Worldview books and character developement

Part Three
Insert soul here...

Someone asked me the other day what book influenced me the most, how and why--and then I read Kaige's thursday thirteen and got to thinking how it all related to character development, and building inconsistencies.

Environment builds character--not "characters" but actual character, the way you think and act, what you'd do in a given situation, in effect--your soul. That piece of you that is always you. Hague would call it "essence".

The best way to explain is that to "be more" there has to be potential. Everybody has some, some people--like St. Exupery would say, "wall themselves away". But in the beginning, there's fertile ground. Bit by bit it goes fallow. Maybe life wears away at you, maybe you tamp yourself down--hold to some artificial horizon. Like the theory of abusers having "been" abused, and continuing on to abuse others.

There's a lot to training and de-sensitization, but I think with the right influences, a person can turn away from what looks like his path in life, can form opinions that differ what his environmental norm would tell others he'd become.

Say a person who's been abused and brutalized, who watches everyone around him acting a certain way--maybe grew up in a system that perpetuates abuse and encourages opting out through drugs or preaches control through being the meanest and baddest guy out there, say maybe one day he's flipping through the channels and watches something that resonates on a level he didn't know he had. Maybe it's about honor, or taking a stand--maybe it's the Shawshank Redemption. How despite circumstances, you can be true to your internal core. That maybe--just maybe, there's something more than dumbing down, zoning out and beating on people for still having potential.

That builds inconsistency because changing the core doesn't change the package. A raisin in a candy bar wrapper still looks like a candy bar until you get the plastic off.

The same goes for a kid growing up in a better environment--maybe she's got two parents, nice home in the 'burbs, three game systems, a closet full of clothes and too much money. And no one pays attention to her. She's forming her world view on reality shows and torture porn, because no one cares enough to model decent behavior. Maybe she finds a book at school and read it, maybe it's Robin Hood or King Arthur. Maybe she realizes honor and standards--chivalry and hope--really exists, and she bases her life on the belief that it doesn't have to be this way. There's more to life than the new PS4 and recreational sex.

It's belief. It's finding the right influence at the right time, and being open enough to listen.

Maybe I went a little strange when I was a kid, reading Robin Hood, and King Arthur (lol...). Maybe Man of La Mancha influenced me. There's this women, Aldonza, she's a whore--and Don Quixote, in his madness--calls her his lady, Dulcinea. He believes so strongly, despite her initial rejection, that she feels herself starting to change. Because of his belief, because of his influence, she becomes Dulcinea.

Bujold in her book, Barrayar, has this scene where Aral is trying to explain Bothari to Cordelia. Bothari is this sociopathic personality who at "his" core knows what he is, and knows there's more out there, but can't change or explain what he wants because no one gave him the tools. Cordelia asks, "why me? Why is he fixated on me?" And Aral says, "...when my father looks at him, he sees a retainer, and Bothari plays one, as deadpan as you please. I look at him, I see a solider, and he becomes one for me. But you--you look at him and see a hero. And for you, he becomes one. You create him more than he ever hoped to be."