A
common piece of advice for writers is “go there,” the “there” meaning anything
from some sort of an adventure to a walk in the park. One cannot write a piece
of writing without seeing the world and experiencing the joys and challenges
that come with one’s journey through it. The same goes for the characters that
appear in these writers’ works. A plot cannot exist without some sort of change
existing in the protagonist’s internal character. Because of this imperative,
something of some sort of significance and import has to occur around/to the
protagonist. Someone cannot experience an emotional, internal, spiritual,
awakening or change by, say, sitting in their room all day playing Call of
Duty. However, imagine that a writer decided to write about one such character
who just so happened to experience a tear jerking, life altering, internal
epiphany in which he finally stumbled upon the meaning of life and was able to
change his emotional and internal outlook and character… while playing Call of
Duty. Would this piece of writing have enough meaning and depth to make an
impact on its readers? Would it be powerful enough to achieve the author’s
noble purpose? Would it be moving enough to cause readers to seek to make a
change in their lives based on the themes and messages the author sought to
impart to his/her readers? Probably not. So, the general consensus among the
writing community is to put their protagonists through “quests,” so they can
best convince their readers and move
their readers to be influenced to integrate into their lives the messages and
themes that authors write about.
Foster
broadens the boundaries (it does not have to be as concrete and overt as quests
like Bilbo’s or Odysseus’) of what
a “quest” can be by outlining the defining characteristics of quests: a
quester, a place to go, the “stated objective,” trials and tribulations along
the way, and the real objective which is always the quester learning more about
himself/herself (in Foster’s words, “self-knowledge”). In addition there is usually
an “evil knight” and a “princess.” However, one might pose the question: why
does a quest need to have these characteristics? These features resonate most
effectively with people because these traits are inherent in our own individual
quest: life. The writer is doing the reader a kind favor of showing other’s
quests and the mistakes they made along the way, and the lessons they learned,
so the audience is more capable of dealing with similar issues in their own
life journey (quest). Take, for example, Laura Hillenbrand’s World War II novel
Unbroken. As Louis Zamperini’s
remarkable life story of resiliency and survival unfold before the reader, it
becomes evident that Zamperini’s life, his quest, is so convoluted and
astonishing that readers have to constantly remind themselves that this is a
true story. And yet, it has all the elements of a quest that Foster outlines.
The quester, Louis, dreams of running in the Olympics (one of the many stated
reasons). However, with the commencement of WWII, he becomes a bombardier.
After his plane crashes in the middle of the Pacific, he finds himself one of
three survivors of an eight man crew. He and his friend, Phil, are able to survive
on a life raft in the middle of the Pacific Ocean for more than 50 days with
sharks incessantly circling their small rubber vessel (the challenges, to name
a few). They end up floating into a Japanese-held island and taken as POW's.
They experience the most horrid treatment in the war with conditions and
treatment that rivaled those that the Jew’s experienced in the concentration
camps during the Holocaust. The stated objective for Louis is simply to get
back to the freedom and love and comfort of his home. He encounters villains
both tangible (i.e. prison guards, sharks) and intangible (hunger, thirst,
sickness, etc.). Though he, at extremely slim odds, survives this odyssey of
surviving on a raft, going to various enslavement camps throughout Japan, and
fighting through his post-traumatic stress disorder, and alcoholism, (to name a
few). However, through his desire to stabilize his life he finds his true
calling (he achieves the ultimate “self-knowledge”).
Hillenbrand
did us an amazing favor. We are able to acquire in about a weeks worth of
reading in the comfort of our home the insight that Louis Zamperini gained in a
lifetime of trevail and suffering. But the lessons that Zamperini learned (and
Hillenbrand imparted to her readers) compel the readers most effectively
because they are about someone’s experience through life, which is the model
all authors use for quests. Much better than playing Call of Duty.
