September 2002 posts
Faith's Turn to the Darkside - Could Buffy have
won without it? -- Majin Gojira, 10:09:33 09/13/02 Fri
Just a thought i've had for a while. Faith's turn to the darkside
has probably been thuroughly discussed...
but, who here thinks that without the human weakness Faith gave
the Mayor, Buffy would not have been able to defeat him. If she
never went bad, I doubt that even two slayers could have defeated
him as Uber-demon Olvikan.
So, what do you think: Was Faith screwed over and used by the
PTB or what?
[> Re: Faith's Turn to the
Darkside - Could Buffy have won without it? -- Apophis, 10:59:35
09/13/02 Fri
I don't think Faith was screwed over by the PTB. It's been shown
that the PTB don't have much control over humanity's free will
(though we learned that from Skip and his credentials have recently
been called into question...). At the end of the day, it was Faith
who chose to join the Mayor. Even if she had killed Finch anyway,
she could've still reformed or just left town.
As for whether or not Buffy could've beaten the Mayor w/o Faith's
emotional secret weapon, probably not (at least, in my opinion).
The Mayor would've had no reason to chase Buffy throuhgout the
school when he could've hurt her more just by eating her classmates.
[> Re: Faith's Turn to the
Darkside ... (general spoilers for season 3) -- Robert, 11:03:43
09/13/02 Fri
>>> "Was Faith screwed over and used by the PTB
or what?"
It depends upon your theology. Some people believe that God is
behind our every action and some believe that God permits us free
will over our own actions. As a good ELCA Lutheran, I believe
that we are free to screw up or not as we are wont.
Let us look more closely at Faith's behavior and actions of season
three. It is true that Faith provided the weakness necessary to
take down the mayor in "Graduation Day", and all other
things being equal, the world would have been lost without it.
However, the mayor could have been stopped before graduation day.
First, It is through Faith's direct intervention that the mayor
obtained the Books of Ascension in "Enemies". It was
not clear to me that the mayor required the books to achieve his
dastardly goals, but the books would certainly have been very
helpful to Buffy and the gang in stopping the mayor. Second, it
was again Faith's direct action (ie. kidnapping Willow) that provided
the Box of Gavrok in "Choices" to the mayor. Without
the box, the mayor certainly would have been stopped in his tracks.
He might have remained a hazard to Sunnydale and the world, but
the immediate crisis of his ascension to demonhood would have
been averted.
If the powers-that-be (PTB) do take direction control of individuals
actions and lives, then I would like to suggest this scenario.
a. Faith was set up by the PTB to kill the deputy mayor, thus
sending her into a moral and spiritual crisis. It provided Faith
with her first test, which she failed. She was unable to deal
with the guilt and shame of killing an innocent.
b. The PTB subsequently gave Faith a series of tests where she
could either decide to do the right thing or the wrong thing.
She chose the wrong things. She killed more innocent people and
a harmless demon. At any point, she could choose to end her descent
into evil, but chose not to. She failed the tests.
c. Since Faith failed the tests and chose to help destroy the
world, her blood (and nearly her life) were required to save it.
The fact that she was not killed, suggests that the PTB will give
her another chance; that they have a future use for her.
This scenario assumes that the PTB are pulling the strings to
this extent. On the other hand, if you believe that there exists
absolutely no free will, that every detail of our lives is orchestrated
by God, then we are all both screwed and blameless.
If however we do have free will (as I believe we do), then Faith
was not blameless. Furthermore, Faith's dire injury and coma at
the hands of Buffy was not a punishment from the PTB, but rather
a consequence of her own misdeeds and actions.
Does this answer your question?
-Robert
the stakes
of the warrior--for your perusal -- leslie,
10:59:36 09/13/02 Fri
This is the first draft of my paper on George Dumezil and BtVS--some
people had wanted to see it posted because they won't be at the
conference at the University of East Anglia. All BtVS quotes are
from Psyche. Feedback more than welcome!
[A] people without myths is already dead. The function of that
particular class of legends known as myths is to express dramatically
the ideology under which a society lives, not only to hold out
to its conscience the values it recognizes and the ideals it pursues
from generation to generation, but above all to express its very
being and structure, the elements, the connections, the balances,
the tensions that constitute it; to justify the rules and traditional
practices without which everything within a society would disintegrate."
--Georges DumÈzil, The Destiny of the Warrior (1970, p.
3)
My title, appropriate as it is to the discussion of Buffy the
Vampire Slayer, is actually the title of a book written in 1968
by the French mythologist Georges DumÈzil. He held that
Indo-European mythologies conceptualized the universe in terms
of three categories that he called "functions": the
first function, sovereignty, controls the cosmic balance and justice
of the universe in the persons of the priestly magician and the
sacred king, binder and judger; the second function, force, is
exemplified in the person of the warrior; and the third function,
fecundity, comprises all aspects of productivity and fertility,
seen in the figures of the farmer, the herder, the artisan, and
women.
Of the three functions, it is the warrior function that is the
most problematic in social terms. As Bruce Lincoln has noted,
"[Warriors] were never foremost in [Indo-European] society.
Always there remained something disquieting about their violence,
which--while highly productive and quite necessary so long as
it was directed against external enemies--threatened the stability
and well-being of I-E society whenever it was asserted within
that society itself." (Death War and Sacrifice, 1991, p.
4). I think it's hardly necessary to argue that Buffy the Vampire
Slayer and Angel: The Series are two narratives that are primarily
concerned with warriors, their conflicts and ambiguities, and
especially the dangers attendant upon their running amok.
In his analyses of the warrior function, DumÈzil concluded
that this function was the most ill-defined of the three, tending
to overlap with the other functions in various ways. The figure
of Odin in Norse mythology, for instance, is primarily a first-function
god in his association with poetry, wisdom, and magic, but also
acts as a warrior god. Norse mythology, however, also has a warrior
god in the person of Thor, the hammerer, but Thor is also, in
some aspects, a god of the farmers, the representatives of the
third function. DumÈzil concluded that in discussing the
warrior function, it was wiser to think in terms of "aspects"
rather than strict identifications. DumÈzil also discussed
the central crisis of the warrior's myth as the committing of
"sins" against each of the functions, violating "in
succession the laws of religion, the warrior's ethic, and one
or the other of the two most important components--sexuality and
wealth--of the morality of the third function." (The Stakes
of the Warrior, 1983, p. 3).
In this paper, then, I intend to look at the characters of Buffy,
Angel, and Spike as aspects of the Indo-European warrior, each
primarily affiliated with one of the three functions. In order
to impose some kind of boundaries on a topic that could easily
run as amok as Angelus, I am going to limit myself to a discussion
of these characters in Buffy the Vampire Slayer alone. Buffy,
the Chosen One, is charged with patrolling the boundaries between
the human and demonic worlds. She maintains the cosmic balance
of the Buffyverse, a warrior of the first function. Angel, who
appropriates the role of Buffy's protector before they have even
met, who serves as her sparring partner, and who, in his soulless
days, rejoiced in the artistry of the kill, is a warrior of the
second function. Spike, who relates to the world in a primarily
physical way, delighting in the immediacy of "fists and fangs,"
the vampire who eats a surprising amount of solid food, and above
all, the vampire who loves women and sex, is inescapably a warrior
of the third function.
The first warrior to "sin" in the Buffyverse is Angel,
who reverts to Angelus after having sex with Buffy. In this guise,
he embodies the nightmare image of the warrior who turns on his
allies. He does not kill for blood--for food--but to hurt as many
people as possible. Marie-Louise Sjoestedt in Gods and Heroes
of the Celts (1949) makes a DumÈzil-influenced division
of Irish mythological heroes into "the hero of the tribe"
and "the heroes outside the tribe." The former is epitomized
by C Chulain who, like Buffy, is charged with patrolling the boundaries
of the kingdom; the latter by Finn mac Cumhal, the leader of the
fÌanna, an army that lives outside the bounds of society
in the wilderness. When Angel turns to Angelus, the Buffyverse
is still divided very clearly between humans and vampires, the
souled and the unsouled, the good and the evil. Angel was always
an ambiguous figure as a souled vampire--Buffy was willing to
trust him out of love, while Xander was always waiting for the
day he'd revert to his old ways--but as a warrior, he fought clearly
on the side of "the tribe," of "us"--that
is, humans--rather than "them"--that is, vampires. Angelus,
however, becomes a "hero" outside the tribe, removing
himself from the human world and immediately reconstituting his
former fÌan, or as much of it as survives, by hooking up
with Spike and Drusilla and coopting their plans to destroy the
Slayer through the resurrection of the Judge--an appropriate opponent
for a warrior herself affiliated with judgment. (Is it a coincidence
that Buffy so often averts Apocalypse, also known as Judgement
Day?)
