Who’s Really Wicked Here?

So I’ve just finished Demonology, a text published in the late 1500’s and written by King James VI of Scottland/I of England. This dude obviously had a huge influence over not one, but two enormous groups of people. It seems that although he could have made great strides towards harmony between the two cultures he ruled over, he was unfortunately, bat freaking crazy. While I’m not saying he was a bad king, I am saying that he was a little weirdo and should probably not have been in charge.

Examples of the weirdness of King James I/VI according to the forward of this text: First of all, the poor nutter butter is the son of Bloody Mary of Scotland (who made it a point to kill her husband, decided she liked the rush and went out on a not so secret killing spree). Little James was fatherless and likely scarred for life as his mom was basically a terrorist. Enough about her though. James was very well read- probably because he wanted everyone to believe that he was divinely appointed to the throne by God and therefore, knew everything. For the same reason he was also a religious nut. He had a new translation of the bible printed as soon as he became king (one which carefully translated certain words to James’ benefit). He was very sexually confused it seems.  He was possibly gay as he preferred the company of young boys. However, it was also know that while “hunting” James liked to torture the crap out of animals, have sex with them, and then kill them and roll around in their blood. 

Yes. 

Now that I have your attention, I would like to emphasize that this man is the man responsible for the whole “thou shalt not suffer a witch to live” thing. I’m talking about Exodus 22:18. In the most popular edition of the bible ever –the King James Bible- that little quote pops up, and it was a big reason that many innocent men and women were tortured and killed in witch hunts. This quote was purposefully mistranslated by James. The Hebrew word that’s wrong here is kashaph, which James had translated to say witch. What it more accurately means is poisoner.

For some reason, schizophrenia maybe, James was positive that witches were out to get him. He encouraged the torture and death of witches, going so far as to invent new tortures and means of death for them himself. He also wrote this book, Demonology, on how to identify and then suitably punish witches and magicians.

I just want there to be an understanding when I talk about this text, that these conjurers are not based off of anything other than one influential man’s fears. Let us remember that when we explore this quote.

“What can be the cause that there are twentie women given to that craft, where ther is one man?/EPI: The reason is easie, for as that sexe is frailer then man is, so is it easier to be intrapped in these grosse snares of the Deuill, as was ouer well proued to be true, by the Serpents deceiuing of Eva at the beginning…”

I can understand the whole Adam and Eve reference, but it feels like an excuse to scapegoat women to me. I think that James is afraid of women. I mean, he’s probably gay for a reason. His mother was a mass murderer and he was probably witness to at least some of that. It seems like he targeted women because he is terrified of them to the point of irrational action. He wants to see them suffer. Now, James does say that men can be magicians or necromancers or sorcerers, but it seems that only women can be witches and witches are common whereas the other types of conjurers he lists are rare.

Closing thoughts: This text explains a lot about witches and there are a lot of magical stereotypes in it which James probably coined. Magicians –like Merlin- can make dishes dance and have powers of sight. He discusses spirits, circles, and the use of blood in magic. He gives witches vampire-esk fears like holy water –wicked witch of the west melts- and rosaries. Having just started D&D again, I can say I have a better understanding of where a lot of the rules regarding magic find their origins. Generally this seems like fear of power at its height. James doesn’t want anyone to be above him to the point where he goes crazy and starts imagining beings which might usurp him. To prove how all-powerful he is, he kills them. In doing so he shows his people how powerful he is. It’s a nasty thing if you ask me. I think the witch hunts may also have been another cruel form of entertainment for him (just like his other hunts. eeeww :P)

D&D: Important Research

As I think D&D is a prominent and popular modern way to explore magic, it seems completely relevant to my research that I should participate in a game or two and document my results. Luckily I happen to know a Dungeon Master that was willing to hook me up with just the kind of game I was looking for – an all Mage game. (For you newbs, this means that all of the characters had to be conjurers of some sort. In regular D&D there are normally a variety of occupations and races. This game is only conjurers and only conjurers that were humans before they were mages. I once played an elven sorceress- which was cool, but would not be relevant here as I want to explore the relationship between people and conjurers.)

Before we began playing our ga… I mean before the research process could begin we had to create our characters. With everybody forced into playing the same thing it was interesting to see how our characters differed, and how everyone went about shaping their conjurers. We all had the same rule book and had to first create a human character –with qualities that we chose from the book. Then we were free to choose what kind of conjurer we wanted to be, followed by what spells we wanted based on what we were able to do given all the limitations we just picked out.

