Character meme!

[vulgarweed]

It's still music festival season, so I've hard hardly any quality time to spend with the new addition to the household. It doesn't even have a name or a wallpaper pic yet.

So I'll do a meme. (I've been tagged for another great one; I'll do that later.) This one I ganked from a bunch of people on the f-list.

1. Comment to this post with the name of a character that I have written in fic or RP.
2. I will comment telling you the following:

a. What initially prompted me to like the character enough to write about him/her.
b. One of his/her best traits.
c. One of his/her worst traits.
d. How easy/difficult I find it to write the character.
e. The story/chapter/paragraph/phrase where I feel that I truly captured the character.
f. My plans (if any) to write the character in the near future.

And/or: Ask me anything fandom-related, and I will probably answer honestly.

Comments

[blueeyedtigress.livejournal.com]

Fascinating, thank you!

I can certainly relate to the terror -- I first read LotR at the age of 13, in the full throws of realising my own mortality. Being dream-haunted/-hunted by Nazgul made that point very clear, let me tell you. But I am not of the mental fibre that enjoys horror movies, so I've never felt a wish to delve deeper into the Nazgul. Very much like Dementors, now that I correlate them -- stupidly obvious, now that I've seen the link. I wonder if anyone has ever written a sympathetic story about Dementors? Or a Dementor/Nazgul crossover?

(Oops, sorry, rambling in your journal ....) ;]

[vulgarweed.livejournal.com]

You're welcome!

I kind of am of the mental fibre that enjoys horror--not movies so much as stories, preferably the kind that gives you the deep, deep creeps over the obvious gorefests. (Huge Lovecraft fan as well).

I actually don't see the Nazgul as being more than superficially similar to Dementors. Dementors strike me as just a sort of predatory animal--cunning but not particularly intelligent, and can't really help what they do, foul as they are. The Nazgul started out as humans--powerful and great ones at that--and have only become more powerful as they become less human. They're actually undead spirits, which gives them a whole other level of...something. (They do solidly bungle the task assigned them in LOTR, but I don't think they're meant to come off as stupid...XD)

[blueeyedtigress.livejournal.com]

Stories (read or visual) become too real to me for me to enjoy the terror -- I'm the sort that can wake up in a cold sweat from nightmares generated by books and movies. And I really hate that. ;P

Not so much superficially as archetypally -- they occupy the same sort of story-niche for the focal characters. The Nazgul, gaunt, black-robed, powerful, terrifying, and inhuman, hunt the young Hobbits; just as the Dementors, gaunt, black-robed, powerful, terrifying, and inhuman, hunt the young wizarding children. For both groups, learning how to face their fears and overcome these shadowy horrors is part of growing up on their journey.

(For the record, I never saw the Nazgul as bunglers or stupid! They were too scary to analyse that way. What I saw, instead, was that seemingly insurmountable horrors could be overcome by courage and determination and sticking by your friends. That, and a good dose of Good Triumphing Over Evil, of course.)

[vulgarweed.livejournal.com]

I think the main source of fascination with them for me is the very fact that they were once human. One way or another, whether they thought it through or not, they chose to become what they are. At least, they chose to give Sauron and his Rings the time of day, and sealed their own fates. So there's something of the horror within as well as the external factor. Could anyone have been seduced with the right appeal? Could I? The premise in TR&TC is that the reason the Witch-king is "more equal than the others" is that he was the only one who fully understood the ramifications of Sauron's "gift" and wanted it anyway. Or wanted it because of what he knew. Even Sauron was impressed with what a nasty piece of work he was to begin with. :D

I think I needed to write the story that way because we get a pretty good look at Frodo's struggle, but in the end, he's saved by grace. I wanted to write that from the point of view of someone too proud to ever let grace anywhere near him.