As Lincoln points out, warriors as a class must be persuaded both
to risk their own lives and to take the lives of others. The latter
is accomplished by demonizing the enemy, denying their humanity.
Tribal cultures often call themselves by a name that means "people"
or "humans" while their word for the people of all other
tribes means "not-human" or "subhuman. He quotes
a proverb from the JalÈ people of New Guinea that is extremely
appropriate in this context: "People whose faces are known
must not be eaten." (Death, War, and Sacrifice, p. 141) Angelus
is eager to eat everyone whose face Angel knew. Killing strangers
will do to pass the time, but what he really wants is to destroy
everyone who matters to Buffy, and by extension, everyone who
mattered to him as a result of his love for Buffy. In the episode
"Passion," Buffy marvels that Angelus is "completely
different from the guy that I knew." Willow counters, "Well,
sort of, except . . . You're still the only thing he thinks about."
Or as Spike says to Angelus later in the same episode, "Are
you insane?! We're supposed to kill the bitch, not leave gag gifts
in the friends' beds," tacitly accusing Angelus of the warrior's
archetypal sin against his own function: cowardice, the failure
to engage in battle at the appropriate time.
After Angel's soul is restored, the role of rogue warrior is taken
by Faith, who requires a paper in herself. Angel himself calls
attention to their similarities in his attempts to reach out to
her. Faith is the one who begins to point out the chink in Buffy's
warrior armor: She's too judgmental. When Faith awakes from her
coma and switches bodies with Buffy, her Buffy mantra is "Because
it's wrong!"
The warrior's archetypal sin against the first function, sovereignty,
is to defy the gods--to defy authority--and to commit acts that
threaten to dissolve the established social structure and thereby
the cosmos. Boundaries only exist as long as they are patrolled.
The Slayer, by her very existence, challenges the traditional
role of women. Joss Whedon has repeatedly stated that his inspiration
for Buffy was the desire to turn on its head the stereotype of
the helpless blonde teenage girl who's the first to get killed
in a horror movie. But even among Slayers, Buffy is notable for
her independence. We see this aspect thrown into high relief in
the two-part episode "What's My Line?" with the arrival
of Kendra, who follows her Watcher's orders without question,
who keeps her eyes cast down in the presence of boys, who has
memorized the Slayer's Handbook. Buffy didn't even know there
was a handbook; Giles says "After meeting you, Buffy, I realized
that, uh, the handbook would be of no use in your case."
Buffy's defiance of authority comes to a head in her rebellion
against the Watcher's Council in "The Graduation--Part 2."
When Wesley objects that this is mutiny, Buffy replies, "I
like to think of it as graduation." From this point on, Buffy
is the one who is a rogue warrior, but she remains grounded through
her personal adherence to the principles of justice. Her defiance
does not lead to a downward slide into uncontrolled violence,
as with Angelus, or to switching her allegiance to an evil authority,
as with Faith, but a "graduation" to a higher authority,
whose superiority is reaffirmed throughout Season 4 through contrast
to the military/governmental authority of the Initiative.
Buffy's self-reliance arises from her willingness to trust her
own judgments. Both Kendra and Faith simply follow orders in their
different ways. (Perhaps the biggest tragedy of Faith is that,
for all her rebellious persona, she remains a minion, winning
the Mayor's love and approval through her willingness to follow
his orders without question: When Professor Wirth asks her why
she is killing him in "The Graduation--Part 1," she
can only respond, "You know, I never thought to ask;"
for her, all that matters is "Boss wants you dead.")
When Buffy must make her own decisions about right and wrong,
especially who deserves death and who must be suffered to live,
annoying as he may be, the black-and-white world of Slayer and
slain becomes increasingly gray. It isn't just that Spike has
been spiked or Anya has become unexpectedly human, but that Buffy,
and all the Scoobies, increasingly encounter demons who are not
particularly evil or ill-intentioned, culminating in Clem, the
floppy-skinned, easy-going, good-hearted demon whose only vice
seems to be kitten poker.
In a seminal essay on Beowulf, "The Monsters and the Critics,"
J. R. R. Tolkien pointed out, in response to scholars who objected
to the "irrationality" of the poem's monsters, that
mythologically, monsters are the literal representations of chaos
and unreason--they're supposed to be irrational, that's the point.
Jaan Puhvel makes a similar point in his introduction to the translation
of The Stakes of the Warrior (xiii-xiv). Nearly all of the writers
at Mutant Enemy have mentioned at one time or another that the
monsters and demons of the Buffyverse are literalizations of the
terrors of adolescence and young adulthood, and it is Buffy's
job to fight them. Buffy patrols the boundaries between the human
and demon worlds each night, patrolling the boundaries of reason
and keeping chaos at bay. Finally, in "The Gift," she
sacrifices her life to close the rip between dimensions that will
cause chaos to engulf, not just the human world, but all dimensions.
Glory, the hell-god who wants to cause that rip, is a decidedly
unbalanced personality. Madness and chaos go hand in hand. After
Buffy is raised from the dead, making the transition across that
boundary between life and death for a second time, she increasingly
questions her own sanity until, in "Normal Again," she
almost opts to remain in the alternate universe of the mental
hospital as a normal schizophrenic.
Spike, who knows something about being a warrior, had earlier
advised Buffy to "Let yourself live, already. And stop with
the bloody hero trip for a sec. We'd all be the better for it."
("Normal Again") Even when Buffy was most in defiance
of authority, she still had Giles to back her up and advise her.
With his absence throughout the sixth season, Buffy truly had
to take on the functions of both judgment and protection, and
ultimately it proved too much for her. Although she managed to
pull back from complete madness, at the end of the season she
is still expounding the principles of human versus Slayer justice
as Willow goes on the rampage. These lectures sound weak enough
when she presents them to Xander and Dawn, but they completely
fall flat when she presents them to Willow, juiced up with the
magic she's absorbed from Rack. Ultimately, Buffy really can't
come up with anything that goes beyond that mocking refrain of
Faith's: "Because it's wrong."
The thing is, throughout the season Buffy has been doing something
very wrong: She's been lying. She started lying as soon as she
was resurrected, lying to her friends that she was trapped in
a hell dimension, lying that she was happy to be back, and then
lying to them about her relationship with Spike. Lying is, again,
a typical sin of the warrior against the first function; DumÈzil
identifies it in Norse mythology when Thor puts his hand in the
mouth of Fenrir the wolf as a pledge that the Aesir will not bind
him; when Odin does, in fact, bind the wolf with a magical rope,
the wolf bites off Thor's hand. In this case, the warrior god
lies for the good of the gods, but he still must sacrifice his
hand in the process. Buffy's lies are not so noble, and the more
she lies, the fuzzier the boundaries between reason and madness
become. Spike may be selfishly motivated, but his insistence that
Buffy publically acknowledge their relationship is a demand that
she be true to her warrior ethos, to live and be a hero, not indulge
herself in martyrdom and a mere "hero trip."
Spike, as we are endless reminded, has no soul and is therefore
unable to make moral choices between good and evil. How, then,
can he understand that her post-resurrection problems are a result
of her dishonesty? Maybe it is because of all of them, he is the
one who has thrown himself most full-heartedly into the role of
warrior. Buffy is ambivalent about her role--she keeps wishing
that she could just be a "normal girl"; Angel has taken
on the role of a warrior in expiation of his vampiric sins. Spike
just likes to fight. He is only depressed are when he is physically
constrained from fighting, when he is confined to the wheelchair
and when he is first chipped and hasn't yet discovered that he
can hit demons. (The wheelchair is an interesting touch: The gods
of the third function, such as Greek Hephaistos, Roman Vulcan,
Norse Volundr and Anglo-Saxon Wayland, tend to be lame.) He skids
into Sunnydale boasting of having killed two Slayers and itching
for a fight with the current incumbent.
As Bruce Lincoln noted, warriors have to be convinced to risk
their lives and that it's all right to kill the enemy. The latter
is assisted by demonization. One of the most effective tools for
the former is the promise of undying fame. The Greeks called it
kleos; the Welsh called it clod; and it's the quality that the
poets extol in their praise poems and elegies. Warriors trade
their lives for this immortality, and Spike, a poet himself in
his mortal life, desires it above almost everything else. Buffy
may be the hero of the human tribe, but Spike sees himself as
the hero of the vampire tribe.