Although my group may or may not be an accurate focus group, it was interesting that we all decided to go in completely different directions. (To save their reputations I will use the first initials of my group members’ names-in case they haven’t publically gone nerd yet.) For the human part of our character creation, S decided to be a handsome janitor, J decided to be an unsympathetic bank robber, D decided to be a scientist of the P.H.D. level, B decided to be a dancer with karate skills, and I decided to be a loner detective. For the mage part, S went for Necromancer, J is a Warlock, D is a Wizard, B is a Sorceress, and I am a Shaman. (The differences for the newbs: necromancer = raise the dead and usually twisted, warlock/witch = bad wizard with mind powers- like telepathy-, wizard = neutral conjurer with time/space magic –can see the future, etc.-, sorceress/sorcerer = good conjurer with light powers- calls lightning from the sky-, and shaman = neutral conjurer with nature based powers -makes trees grow, talks to animals.) We each chose a different kind of conjurer from one another by accident, but I think everyone had something in mind when they made their characters.

For me it was Harry Dresden. I had just come off of reading the first book and really wanted to be a magic slinging detective. For B, she just wanted to be a dancer and a good person- the clueless fun character. D was completely basing his character off of Dr. Who. He even asked the DM if he could have a sonic screwdriver. J wanted to be a rebel character to try to screw up the DM (his brother). And S didn’t exactly know what to pick so he did some funky combination of things (an attractive janitor with the power to make zombies) because it sounds complex and he’ll have to think harder about the decisions his character makes.

All in all I wonder about some things now. Are all conjurers somewhat based off of other ones? I can name a ton of them based off of Merlin. Maybe Merlin is based off of someone too. I’m also seeing that magic is a form of entertainment for us. I wonder how far that extends. As in, when is magic entertaining and awesome and when is it frightening? Is the entertainment factor why magic is awesome?

The Importance of D&D (for Dummies)

D&D is a widely popular role playing game (at least among us nerds); where friends gather together to essentially tell a group story. In the game there are players who create characters that they will control in a realm designed by a special player, usually known as the Dungeon Master (The DM). The DM will set up a plot which is unknown to the players and ask them to make decisions to direct the story based on what they think their character would do in a given situation. This means that while certain events in the plot are set by the DM, the players may choose how to get to those given points. The DM must be able to bend to what happens and guide the players along. 

To keep the poor DM from being the ruler of utter chaos, there are rules and limitations to what each player can do. When creating a character, players must select their character traits and abilities from a given list. Once those traits and abilities are decided, they can be added to but not undone. Players are also limited by luck. The DM will often ask players to role dice. You need to role higher than a certain number in order to perform an action. You are rewarded more dice to roll if you choose to be skilled in something: ex- If one of my abilities is theft and I am rolling for the chance to steal something, I would get more dice to roll because it betters my odds of success. It all sounds very complicated, and it is. So why do it? 

D&D, which stands for Dungeons and Dragons, has been around for decades and the story-telling is usually set in a Tolkien-esk fantasy realm. This means that not only are you limited by the rules and limitations of your character, but you must have a fairly good background knowledge regarding fantasy creatures in order to cope with the setting of the story. 

It seems to me that we like D&D BECAUSE of the structure it affords us in a world that no one has a complete grasp of because it’s make-believe. In our own society we can’t control everything and it drives us nuts. It’s not just me and my OCD self, people need to control things. We seek structure as a species dependent on one another. Civilization is the opposite of this savage, primal animal that we are trying to escape. Order, Rules and laws, Control is what we instinctively reach for in our struggle for evolution. In our struggle to better ourselves. We like D&D because magic is pretty awesome, but it is also really scary –unless you control it or understand it.

This is really important I think, so I will repeat it. Magic is awesome when YOU control/understand it. D&D allows for a regulated magical environment where you can manipulate your own identity to fight or wield magic. It is a tool that helps us explore how we might deal with scary situations involving magic, without actually ever getting that close to it. You are separated from the action of the story by your character. It is like acting. Instead of being you and responding as you would, you are pretending to be someone else and responding as they would. It is hard not to put yourself into your character because sometimes you have to figure out how you would react before you can figure out how they would.

The Tempest and Nature

Yay Shakespeare Time!  So in The Tempest there is this really smart dude named Prospero. He is a duke who is betrayed by his brother and basically exiled to a deserted island so that the brother can take his place as duke. In order to regain his dukedom, Prospero uses magic –and his wits- to stage an elaborate reveal of his brother’s treachery.

One of the first things that The Tempest mentions about Prospero is that his magic comes from his books. It isn’t that these books are spell books; the idea is that magic comes from knowledge. I really like how bluntly Shakespeare connects the idea of wizardry with wisdom.

Magic is also repeatedly referred to as an art. There is this theme in The Tempest of order versus chaos. Art and music are considered ordered patterns or ordered sound. Magic is being framed as orderly and purposeful in this text, which I think is very interesting. I had never specifically thought about magic as orderly, but most of the conjurers that I have read about adhere to rules when practicing magic. The fight for control of your magic is a sweeping theme in a lot of texts. In Harry Potter magic is controlled through learning and practice in a school environment. Their powers may not come directly from knowledge, but without gaining knowledge they would never be so versatile in their spell casting abilities. In the Harry Dresden series there are magic words and rituals that he had to learn to practice magic effectively. Even Merlin can only teach magic to someone who is first a scholar (Prose Merlin). 

