice of wisdom could easily be swapped out for sage, conduit, or, well, oracle, rendering the naming conventions in the Matrix a bit lazy. Once the persistence of character archetypes is becoming clear by example, I take a different persuasive tack and offer up some of the more pervasive and universal examples. One of Young's more celebrated works is titled Christ as the Symbol of the Self. Anyone who's ever heard one aspiring screenwriter chatting with another at Starbucks while pecking away on his laptop is familiar with the concept of the hero's journey. The term has become a bit of a cliche, even a punchline in Hollywood circles, due to overuse. But the truth is, almost any story with redemptive thematic content could qualify as a hero's journey. I would argue that every last Miyazaki film is a hero's journey. Categorically, the character arc moves from meekness to empowerment, mirroring the classic arc from idleness to purpose. Many filmmakers have directly credited the works of comparative religion expert Joseph Campbell, who popularized the term the hero's journey for the basis of their work. George Lucas has said in no uncertain terms that the writing of the Star Wars franchise was informed by Campbell's model of the hero's journey. The Wachowskis have said the same of their work. Campbell's The Hero with a Thousand Faces is the publication that most distinctly breaks down the hero's journey as used in modern storytelling. Classic epics like The Iliad and the Odyssey have been called heroes' journeys. Even The Alchemist by Paul Coelho fits the model to a T. But the ultimate quintessence of the Hero's Journey template would be the story of Christ. When one takes the time to compare all the milestones in Campbell's model with those of Christ's life, the two are indistinguishable. I would argue that Christ is the ultimate symbol of the self for a myriad of reasons, the most obvious being, we are all children of God. Or if that language is uncomfortable, we were all birthed by the universe. Christ is universally identifiable, embodying the human condition, and that we all feel transplanted in the physical realm, disconnected from an invisible father figure, our divine source. We feel cut off from it and disenfranchised, hence the seeking so often inherent in narrative. We are driven to reunite with our divinity. This is the calling that the hero initially denies then ultimately accepts in the classic hero's journey. Another distinct milestone on the hero's journey is doubt, a sense of being forsaken by the Creator. Once aligned with purpose, however, the hero offers redemption to others. Christ resonates as the symbol of the self, due to his role as martyr. To a degree, it's human nature to feel misunderstood or misjudged. When our head hits the pillow at night, we prefer to think of our own essence as purely innocent, despite rough edges or any appearance to the contrary. Rationalization accounts for the compulsion to embrace our goodness and worth in the eyes of our Creator and attribute all else to misjudgment. For more of Campbell's views on comparative religion, the recurring templates informing mythology and religion the world over, check out the comprehensive video series of his work, The Masks of God. Tropes, the gamut from archetype to stereotype to cliche. In cinema, a trope is what the Art Direction Handbook for Film defines as a universally identified image imbued with several layers of contextual meaning, creating a visual metaphor. In literature, trope refers to the use of figurative language for artistic effect, such as a figure of speech. The word trope has also come to denote commonly recurring literary and rhetorical devices, motifs, or cliches in creative works. For example, pathetic fallacy is the use of a storm to echo a character's melancholy, or a coming storm to symbolize impending war. Some definitions of this device flop the definition, saying we personify the natural element, the wistful wind or the melancholy rain. When does an archetype become so overused that it lapses into cliche? When does an image, plot device, or even a character become hackneyed, jaded, tired? I regularly ask students where they draw the line between archetype, stereotype, and cliche. The answers I hear most often, with which I concur, distill as follows. Devices are more palatable and resonant when they are universal. That is, when they transcend time and defy cultural relativity. Stereotypes most often abound when there is insufficient context or research. It's then that cultural appropriation enters the equation. The less a conceit is tied to a specific time and place, the more universal it becomes. The more culturally relative and time-specific, the greater the risk of defaulting to stereotype. I would offer that abiding true inspiration is what rescues one from falling into cliche territory. The very intention behind the work is its saving grace. Minus true inspiration, imparted by the universe itself. All that's left is mimicry. By honoring inspiration and being true to it, while infusing authentic life experience, story details tend to ring true. Artists and writers often hear the damning adage, it's all been done before. This paralyzing claim is leveled