Even after he has changed sides, even after he is chipped, Spike
still regards himself as the upholder of vampire tradition; confronted
with a band of teenage vampires who are out wreaking havoc on
Halloween, he's disgusted: "It's Halloween, you nit! We take
the night off. Those are the rules." The other vampire boasts,
"Me and mine don't follow no stinking rules. We're rebels!"
To which Spike replies, with a certain amount of justification,
"No, I'm a rebel. You're an idiot. Give the bunch of us a
bad name." ("All the Way") Spike may be a rebel
from human society, but as a vampire, he enforces the rules and
he is protective of his reputation and that of his "tribe."
In "Fool for Love," Spike jumps at the chance to tell
the story of his unlife to Buffy, and the discrepancies between
his narration--interestingly, he specifically labels what he is
doing for her as "narrating"--and the flashback scenes
that the audience sees show that Spike is very deliberately puffing
himself up; as Angelus notes in one them, "William the Bloody
likes attention. This is not a reputation we need." Spike
counters, "I'm sorry; did I sully our good name?" In
the episode "Restless," Giles dreams of Spike posing
for pictures, "hiring himself out as an attraction"
and clearly thriving on the adulation--"it's showbiz."
In "Crush," he's dismayed that Drusilla has heard about
the chip, but even in his self-loathing he sees himself as "a
cautionary tale for vampires." In "Checkpoint,"
he's charmed that a member of the Watcher's Council not only has
heard of him, but wrote her thesis on him. The subject of a thesis!
Now that's undying fame.
As a 99.44% soul-free vampire, perhaps Spike has no choice but
to relate to the world primarily through his body; a body without
a soul, after all, is nothing but dead flesh. He is also the vampire
who can least exist without a mate; even Harmony is better than
nothing. Without a woman, he turns into a drunken, disorganized
wreck; he proudly proclaims himself "love's bitch."
DumÈzil's third function, fecundity, is the function concerned
with women and wealth, whether than wealth is expressed as acres
of fertile fields, enormous herds of cattle, finely wrought metal
works, or just plain money. Spike is fond of both sides of this
function. He prides himself on being a protector of women. On
his first appearance he has come to Sunnydale to seek a cure for
Drusilla; when he and Buffy become engaged under the influence
of Willow's spell in "Something Blue," he apologizes
that he can't protect her when they are under attack by demons;
as Glory makes her presence known, he becomes the protector of
Joyce and Dawn; even as things fall apart at the end of Season
6, he is still the only protector that Dawn wants. Spike also
has his mercenary side. His third arrival to Sunnydale, in "Harsh
Light of Day," is due to a quest for treasure; he charges
Giles for helping him when Ethan Rayne turns him into a Fyarl
demon in "A New Man"; he steals Xander's change from
a table in the Bronze in "Crush" among other, ongoing
petty thieveries; he demands that Buffy buy him beer and fried
onions to accompany his story--excuse me, narration--in "Fool
for Love." At the end of that narration, however, when Buffy
scornfully flings over him the money she had promised, cash can't
compensate for her rejection. Spike likes money, but he likes
women better.
Spike is astute enough to recognize that sexual tension has always
pervaded his relationship with Buffy, even in the days when they
were mortal enemies; he couches the terms of their first face-to-face
fight in "School Hard" in terms of deflowering a "nice
ripe girl," tossing aside his phallic weapon--a poker--and
promises that "it won't hurt a bit," announcing that
weapons "make him feel all manly." But this is lust,
blood lust and sexual lust inextricable from each other. This
association is not unique to the Buffyverse. Many scholars have
noted that warriors are associated with heat, an expression of
their martial passion. Words for warriors and warrior-like qualities
are often derived from roots meaning "swollen" or "tumescent."
Like an erect penis, the warrior in his battle frenzy is regularly
described as being larger, hotter, harder, capable of more force,
and of a different shape than he is in his relaxed state. As Spike
falls in love with Buffy, that lust is overlaid with his--in his
mind--trademark protectiveness. Spike see himself above all as
a being--living or undead, chipped or no--who would never harm
"his" woman. Sex may get rough, bondage is constantly
lurking in the subtext, but these are pleasures of the flesh.
And then he tries to rape Buffy.
As a villain, even an electronically castrated one, it's hard
for Spike to commit a sin against his own warrior ethos. The closest
he has come to betrayal before this is in allying himself with
Buffy to thwart Angelus's awakening of Acathla, an act that is
necessary to preserve his love for Drusilla and, incidentally,
the fleshy world that he adores. Nothing can shake his self-perception
as a protector of women and an upholder of the laws of vampiredom--like
Faith, his rebellion consists of trading one set of rules for
another. For Spike, then, the only warrior's sin that he can commit
that will count, that will challenge his self-identity the way
Angel's reversion to Angelus or Buffy's dissolution into schizophrenia
did theirs, is an act of sexual violence. It isn't just that he
has hurt a woman he loves, but that by doing so, he has tarnished
his identity as a warrior who lives by the rules of his kind;
his reaction, therefore, is to reestablish his prowess as a warrior
by undergoing physical trials (no written) that result in the
establishment of a new identity: a vampire with a soul. Heracles,
after committing his own sin against the third function by killing
his wife and children, runs mad and immolates himself but lives
on as a god. Spike's sin against the third function, it seems,
has also engendered a movement upward on the spiritual food chain.
We have yet to see how this will play out.
Georges DumÈzil saw the three sins of the warrior as three
separate sins committed by one warrior, a unitary assault on the
entire mythic cosmos. I have found these sins divided among three
warriors in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. How did they get there?
Well, I doubt the writers at Mutant Enemy have been spending their
abundant spare time brushing up on French mythological theory.
Rather, the underlying mythological structures that DumÈzil
and his followers trace in ancient mythologies are still with
us today. We can see them reflected in the very structure of the
American federal government, divided into the judicial branch,
charged with making the decisions that will maintain our cosmic
order; the executive branch, whose leader is the commander-in-chief
of the military and who, for better or worse, maintains the reputation
and fame of the country; and the legislative branch, composed
of representatives of the common people, the ones who labor to
create the nation's wealth. The very doctrine of the separation
of church and state is a reaction to the early modern European
doctrine of the divine right of kings, a doctrine that ultimately
traces back to the Indo-European first-function figure of the
sacred king. These socially learned ways of conceptualizing the
universe and keeping chaos at bay persist because they are, to
a large extent, unconscious and thus unexamined. We can even see
them underlying the Scooby Gang itself, not just in the easily
identifiable figure of Buffy the Warrior, but also in Giles and
Willow as representatives of the dual nature of the first function,
judger and binder (Willow's very name refers to a plant traditionally
used for creating bonds) and Xander as the man of the earth, the
laborer and craftsman. In "Restless," the Scoobies sit
before the flickering light of the television screen, and they
are assaulted by the spirit of the First Slayer, who only knew
the flickering light of a campfire. The trappings of life may
have changed, Buffy may not sleep on a bed of bones, but the stakes
of the warrior remain high.
[> Thanks for posting this!
-- shadowkat, 12:00:23 09/13/02 Fri
Don't have time to read now but am keeping thread alive
until I do!
Looks great.
[> [> Yes, my thanks
also. I enjoyed it immensely. -- Dead Soul, 12:11:25 09/13/02
Fri
[> Keepin' the thread alive
-- Masq, 14:56:08 09/13/02 Fri
[> That's fascinating Leslie,
thanks. -- Lilac, 15:32:10 09/13/02 Fri
[> Great essay, but it was
Tyr, not Thor, who gave up his hand to Fenrir. -- Finn Mac
Cool, 15:51:48 09/13/02 Fri
[> [> Re: Great essay,
but it was Tyr, not Thor, who gave up his hand to Fenrir.
-- leslie, 16:05:11
09/13/02 Fri
Thanks for pointing that out--looking back at my source, I see
I skipped a line looking back and forth between page and screen!
[> Adding my thanks, leslie.
-- aliera, 16:21:42 09/13/02 Fri
[> Wow...very interesting
points! -- shadowkat, 08:21:44 09/14/02 Sat
Well you have managed to convince me of the importance and necessity
of the attempted rape scene for Spike's character arc. Not real
sure how it helped Buffy's character arc...but hey we haven't
seen the whole story yet.