If magic is cool when it is this thing that can be learned about and controlled, then it becomes scary when it is unfamiliar and uncontrollable. This suggests that magic has two sides to it, star wars style. It can be ordered like society or it can be unchecked like nature. I think that this has to say something about us as a society that we are drawn to order and are scared by raw nature. We are still fighting that whole cave man thing. Everyone wants to be better than our ancestors. It’s also just common sense to be terrified of nature. Nature is unpredictable; a tsunami might wipe out half of Japan or you might be struck dead by lightning while walking home one afternoon. What is very clear is that we as a society value knowledge as a trait. All of the good sorcerers are smart cookies, and a whole slew of the bad ones are less informed. Examples: Morgana (in some portrayals), Harry Dresden Book 1 villain, Caliban, and all of the witches ever (see Demonology). 

 

The Tempest can teach us that there is no Utopia. There is no control. As much as Prospero wants everything to go his way, even he can’t predict everything or fight his own imperfections. But it also teaches us that we will fight for that nonexistent Utopia even knowing it isn’t real.

End Thoughts: Witches are, unsurprisingly evil in this text. There are random spirits that Prospero also uses as a source of power – conjurers drawing power from the magical realm. Ariel is visually like the Blue Fairy, and Prospero had an invisibility cloak before they were popular. Prospero = the original hipster.

Witches, Scholars, and Prophecies

So the Prose Merlin is this long medieval text about the life of Merlin and his adventures with King Arthur. This text is probably one of the first to expand upon Merlin’s creation and demise in detail, and so I think it is especially important to concentrate on these parts. According to the text, Merlin is born as this almost divine being with formidable powers of perception even as a child. He can see everything that has ever happened in the past, as well as everything that will ever come to be in the future. As a writer, the first thing that I thought when I read about Merlin’s psychic abilities was, how the heck does a character like that look forward to anything (in the slang sense not the prophetic), and would anything bad ever happen to him or would he just avoid it?

To understand what catches him in the end, I think you have to know a bit about Merlin’s character. Merlin is this incredibly intelligent man – if he is a man. The best modern comparison I can think of for Merlin is Dr. Who. The Doctor is not human, can do some superhuman things (although he isn’t magical necessarily), knows roughly what has happened and what will happen, and can be depended on to swoop in and save the day when he’s needed. This is Merlin. He is half-devil and touched by God-therefore not quite human, he has the whole psychic thing, and his bros are always calling him to come save the day –which he always does.  Both characters have a knack for finding their way to the right place at the right time, sometimes it seems by accident. And this is how it seems that Merlin finds Nimiane.

Merlin is wandering through the woods in between trying to save his buddy Blase’s butt (as well as all of the people in Blase’s kingdom) when he happens upon a grove where a maiden sits by a well. Enter the demise of man: woman.  When Merlin is with Nimiane he seems like a different Merlin. The passages where they interact are the only passages I’ve read where Merlin seems like he is human. He really shows off for her, conjuring a parade of partiers and boasting of all the other amazing magical things that he could do if he wanted to. He comes off as being a somewhat flawed individual rather than the almighty Merlin the wizard. He hands secrets over to her, like how to deflect any magic he might want to use against her. She becomes a “master in the Seven Arts” (roughly translated from the middle English). Eventually she asks him to show her how she might trap him so that he would have to stay with her forever and never leave. AND HE SHOWS HER! He’s like, “Oh, Nim! I love you so much that I’ll teach you even though I don’t really want to be trapped forever. This kinda sucks. Oh, well. Here’s the spell sweetie bean.” (Not actually what he says in the text, but it’s a good summary.) It kills me that he already knows at this point that he is going to lose everything to her and goes along with her anyway. Is lust just his vice or what?

Why Nimiane? Is this text just being sexist or is it important that Nimiane is the one to disarm Merlin beyond her being a woman? I think it is important that the person who brings Merlin down be someone unlikely and possibly even someone who is or seems weaker than him. We want to think that if he had to battle a wizard a normal person might be able to take them down without the need of special powers (“Aladdin”, Eragon, Circe in The Odyssey, Rapunzel). As a medieval woman it would be accepted that Nimiane was weaker than any man just based on her sex. Nimiane might also be important in that she is a scholar. Merlin says that he can only teach her magic if she is well learned (Magic and Knowledge love each other I think). 

I really love the idea of the only pupil Merlin ever has being a woman too. Score one for witches there. Nimiane gets to be a scarier more powerful version of Merlin in that she can not only do the awesome magic stuff he does, but she can manipulate him into giving her anything. I think this speaks to part of why witches are so feared. Witches are terrifying to men in that they are women with more power than any mortal man will ever have no matter what. Perhaps that is why they were later hunted and turned into monsters when wizards never were.