Being told to do,

[kippurbird]

Pacifism in story telling.

Okay, it needs a better title than that, but it sort of gets to what I've been thinking about the last couple of days. A couple days ago I finished reading Rosemary and Rue by Seanan McGuire. It was an ARC I got at Comic Con, the actual book coming out on September first. I say that because it is a good read. I enjoyed

Comments

[ceitfianna]

Hey, I hate to nit pick since you bring up a very good point but pacifism is not fighting and is not the same thing as playing a passive role.

Though I'm completely with you on the characters being passive thing, its something that makes my teeth grind. Its also connected to writing in the passive voice for me too, which is a great way to just drain the energy from any moment.

[kippurbird]

I did mean passive role and not pacifism as in not fighting. I should clear that up. I see the mistake I made.

[ceitfianna]

No worries and its an easy mistake to make.

[kippurbird]

And fixed. ^_^

[rurounitriv]

You make some good points, but you want to watch your word choice.

Passiveness is not the same as pacifism. Passiveness is sitting around like a lump, letting other people shove you around. Pacifism is the quality of being a pacifist - of believing that violence is not a solution but the problem.

You can be an active, strong-willed, self-directed pacifist. Martin Luther King Jr and Mahatma Gandhi were prime examples of active pacifists. They didn't let anyone shove them around - even when those doing the shoving were armed and willing to kill. They chose their paths, they walked them, and they brought the world dragging along behind them.

[kippurbird]

Yeah. It got pointed out to me. Fixing it now. XD

[rurounitriv]

Sorry, didn't mean to pick on you - the other comment wasn't there when I wrote that. :)

[palmer_kun]

Yes, she is somewhat passive, but one must consider a lot of the context

[x_trickster_x]

I agree. It's just the nature of mystery to do that. Essentially it IS just chasing after clues but that's the interesting part and it's a world away from being passive.

[smithysmith]

I actually think there are certain situations where it is better for a character to be a bit passive. Book!Eragon may be passive, but Movie!Eragon was much more active, deciding for himself what he wanted to do even when it contradicted what Brom wanted. The result: he looked like a complete moron. And that is the result of a lot of 'active' protagonist who decide to ignore the advice of older and wiser companions and beleive they know better, they end up looking stupid.

A protagonist who decided that he didn't know enough about what was going on to make informed decisions and would therefore trust someone who did have the requisite knowledge may not be very active, but at least he/she would be sensible.

[foxypope]

But at least someone who does what they want to do instead of what they're told will have some character growth, though. If we got any indication that Eragon often refused to do what he was told, even at moments he needed wisdom the most, then if he was taking an active role in the story then we'd hopefully see him grow and learn to listen to people who know better than you. It'd be a part of his character growth if he was free to make mistakes.

If we have a character that simply does everything that they're told, there's a lot less character growth going on. They're just sort of puppets going along in the story, like they are in Eragon. While I agree with Palmer_kun about allowing this in certain genres and situations, in stories like Eragon, it would be a more enjoyable story if Eragon were allowed to make some mistakes. Conflict would arrive from that instead of random encounters.