You also hit on something I hadn't really thought of before:
Buffy's tendency to be so judgmental and how this is one of her
major flaws. She doesn't back up why certain acts are wrong. She
just believes they are because that is what she's been told. Faith
makes fun of this attitude in Who Are You and to some degree in
Bad Girls and Enemies. Enjoying sex in any way that doesn't fit
the societal norm = is wrong. Having sex with a vampire is so
wrong - you don't tell your friends about it. If he has a soul,
well you might be able to justify it. And oh, wait, she can for
awhile, because she came back wrong? Buffy was devastated when
Tara told her she wasn't "wrong", that she didn't come
back "wrong". When Buffy insisted her actions were wrong.
Tara kept trying to tell her that it wasn't that simple.
But Buffy can't see that. To Buffy the lines are clearly drawn,
she patrols the boundaries. Riley's return in AYW redrew those
boundaries for her - demons are wrong, humans are right. The slayer
kills demons, doesn't fraternize with them.
How fitting that her opponent in Surprise/Innocence is the Judge.
Great point! In Surprise both Buffy and Angel cross the boundary
- they sleep together. A major sin. Before they do, they've run
into the Judge who cleans the world of humanity of what he considers
the impurities of good, affection, love, etc. So only pure evil
exists. The Judgemental authority figure in the flesh. Who burns
your sins and your flesh away on contact. Angel doesn't get burned,
because by sleeping with Buffy - he breaks the curse and is cleansed
of the soul that brings him all those pesky good emotions. He
abandons her.
Buffy's judgemental attitude is the reason she can't convince
Willow to back down. Buffy can't talk to Willow, all she can do
is fight her. It's why Giles says that Willow can't be defeated
by the slayer. Willow can only
be defeated by someone who won't judge her. Ironically the only
one who doesn't judge Willow is Xander. Up until this point, Xander
has demonstrated the most judgemental and self-righteous behavior.
He blasts Buffy for sleeping with Spike. He blasts Anya for doing
it. If they had slept with his friend Richard or Jonathan, he
probably wouldn't have been so upset. But they slept with an evil
soulless undead thing. Humans=good, Demons=bad. Then Warren comes
along and
shoots and kills his friend Tara and wounds Buffy. And suddenly
the world no longer seems so simple. He's the one to tell Buffy
- "Is Warren any different than those vampires that you dust?"
Buffy's response seems fairly weak:
"Yes he's human - human laws..." Xander seems to realize
as we move through Villains to Grave that it is rage and grief
that is possessing Willow and self-hate, all emotions Xander is
all to familar with, particularly the self-hate and the loss.
He lost Anya and he did it himself and he almost lost Buffy again.
In a way the fact Xander was the only one able to talk Willow
down and Buffy wasn't - reinforces your point about Buffy's flaw.
Another point you make that lit a light bulb over my head was
"Thor puts his hand in the mouth of Fenrir the wolf as a
pledge that the Aesir will not bind him; when Odin does, in fact,
bind the wolf with a magical rope, the wolf bites off Thor's hand.In
this case, the warrior god lies for the good of the gods, but
he still must sacrifice his hand in the process." Most of
this season we've seen the image of cut off hands. Particularly
in the first six episodes.
There's the cut off limbs of the Buffbot, the hand in the cookies
in ALL THE WAY, the hand under the glass in TR, the hand by Spike's
head in Smashed. In each of these episodes, Buffy is keeping secrets
from her friends. She's lying.
First the lie is about being in heaven. Then it's about seeing
Spike. Then it's about sleeping with Spike.
The last time Buffy lied - we saw hand imagery as well.
In Surprise, Buffy is lying about her romance with Angel to her
mother and to Giles - she doesn't let them really know she's kissing
and getting as physically involved with him as she is. The Judge's
hand strangles her by her throat.
Then in Season 3, Buffy lies to the Gang about hiding a
resouled Angel and kissing him. Once again in Revelations she
is hunting down a wicked powerful hand, which because of her secrets
- allows the wicked Watcher to get the upper hand so to speak.
In Restless Buffy rejects the hands - the hands are her spirit,
her force. And each time she denies them - they either attack
her or she is weakened. In a way, when Buffy denies the hands,
she is lying to herself, lying about who she is. Spike is continuously
forcing her to face what she doesn't want to see. He keeps saying
you are the slayer.
You are part of the darkness. A warrior. Embrace it. And she punches
him. She wants to be the normal girl. Something he taunts her
with. "A Normal job for a normal girl" (DMP)
Just as Faith taunts her in Bad Girls and later Enemies in Season
3. Buffy's biggest sin isn't the small lies she tells her friends,
but the big one she insists on continuing to tell herself that
she's just a woman, a girl - not the Warrior of the People, not
the slayer, not part darkness and part light. By doing so, she
rejects the hands and her judgement, is lacking in focus and becomes
a stilted meaningless phrase: "Because it's wrong."
Thanks again leslie for sharing this essay with us. I find that
I've been agreeing with you quite a bit lately. And this essay
was truly amazing.
Good luck presenting it at East Anglia.
(have to run, so posted without reviewing first, apologize for
typos ahead of time..)
SK
[> [> "Because it's
wrong. . ." -- Finn Mac Cool, 09:29:37 09/14/02 Sat
Many people seem to believe that Buffy's stance for not doing
certain things "because it's wrong" is self-rightous
and not the proper way to conduct morality. But, the thing is,
morality is often times totally illogical. Why is it OK to kill
vampires but not evil humans? Buffy can't really explain why in
a satisfactory way. She just knows that it doesn't feel right.
And I can respect that.
[> [> [> Re: "Because
it's wrong. . ." -- lachesis, 14:51:29 09/14/02 Sat
I could be wrong here, but I saw a very great difference between
the use of this phrase in S.3 and S.6. My perception was that
in S.3, while this was an attitude that Buffy had, it was not
a phrase she used. Faith's use of it was funny - lol funny, to
me - but it also had a serious aspect. Faith understands that
not doing 'wrong' things is part of being Buffy, but at first,
like a child, she does not understand *why* - why some things
are held to be wrong, and more importantly, why one should *therefore*
not do them.
I foung TYG and WAY to be extremely poignant episodes because,
as Faith attempts to be Buffy (helping people through slaying,
rather than slaying for its own sake) and is treated like Buffy
(with love and trust) she seems to gain this understanding, and
to see its pracical benefits: the feeling of self-worth that comes
from accepting and discharging responsibilities, the empathy which
underlies it, the support one is given when one is trusted and
accepted.
We have already seen Faith's descent into darkness, but these
episodes make it seem possible that the main explanation for this
lies not in her nature, but in her tendency to base her actions
on the (often negative or ambivalent) reactions of others to her.
Before, she may have seen Buffy's restraint as *constraint*, and
herself as the one who was free. (One could argue that Spike has
a similar tendency, as Leslie points out about reputation, and
similar illusions of freedom - but let's no go there).
Anyway, that was a bit of a digression about episodes I particularly
like...my point is that in S.3, Buffy's attitude - neatly summarised
by 'because its wrong'- is in complete accord with her actions.
She does not do things which she believes to be wrong. Buffy's
use of the phrase in S.6 is different - here she is implicitly
or directly referring to things which she believes to be wrong,
but does/has done. Just as this particular phrase was used in
S.3 to highlight Faith's childish lack of understanding of Buffy's
nature, in S.6 it highlights Buffy's childish desire to cling
to certainties which are no longer appropriate, rather than examining
her own behaviour and motives.
How do we know that these certainties are no longer certain? Because
Buffy herself does not base her actions upon them. My perception
(and I haven't checked, so correct me if I'm wrong) is that Buffy
generally uses this phrase in S6 with reference to her relationship
with Spike, or situations which seem to her to parallel it, like
Willow. She has reasons for sleeping with Spike. There are also
very good reasons not to do so, both moral and practical. The
situation is 'complicated.'
We do not usually see Buffy do things that she believes to be
wrong. Like everyone, some things she does turn out to have *been
wrong* but that is a completely different problem. In previous
seasons, we have also seen that one of Buffy's strengths is her
ability to act from her moral and emotional centre. In S6 she
is not doing so - I'm not criticising, this is one of the things
that trauma does - and is instead falling back on 'moral certainties'
which deny the complexity of her problems. 'Because its wrong'
has ceased to work for her internally. Buffy saying it in S.6
therefore means as little as Faith saying it in S.3, perhaps less,
since it seems a heart wrenching cariacature of her former self.
