Show Notes
'I am glad you are here with me. Here at the end of all things, Sam.’ We have reached the very dramatic conclusion of the greatest fantasy trilogy ever written. It's been a long road to Mordor, but the adventure doesn't stop there. Heroes will arise, wars will be fought, perils will be faced, a king will return. In this episode: How Sauron used propaganda to do his dirty work for him, can Merry go from zero to hero(?), and Tolkien's thoughts on Frodo's actions on Mount Doom. Plus, a lot more!
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More from Becoming The Main Character
Achilles, the greatest warrior in Greek mythology, knew his fate: stay and fight at Troy and die young with eternal glory, or go home and live a long, forgotten life. He ended up with the glory and the early grave. Then, in the land of the dead, he told Odysseus it wasn't worth it. It's one of the most powerful scenes in Homer's Odyssey, and Christopher Nolan left it out of his film. This episode goes back to the Iliad and the Trojan War to find out why Achilles ended up there. He thought he was making reasoned choices, but his passions were deciding for him the whole time. Most of us live the same way: sure of what we want in theory, hedging in practice, and letting our worst days settle the questions we never answered. Achilles shows what that costs, and what it takes to make a choice that's truly your own. --------------------------------- Sign up for 'BTMC: Protagonist Edition', where you get the full story the day it releases, plus EXTENDED VERSIONS of the episodes, access to all the Character Analysis episodes, and early access to the next book. Sign-up link below: Get BTMC: PROTAGONIST EDITION: https://becomingmain.supercast.com/ GET THE FREE NEWSLETTER: "THE SCHOOL OF PROTAGONISM" Substack: https://schoolofprotagonism.substack.com/ BTMC on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@BecomingMain FOLLOW BTMC FOR MORE GREAT CONTENT: Instagram: https://instagram.com/becomingmain X: https://twitter.com/becomingmain
In a continuation of our series on why mythologies and folklore are useful to the identity of a culture, we continue diving into the stories that have cemented themselves in the American mind. Even if these particular stories are unfamiliar, their essence will resonate with the stories you think of as foundational to what it is to be "An American", the same way the stories of Hercules or Perseus defined what it was to be "Greek". This episode is fascinating as you realize how much the idea of the frontier was a building block to our identity as a country even now, when the frontier wilderness has all been mapped and populated. ------------------------------------- Sign up for 'BTMC: Protagonist Edition', where you get the full story the day it releases, plus EXTENDED VERSIONS of the episodes, access to all the Character Analysis episodes, and early access to the next book. Sign-up link below: Get BTMC: PROTAGONIST EDITION: https://becomingmain.supercast.com/ GET THE FREE NEWSLETTER: "THE SCHOOL OF PROTAGONISM"Substack: https://schoolofprotagonism.substack.com/
We've been floating down the river having a pretty good time so far, but the events of the last chapter have sobered Huckleberry Finn up a bit to the uglier side of life. But we're back on the raft with Jim, with more people to meet, more life lessons to be experienced, and more dangers to be faced. Let's settle in to the rest of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn------------------------ Sign up for 'BTMC: Protagonist Edition', where you get the full story the day it releases, plus EXTENDED VERSIONS of the episodes, access to all the Character Analysis episodes, and early access to the next book. Sign-up link below: Get BTMC: PROTAGONIST EDITION: https://becomingmain.supercast.com/ GET THE FREE NEWSLETTER: "THE SCHOOL OF PROTAGONISM"Substack: https://schoolofprotagonism.substack.com/ BTMC on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@BecomingMain
What happens when you take a story that is controversial enough to be frequently banned from libraries and mix it with an author who doesn’t care what you think about his writing? You get Mark Twain’s “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn”. But why is a story about a boy floating down a river so scrutinized? Some reasons are obvious, but others are less so. All I know is I found the character of Huck to be a great study in choosing what matters to you. So come on in, the water is fine...for now.
Why does a culture need its own stories? Can't it just borrow someone else's?