The hero on the horizon
“A hero is someone who has given his life to something bigger than himself” — Joseph Campbell
Joseph Campbell has outlined a hero’s journey in his analysis of stories, mythologies, and rituals throughout the ages and the world. For aspiring writes, artists, actors, directors, anyone attempting to create a story — their own or pure fiction — he has given an algorithm for a heroic life! I wonder if humanity has always desired to be heroic. I wonder if everyone around me desires to be heroic. I am certain the answer is negative. Shakespeare notes that, “The desire to be unique is the most commonplace”. I can conclude that we wish to be unique but not necessarily heroic. A certain altruistic quality attached to the hero is missing from common people’s desires.
Each era in the lifetime of humanity had its own requirements, resources, and values. Stories of these bygone eras have turned their focus to highlight these needs, fears, and aspirations of their respective times. The heroes often depict the aspirations and values of the contemporary society. Every now and then — a character emerges on the social scene that tears through the fabric of its contemporary society and symbolizes a new way of thinking and living. This character sheds light on available resources and fulfills the needs. This character brings forth the tools for the society to move forwards. The main character in a story may not necessarily be a hero. In this imagined excursion on mine, I attempt to explore the main character of my time.
We began with stories of animals and plants as we observed our surroundings. They gave us nourishment and shelter. Then we tried to make sense of our surroundings and the ways of nature and explained it with magic and divine intervention. The ancient gods were still rooted in nature. Thus, the characters of our stories explained the events in nature.
As the ancient people settled at one place with the advent of agriculture and built kingdoms, they chose their leaders to ensure safety. The values of courage, strength, and responsibility gained importance. We are all too aware of divine kingship of the ancient Egypt, the legend of king Arthur and the knights of the round table, the princes who fought in the war of Kurukshetra(Mahabharat). These main characters were protectors, they provided the common people with security.
As the world settled in a ruler-and-the-ruled format, it began laying laws — it needed a basis for the right and the wrong. The divinity of the ancient times was a good place to look for guidance. Then came the characters who upheld and may be preached virtues and faith — such as Jesus, Budhha, Prophet Muhammad, prince Ram and so many others. The main characters of these stories provided us with values for bringing shape and structure to the budding the societies.
When the survival was no longer threatened and the flight or fright response was not literal, love and romance sprang forth from our biology. There came a time when mankind was stable and protected enough to enjoy the luxury of choice and romance — which was now added to the list of aspirations of the common man. We get stories of complex human emotions such as those of Romeo and Juliet, Helen of Troy, Pride and Prejudice, Shakuntal, and so on. They are not focused on single virtue, but rather stage a grand display of the human relationships. The lovers as characters were one of the first acknowledgements of the human psyche and the duality between human mind and body.
One’s belonging to some one, some place, some organization began to be seen as a part of ones identity. People went to great lengths to protect this identity born out of history, culture, and geography — they still do so. Nationalism also became a kind of romance, when the emotions ran strong enough. The main characters of world wars and freedom struggles throughout the world showed us determination, patience, and brotherhood which were desperately needed to quieten the strong romantic emotions rampant everywhere in the young tempestuous world.
With the renaissance and industrial revolution, knowledge could become accessible to the common man and the uniformity of our collective existence was reinforced. The spirit of enquiry and question breathed life in the archaic societies around the world. Although people had always aspired to push boundaries of their professions, the scientific method brought a system in place. The truth has always been dictated by the strong, the brave, the rulers, and the divine. The scientific method democratized the truth — everyone aspired to be a part of it. To facilitate this, there came forth a new character — the detective. He observed, he deduced, he inferred. The scientific method had found its way in the literature. The most famous of them was Sherlock Holmes.
The detective was not necessarily a model citizen —s/ he was certainly not free from all the evils and not at all full of all the virtues. It was because he questioned the authority of the state and also the faith. This often made him an outcast, a maverick, difficult to understand or bond with, and also feared by the conservative folk for his lawlessness. But at the same time, he proved to be an excellent subject to write a riveting story. The hint of anarchy that hangs over this character, gives the author a certain freedom to create intelligent twists and turns in the narrative. This character has kept us entertained for over two centuries and still remains a very popular character. He is a chimera, a shape shifter and takes form of a scientist ahead of his times, a doctor with unconventional cures, a lawyer with dangerous arrogance, and so on. The TV series of recent years tell stories of mavericks excellent in their fields finding solutions based on observations and keen eye.
It has been two centuries and the mysteries of the universe have been studied, unraveled, and made common knowledge due to the world wide web. The detective is no longer a mystery and neither a singular figure. Social media has democratized the skillset needed to search for the truth and now everyone is an investigator. This has resulted into a growing realization that there are very few ultimate truths but there are thousands of proto truths— truths aggregable for a limited time, space, and culture. With the rise of influencers, capitalism has also turned the investigation into a money-making product. As has always been the case, influence has found its way to twists the truths to make money. A weary consumer now no longer demands the truth but only convenience. With the diminishing demand for his product, the mysterious detective is alas dead!
The importance of individual has grown immensely in the recent years which in way has made brought about uniformity. I began this essay the mention of Shakespeare saying “ Nothing is so common as the wish to be remarkable”. And we have made this wish come true for everyone! Today, everyone is a writer, painter, dancer, actor, news reporter, investigator on the screen without the struggles of yesterday. They rise to moments of stardom. The people themselves have become products in the marketplace of the world and everyone aspires to both create and fulfill a demand. Everyone is a main character trying to break through the fabric of society's normal.