We cannot go back, but we can grow, learn, and by doing so move
on to happier, healthier places in our lives. 'Because its wrong'
is a perfectly good reason for not actually doing something. But
when it has become a stick to beat yourself with for something
that you have done, and will do again, then there really is something
wrong. Just my opinion though. Feel free to 'take it and run.'
[> [> [> [> Re:
"Because it's wrong. . ." -- leslie,
16:29:50 09/14/02 Sat
Still, it's interesting that the continued repetition of the word
"wrong" (whether it's "because it's wrong,"
"came back wrong," or whatever) seems to indicate that
the speaker, whether Buffy or Faith (or Spike) is using a hollow
concept of "right and wrong" to cover up a deeper sense
of unease and disquiet, possibly (in Faith and Spike's cases)
because they don't really get the whole "justice" thing.
[> [> [> [> [>
Re: "Because it's wrong. . ." -- lachesis, 16:23:54
09/15/02 Sun
Completely agree with you. My perception is that the word 'wrong'
is rarely used on the show, and when it is, is used deliberately
to convey this. One of the things that I find interesting is that
BtVS uses words very carefully, particularly in exploring ethical
issues, avoiding 'loaded' terms which predefine what is being
explored. In this context 'wrong' always seems to me to have an
ironic flavour.
And in OMWF, it is noticeable that the three characters who identify
'wrongness' don't use the word: Buffy - "nothing here is
... right" & Giles (and Tara in her song, I think) - "something
isn't right." (It's late, and I don't have time to check...)Just
a random thought.
Loved your paper - I'm sure it will go down very well at East
Anglia.
[> [> Re: Wow...very
interesting points! -- leslie,
10:10:17 09/14/02 Sat
Argh! All wonderful and important points, and already I'm not
sure if the paper is short enough to fit in the allotted time!
If I have the chance to revise this for publication, I'm going
to have to work a lot of this stuff in (with a big ol' acknowledgment
footnote).
The thing that surprised *me* as I was writing this was just how
unbelievably pervasive Spike's obsession with reputation is. It
comes up in one form or another--if only a throw-away comment--in
just about every episode he's in. And (it is just now occuring
to me), the main refrain of his bitchiness at Buffy about her
refusal to acknowledge their relationship is that she won't do
it because she's afraid it will ruin *her* reputation. Again,
part of their differing orientations: he sees it as a matter of
reputation, she sees it as a matter of right and wrong. (Hence,
I think, some of his anger at her--she thereby implies that he
is not "glorious" enough for her.) I am *really* anxious
to see how the soul is going to affect Spike's attitudes here.
It seems obvious that he will acquire some moral compass, but
will his concern with his own fame decrease as well?
[> [> [> Reputation
-- Rahael, 10:37:19 09/14/02 Sat
It's a pretty fitting concern isn't it? Considering when and where
he grew up. We often talk about the importance of reputation (sexual,
moral etc) for women in the Victorian era, but I think reputation
can be seen as an important concern for men as well. Prescriptive
literature certainly seems to think so. And I'm beginning to think
that the construction of gendered behaviour doesn't happen in
isolation - the construction of masculinity and femininity happen
in tandem.
I've been AWOL, so will have to come back with some appreciative
comments on your essay once my brain starts recovering from all
that lack of sleep, too much alcohol and food. Conferences are
fun!
Have a good one in East Anglia!
[> [> [> [> Re:
Reputation and Spike -- shadowkat, 20:29:45 09/14/02 Sat
Two interesting points here and yes I think you're onto something
with this Leslie. Actually I think it's almost a whole other essay.
LOL!
Writers are obsessed with reputation. There is no greater insult
for us, than being called a bad writer, a bad scholar, sloppy.
We (okay maybe I should speak for myself here) want to be immortalized
in our prose, to be considered good. Look at all the awards set
up for writing.
Poetry even more so. I have an Uncle who is a poet...and my Dad
upon reading his poetry often comments on how self-indulgent it
is and then states with some bemusement, that most if not all
poetry is self-indulgent, hence his reason for disliking it. Yes
I have a point here - William the bard, when we meet human William
in Fool For Love - our first image is of a man sitting alone in
a corner during a party hunting a word for a haiku. He is immersed
in it. So immersed when he can't think of the right word, he asks
the first available passerby barely noticing it is a waiter and
a highly inappropriate person to ask. And when Cecily rejects
him, he says somewhat defensively..."oh I may be a bad writer,
but I'm a good man" - please don't judge me on this...on
my acts. I can sympathize. Being somewhat sensitive to criticism
myself, actually I don't take it well at all - a major flaw -
I can sympathize with William who is rejected for his poetry.
So it makes sense that he strives so hard to build a worthy reputation
as a vampire.
There's something else you comment on about Spike that strikes
me as interesting - you say, he like Faith, considers himself
a rebel but all he really does is change
groups and rules. Buffy, if you think about it, is the true rebel
on the show. All the others? Aren't. It reminds me of what people
say about the bad boys in school - who act out.
But if you look closely? Are they really being rebellious?
Not really. They are usually in a gange or running with a group
of peers - all of which have their own set of rules, that they
abide. Spike certainly has a set of rules.
Vampires: kill humans. take what they want, don't pay for it,
drink blood. Enjoy bad things. Cause chaos. Don't destroy the
world as just make it better for demons.
Spike & Harmony in Family:
Harmony has just gone shopping. Spike looks at her somewhat annoyed.
She says there was a sale at her favorite boutigue.
Spike: Don't tell me you paid for it? (he looks somewhat horrified
at the idea.)
Harmony: Nooo, (silly) I killed the clerk. But still a sales a
sale. (Spike clenches his jaw in irritation. HArmony is just not
Spike's idea of a proper vampire. She embarrasses him.)
In All The Way - (there's another interesting scene showing Spike's
view of vampire and what they do)
Spike: What I wasn't doing anything...
Buffy rolls her eyes
Spike: Well okay I was nicking the burba weed, it's what I do.
(Not exact can't get to Psyche at moment...but you get the idea)
And later in AYW, when Buffy discovers the demon eggs and he tries
to explain and she says no more games Spike:
Spike: You're one to be talking about playing games. You play
me all the time. Changing the rules as you go along.
You know what I am. You've always known but you come to me all
the same.
Spike has never lied to Buffy about being an evil Vampire.
As far back as The I in Team - whe Buffy tells Riley that Spike
isn't bad anymore because he has a chip. Spike says: No I'm bad.
What am I a bleeding broken record? I'm evil.
I just can't hurt anyone anymore. Doesn't change what I am.
Vampires=evil. I'm a dark warrior. And boy does he try.
He doesn't really start moving away from it until he falls for
Buffy. But even then, we see him commenting on the vampire rules.
In Crush when they go on that awkward stakeout/date.
Spike and Buffy burst in on the vamp nest and the vamps skeddal.
Spike winces in embarrassment.
Spike: Well that was pathetic. I'm embarrassed for my kind.
To Spike - vampires fight. They don't act in fear. There's nothing
to fear. They're dead. Immortal. They enjoy drinking blood. They
enjoy food. They enjoy killing.
The chip eats away at that.
It's an interesting parallel. Because we see Faith go through
the same thing. To Faith - slayers rule. They have the power.
They can do what they want. They love killing.
It's what they were made for. Spike and Faith say the same thing
- we're killers. Cool. But in This Year's Girl, Five By Five,
Who ARe You and Sanctuary - it starts to eat away at Faith...the
killing. Her conscience eats away at it. The one thing Faith,
the supposed rebel was proud of, becomes twisted into something
ugly. How would you feel if the thing you were the best at, gloried
in, became something horrible? Something that isolated you? This
is what has happened to Faith and Spike, who both gloried in their
power in their reputation as warriors. They didn't really care
which side they were on (mercernaries) they just wanted to win,
and get accolades.
Bear with me...I know I'm rambling here..tend to do that
in reply posts. I think what happened to Faith in Sanctuary and
Five by Five and Who ARe You in Btvs 4 and Angel 1
is now happening to Spike. The very thing they gloried in, what
made them feel important, the acts they were proud of: Faith's
acts for the Mayor (dead prof, box of gavroch,
shooting angel, etc), and Spike's killing of slayers, mass destruction,
etc - suddenly become the very things that make them hate themselves
the most. It would be like someone telling you that your writing
started WWIII and were responsible for mass mayhem. Your reputation
that once made you so proud is now what makes you hate yourself.
