Sybal Janssen
asked
Lois McMaster Bujold:
The English Department of the uni. I attended structured their degree program to emphasis both history and criticism. One d-- paper after another. Sadly, I still see themes (whether they exist or not.) I am much taken with the idea of "surrender of self to the greater" that shows up in "Memory" and in the Chalion series. Is this a product of deliberate intent, or the character's spontaneous outgrowth?
Lois McMaster Bujold
By that I'm guessing you mean the author's deliberate intent. I don't think character growth is spontaneous; it is usually a result of the story-so-far, which is why the writer has bothered to put all that stuff on the page in the first place.
Whether surrender-of-the-self-to-the-greater is right or not will depend on the character and their particular story (and their particular "greater", not to mention what is meant by "surrender".) Very easily it might be the reverse, a character recognizing that whatever they had identified as their greater actually wasn't, and should instead be ignored or resisted.
Miles has a descant on it somewhere, to the effect that true destiny does not consume, but rather, returns an enlarged self. If something consumes with no return, one may be in unrecognized trouble.
Ta, L.
By that I'm guessing you mean the author's deliberate intent. I don't think character growth is spontaneous; it is usually a result of the story-so-far, which is why the writer has bothered to put all that stuff on the page in the first place.
Whether surrender-of-the-self-to-the-greater is right or not will depend on the character and their particular story (and their particular "greater", not to mention what is meant by "surrender".) Very easily it might be the reverse, a character recognizing that whatever they had identified as their greater actually wasn't, and should instead be ignored or resisted.
Miles has a descant on it somewhere, to the effect that true destiny does not consume, but rather, returns an enlarged self. If something consumes with no return, one may be in unrecognized trouble.
Ta, L.
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