VCU WRITING: THE HERO'S JOURNEY (LECTURE THE SECOND, AND ABOUT FUCKING TIME!!)

BE WARNED! THIS IS SUPER-HEAVY READING, BUT IT IS NECESSARY. BEAR WITH ME.

First and foremost I would like to say that COLLEGE IS NOT A GOOD TIME TO BE THROWING DOWN HUGE WRITING LECTURES BECAUSE YOU HAVE NO TIME.

Now, we go into the long-awaited followup to the Hero's Journey, and because I've been such a lazy hack I'm going to run you through, not just two, but THREE steps this lecture. Let's take a look at the roadmap and see where we are:

I. THE ORDINARY WORLD
II. THE CALL TO ADVENTURE
III. REFUSAL OF THE CALL
IV. ENCOURAGED BY MENTOR
V. CROSSING THE FIRST THRESHOLD

VI. TESTS, ALLIES AND ENEMIES
VII. APPROACH THE INMOST CAVE
VIII. THE SUPREME ORDEAL
IX. THE REWARD
X. THE ROAD BACK
XI. THE RESURRECTION
XII. RETURN WITH THE ELIXIR

So let's get this crazy train running!

III. REFUSAL OF THE CALL

Going back to our first lecture, you will remember that to initiate one's journey, they have to receive a Call to Adventure. You MUSTN'T skip over this step, because you miss a lot of development if you do. Accepting the Call to Adventure is a leap of faith; a step into the unknown, to a place outside of their Ordinary World; your hero MAY or MAY NOT have reason to jump headlong into this, and that is what the Refusal of the Call represents.

The Refusal can come in a number of forms:
-Avoidance: Perhaps your hero is overcome by other motivations, or possibly other Calls.
-Excuses: Your hero may be overcome by urgency.

In itself, the Refusal can carry a lot of weight. Oftentimes, a hero who completely avoids his/her Call refuses to accept change, and therefore sets oneself for tragedy (a Tragic Hero, if you remember, is a Hero who refuses to change or adapt, and it becomes their downfall).

You can sometimes use stage II and stage III to add some complexity to the story by presenting multiple Calls. From here a branching point is made, where you can make your audience anticipate which path your hero will take. Sometimes refusing one Call will open an opportunity for another.

Now, suppose despite the weight of this decision that your hero does, indeed, decide without hesitation to jump headlong into his/her adventure; there is STILL yet more ways to represent the Refusal. Perhaps the Hero doesn't refuse, but his/her peers might. If your hero doesn't see the peril involved in going down this path, maybe someone else does and decides then to point it out.

Ultimately, the Refusal of the Call is a signifier that there is danger involved in pursuing the adventure, whether expressed by the Hero itself or by other elements. In either case, this presents a moment of hesitation that gives the hero his/her first chance to resolve his/her intentions. But that doesn't come immediately, because that's covered by...

IV. ENCOURAGED BY MENTOR

Now, if you've read any of my writing threads, you should know by now: NEVER TAKE THINGS BY FACE VALUE. Think FIGURATIVELY, not LITERALLY. Not every story needs an Obi Wan, but this step IS necessary.

The Encouragement stage presents a chance for your Mentor to step onto the stage and help your hero along. REMEMBER STILL, that a Mentor doesn't have to be a person; it can be an experience, a place, a thing, or even logic or reason. In this stage, the Mentor offers a bit of help to get your Hero going along: they might teach or train them in some aspect, they might protect thm, they might give them gifts or plant information.

Ultimately, it is in this stage that a Mentor or Mentor-like force motivates the hero to carry along with this journey. Depending on the flavor of your story, you can also use this stage to establish some themes: is your Mentor in this stage a benevolent force? Is it a malicious force that is encouraging your hero into their plot? Will this Mentor appear later? Is this Mentor, perhaps, your Shadow in disguise (or perhaps an agent of the Shadow)?

Nevertheless, this is when your hero finally decides to up and leave for the journey. This brings us to...

V. CROSSING THE FIRST THRESHOLD

The appearance of the First Threshold presents yet another chance to test your Hero's resolve. Crossing the First Threshold means really committing to the journey; there may be a pause or a brief lapse of personal doubt, but ultimately this is where the hero takes his first step outside of the Ordinary World (this can be arguable, given some plot structures: for instance, in Rice Boy, our limbless protagonist technically leaves his Ordinary World on his way to see the Tree Keeper, but after seeing the Tree Keeper, yet more thresholds await him).

Crossing the First Threshold can be seen as going beyond your hero's furthest known point and venturing into the unknown. Sometimes this may be difficult for your hero to achieve, and likely, there is a Threshold Guardian involved (as its name would imply). In the end, your hero makes it through, stumbling and sprawling into a new, alien place. In this place, the rules are different and there are few things (if not nothing) the hero understands. It can be said that crossing the first threshold always ends in a rough landing, because this is the first step towards adaptation and change.
____________________________________________

AGAIN there is no "assignment" for this lecture, just some space for discussion and questions.

So... I don't want to sound like a total fucking douche... but to make sure I understand this threshold thing clearly (I'm pretty sure I do, but I'm having a hard time applying it to things I've seen other than Star Wars, which is for some reason so friggen easy to do...).

In Avatar: The Last Airbender, would you say that Aang's discovery of Monk Gyatso's skeleton at the Air Temple was the First Threshold, seeing as that was when it really hit Aang how much he had lost by laying dormant for 100 years? I think so, because at first Aang is reluctant to believe that he is the last of his lineage and tries to remain hopeful (the Refusal, perhaps? if you don't count him running away int he first place), but snaps when he sees ol' Gyatso...

Also, for the hell of it... would the Mentor be Katara, encouraging him to the north pole to learn waterbending, or Avatar Roku in the solstice...?

Well, firstly, I've never watched Avatar, so I really actually have no frame of reference to what you refer to.

Crossing the First Threshold really means to leave one's Ordinary World. It's the first steps onto the true 'journey' and one's first look into the Special World. You could say that Luke Skywalker's First Threshold was actually simply leaving the farm with Obi Wan after the raid. In LOTR, Crossing the First Threshold meant for the hobbits to leave the safety of the Shire.

Because I don't watch Avatar, you'll have to fit the references into this framework: Consider what Aang considers his 'Ordinary World', his lifestyle before receiving his Call to Adventure. Then consider the first line he crossed into breaking out of that World; that would be the First Threshold.

Hey Guys, new to the forums, so sorry if it's bad form to reply to such an old thread, but here goes (we'll see if there's even anybody still reading these :D ) :

First off, really cool topic, very informative.  I was wondering if the steps in the storytelling necessarily have to to happen in this order?  For instance, I have a story idea in mind where the protagonist embraces the quest right away (out of a sense of duty to his community and his brother), but eventually has doubts and abandons it, only to pick it up again later.  Based on what you've covered so far, this would be a case of Refusing the call coming well after crossing the first threshold.  Am I off base?  In my ignorance, I guess this could also fall under "The supreme ordeal..."

Thanks for your insight.

 

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