Buffy has already struggled with this. Buffy unlike Spike and
Faith was never proud of her rep as the Slayer. Riley and Sam's
comments about her being like Santa Clause embarrass her. She
is a little afraid of what she is. Spike and Faith don't understand
this. (Well Faith didn't until
Who Are You and Sanctuary). Nor does Willow. She always thought
Buffy was proud of it. Willow believes doing the dark magics is
something to be proud of. (Until maybe now.)
I too wonder how the turn around will affect Spike. How will he
handle his status of Dark Warrior - killer of slayers and hundreds
of people now? A status that he used to brag about and glory in?
Remember in School HArd?
His first speech is bragging about killing slayers.
He brags about it in Fool For Love. (And as an aside, how will
Willow deal with the very thing that gave her pride, her ability
to do magic, being twisted into something so horrible she can't
look her friends in the face? Or Anya who was so proud of being
the great ex-vengeance demon, a demon the lower beings worshipped?
Realizing the power she yearned to have back is not worth having
and her reputation, not something to be proud of?)
It reminds me of the bullies in school, the bad boys and girls
, with the motorcycles and the cool leather jackets who smoked
pot
and stole from the stores and made fake ids and wore bruises and
scars from gangland battles and fights as badges of honor -suddenly
realizing that wait - all I have is a few scars for my efforts.
Nothing else. And feeling somewhat ashamed. They were young Warriors
in school, rebels. Now...that they've graduated or moved past
school?
They are nothing. And their misdeeds? Have either landed them
in jail or somewhere else equally horrible.
Unless of course they pull themselves together and actually attempt
to change.
(Oh understand the length problem. Have the same problem
myself. )
SK
[> [> [> [> [>
Re: self-reflective works (spoiler up to season 7and whitman
and jung) -- aliera, 06:47:30 09/15/02 Sun
A little twist to your point in the opening paragraphs about writers
and poets and others. I know this is OT of where you went with
the succeeding paragraphs; but, it was the beginning that really
caught my eye, so I hope you forgive the digression. This summer
I've been reading quite a variety of different subjects and interestingly
some common patterns emerged. One of which was the discussion
of the presence of the artist in his/her work. When reading the
works of those who followed Jung, I am hearing as criticism that
he was really discovering himself; the question also arises in
works about Whitman writing primarily about a recreation of himself
as archetype and in Gould in describing the vagaries of memory
and the validity of the work of scientists who took the wrong
direction.
Joss in an interview this summer writes (retcons;-) a part of
the reason for returning to highschool,
"and the only time I've ever truly felt sad and like I'd
lost something was when they graduated, because I was like, 'Wait,
wait, I went through more bad things. There's more pain I haven't
talked about yet! I haven't complained enough.'"
...reinforcing the oft stated comment that some of his best work
is generated when drawing on his own experiences. Likewise, or
contrariwise, season 6 was criticized as Marti's trying to work
out her problems on screen. JM also mentions that pieces of the
character of William in FFL were based on a conversation that
he had with a writer and were very difficult for him to put on
the screen. In the last example we also have another way that
writers work, by drawing on the experiences of others. Gould joking
remarks that we realize the brain (as wonderful as it is) has
flaws and we should consistently re-examine our thinking, our
preconceptions; but, what instrument are we to use to do so?(4)
I am unsure how we are able to separate ourselves from our work;
for I see the voice of the writer as it's foundation.
"If I am put beside
the born blind,
I will tell her softly, so softly,
with my voice of dust,
'Sister, take my eyes.'" (1)
What I think makes Joss's works and your essays and Whitman and
Jung and many others so successful is that ability to touch the
common experience in the right way. A combination of insight and
execution and at it's most successful perhaps the ability to provoke
that emotion change.
"Poets to come! orators, singers, musicians to come!
Not to-day is to justify me and answer what I am for,
But you, a new brood, native, athletic, continental, greater than
before known,
Arouse! for you must justify me.
I myself but write one or two indicative words for the future,
I but advance a moment only to wheel and hurry back in the darkness,
I am a man who sauntering along without fully stopping, turns
a casual look upon you and then averts his face,
Leaving it to you to proove and define it,
Expecting the main things from you." (2)
Implied in what Joss has done with Buffy and what we then do here
is the change, the creation, the reconstruction of a new mythos,
a new way of viewing and acting on and in our world. Statement--deconstruction--reconstruction:
reweaving of something new.
Patricia Klindienst writes in "The Voice of the Shuttle"
about weaving as an activity that brings together and reconnects...an
image of the silenced voice (she speaks particularly of women
but I see it for men also.)reawakened. The need fo re-membering
or mending what violence has torn apart and telling the tales:
thus repairing the connections of sisterhood, reinstituting the
voice , restablishing dialogue and community....and she notes
that this weaving does not unravel culture though the goal is
to unravel many cultural fictions. (3)
Joss seeks the same unraveling for both women and men, for the
culture in question is all of us. This is part of how I read Spike's
portrayal, the poet who became a dark warrior (at least in his
own mind). Spike's seeking of reputation or empowerment as a seeking
for identity for individuation. I read it as in part a deconstruction
of dark side of that quest that mythos. And Buffy whose very name
evokes a stereotype which is constantly identified and deconstructed
and reconstructed before our eyes. Likewise Willow initially one
of the very weakest of the Scoobs, who last season had the power
to destroy the world, ending and beginnings, deconstructed and
reconstructed before our eyes, yet presented in such a way as
to allow, to invite, to require our further thought, further decontruction,
and subsequent reweaving.
Klindienst believes that if the myth of the weaver is predictive,
is deconstructed and reconstructed to a myth of meaning for our
times...that we invoke a new myth that of the (woman) artist (or
man-my insert)who in their voice uncovers not only it's strength,
it's re-membering, but it's power as a catalyst to change abuse
violence dismemberment into positive change reweaving peace. (3)
When Joss or Marti or others find their voice that voice has the
same evocative power. They illustrate the myth and the false myth
in the characters and the stories that they presents, the wrong
choices, the dismemberment, the reconstruction, rebirth. We follow
to understand, to deconstruct, and to reweave a better mythos
for the fabric of our own lives. It is one of my favorite aspects
of the show (and Angel)and one which truly sets it apart and above
many other works.
"Whoever you are, to endless announcements---"
"And of these one and all I weave the song of myself."(2)
--regards, angela
(1)from 'El Reparto' by Gabricla Mistral, "Selected Poems,
p.204.
(2)from "Whitman: A collection of Critcal Essays" edited
by Roy Harvey Pierce, (Englewood NJ: Prentice Hall, 1962).
(3)from 'The Voice of the Shuttle is Ours' by Patricia Klindienst
originally published in "The Stanford Literature Review"
1 (1984):25-53.
(4) from "Eight Little Piggies: Reflections in Natural History"
by Stephen Jay Gould, (New York:WW Norton & Company, 1993): p205.
[> Incredible essay!!
-- redcat, 11:23:43 09/14/02 Sat
Wonderful work, leslie!! Really insightful connections made between
the three characters
and Dumezilís warrior aspects. A few notes below sparked
by your excellent work:
In para 7, you write, ìAs Lincoln points out, warriors
as a class must be persuaded both to risk
their own lives and to take the lives of others.î [And]
ìOr as Spike says to Angelus later in the
same episode, "Are you insane?! We're supposed to kill the
bitch, not leave gag gifts in the
friends' beds," tacitly accusing Angelus of the warrior's
archetypal sin against his own function:
cowardice, the failure to engage in battle at the appropriate
time.î
As fits in with both Lincolnís and your arguments about
the difficulty of socially-culturally-
structurally constraining the warrior, one piece of that restraint,
found within the warriorís ethic,
is that the kill should not be done because it brings personal
pleasure or erotic satisfaction,
rather because it *must* be done for the sake of the protected
groupís safety, thus allowing the
act of killing to become an act of justice. The berserkerís
rage, the warriorís battlelust, even
modern armiesí systematic provision of prostitutes to soldiers
both pre- and post-battle, are all
ways to explain, excuse, incorporate and thus contain within the
broader system of control the
fact that such eroticized pleasure is in reality often deeply
connected to the act of the kill.
Spikeís comment to Angelus, then, perhaps can be seen as
chastising him not so much for
cowardice as for a too-overt, too-public, too-well-panned ñ
dare I say here, too sadistic? -
creation and celebration of that tabooed (within the ìtrueî
warriorís creed) pleasure in the kill.
