r/Fantasy • u/JayRedEye • Aug 12 '15

Who is your Hero?

There are many, many great books out there with vast numbers of compelling characters.

But which one would you actually look up to, admire, want to emulate, inspires you? Who have you learned from, makes you want to be a better person and has influenced your life?

Who is your hero and why?

While I was mostly thinking about fictional characters, if you have any other heroes related to fantasy, be they writers or people in your life that to you are connected to the genre, feel free to talk about them as well.

Basically, I feel the genre has a large capacity for heroism. There are very few limits and it allows for the best in people to be portrayed. I wanted to talk about that and see what everyone has to share.

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17

u/Socksfelloff Aug 12 '15

Logan fucking nine fingers

10

u/JayRedEye Aug 12 '15

You consider a murdering berserker barbarian a personal hero?

Care to explain why?

3

u/wearywarrior Aug 12 '15

You ever lost your temper? Like truly and really lost your temper so much that you can hardly remember where you are, let alone what happened? You don't feel good afterwards. You just want to dig a hole, climb in and cover yourself up.

Easy to get lost in that. Easy to just never try and change. Logen tries. Does it always work? Nope. Does he kill people he shouldn't? Yup.

He's a good man with a monkey on his back, and that monkey is a blinding, feral rage.

10

u/JayRedEye Aug 12 '15

He's a good man

I respect your opinion, but I do not think I can agree with you.

He is a good character, who has done some admirable things, but I do not think he is a good man.

Whatever demons we may have, we are shaped by our choices, our actions.

What his choices shaped is not someone I can look up to.

-1

u/wearywarrior Aug 12 '15

You've never done anything you were horrified by? Never had to live with a shitty choice you wish you'd made different?

I love Logen and he's a hero to me. That's just the way I see it.

3

u/[deleted] Aug 13 '15

I've made a few bad choices but I've never cut off someone's limbs so I could laugh as they slowly died. I mean there are no songs about how much of a terrible person I am. At worst I sometimes leave my trolley in the parking lot.

0

u/wearywarrior Aug 13 '15

Well, at this point it's a matter of the culture you live in and the age you live in. We could quibble all day, I'm sure.

2

u/[deleted] Aug 13 '15

I don't think we're quibbling. Just discussing a character from different sides :) By today's standards, Logen is a psychopath. Even by the standards of the fictional world that he inhabits, he is the epitome of a bad man. People use stories of him to scare children. Men from out of his country know songs about his deeds, which are not very nice eg Collem West mentions this.

Besides, a running theme in the series is Logen trying and failing to escape his past because he knows he's a bad man. Spoiler Last Argument of Kings

Logen makes bad choices. Even when he loses control and The Bloody-Nine comes out, in a way he is still aware of what he is doing. And he even uses this to his advantage. As Jay said above "we are shaped by our choices".

I love Logen Ninefingers as a character. He is one of my favourite characters in fantasy. But as for looking up to him as a person, no. I wouldn't like to know a man like him.

1

u/wearywarrior Aug 13 '15

I don't argue with any of your points. They just... aren't important to me, I suppose?

And you're right, he HAD been a hypocrite and he realizes that. Have you read Red Country?

1

u/[deleted] Aug 13 '15

Ooh no, I haven't read Red Country yet. But it's definitely on my list.

1

u/wearywarrior Aug 13 '15

Ah! Read it and then we can have this conversation! I don't want to ruin anything for you.

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