November 03, 2013: A Quality of Mercy

To my mind, television writing/production/acting will never surpass the original 60’s “The Twilight Zone” series. As we were approaching Halloween last week, I thought it  appropriate to revisit some of the stories that I risked not only parental wrath, but also my own personal fears, to watch in my early youth.

“The Twilight Zone” had a number of never-to-be-repeated graces that allowed it to succeed. First, it was television when it was still  AOK to borrow heavily from theater, but add production techniques of early television. Secondly, as a new-ish (and potentially profitable) medium, it attracted the best writers, actors, producers, and directors of that generation. Thirdly, it was still an age when it was OK to tug on heartstrings. Younger viewers would most likely find TZ as schmaltzy and saccharine (and they would be right.) Oddly, this is what I find most attractive in the series. There also seemed to be a trust in, and freedom provided, the artists in the 60’s that does not seem so prevalent today. Last, the premise of the show was that anything may happen in the Twilight Zone.

I was able (through the help of my local library) to get ahold of Season #3 and it held not only the gems that I remembered, but also those that I had never seen. Here are my favorites:

[Here follow spoilers….so if you have never seen Season #3 of the Twilight Zone, I invite you to STOP reading now and revisit the blog when you have. In a pre-M. Night Shamala world, the “twists’ of TZ are its strength. I would not want to deprive you of these.]

“Little Girl Lost” Episode 91-March 16, 1962:  A young girl has inexplicably slipped into another dimension located just behind her bed, leaving her parents the sole choice to locate her in the otherworld and rescue her.  It’s like “Poltergeist” only better and much shorter.

“The Gift” Episode 97-April 27, 1962: An alien crash lands in village full of hostile humans, except a boy that he befriends and gives a gift. Ok…can anyone say “ET?”… Anyone?…Anyone? Mr. Spielberg???

“To Serve Man” Episode 89-March 02, 1962 Earth is visited by scary 9-foot aliens called Kanamits. Despite their appearance, they seem all helpful and even carry around a book called “To Serve Man”…only it’s a COOKBOOK!!!! OK, this as the one that after watching, I was so terrified, that my parents forbade me watch TZ. This didn’t stop me, however. I just continued to watch the show hiding behind the couch (much to the amusement of my older siblings.)

“Nothing In the Dark” Episode 81-January 05, 1962: An old woman afraid of the specter of Death is visited by him nonetheless, but in the form of a young and strikingly handsome Robert Redford. This Death is warm, intelligent, compassionate, caring, and patient…gently taking us only when we fully understand the inevitable.

“The Changing of the Guard“ Episode 102-June 01, 1962: An educator, prematurely dismissed from the job and the students that he loves, considers that he has wasted his life. At his last moment he is visited by ghosts of his former pupils who assure him that his lessons of courage, loyalty, honesty and ethics have not been in vain. It’s like “It’s a Wonderful Life” only specifically for educators.

…and last…the one most pertinent to the blog:

“A Quality of Mercy“ Episode 80-December 29, 1961: During the last days of WWII an American platoon is besieging a cave on a Philippines island occupied by starved and defeated Japanese soldiers. A hard-nosed, by-the-book lieutenant  (Dean Stockwell) shows up to stir the platoon into an assault on the cave to finally destroy the Japanese. The exhausted platoon resists the unnecessary loss of life on either side. In an inexplicable moment (common in TZ) the lieutenant is not only transported back in time to May 4, 1942 but has now become a Japanese lieutenant besieging the same cave occupied by Americans! He gains the insight that all armies would train out of every soldier if they were able: the sympathy that the “enemy” is just another human deserving of mercy.

The show nails its point by quoting Shakespeare from “The Merchant of Venice”

“The quality of mercy is not strained. It droppeth as the gentle rain upon the place beneath. It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.”

[Much thanks to the Hudson Public Library for procuring “The Twilight Zone, Season 3 and extending the loan in order to write this article.-SV]

May 23, 2013: Homo Narrans

“Bru na boinne” or Newgrange by SE Vedder

A few weeks ago I was reading the short story by Lafcadio Hearn “Horai” in his book Kwaiden (1904.) “Horai” is a story Hearn wrote inspired by a silk print in his house depicting the utopia otherworld influenced by a Chinese myth from 2100 years ago. As i was reading the story, I realized that I had read Hearn’s description of Horai before…but it was from a land, people, and culture half a world away from Japan and China!

I have never been completely comfortable with the name we choose to call ourselves: “homo sapiens” or “wise-man.” Partly because it sounds like we are pretty full of ourselves, but mostly it is, where I allow an occasional wise action taken by a single man, and I have met a few rare truly enlightened individuals,  “homo sapiens” implies that we are altogether, and consistently wise. If we were honest, we would have to admit this is blatantly false. A more accurate moniker for humankind would be rather “homo narrans” or “story-telling man.”