at both recurrent themes and familiar narrative forms, like the Shakespearean story templates Loss of Innocence, Forbidden Love, or Coming of Age. In my view, the fact all stories have been told before need not be damning. The luxury of relying on a rich history of reinforcement is what lends profound resonance to a story. The trick seems to lie in changing up the particulars, settings, circumstances, and conditions to introduce relevance for new audiences. If it's true it's all been done before, with regard to thematic content and story template, the new territory begging to be explored may well be tone. Literary form is constantly evolving, as is film language and cinema. With them, the range of emotion and conceptual experience evoked in readers and audiences also evolves. Producers of mainstream studio pictures tend to have little faith audiences will accept poignancy in a comedy or comedic moments in a poignant drama. The range in American studio pictures is quite narrow compared to that of independent and foreign films. Director Gaspar No has said of his controversial film Irreversible that his intention was to capture both heaven and hell on screen within one cinematic experience. Quite an ambitious objective. I am somewhat like-minded. To me, the novel untapped territory in film lies between the lines, in the realm of tone. What if a filmmaker has never captured melancholy and sublime in the same on-screen moment? Something archetypal this way comes. In today's milieu, it is more fashionable to speak of tropes rather than archetypes. As touched on earlier, the logical implication is that social conditioning alone accounts for any resonance, not some postulated reservoir or database invented by a dead quack. This perspective favors the proverbial nurture over nature when it comes to innate responses. In former chapters, we covered the survival-based reasons humans learned through metaphor. We looked at how neurotransmitters, peptides, and hormones, we call emotions, flag certain experiences for mapping on our brain, as our worldview or value system. The suggestion here is that the whole of human experience, all man has learned, is mapped similarly and passed on in our DNA. The antibodies that have evolved for every pathogen man has ever encountered during human history are encoded and passed on. Why should innate responses be any different? What we call instinct in animals and intuition in humans is just as critical to our survival and proliferation. Whether one dismisses the notion of a collective unconscious as quackery or flat out thinks Jung is misinformed, the bottom line is it's inconsequential. The vocabulary of archetypes remains the language we speak as artists and storytellers. In that spirit, let's take a look at a few of the most enduring character archetypes. There are too many to explore in the context of this book, but we will hit on a few to illustrate the enduring power of archetypes in narrative. Talk about taking the baton and running with it. Contemporary lists of character archetypes and archetypal story templates have evolved far beyond those referenced directly in Jung's writings. The egotypes, soul types, and self-types Jung originally coined have been reframed and augmented posthumously by a bevy of Jungian analysts interpreting his works. Many Jung disciples add their own proprietary twist for branding purposes. For that reason, let's start as near to the source as possible. Authors Carol Pearson and Margaret Mark have identified twelve different character archetypes in Jung's original writings, organized in three overarching categories based on a fundamental driving force.

SPEAKER_01 34:23

These include egotypes, innocent, orphan slash regular guy, slash gal, hero, caregiver, soul types, explorer, rebel, lover, creator, self-types, suggester, sage, magician, and ruler.

SPEAKER_00 34:47

Other authors like Margaret Hartwell and Joshua Chen go further, augmenting these twelve archetype families with five archetypes each. Hartwell and Chen 2012. Their lists are as follows Innocent Family Innocent, Child, Dreamer, Idealist, and Muse, Caregiver Family, Caregiver, Angel, Guardian, Healer, and Samaritan. Citizen Family, Citizen, Advocate, Everyman, Networker, and Servant, Creator Family, Creator, Artist, Entrepreneur, Storyteller, and Visionary, Explorer Family, Explorer, Adventurer, Pioneer, Generalist, and Seeker, Hero Family, Hero, Athlete, Liberator, Rescuer and Warrior, Jester Family, Jester, Clown, Entertainer, Provocateur, Shapeshifter, Lover Family, Lover Companion, Hedonist, Matchmaker, Romantic, Magician Family, Magician, Alchemist, Engineer, Innovator, and Scientist. Rebel Family. According to Jungian analyst June Singer, a complete list of archetypes cannot be compiled, nor can differences between archetypes be absolutely delineated. Singer 1994. I wholeheartedly agree. In the same way we are all complex multifaceted conglomerations of you name the system of categorization, type A and type B personalities, introversion and extroversion, anyogram types or astrological traits, characters are mixed bags. Especially when they're dimensional and therefore relatable. Singer proposes this list of opposites ego slash shadow.

