Kyriakos
06-21-2011, 03:06 PM
“I was thinking of the tale of the monster of the hill, which had made such a big impression on me in the middle, or the end, of elementary school. The monster of the hill was a Cyclops who had been forced to live away from the nearby village, in the wooded hill, so that it would not be coming to contact while remaining there with the villagers who feared him. Probably his voluntary exile there was enough so that in the village they would confine their interest in him to only a few popular stories in which furthermore perhaps with time it would have become possible that also doubts would be added for the possibility itself that there could be some foundation for them in the real incident, if it wasn’t for two villagers traveling at some time to the hill, and there being met by the monster.
This meeting had as a result the death of one of them, since due to his horror when he saw the monster he stepped back, but he stood next to the edge of a cliff and so now fell to the pointy rocks of the landscape below. The other villager, most probably still horrified not only by the sight of the monster- due to which in all probability he had shut his eyes so as to avoid looking, irregardless of how much he should have been also fearful that thus he remained even more open to attack, but also later one when the monster begun talking to him that with such a behavior he would only make it more willing to attack him- but also due to the demise of his fellow traveler, begun begging, in tears, not to be attacked.
The monster, as much as I can recall, tried to explain to him that it was not his will at all to harm them, and that it was not due to him that the other man died, an explanation which the other traveler seemed to accept only pretentiously, since he had foreseen that in this way he would manage to convince the monster to let him go, which was all that he was thinking of.
Truly, the monster allowed him that, but when the villager returned to the village he presented differently what had happened, claiming that the monster had attacked them, and rallied the villagers to form a group armed with pitchforks so that they could capture and kill that creature of the hill.
The story was coming to an end melancholically, since now the monster, already half-beaten by its own despair that the villager had tricked it- something which however perhaps it had expected, in its deepest thoughts- threw itself against the villagers, who succeeded in immobilizing it, perhaps with minimal casualties, and to slay it”.
This is a translation of a note in my diary, about a story i had watched in an old japanimation :) At the time it had made me feel very sad about what had happened to the creature on the hill. Also it made me think of the parallelism between the plot of that folk tale, and the arabic tale of the evil Jin, which i had mentioned some months ago in another thread, since both creatures are being depicted as evil, whereas both had been forced to live in isolation for very long periods, and we are not really told of their own side of the story, while they both meet their doom in the end as well.
It also made me think of the folk presentations of the complicated theme of "beauty" and "uglyness", where the focus is in clear contrast between two worlds, while peripheral concepts (ethics, fear, hatred) surround the stable, main ideas.
Contrary to more intricate writing, where all notions are broken up to molecules, in folk stories (or mythologies, their archetype) there are always very concrete such over-notions, which are presented as atoms, not as something to be broken up (atom, although not the smallest part of mass we now can divide, etymologically means just that).
-What were your views of the story of the monster of the hill?
-Do you know how that japanimation was called? (not very possible perhaps, but i would want to see it again :) )
-What is your view of folk stories and mythology?
http://www.canvasreplicas.com/images/Japanese%20Bridge%201900%20Claude%20Monet.jpg
This meeting had as a result the death of one of them, since due to his horror when he saw the monster he stepped back, but he stood next to the edge of a cliff and so now fell to the pointy rocks of the landscape below. The other villager, most probably still horrified not only by the sight of the monster- due to which in all probability he had shut his eyes so as to avoid looking, irregardless of how much he should have been also fearful that thus he remained even more open to attack, but also later one when the monster begun talking to him that with such a behavior he would only make it more willing to attack him- but also due to the demise of his fellow traveler, begun begging, in tears, not to be attacked.
The monster, as much as I can recall, tried to explain to him that it was not his will at all to harm them, and that it was not due to him that the other man died, an explanation which the other traveler seemed to accept only pretentiously, since he had foreseen that in this way he would manage to convince the monster to let him go, which was all that he was thinking of.
Truly, the monster allowed him that, but when the villager returned to the village he presented differently what had happened, claiming that the monster had attacked them, and rallied the villagers to form a group armed with pitchforks so that they could capture and kill that creature of the hill.
The story was coming to an end melancholically, since now the monster, already half-beaten by its own despair that the villager had tricked it- something which however perhaps it had expected, in its deepest thoughts- threw itself against the villagers, who succeeded in immobilizing it, perhaps with minimal casualties, and to slay it”.
This is a translation of a note in my diary, about a story i had watched in an old japanimation :) At the time it had made me feel very sad about what had happened to the creature on the hill. Also it made me think of the parallelism between the plot of that folk tale, and the arabic tale of the evil Jin, which i had mentioned some months ago in another thread, since both creatures are being depicted as evil, whereas both had been forced to live in isolation for very long periods, and we are not really told of their own side of the story, while they both meet their doom in the end as well.
It also made me think of the folk presentations of the complicated theme of "beauty" and "uglyness", where the focus is in clear contrast between two worlds, while peripheral concepts (ethics, fear, hatred) surround the stable, main ideas.
Contrary to more intricate writing, where all notions are broken up to molecules, in folk stories (or mythologies, their archetype) there are always very concrete such over-notions, which are presented as atoms, not as something to be broken up (atom, although not the smallest part of mass we now can divide, etymologically means just that).
-What were your views of the story of the monster of the hill?
-Do you know how that japanimation was called? (not very possible perhaps, but i would want to see it again :) )
-What is your view of folk stories and mythology?
http://www.canvasreplicas.com/images/Japanese%20Bridge%201900%20Claude%20Monet.jpg