We are leaving less and less unique footprints on the world, and more and more irrelevant garbage in our physical reality. The items that we own do not tell us about our past, they do not accompany us enough to be infused with stories from our lives. For example, a piece of clothing no longer comes with stories from its creation, repair, wear, and tear, and destruction. It sits in our phone memory as a collection of pixels — as an individual fond memory for the wearer; for others not so much. Our garbage is forgettable for those who witness our lives — our partners, peers, and progeny. Life and experiences are no longer collective but private.
In this private life, the once important aspirations of being accepted by the society have fallen aside. Now we aspire to be true to our personality. We aspire to go in search of happiness. Earlier, we said that our heroes answered the call of duty, adventure, glory, faith, romance, and search for the truth. Now, I believe, we wish to answer the call of peace, happiness, and acceptance. If you follow closely the development of our heroes, we see the Maslow's pyramid being built. We started with food, shelter, moved on to safety, followed by love and morality. With the entry of detective, our aspirations became professional in nature, and each professional achievement boosted our self-esteem. If our main character is to follow the Maslow’s pyramid, s/he needs to bring forth the tools for self-actualization.
Maslow has said of self-actualization: “It may be loosely described as the full use and exploitation of talents, capabilities, potentialities, etc. Such people seem to be fulfilling themselves and to be doing the best that they are capable of doing. They are people who have developed or are developing to the full stature of which they capable.” We immidiately tend to associate spirituality, with such notions. But out main character needs to interact with the society, bring it the much needed tools to move towards self-actualization. S/He cannot be a monk in the Himalayas. The precedent is that everyone is forgettable, producing irrelevant garbage, and a consumer in the world’s marketplace. Our main character would need to break the biases and bondages that s/he grew up with to become his full potential. For that s/he needs to gain experiences out of the context of his life. He might be in pursuit of knowledge, beauty, or spirituality. Popular spiritual practices of the world stress on detachment from wants as the source of happiness. Anonymous, out of context, eager, and detached. Do we know someone?
Lets paint him/her into existence… Someone going along with a crowd of — say — daily commuters. Out of context — may be s/he is a first timer — still figuring out the technicalities of survival in the place. Eager to explore? Still betting on the first timer. Lastly — s/he needs to be detached. S/He is not going to stick around to ‘become’ the daily commuter. S/He is a temporary fixture, a passing ship. Behold! The tourist!
Tourism industry is a vast enterprise. I agree that most of the tourists are not aspirational characters. They litter, they subjugate the locals, and they judge. I argue that they are not tourists in real sense. They are people in search of their home in a entirely different place. A tourist is a person who is travelling or visiting a place for leisure. Majority of the people crave familiarity and convenience during their travels — familiar food, familiar commutes, familiar language. I think they are not “travelling for leisure”, but “longing for the comfort of their home”; a home which has long ago turned into a marketplace of investigation and expectation.
Today, man can reach any corner of the world and even cover all the corners of the world within his lifetime. With such tools for travelling and communication, he can immerse in the geography and culture of people far far away. It not only allows him a judgement-free and a consequence-free space to make mistakes but also time to introspect upon his behavior and highlight his biases. Humanity shines brighter under the roof of tourism than in any other business deal. Becoming self-aware in the mundane daily life is extremely difficult. Now, more than ever in the history of mankind, the common man can afford to be a tourist and the tourist is just inches away from the sweet fruit of self-awareness. Its a great opportunity to remould ourselves, seek knowledge, appreciate the beauty of the nature, and witness humanity.
Tourist is an interesting character. He is not a wanderer; for he has firm roots and a place to call home. He is not an necessarily an adventurer for he has tools for efficient planning. He is not necessarily a lone wolf for he follows recommendations and learns from other’s experiences. He is also not necessarily a person of science for he does not promise an analysis and an inference.
I think as the main character of my time, a tourist of today is trying to fit in as many experiences in his lifetime as s/he can, to stretch her/his mind beyond the boundaries of its imagination. S/He participates in the mad marketplace, but, s/he is no longer a product of a single family, culture, geography, organization, or academia. S/He is a wizard with a collection of memories, a cabinet of curiosities, and an open lifestyle curated by friends in far away places. S/ He has witnessed mother nature in her brightest, kindest, fiercest, and dullest moments. S/He knows that harming her is harming ourselves and is a champion of her beauty. Like a hero described by Joseph Campbell, s/he brings back souvenirs and insight from his victories to the common people stuck in the mundane, urging them to introspect, introducing them to a different norm.
Tourists also make wonderful villains — do not judge them for they may sully your image in the world, do not take advice from them for they wont stay with you to bear the consequences, and never ever give your heart to them for their loyalties lie back home. They do provide a lot more freedom to the creator because their primary feature is that they are temporary. None of the main characters that came before had temporary existence.
Come to think of it, we are sometimes tourists in other’s lives, and others are tourists in ours. Some people come into our lives, look around our mind palaces, and leave! In the process, they may trash the place or they may add a treasure trove of memories. Whether in death or distance, they leave without a regret. With a true spirit of a tourist, you should acknowledge the limits of our time, and move on to other destinations. The journey is the key, my dear tourist!