SPEAKER_01 37:04

Meaning slash absurdity centrality slash diffusion order slash chaos opposition slash conjunction time slash eternity sacred slash profane light slash darkness transformation slash fixity.

The Hero’s Journey And Christ

Tropes, Stereotypes, And Cliché

Character Archetypes In The Wild

The Innocent: From Ophelia To Selma

The Orphan And The Everyman

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This list resonates with my sensibilities more than any other with regard to thematic content. The opposites, or gamets as I prefer to think of them, are the very themes that crop up in my writing, regardless of intention, and those that resonate with me most profoundly on an existential level. Many narrative conventions are said to encapsulate the human condition. In my estimation, there is a world of conjecture beyond it to do with the very nature of life in the physical realm. The manifestation of consciousness. This list beautifully touches on the very existential questions sentience begets. Innocent until proven guilty. The most notable character type among the egotypes would be the innocent. The character of Ophelia in Shakespeare's Hamlet is a classic literary example. Ophelia's purity and innocence is sacrificed to patriarchy with tragic results. Another classic template is found in the character of Madame de Truvel from Lady Asons Dangereuses, Dangerous Liaisons. Her earnestness and sincerity is exploited by deception and seduction, again to tragic consequence. The original 1782 novel by Pierre Cordelot de Latlo has been adapted as a play in 1985 and as a cinematic period drama starring Glenn Close, Michelle Pfeiffer, and John Malkovich in 1988. The 1989 film Valmont is also based on Les Liazons Dangereuses, as is the Gen X teen version, Cruel Intentions. Though not destined to win any Oscars, the literary classic turned teen drama did pave the way for the new millennium's gossip girl. The fact that a literary period piece has endured and been adapted in so many formats is proof of the universality of its themes and character archetypes. The character of Melanie from the novel and Oscar-winning 1939 film, Gone with the Wind, is another quintessential innocent. Melanie embodies not only Southern gentility, but true grace and kindness, in contrast to the tempestuous, manipulative wiles of protagonist Scarlett O'Hara. The iconic role was played by Olivia de Havilland in the screen version of the classic. Brad and Janet, played by Susan Surandon in Rocky Horror Picture Show, are innocents of the deer in the headlights variety. Their learning curve is enormous. Couched in chipping away at sexual boundaries and rigid gender norms, it is symbolic of the opening of the mind in general. Other babes in the woods include passive narrators like Clifford Bradshaw in the musical Cabaret, Brian in the film version, Nick Caraway in F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gadsby, and Stingo in Sophie's Choice. These passive narrators are largely wallflowers who watch events unfold, but it is their innocence at stake when they find themselves in over their heads. In all cases, they emerge from disillusionment with preserved innocence, but a healthy dose of realism. As a side note, I highly recommend Sophie's Choice for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is that Meryl Streep is a goddess. Every film critic and every book one picks up on filmmaking or cinema espouses its own list of must-sees and groundbreaking films that supposedly changed the course of film history. No two lists are the same. For aspiring filmmakers, any catch up one can play has value. In the art direction of animated features, it is important to know the tradition of live-action film that evolved neck in neck with animation. Entire sequences of The Incredibles, for example, pay homage to genres like Film Noir and the Spaghetti Western. In Sky Captain, many movements in cinema are similarly satirized, and the joke is lost if one does not know her film noir from her cinema verite. In the spirit of playing catch-up on film history, I feel justified in recommending Sophie's Choice. It will be an opportunity to consider the role of passive narrator, Stingo being the classic innocent, to identify character arcs, and to endure one of the greatest tearjerkers of all time. A flashback scene from Sophie's Choice is regularly voted one of the top three tearjerkers of all time. No spoilers here, along with a certain heartbreaking hospital scene from Terms of Endearment. The final fish out-of-water innocent I'll list, by way of example, comes from a film that also happens to star Dame Meryl Streep. The