Spike stands for the ìsimpleî pleasure of killing,
ìfists and fangs,î the deep but immediate
satisfaction of the blood spurt, the in-the-moment carnal appreciation
of the victimís strangled
cry. Angelusí fascination with the long-term torture of
his victims turns him from the ìwarrior
outside the tribeî to something not quite a true warrior
at all. Spikeís comment, which focuses
on the sexualized nature of Angelusí arrangement of Jennyís
body in Gilesí bed, makes note
of how far Angelus has strayed from his function within the righteous
triad of warrior-ship (that
triad, I would argue, righteous even if one is on the side of
evil) that Dumezil has identified.
As you note, Faith takes over the ìwarrior outside the
tribeî function after the return of Angelís
soul and, unlike Angelus, she kills pretty much as she is directed
to. What pleasure she takes
in the kill comes, as is appropriate for the true warrior, directly
in the act of the kill and directly
after in sexual activity sparked by the act of killing. If the
first-function warrior, as both binder
and judger, acts to maintain balance between the worlds of good
and evil, then Buffy almost
would have been structurally required to send Angelus into Acathlaís
hell to rid the world of
that being who had unbalanced the necessary bi-polarity between
the true warrior of the tribe
and her opposite, the true warrior outside the tribe. The angsty
irony, of course, is that it is not
the failed warrior Angelus whom Buffy ultimately has to send to
that hell, but the true second-
function champion Angel.
On a completely side note, Spikeís more appropriate performance
of that ìwarrior outside the
tribeî function, along with his connection to and performance
of the third function properties,
are both destroyed in the SR because that IS an act of cowardice,
under the code of ethics for
both second and third function warriors.
I am also really struck by you last paragraph comments on the
Scoobies in relation to
Dumezilís triadic functions. Very insightful connections
to be contemplated there! Are we
going to be treated to an essay on that when you get back from
England? hint, hint...
And finally, musings inspired by shadowkatís excellent
post above on the ìhandî issue: I
wonder what Buffyís ìhanding offî of a sword,
and thus of part of her second-function warrior-
self, to Dawn, Buffyís putative childe, at the end of Grave
might portend? We have seen the
splitting of the second-function warrior in several cases - Angel,
Angelus, Faith, along with the
splitting of the first function through Giles and Willow, and
the third function through Spike and
Xander. We have also seen the attempted integration of the four-part
nature of the Slayer
(spirit, mind, heart and hand) be disrupted by the presence of
the primal First Slayerís ìnature.î
Will we now see something that structurally resembles the incorporation
of the dual properties
of all three warrior functions in Season 7, enacted through Buffyís
relationships with those who
function as the various sides of each of those dualities? Is Joss
(even if unconsciously)
attempting to create a post-modern myth in which the ancient three-part
division of the hero
can be sustained but in which the dual nature of all three aspects
also can be incorporated into
one contemporary hero? Will Buffyís final epiphany be,
not her life sacrifice, but her
integration of the light and dark aspects of each of her warrior
functions into herself?
Again, fabulous essay, leslie!! Best wishes for itís excellent
reception at the conference!
[> [> Re: Incredible
essay!! -- leslie,
11:52:24 09/14/02 Sat
Thanks for the feedback! I agree with your points, although I
do think that there is a tacit accusation of cowardice as well
in Spike's comment to Angelus. The Slayer *is* a threat to their
group, and while Angelus is, as you point out, indulging himself
in the sensuality of torture during this whole arc, he also doesn't
attack Buffy directly because he knows that, if the two were just
to go at it, all other things being equal, she would probably
beat him. He enjoys the torture, but he is also trying to weaken
her self-confidence so that when they do fight, she will be distracted
and vulnerable. From Spike's "fists and fangs" point
of view (especially as he is confined to the wheelchair at this
point and thus more vulnerable than usual), this is not only cowardly--he
believes in seeking out opponents who are *more* powerful than
he is, thereby proving himself in battle (yet another Victorianism--fair
play)--but also exposes the group unnecessarily to danger.
[> [> [> Absolutely
agree -- rc, 12:16:20 09/14/02 Sat
And the fact that it is Spike who implicitly accuses him of cowardice
ties in with the conversation (in a subthread above) about Spike's
constant concern for "reputation." Although his comment
to Angelus works on multiple levels in its critique of Angelus'
actions, each of those levels is filtered through Spike's understanding
of the warrior's code. From his Victorianist perspective, toying
with one's victims is both cowardly and self-indulgent, qualities
that are "ungentlemanly" and thus certainly un-warrior-ly.
[> [> [> Angelus from
FFL -- Rufus, 00:27:19 09/16/02 Mon
Angelus is a monster trying to find value in his actions. As a
man/Liam, he was constantly stifled in his attempts to seperate
from the family unit and do what he wanted to. There were a few
things he said that speak to the type of vampire he was to become.....
From FFL:
SPIKE: Oh, I'm sorry. Did I sully our good name? We're vampires.
ANGELUS: All the more reason to use a certain amount of finesse.
SPIKE Bollocks! That stuff's for the frilly cuffs-and-collars
crowd. I'll take a good brawl any day. Angelus approaches Spike
menacingly.
ANGELUS And every time you do, we become the hunted. DARLA (sing-song;
to Drusilla) I think our boys are going to fight. Drusilla claps
her hands giddily.
DRUSILLA The King of Cups expects a picnic! But this is not his
birthday. Darla looks at Drusilla like she's crazy.
DARLA Good point... SPIKE (to Angelus) Yeah, you know what I prefer
to being hunted? Getting caught.
ANGELUS That's a brilliant strategy really... pure cunning.
SPIKE Sod off! (laughs) Come on. When was the last time you unleashed
it? All out fight in a mob, back against the wall, nothing but
fists and fangs? Don't you ever get tired of fights you know you're
going to win?
ANGELUS No. A real kill. A good kill. It takes pure artistry.
Without that, we're just animals.
To think that a vampire has just as much conflict about finding
meaning in unlife as the man did in life. Angelus just brought
over all the junk that crowded Liams darker thoughts and put actions
to them, where before his conscience would have prevented him
from doing much more than seek escape in a bar.
In The Prodigal, we see just how profoundly Liams father touched
the son with his cruel words.
Dad: ìItís a son I wished for - a man - instead
God gave me you! A terrible disappointment.î
Angel: ìDisappointment? A more dutiful son you couldnít
have asked for. My whole life youíve told me in word, in
glance, what it is you required of me, and Iíve lived down
to your every expectations, now havenít I?î
Dad: ìThatís madness!î
Angel: ìNo. The madness is that I couldnít fail
enough for you. But weíll fix that now, wonít we?î
Dad: ìI fear for you, lad.î
Angel: ìAnd is that the only thing you can find in your
heart for me now, father?î
Dad: ìWhoíll take you in, huh? No one!î
Angel: ìIíll not lack for a place to sleep, I can
tell you that. Out of my way.î
Dad: ìI was never in your way, boy.î
I see a lot of Angels continuing problems come from his feelings
regarding familial love. Sins of the father hopefully not being
passed down to the son....but Holtz brought up Angels son Connor...so
how will Angel react to his sons betrayal?
Angel: ìYou told me I wasnít a man. (Slowly stalks
closer to his dad) You told me I was nothing. - and I believed
you. You said Iíd never amount to anything. (His dad stares
at him with wide-open eyes) Well, you were wrong. (Angel morphs
into vamp face) You see, father? - I have made something out of
myself after all.î
In becoming a monster Angelus became a "free" man...so
he thought but what he once was will always follow him with or
without a soul. The soul may make the difference in how a demon
or man will act out his problems, but the removal of a soul doesn't
make them go away.
[> Very interresting, thank
you for posting it ! -- Etrangere, 14:55:59 09/14/02 Sat
And I promise I WILL come around and translate that french essay
about Buffy and the three functions of Dumezil. I've been a bit
more busy this summer than I though I will, that's why i haven't
done it yet.
Sometimes you made me think about : "As Bruce Lincoln noted,
warriors have to be convinced to risk their lives and that it's
all right to kill the enemy. The latter is assisted by demonization.
One of the most effective tools for the former is the promise
of undying fame. The Greeks called it kleos; the Welsh called
it clod; and it's the quality that the poets extol in their praise
poems and elegies. "
Isn't that why Glory was called Glory ? She's certainly
linked with the idea of implacable death and Buffy, offcourse,
is the obscure hero, the one that is not glorified, that fight
in the dark side of Sunnydale.
The Gift begins with Buffy not being recognised for who she is
by a vampire, and claiming to be "just a girl" as ever.