Our stories are the most constant and important part of who we are as a creature. Our stories reflect our wishes, desires, fears, hatreds, loves and hopes. Better..our stories are told and universally understood (properly translated, of course) by almost every human on the planet, regardless of political boundary, economic condition, culture and even over the expanse of time. As long as we have been telling stories, they have reflected our very souls.

Carl Jung

Joseph Campbell

The idea that our collective unconscious is represented in the themes of our stories is not an original one. Much as been said by sundry experts of psychology and sociology, not the least of which is Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell (most especially in his “Hero of a Thousand Faces.) I only offer the Horai story as a new one as an example that I, at least, hadn’t heard before.

Mt. Penglai

The story of Horai is that of a mystical land on an island that has a mountain. The original Chinese tale is associated with Mt. Penglai in the Shandong province. One theory states that migrants from the Shandong region might have brought the story with them to Japan in the late stone age. This theory connects similarities of prehistoric tomb styles in both Japan and the Shandong region. Since then, Japanese have adopted the tale, changed its name to “Horai” and even named a mountain in Japan after it.Hearn describes Horai as such:

“In Horai there is neither death nor pain; and there is no winter. The flowers in that place never fade, and the fruits never fail; and if a man taste of those fruits even but once, he can never again feel thirst or hunger. In Horai grow the enchanted plants So-rin-shi, and Riku-go-aoi, and Ban-kon-to, which heal all manner of sickness;–and there grows also the magical grass Yo-shin-shi, that quickens the dead; and the magical grass is watered by a fairy water of which a single drink confers perpetual youth. The people of Horai eat their rice out of very, very small bowls; but the rice never diminishes within those bowls,–however much of it be eaten,–until the eater desires no more. And the people of Horai drink their wine out of very, very small cups; but no man can empty one of those cups,–however stoutly he may drink,–until there comes upon him the pleasant drowsiness of intoxication.”

When I said I had read this before, I am referring the descriptions of Tir na nOg, the Irish otherworld “land of youth and beauty.” Ti na nOg is described thusly:

“It is the most delightful land of all that are under the sun; the trees are stooping down with fruit and with leaves and with blossom. Honey and wine are plentiful there; no wasting will come to you with the wasting of time; you will never see death or lessening. You will get feasts, playing and drinking; you will get sweet music on the strings; you will get silver and gold and many jewels. You will get everything I said…and gifts beyond them which I have no means to tell of.”
-description of Ti na nOg by Niamh of the Golden Hair to Oisin

Curiously, both these collective utopias originated in the late stone age by cultures that never could never have had any contact with one another, yet each description is almost a perfect facsimile of one another. Theses wishes for perpetual youth and health, mild weather, plentiful food and drink are natural enough ones for a hunter/gatherer society, but have human wishes changed that much in all those years? Isn’t our Christian idea of heaven very close to either Horai or Tir na nOg?

There seem to be a few “rules” regarding humans entering the otherworld, whatever the culture:
1. The otherworld is ruled by faerie, magical creatures with preternatural abilities.
2. Unless invited, the otherworld will be difficult to reach for the human.
3. The human is almost always required to achieve a quest of some kind, for which he is richly rewarded by the faerie.
4. Once leaving the otherworld, “all bets are off” for the human. Gold turns to acorns; his youth instantly disappears; his faerie love remains in the otherworld.

As to being hard to reach, otherworld is often on an island (often a disappearing island,) through mist, under lakes, in a cave, and even within burial chambers (in Ireland, one word for a burial mound is bruidhen, a word that means “hostel” as in a place of sanctuary and comfort!)

Perhaps as a reflection of human imagination, or just a further extension of our wishes, the otherworld seems to adopt a kind of metaphysical silly-putty: seasons merge as trees bear both Spring buds and Autumn leaves; space expands as rolling fields are contained in a “faerie mound;” and in a kind of Einsteinian-relative-elasticity, time stand still in otherworld. Most amazing is that the otherworld seems to adapt to the attitude of the human entering: a fighter seeking conquest is met with arcane foes and weapons, while a peaceful man invited within is treated to superlative food, drink, and entertainment of magical proportions.

 

Our tales express us, bind us, hold us. Our stories, with words, sculpt not only who we are, but who we wish we could be. The idea that such similar stories could originate completely independent of one another, shows that whatever our nation, our culture, our beliefs…we are more alike than different.

Throughout the world, and through his stories, homo narrans continues to speak out his deeds, thoughts, and desires, linking us all in a legacy that celebrates our collective imagination.

 

[Special thanks once again, to the staff of the Hudson Public Library (most especially April) that provided valuable sources  for this article.]