character of Andrea from both the novel and the film, The Devil Wears Prada, must learn to swim with sharks while maintaining her own integrity. In examples like Hamlet and Dangerous Liaisons, the Innocent is a secondary character who serves as a symbolic sacrificial lamb and a larger parable about the human condition. Dangerous Liaisons is a cautionary tale about folly, excess, and vengeance, in which Valmont meets his match and becomes the sucker in his own schemes. Hamlet is a cautionary tale about corruption, preoccupation with appearances, and revenge, in which Ophelia is a symbolic element. She represents what is sacrificed when these forces dominate. In stories like The Devil Wears Prada, innocence or naivete is actually the fatal flaw of a protagonist's main character with a full arc of her own. Our final example of the innocent as sacrificial lamb would be Bjork's character Selma in Dancer in the Dark. I will take this opportunity to impose my own tastes and highly recommend this film. In the progression of the movie musical genre, it represents no small breakthrough. I am a fan of the genre beginning with 1950s Fair and 1964's Les Perfluis de Cherbourg, the first true rock opera. My love affair with movie musicals continues through Hare and Jesus Christ Superstar to Julie Tamor's Across the Universe, La La Land, and Woody Allen's Revival of 50s Nostalgia in Bullets Over Broadway. In this vein, Lars von Trier's Dancer in the Dark, starring Björk and featuring her original songs, ranks among the most innovative and groundbreaking cinematic experiences. Its nonlinear storytelling, experimental score, and highly innovative techniques, like multiple camera shooting of highly choreographed musical numbers, makes it stand out from all the others. It's a hard-knock life. The second pervasive archetype I'd like to look at is the orphan regular guy or gal. Speaking of crossover, the passive narrators mentioned in the innocence category above, double as every men, allowing readers and audiences to identify, plug in and transform on the Yellow Brick Road journey. Their relatability and appeal are inextricable from their innocence, which is nearly always their fatal flaw. These passive narrators are the ultimate non threatening identifiable protagonists. It's said that a protagonist must be faulted in order to have an arc, some fatal flaw that leaves room for growth. This is categorically true, as is the fact that. That relatability requires human frailty, hence the obligatory dimension. But there is more to the orphan/slash everyman archetype than relatability and appeal. The existential disenfranchisement I spoke of earlier, being cut off from our source, means we are all essentially orphans. There's a reason Disney films, too many to list here, inevitably incorporate a missing or dead parent. The lack keys into a universal longing for connection and belonging. The lack of a parental figure that seems to come with existence. I often ask my students the leading question, why might Disney's tradition of orphaning protagonists have evolved? Though I'm clearly hinting at the aforementioned existential predicament, looking for daddy, their responses usually have more to do with empathy. Because your heart goes out to them, I usually hear. It's inarguable that we invest emotionally in a defenseless or otherwise vulnerable character who must fend for themselves. Altruism is in our genes. When a character has been dealt to poor hand, the very instinct to step in, which accounts for the adage it takes a village, kicks in. The orphan character is easy to root for, often sharing qualities with the classic innocent. We easily invest in the outcome of their goal. In the true way of storytelling, we hope it will be accomplished and fear it may not. It's worth noting that the everyman version of the orphan archetype should not be confused with the plain folks propaganda technique. That's the one used in advertising, often in tandem with the bandwagon technique that employs regular Joes or everyday folks to endorse products or services. Being the subversive individual that I am, I've bristled for five decades now whenever I hear the phrase folks just like you in a television commercial. Firstly, I wonder where these folks are, as I've never met them. Then the resentment creeps in. In addition to scant fringe benefits to solidarity and identity politics, I am keyed into the downsides of conformity. The tribal instinct to demonize the other and bond against a common enemy. Drum circles, yes, soccer riots no. When I see large groups of humans in any context, rather than rushing to join them for fear of missing