Another useful tidbit from another fandom
Nov. 29th, 2006 07:26 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
teratologist.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
deathtocapslockCreating the Innocent Killer: Ender's Game, Intention, and Morality
Most of you have probably heard of Orson Scott Card, noted batshit person and sf author, and his most famous work, Ender's Game. Not unlike HP, Ender's Game relies on the old classic narrative of the Special Child who overcomes enormous odds to destroy a force of evil that is threatening the entire human race.
I was really struck by what Kessel had to say here, and the similarities and differences to the way Harry Potter is presented to us as a hero:
Despite his moral preoccupations, in this summary of his novel Card seems less interested in interrogating Ender’s morality than in evoking sympathy for him.
The most obvious way Card produces sympathy for Ender is by subjecting him to relentless, undeserved torment... When Ender is not being lied to by authorities, he is being bullied. The source of most of the hatred directed toward Ender is that he is superior to virtually everyone in the book—superior in intelligence, creativity, sensitivity, logic, psychological understanding of others, morality, and, when it comes down to it and despite a lack of training and physical stature, hand-to-hand combat. In that first chapter, the same day the monitor is removed, Stilson, a playground bully, attacks Ender. At the age of six, in the first of several physical battles Ender wins, he completely incapacitates Stilson.
We later learn that in the course of the fight, Ender inadvertantly killed his adversary - knowledge that is kept from both Ender and the reader for several hundred pages. In fact, as Kessel points out, this establishes a pattern for conflicts throughout the series:
* Ender is resented by others for his skills, honesty, intellect, superiority—in fact, for simply being who he is
* The others abuse Ender. They threaten his life.
* Ender does not or cannot ask for intervention by authority figures.
* Even when authority figures know about this abuse, they do not intervene. In most cases they are manipulating the situation in order to foster the abuse of Ender
* Ender avoids confrontation for some time through cleverness and psychological cunning, but eventually he is forced, against his will, to face an enemy determined to destroy him.
* Because he has no alternative, Ender responds with intense violence, dispatching his tormenter quickly and usually fatally. Ender engages in this violence impersonally, coolly, dispassionately, often as much for the benefit of others (who do not realize or admit that Ender kills on their behalf) as for himself. Onlookers are awed by his prowess and seeming ruthlessness.
* Ender does not know that he has killed his adversary.
* Ender feels great remorse for his violence. After each incident, he questions his own motives and nature.
* In the end we are reassured that Ender is good.
The first, second, third, and final steps seem shocking familiar; the fourth is certainly implied in the Harry Potter series from Dumbledore's leaving him with the Dursleys onward. The issue of Harry killing his adversary has, thus far, been elided by the use of a combat system that allows for magical healing from catastrophic, totally destructive attacks, and this is probably the result of restraint based at least in part on the genre and intended audience. But the remorse step - which in Card's writing is the cue for someone to comfort Ender and tell him that what he did was necessary, triggering the final step - is, as the reviewers here have noted, conspicuously absent. When Harry Potter experiences self-doubt, from time to time, it almost never revolves around the question of whether he used excessive force, or excessive anything actually. His only questions about himself are whether he did enough - enough to try to save Cedric, enough to prevent Sirius from going to the Ministry, enough to detect that the Half-Blood Prince was 'evil', etc. And of course, since Harry Potter is already doing things that are clearly superhuman for a teenage boy (defeating Voldemort and bringing home Cedric's body, going to the ministry himself to rescue Sirius, dueling with the Half-Blood Prince one-to-one, etc.) the reader can easily answer those questions yes and go on with total sympathy.
It seems apparent, at least to me, that one can view Ender's Game as a sort of cultural prelude, in some regards, to the Harry Potter books - or at least, an earlier wave in the same tide. EG asks, and answers, a certain question about the use of violence and the nature of heroism, and HP is structured around the idea that that answer can be taken as a given.
