Re: heroquests n stuff

From: Sandy Petersen <sandyp_at_idgecko.idsoftware.com>
Date: Thu, 29 Jun 95 11:53:12 -0500

Dave Dunham
>Given how universal the hero motif is, I'm sure we can come up
with >any number of heroquest movies.

	Angelheart
	Hellraiser
	March of the Wooden Soldiers (the bad guy is the heroquester)
	Alice in Wonderland
	The Time Machine
	Rocky
	Field of Dreams
	Baron Munchausen
	Star Trek Generations
	Monster Squad
	Jacob's Ladder
	Flatliners
	The African Queen
	etc. etc.

All the above and of course many more will spring to everyone's mind. "The African Queen" is a prime example of a fine heroquest. [Hepburn: "You _promised_ to take me down the river." Bogie: "Miss, there's death a dozen times over down that river."]

Alison Place:

        Lists an excellent description of why many cultures will accept the idea of opposition, even amongst Runes. I agree with her theory that opposed Runes are not necessarily a God-Learner fiction. But the way different cultures view that opposition will be different, and even the spot wherein they place the difference. It's certainly true that all Earthly cultures know of death, for instance, but there are cultures which (for instance) require a divorce before a widow or widower can remarry -- the dead person's presence is still considered important. In the Andaman Islands, people are buried and mourned whom we (in the US) would consider to still be alive. It's not just a matter of primitive barbaric cruelty - -- death, for them, occurs at a different time than for us. There's a tiny trace of this in our own culture. You know, the mafia boss calls you and says, "You're a dead man." And you are, even though you can still walk, talk, and breathe for a few hours or days.

        So while all cultures in Glorantha may recognize the Life and Death Runes, they may not all see them in the same way. I can think of several basic ways to approach a binary rune system:

1. Dialectic (the two Runes cause activity by their opposition. This is the classic God Learner interpretation.)
2. Complementary (neither Rune makes sense alone. Both are be present in everything. If one Rune gets too much intensity, the other Rune is "attracted" to it, in a Yin-Yang sort of way. This is the classic Lunar concept.)
3. Continuum (the two Runes are really part of the same substance, just different ends of it -- like a spectrum, or the dichotomy of "light/dark", in which there is every degree of lightness and darkness between the two extremes.The classic Kralori ideal.)
4. Mirror (the two Runes are exact opposites. This is not exactly the God-Learner point of view, and in fact implies that the two Runes are really the _same_ thing, seen in different ways. The classic East Isles interpretation.)

Peter M.
>I didn't mean to assert the 'opposed pairs' were GL constructs
just >merely say that we don't have to take the GL's word on what the >realtionship of the runes with each other are as the absolute truth.

        True. I have, however, noticed an irksome tendency on the part of some to assume that if the GLs believed something, this must be evidence of the idea's _falseness_. (And you, Peter, are NOT one of the culprits I'm berating.)

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