out on something, I generally run in the opposite direction. Actors like Tom Hanks, John Goodman, and Tim Allen have made careers out of playing the everyman. The typecasting assures audiences know what they'll get and result in longevity for the cash cows in question. The female equivalent may be the relatable plain Jane or girl next door. Think Emma Stone, Mary Tyler Moore, or Debbie Reynolds, as compared to Liz Taylor or Angelina Jolie. As a filmmaker, I make a mediocre film watcher. I'm anything but critical. Rather than analyzing technique in order to learn and grow as a filmmaker, I get drawn in. My relational, humanistic nature means I'm a sucker for story. I inevitably find myself immersed and forget to study. The medium becomes invisible and I become one with the message. Unless, of course, a boom mic enters frame and destroys my willing suspension of disbelief. I tend to get my money's worth at any film. I've almost never walked out, even if it means going home whistling the set. The way I protect myself from the frustration of subpar cinema is being selective about what I partake in. There are a handful of actors whose choices I so admire that I'd trust any film they've chosen to be a part of, or any director they've agreed to work with. I've joked that I would watch Kate Blanchett or Gayal Garcia Bernal make out their shopping lists. On the other side of that coin, I tolerate the well-loved Tom Hanks. Nothing wrong with his acting chops. It's just that I prefer when an unknown screen presence simply disappears into a role. And Tom's cutting nasal voice nearly always gives him away. And Tim Allen, forget about it. When people call him an everyman in reference to home improvement or his more recent Republican-amed series Last Man Standing, I think he may be Middle America's everyman, but he ain't mine. The orphan archetype is often downtrodden, an underdog. These qualities mean there is more to overcome, lending redemption to the character arc. They are also ideal for the meek shall inherit template, as best established in Christ's The Beggar and the Rich Man parable. The most quintessential example of a classic orphan would be the obvious, little orphan Annie. A slightly less irksome example would be the street urchin that is young Edith Piaf in Ma Vie en Rose. It's a biopic, of course, based on true events in the life of the famous torch singer. But the archetype is immediately recognizable. Iconic historical figures do as much to reinforce character archetypes as those in literature, pop culture, or cinema. Other classic orphans in literature would include the characters of Oliver Twist, ID, Cosette from Les Miserables, Peter Penn, and Mowgli. And then there's that list of Disney characters missing one parent that reads like War and Peace. While we're on the subject, Disney also cemented the evil stepmother archetype in cultural vernacular. There is much speculation about the symbolism informing the long and rich history of this archetype in regional folklore. I like Marianne Williamson's take the best. According to her, the wicked stepmother is that which claims to be our source. She likens it to the ego, which promises to love and nurture us, but it's a false promise. The wicked stepmother, which is the ego, can put the sleeping beauty or Christ within us to sleep, but she can never destroy it. What is created by God is indestructible. Marianne Williamson from Return to Love Williamson 2009. Sung or unsung, they're heroes. The hero archetype is most closely associated with the hero's journey. It's right there in the name. The archetype is as much a recurrent motif as it is a character archetype, one to do with overcoming obstacles to accomplish a goal. The hero's main feat is to overcome a monster of some kind, most often symbolic of humanity's shadow side. The defeat of the monster is the long hoped for and expected triumph of consciousness over the unconscious. The hero myth is an internal drama projected outwardly, with both microcosmic and macrocosmic implications. The best contemporary example of the hero's function in confronting man's shadow would be the film version of the ancient text, Beowulf. In the CG adaptation, the monster Grendel represents the sins of the father come home to roost. Grendel is the incarnation of man's ills on the macrocosmic scale, and Beowulf's dalliance is on the micro. A descendant of Cain, Grendel is described in the ancient poem as a creature of darkness, exiled from happiness and accursed of God, the destroyer and devourer of our humankind. If that's not the shadow side of human nature, I'm not sure what is. Other classic examples of the