Goodness is not a matter of acts, but of intentions, an inherent quality independent of what one does. “I don’t really think it’s true that ‘the road to hell is paved with good intentions.” Card stated in a 2002 interview.9 “Good people trying to do good usually find a way to muddle through. What worries me is when you have bad people trying to do good. They’re not good at it, they don’t have any instinct for it, and they’re willing to do a lot of damage along the way.” The import of this statement is that there are some people who are good before they act, and some others who are bad before they act, and that goodness or badness is exhibited in their actions. These "bad" people can’t do good, and “good” people can’t do bad.
Unfortunately, I think that this may be the answer. Even if Draco and/or Snape are redeemed, it seems pretty clear that we are going to see that redemption as a change from a bad nature to a good nature, not an illustration of a more subtle underlying pattern in human nature in general.
I also particularly commend the bits of the essay that deal with the character of Graff, EG's Dumbledore analog, but that would be a whole 'nother essay.
Most of you have probably heard of Orson Scott Card, noted batshit person and sf author, and his most famous work, Ender's Game. Not unlike HP, Ender's Game relies on the old classic narrative of the Special Child who overcomes enormous odds to destroy a force of evil that is threatening the entire human race.
I was really struck by what Kessel had to say here, and the similarities and differences to the way Harry Potter is presented to us as a hero:
Despite his moral preoccupations, in this summary of his novel Card seems less interested in interrogating Ender’s morality than in evoking sympathy for him.
The most obvious way Card produces sympathy for Ender is by subjecting him to relentless, undeserved torment... When Ender is not being lied to by authorities, he is being bullied. The source of most of the hatred directed toward Ender is that he is superior to virtually everyone in the book—superior in intelligence, creativity, sensitivity, logic, psychological understanding of others, morality, and, when it comes down to it and despite a lack of training and physical stature, hand-to-hand combat. In that first chapter, the same day the monitor is removed, Stilson, a playground bully, attacks Ender. At the age of six, in the first of several physical battles Ender wins, he completely incapacitates Stilson.
We later learn that in the course of the fight, Ender inadvertantly killed his adversary - knowledge that is kept from both Ender and the reader for several hundred pages. In fact, as Kessel points out, this establishes a pattern for conflicts throughout the series:
* Ender is resented by others for his skills, honesty, intellect, superiority—in fact, for simply being who he is
* The others abuse Ender. They threaten his life.
* Ender does not or cannot ask for intervention by authority figures.
* Even when authority figures know about this abuse, they do not intervene. In most cases they are manipulating the situation in order to foster the abuse of Ender
* Ender avoids confrontation for some time through cleverness and psychological cunning, but eventually he is forced, against his will, to face an enemy determined to destroy him.
* Because he has no alternative, Ender responds with intense violence, dispatching his tormenter quickly and usually fatally. Ender engages in this violence impersonally, coolly, dispassionately, often as much for the benefit of others (who do not realize or admit that Ender kills on their behalf) as for himself. Onlookers are awed by his prowess and seeming ruthlessness.
* Ender does not know that he has killed his adversary.
* Ender feels great remorse for his violence. After each incident, he questions his own motives and nature.
* In the end we are reassured that Ender is good.
The first, second, third, and final steps seem shocking familiar; the fourth is certainly implied in the Harry Potter series from Dumbledore's leaving him with the Dursleys onward. The issue of Harry killing his adversary has, thus far, been elided by the use of a combat system that allows for magical healing from catastrophic, totally destructive attacks, and this is probably the result of restraint based at least in part on the genre and intended audience. But the remorse step - which in Card's writing is the cue for someone to comfort Ender and tell him that what he did was necessary, triggering the final step - is, as the reviewers here have noted, conspicuously absent. When Harry Potter experiences self-doubt, from time to time, it almost never revolves around the question of whether he used excessive force, or excessive anything actually. His only questions about himself are whether he did enough - enough to try to save Cedric, enough to prevent Sirius from going to the Ministry, enough to detect that the Half-Blood Prince was 'evil', etc. And of course, since Harry Potter is already doing things that are clearly superhuman for a teenage boy (defeating Voldemort and bringing home Cedric's body, going to the ministry himself to rescue Sirius, dueling with the Half-Blood Prince one-to-one, etc.) the reader can easily answer those questions yes and go on with total sympathy.