Glory's minion makes a joke about "this will be our day of
glory" while Buffy makes "not exactly the St Crispin
Speech", what she says is quite the contrary of a glorification
of death. Buffy's death in the Gift is nto about saving the world,
it's about saving her sister.
While Ben wants to live forever grace to Glory, Buffy is ready
to die and only survive in her child/sister.
And her grave a hidden one.
[> [> Re: Very interresting,
thank you for posting it ! -- leslie,
16:13:01 09/14/02 Sat
Interesting point. I'm not sure Glory was exactly that kind of
glory, though. She seemed to be "glorious" simply by
existing; a warrior's glory was something that had to be earned
through action. Webster's has one definition of "glory"
as "praise or renown, or something that earns praise or renown,"
and others that are "great beauty and splendor" or "a
state of great gratification or exaltation." The first would
be the warrior's glory, the other two would be Glory's glory.
(There's another definition that means "spotlight or limelight,"
which is the result of achieving either definition.) The ideas
are related, but the glory that poets promise heroes is definitely
*renown*. Heracles' name means "glory of Hera;" his
own "kleos" is something that he achieves through his
deeds, but he creates a passive "glory"--a reflected
glory--for the goddess in the process.
[> [> [> Re: Very
interresting, thank you for posting it ! -- Etrangere, 09:18:22
09/15/02 Sun
"I'm not sure Glory was exactly that kind of glory, though.
She seemed to be "glorious" simply by existing; a warrior's
glory was something that had to be earned through action. "
What I mean is Glory might have been a symbol of that glory and
fame you gain for Buffy, an idea that she is fighting against.
I didn't mean that Glory herself had that kind of glory, just
that it added another layer of the way S5 discuss death.
[> [> [> [> "Cry
God for Harry, England and St George" -- Rahael, 09:32:31
09/15/02 Sun
Very true, Ete.
Especially considering Henry's search for glory and manhood in
France. The St Crispin's Day speech talks about men being ashamed
because they weren't here. Men would be proud of the wounds they
would receive in that battle. It's a triumphalist speech. I think
it underlines the point about military 'glory', since Spike and
Giles quote it, only to undercut it wryly. Less Henry himself,
more the poor bloody infantry.
I thought your point about the hidden grave was great!
[> So impressed! Leslie,
that was great! -- ponygirl, 17:15:16 09/15/02 Sun
[> Thanks for sharing
-- vh, 07:16:33 09/16/02 Mon
[> Xander/Iskander --
fresne, 12:35:12 09/16/02 Mon
Echoing just about everyone else, fascinating!
And while you probably donít have time to take this on
in the essay (lest it become the essay that ate Anglia), given
your analysis of Willowís name at the end, Iím curious
as to your take on Xanderís full name, Ale(xander).
I would assume that heís named after one of the more famous
Alexanders, Alexander the Great of Macedonia. Even if he isnít,
in an essay on heros, it's this Alexander that I think about.
After all, that Alexander carried a copy of the Illiad with him
always. A man who was, among many other things and in no particular
order: a leader, culturally comfortably bisexual, a general who
fought in the frontlines, very aware of the cult of heroism, no
small imbiber of alcohol, very concerned being remembered, had
an ìinterestingî relationship with his parents, and
certainly well traveled in a conquering as I go sort of way.
In that Xanderís name is a contraction (and not the more
obvious Alex), it points out a tension between being a Zeppo-ish
hero and the sort that slices Gordian knots. Xander most succeeds
as a hero when he lets go of the Conquistador and accepts himself
as a Comfortador.
This is most notable in Grave, where we have Dawn chastising Xander
for not being a Spike-ish hero, but that is not what the situation
requires.
I also want to throw in there, but not quite sure where it fits
in, that Spike isnít the only one concerned about reputation.
In LC, Xander is concerned that Buffyís world will intrude
into his work world, where his self esteem as a team leader and
builder is invested. However, it is inevitable that the two worlds
will and do collide during his wedding. And itís all the
same world anyway.
[> [> Re: Xander/Iskander
-- leslie, 13:02:22
09/16/02 Mon
It didn't strike me until I had gotten all the way to the end
of the essay, with no more time or space, but if Spike is a warrior
primarily associated with the third function, and Xander is the
representative of the third function within the Scoobies, no wonder
Xander is so antagonistic to Spike (another "well, duh!"
moment). Xander wants to be a warrior but he's, in his mind, stuck
being a carpenter, while Spike gets all the girls. Though it's
interesting that, given that "fecundity" is his function,
the sexual adventures of Xander and Anya (and making money is
also a third-function activity) are the least problematic of all
the Scoobies. Do we ever hear Anya wailing "Why do I let
Xander do these things to me?" I think not. Not until he
leaves her, and then it's emotional, not sexual.
A Poem for the 7th Season of "Buffy"
(minor season 6 spoilers)--kind of a "Night Before Xmas"
parody -- Rob, 23:12:44 09/13/02 Fri
Twas two weeks before "Buffy," and on the ATPO Board
Posters were anxious for the show they adored,
To lift up their spirits, and give them new reasons
To dissect every line from the past six great seasons.
Of course, there is nothing on which they'll agree,
Even whether all six seasons were great, patently.
But the "back to the beginning" premise does sound inviting,
And a new "Buffy" year...what could be more exciting?
Last year was a year filled with controversy,
From the lesbian death to the fawn killed cruelly,
To the darkness and sadness the Scoobies were baring,
Some fans hated it, though some thought it was daring.
This year, it seems, optimism will increase,
And all of these dark, gloomy days will now cease.
Sixth season was sad, this summer was sadder--
Four months without "Buffy" is definitely badder
Than any other fate that can be thrown in sight...
September 24th's going to be a glorious night!
Rob :o)
[> *clap* *clap* Author!
-- HonorH, 23:23:25 09/13/02 Fri
Lovely bit of poetry, m'boy, simply lovely.
[> [> Why thank you!
:o) -- Rob, 21:35:54 09/14/02 Sat
[> The Twisted Version
-- Finn Mac Cool, 06:45:55 09/14/02 Sat
Don't want to steal your thunder, but I couldn't resist adding
the twisted version of The Night Before Buffy (there are no actual
spoilers in here, just so you know).
My hands were all shaky, my face had gone pale.
A letter from Joss had arrived in the mail.
It was hastingly written in a new ball point pen.
Return adress LA and studio ten.
Dear Finn, he said, I'm writing to you,
because I've got spoilers coming out the whazoo.
I want you to know every last part,
of Buffy's new season and story arc.
Everyone will forget all of their angst,
because of grief given from Season Six cranks.
Tragedy and drama are things of the past,
prepare for pure humor, coming fast.
Anya will give up her vengeancy form,
and will do everything to try to conform.
Willow will be drained of her dark magic,
and will go cold turkey, avoiding the tragic.
She can't be blamed for the evil she did,
magic possessed her and set free her id.
Xander will be his old Zeppo self,
being Hell's butt-monkey and little else.
Dawn will become our next little Slayer,
cause then maybe Michelle will let me lay her.
Giles will be back and be a mentor as well.
Forget growing up, that's hard as hell.
Buffy will be a quippy sensation,
yell girl power to the whole nation.
All her trouble's from the season past,
will all be forgotten amazingly fast.
. . . except for old Spikey, who has just returned,
he was her true love but then he was spurned.
But now he's got a soul, and all's hunky dory,
he'll shack up with Buffy and have a love story.
Then there's the Big Bad, and this one's a doozy,
Mr. Trick will be back, bringing his Uzi.
And at season's end, all will be well,
as our favorite characters blow up hell.
Sending out spoilers is like sex, it's no joke.
Sincerely signed Joss. . .
And then I awoke.
I hate staying unspoiled, or trying to fake it,
ten days until Buffy, i don't think I'll make it.
[> [> ROFL ! -- Etrangere,
13:54:33 09/14/02 Sat
Ok that's a nightmare !
[> [> Well done and great
job to Finn and to Rob -- Sophist, 15:05:17 09/14/02 Sat
[> [> Very funny, very
twisted-- -- HonorH, 15:31:16 09/14/02 Sat
But the line about Michelle has a squick factor of about 9.8!
[> [> [> About the
Squick Factor -- Finn Mac Cool, 20:09:03 09/14/02 Sat
Yeah, I know. It's just I've read the interviews where Joss talks
about how great an actress Michelle Trachenburg (is that how you
spell it?) is, and I'm currently reading a novel about Hollywood
and all the stuff that goes on at movie/TV studios, and so the
squickiest possibility enters my mind.
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