hero archetype would be Achilles and Troy, or any telling of the Trojan Wars, and Ulysses in Clash of the Titans, or any telling of the Peloponnesian Wars. In the Iliad and Odyssey on which the latter is based, Ulysses goes head to head with the Kraken, just as Hercules is tasked with defeating the Hydra. Captain Ahab from Moby Dick is a tortured hero with shades of the adventurer, and the demons of the faulted T. E. Lawrence in Lawrence of Arabia run even darker. Again, though based on a historical character, the often lauded film, for good reason, has ingrained this kind of faulted hero in cultural consciousness as much or more than any literary character. In that same spirit, Ernest Hemingway himself, as much as the characters in his writings, has become an embodiment of the adventurer archetype to rival the most interesting man in the world. The man and his legacy have come to symbolize a particular brand, however patriarchal, of adventure-seeking and intellectual curiosity. Rosemary and Sage. The Sage archetype is alternately known as the conduit, voice of wisdom, or oracle. The three fates of classical Greek mythology are likely the most clear-cut representation of human conduits for divine wisdom or intervention, predating centuries of fabled prophets, mediums, and visionaries. Immortalized in art throughout the ages, the fates, or the Moirai, consisted of Lashesis, Clotho, and Atropos. Together they enforced fate or destiny, as juxtaposed with free will and randomness. The high priestess, Pythia, simply referred to as the Oracle of Delphi in films like 300, was consulted by kings, whereupon she would utter prophecies from a state of divine possession by Apollo. Referred to by countless writers, the Oracle of Delphi is considered by historians to have been more than an iconic mythological figure. Consulting her was one of the most prominent religious institutions in the classical world. A clear-cut contemporary example of the voice of wisdom slash oracle archetype would be the oracle character in the blockbuster The Matrix. The underlying archetype is hard to miss. The Wachowskis didn't so much as change her job title to a proper name. The sage archetype is occasionally thought of as the conscience in Judeo-Christian tradition, the voice given to that internal moral compass known as ethics. The conscience has been depicted as the angel on one shoulder that tempers the devil on the other. This version of sage as conscience is best understood by analyzing the Italian folk tale Pinocchio. In the Disney animated classic that has cemented the morality tale in popular culture, Jiminy Cricket is known to represent the conscience, Pinocchio's and ours collectively. The story is a parable for the human condition in which each element is symbolic. A variation on Shakespeare's assertion the world is a stage, Pinocchio's parable suggests that life is a stage. We are all, along with Pinocchio, puppets to Geppetto's, the puppet masters, God. The journey toward becoming a quote real boy is symbolic of building character in life and ultimately redeeming oneself. The Holy Spirit in Christianity is the ultimate voice of wisdom. An agent of God, the Holy Spirit or Holy Ghost is the conduit through which God communicates with man. In Pinocchio, though Jiminy Cricket represents the conscience, the Holy Spirit is actually embodied by the Blue Fairy, who ultimately grants the puppet real boy status. In my art center classes, as mentioned earlier, I usually start with the sage archetype because it's immediately recognizable. A dozen examples pour out of my students straight out the gate. This is a good way to establish the prevalence and durability of character archetypes. Among the usual suspects cited by students are J.R.R. Tolkien's Gandalf from the Lord of the Rings franchise, Yoda from Star Wars, the aforementioned Oracle from The Matrix, Grandmother Willow from Pocahontas, and Mr. Miyagi from the Karate Kid. Speaking of Miyagi, shamanistic wise old men dominate this archetype. In cinema, they are often associated with Eastern Taoist philosophy, opening the floodgates to stereotype. In addition to Mr. Miyagi, filmed entertainment is flooded with characters like Master Poe in the popular 1970s television series Kung Fu, Pai Me in Batman, Pai Mei from Kill Bill, and Kit Toot in Eat Pray Love. Due to their long lifespans, wise old sages often appear as turtles or owls, such as Morla in Never Ending Story, or Owl in Winnie the Pooh, whose uninspired name clearly set the stage for the Matrix's straightforward naming convention. When it comes to stereotypes, cliches, or general lack of originality, I think it