Chosen vs. Unchosen
I've been reading a lot (or at least a few) fantasy books lately for girls and now I have feelings about Girls Who Are Special. I’m not dismissing them all with a "Mary Sue" label because they're not always written badly or as overly perfect. But there is a related wish fulfillment idea there. But I just never really related to that particular wish
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The thing I'm trying to get at (maybe) is that the reason these stories may fail is that what they're trying to capture/represent is a very vague, childish/child-like feeling. It's hard to really make 'believable'; rather, you just have to start out feeling it. As a comparison, I think of the 'feeling' I had when I read Mary Stewart's 'The Crystal Cave' (about Merlin) when I was 12 or so, and there was a part about Merlin hiding in secret passageways inside the walls to listen to people. I still have a very vivid memory of that. It wasn't just a fact, or a cute detail-- this idea meant something to me (because of my long-time fascination with secret passages, fondness for castles, desire to observe others secretly, identification with 'lost' or wandering, curious children, liking small hiding places, etc). So this detail was instrumental in feeling I *was* Merlin when I read the book-- it catapulted me into his world. Similarly, when it works, I think this 'destiny' thing may (ironically) depersonify the main character in a useful way for the reader-- so that the character's personality recedes into this archetype of the Fated Hero/ine, which the reader can enter. It's a bit like saying 'once upon a time', except you're trying to evoke a more subtle emotional resonance which falls flat if there's nothing *there* (detail-wise) to support such emotional linkage for the reader.
I don't know if that makes sense. I just think that 'The Hero' (the fated hero is automatically Jungian, or 'The Hero') has an interesting mythic function but compromised narrative function, so the emotional linkage has to compensate or it won't work. If the Hero isn't a 'real' character but a stand-in for the reader, the reader should see themselves in the character in various unpredictable (for the author) ways. It is best to leave that door open without being so heavy-handed. Like, Stewart's Merlin was never a Jungian Hero-- was always just Merlin-- it's just I chose to empathize with him. Fatedness is kind of a meaning short-cut. Like a bright blinking neon sign saying 'meaning here!', but usually it's empty, in part 'cause most writers-- and most subjects-- don't have a real connection with what fate is. Ironically, Merlin is one of the few subjects that you could easily write about fate with, 'cause after all he was a precog and Arthur was, of course, the Once and Future King, etc etc. And the theme of Arthur's destiny being death (no matter what Merlin might do or try) is a huge theme from the very beginning to the end of Stewart's work. That's really the thing about destiny. It has to be a weight that's there holding down the narrative, effectively guaranteeing it's vaguely in the format of a Greek tragedy (... and now I see how the structure of Oedipus and Stewart's Merlin trilogy isn't that different). Even JKR tried to do it (with Harry's 'death') but chickened out. Anyway, compared to most people who use 'destiny' to make characters 'special', she was super hard-core, 'cause most stories simply ignore the limitations implied and focus on how things supposedly had to happen this way and for some reason that makes it 'cooler'. The consequence of using destiny that way, of course, is that you destroy all tension and movement, or in other words the lifeblood of narrative itself is dried up.
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But I think you're absolutely right about it capturing a feeling like that. (I think my own feeling of not being special probably came later because kids can't really think of themselves that way.) But yeah, I mean, everyone feels special in some ways. After all, the world is made up of me and everyone else.
I have read Crystal Cave and that's a really great example of it done well, I think. He's not he really is actual Merlin all the time. Also, the whole thing of listening to people talking about him, that's another thing where in a way every kid feels at times like people are arranging their lives for them because they are! The whole destiny thing can be a metaphor for parental expectations or even better their own expectations and desires for their own life.
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