It seems apparent, at least to me, that one can view Ender's Game as a sort of cultural prelude, in some regards, to the Harry Potter books - or at least, an earlier wave in the same tide. EG asks, and answers, a certain question about the use of violence and the nature of heroism, and HP is structured around the idea that that answer can be taken as a given.
Goodness is not a matter of acts, but of intentions, an inherent quality independent of what one does. “I don’t really think it’s true that ‘the road to hell is paved with good intentions.” Card stated in a 2002 interview.9 “Good people trying to do good usually find a way to muddle through. What worries me is when you have bad people trying to do good. They’re not good at it, they don’t have any instinct for it, and they’re willing to do a lot of damage along the way.” The import of this statement is that there are some people who are good before they act, and some others who are bad before they act, and that goodness or badness is exhibited in their actions. These "bad" people can’t do good, and “good” people can’t do bad.
Unfortunately, I think that this may be the answer. Even if Draco and/or Snape are redeemed, it seems pretty clear that we are going to see that redemption as a change from a bad nature to a good nature, not an illustration of a more subtle underlying pattern in human nature in general.
I also particularly commend the bits of the essay that deal with the character of Graff, EG's Dumbledore analog, but that would be a whole 'nother essay.
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no subject
Date: 2006-11-29 07:58 pm (UTC)(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2006-11-29 08:31 pm (UTC)Card's books never held any appeal to me. So I never felt the need to read them. But I've met people who loved them.
What Card's quote and sometimes HP represents to me is the failure to really think about the intricacies of morality. I don't understand the thought processes that state that a good person will always be good even when acting in a questionable matter. How does someone come to that world view?
Also, this kind of thinking leads to very maladaptive forms of the Gary Stu/Mary Su archetypes. It allows the reader and/or writer to exult in the lead character's suffering but at the same time participate in justified revenge when these wrongs are righted. The character's suffering wipes clean any violence they do or plan to do.
This is a disturbing but very simple mentality and many people are seduced by it.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-30 02:03 pm (UTC)Almost everywhere we find the effort, marked by varying degrees of intensity and by the use of various coercive measures, to rid ourselves as quickly as possible of the child within us—i.e., the weak, helpless, dependent creature—in order to become an independent, competent adult deserving of respect
Maybe it's just me, but that reminded me strongly of Snape. Snape's transition from the Worst Memory chapter to his adult self fits into that mold. Snape is actually a better parallel to Card's main character IMO. Interestingly, that makes me happier with the HP series, because I'm guessing JKR doesn't share the same ideas as Card for her intended moral themes...
(no subject)
From:no subject
Date: 2006-12-01 04:31 am (UTC)As to whether Rowling is going, ultimately, to be as morally empty as this - I do hope not. At this point, it could go either way, but I'm reading the books as a quest for redemption and reconciliation, rather than a standard kill-the-monsters sort of story. So Harry is (1) going to have to face his own bad acts *and* bad intentions (and it's really weird that Card tries to separate these two. If they can be separated, it's what you do that makes you 'bad'. No one but God can really judge anyone's intentions.), and (2) forgive his enemies. Snape is going to have to do the same. voldemort will be defeated if, and only if, these two reconcile. I also think that, if Rowling is heading in Card's direction (I sincerely hope not), Harry is more like Ender than Snape is, for exactly the reasons teratologist gives above. I, for one, would like to see some real evidence of the pure heart and capacity for love Dumbledore kept talking about.
Thanks for the link! I know a few adolescent readers I'm going to pass it on to. (It's a bit scary how much young teen boys love "Ender".)
no subject
Date: 2006-12-01 07:54 pm (UTC)I find it a really interesting authorial technique to brush what the character meant to do under the rug by focusing on what the character didn't mean to do. Sure, Your Honor, the defendent beat to a pulp/siced up the victim, but he's totally innocent because he didn't mean to kill anyone! And because we're in that character's head and identify with him, it often works, at least for a while.