important to acknowledge the role of parody in satire. Those who are quick to point the finger and claim a work is derivative may not have been on the planet long enough to get the joke, to recognize that what they're watching is a tongue-in-cheek homage. A great parody will poke fun at everything from Russians as bad guys to vamps to hard-boiled detectives, while throwing in a bit of witty repartee for the road. The Man Behind the Curtain. The original creator archetype is broken down in latter traditions to the inventor, the mad scientist, and the absent-minded professor. Returning to our stalwart and concise example, The Wizard of Oz, the great Oz, the man behind the curtain, turns out to be disillusioning, a fusion of the trickster archetype with the classical God archetype. I call this the abandoning or disillusioning God. A great many stories present a version of God that is anticlimactic after all the protagonist seeking is Odyssey or quest. The seemingly selfish or mundane God character is symbolic of an unbarnished view of a less than benevolent universe out to propagate at all costs. A universe that chews up individuals and spits them out, once exhausted in its dialectic. In our other example, Pinocchio, the parable hinges on the puppet strings being pulled by Geppetto, the classic creator. The inventor version of this creator archetype, while still referencing God, is best embodied by Daedalus in the Icarus myth of Greek classicism and earlier Minoan mythology. A more contemporary screen depiction of the creator archetype would be Jeff Bridge's character in the film adaptation of the young adult novel The Giver. The mad scientist version of this archetype would be Doc Brown from Back to the Future, Malcolm from the Jurassic Park franchise, or frankly any Jeff Goldblum role, take your pick. Another variation on this classic archetype is the absent-minded professor. This variety suggests that brilliant minds churning on numeric equations or profound insights cannot be bothered to recall the location of keys or sunglasses. Examples include Mr. Meredith from Anne of Green Gables, Professor Porter from Tarzan, and in real life, by all accounts, Nicola Tesla or Albert Einstein. Hopefully, this sampling of vivid character archetypes from literature, cinema, and the annals of history rings familiar. Their durability is evidenced by the many adaptations post-stating the examples I chose. Many were novels later adapted as plays that eventually made their way to the silver screen. Hopefully, those examples you've seen or read came back to you and resonated. My wish for you as a storyteller would be to keep an eye peeled for real life incarnations of these types in daily life. They're everywhere. A great storyteller is primed for the iconic images, contrasts, juxtapositions, and most importantly, behaviors that make us human. The same mold. Now that you have a sense of character archetypes, let's take a look at other devices said to have an archetypal basis, those that originated in consciousness, pre-language, and continue to lend resonance to the means by which we transform. Story. In the same way distinct iconic characters resonate for what they represent in the human psyche, certain story templates or structures resonate as universal metaphors for life. Synthesizing contemporary schools of thought, the following archetypal templates underlie all stories Rags to Riches, Pygmalion, My Fair Lady, Pretty Woman, The Quest, Voyage and Return, Through the Rabbit Hole, Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, Comedy, Want or Need Met Tragedy, Neither Want Nor Need Met, Precautionary Tale, Rebirth, Return to Innocence, Transformation for Protagonist, Catharsis for Patron. In my own work, I don't tend to force tropes or archetypes. Oh, I observe them around me daily, augmenting the canon of human experience that makes me a writer, and I supplement that observation with study. But when putting proverbial pen to paper, I am more concerned with honoring inspiration. I trust that by drawing from direct experience with every word and honoring the concept that the universe has gifted me, the ring of truth will prevail. Oh, I trust that the influences I've identified in my journey toward mastering craft will play their part. The muses I imagine are whispering words or phrases to me across time and space. By allowing the inspiration and experience life itself provides, I fancy I am in little danger of producing strictly derivative or reductionist work. The thing is, I am sure all writers since the dawn of time have had the same delusion. Cliche is in the eye of the beholder. Still I keep in mind