Of Questing

    To open up this book, Foster has chosen a topic we see often and in many forms throughout literature: questing. Or, rather, a brief study of the true nature of questing, for the hero never aqcuires the "stated" object of their desire. The more important Holy Grail is discovery of the self.

     While I read about heroic quests all the time, I'm not sure if I was ever aware of this neat secret before now. I must have been on some level because the idea didn't surprise me at all. It makes plenty of sense: Frodo's quest for Mount Doom is also the search for personal deliverance from the evil of the One Ring, just as it is the search for all of  Middle Earth's deliverance. Another observation I had was that the journey awakens an inherent nobility and gritty heroism in the outwardly quaint and introverted hobbit. It becomes more apparent than ever how much Frodo belongs with the elves in their own, separate search for peace after the Ring is destroyed, so much so that he joins them across the western sea even though he's found a very happy little life once again in the Shire. So, while the Heroic Quest initially seems to permenately damage Frodo, marking him with an inexplicable yet ever-present state of depression that drives him away from domestic bliss with Sam in the Shire, I would also argue that it brought out amazing qualities in him one wouldn't expect to find: unstoppable inner strength, determination, wisdom, courage, ect. The Quest brought forth his true self.
     This makes the Quest that much more important, I think. After all, who really wants to read about a Quest that's only about a holy chalice or golden fleece or some small, rocky island you once called home? Although these objects may be of varying importance, what the journey brings out of the character is far more interesting and important. Characters are our little literary spies, working from the inside, keeping us in the know at all times. Naturally, we get to know them pretty well, sometimes even the entire geography of their souls. That's why I've come to believe in the significance of their inner-quests.
     Another inner-quest book I've read that I'm a little more reluctant to admit to reading (and enjoying completely ironically) is The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice. Our hero this time is, not surprisingly, a vampire named Lestat. He's a character the world first encountered as the rather pathetic villain of Interview with the Vampire (which revitalized the vampire genre for better or for worse back in the 70's) but now claims to be a fabulous, swashbuckling hero who spends immortality traveling the world and searching for the origin of vampirism and the meaning of his new life. Unfortunately, even though he does discover what started it all, he leaves his holy grail empty--his immortality still has no meaning, and as humanity goes on, the literal evil of vampirism also loses its place in the world. And so, Lestat becomes more and more self-indulgent, reckless, and vain, rather like a teenager who feels like all the world's a not particularly funny stage, a transition I'm still struggling with myself. This of course begs the question of what I will find at the end of my inner-quest. Personally, I'm hoping for secret superpowers.