that life is stranger than fiction, and there are walking cliches around us every day. Desert rats crop up in far from the thick of things, my collection of short stories largely centered in Inyo County, California. Some of them rival the Appalachian Hicks immortalized in deliverance. But these people live and breathe, and I draw on a childhood spent in the Mojave Desert among miners, prospectors, and geologists. Their sought-off shotguns, missin' teeth, and sometimes missin' limbs are the real deal. As a writer, I fancy that my job to a degree is to master how imagery will land with readerships, mainstream or niche. To understand the gamut from cultural relativity to universality. Even so, I cannot control how my work lands with readers. I can only control my intention. If a real life inspiration for a character is too over the top to be believed, we artists sometimes say of a sunset, if I painted it no one would believe it. I accept the caricatured flavor of the character, or tone it down as suits my intention, my story, best. It's all I can do. They say opinions are like assholes, everybody has one. I have found this to be true. The balance between listening to feedback and tuning out the noise in pursuit of inspiration can be a delicate one. When it comes to cliche being in the eye of the beholder, I hinted earlier that a tongue-in-cheek homage, or even satire, can be lost on those without the relevant exposure, these uninformed patrons are quickest to point the finger in their policing of the dreaded cliche. To a degree, stereotype is the territory of the uninspired. In the starkest of terms, only hacks with nothing to say will default to mimicry. For this set, in place of true inspiration breathed by life itself, the impetus for crafting a story is a desire to emulate existing fare. The cart is effectively before the horse. Familiar form, original content. Imagine that an underprivileged kid in the Appalachians finds a banjo and teaches himself to play. He's never left his neck of the woods and does not own a radio. With little exposure to anything other than the bluegrass he's heard on porches and in local dance halls, the first song he attempts to write will inevitably come out with a bluegrass chord progression and melody. Though inspiration may be non-local, the form creative expression takes tends to be that dictated by exposure. More on this in chapter 5, Finding Your Voice. But in the conversation about the gamut from archetype to cliche, a healthy acceptance of familiar form is freeing, in one's work and others. For a writer or songwriter, the regimen of form might be a given genre and the conventions that define it. For a painter it might also be genre, Western oil painting or pop art, but it extends to the chosen medium, materials, and content or subject matter. In my own writing, I strive to find new and novel ways of expressing old ideas. Dialogue tags become tired over time, as do go-to descriptors. However, there are many cases where my quest to find just the right combination of adjectives to bring a new twist to a familiar image or motif. One with poetry, alliteration, and rhythm is overridden by the understanding a phrase is not meant to draw attention to itself. Reserve is the key in writing. If every phrase is loaded, nothing has impact. For that reason, I reserve novel, poetic, or otherwise attention-grabbing descriptors for significant moments, images, motifs or symbols, and cruise right by those meant to be mundane. The best way to do that, in fact, is to use a familiar colloquialism or turn a phrase like, She turned on her heels and continued on, or he hung up the phone and went about his business. Some editors might disagree with this sentiment, bristling at vernacular phrasing, but in my view it comes down to voice. The tone and narrative voice of a given Peace will determine what's needed. As I suggested at the outset of this book, I find it more productive in my own work and my teaching to resist notions of right, wrong, or good, bad in artistic expression and instead speak of choices, cause and effect. In closing, in bringing this chapter to a close, I offer a random assortment of familiar recurring character tropes. I encourage you to meditate on them. Then as an exercise, list examples you may have come across in literature, stage, opera, ballet, cinema, or any storytelling medium that incorporates character. Medler, manipulator, used car salesman slash snake oil salesman, spinster, curmudgeon slash grumpy old man, abuser slash exploiter, the sociopath, the eccentric, seductress, femme fatale, Lothario Playboy Heartbreaker, Spinster slash old maid, matriarch,