Mimara and Proyas - Parallels.

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Cüréthañ

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« on: September 04, 2014, 08:49:24 am »
I was thinking about Mimara and Proyas and their thematic roles and character arcs in AE and PoN.

I feel like these are the only characters that clearly exhibit proper moral agency.
They are both self-critical and sharply aware of where their personal moral boundaries are and the relation of those to cultural and socially defined boundaries.

Proyas starts in obviously the better social situation, no-where near as horribly scarring as Mimara's childhood, but they are both inheritors of their parent's legacy.
Proyas is the heir of Conriya and is expected to be the very example of male piety in Inrithism.
Mimara is, like her mother, at first subject to the common fate of most Earwan children and women, mere chattel before the hungers of men.
Also like her mother, Mimara is suddenly elevated the very top of the social ladder.

Both of them are initially prisoners to TDTCB.

They are each exposed to Socratic Method via Akka, learning to question their assumptions from his influence and find that their decision making becomes ever more fraught.
Akka is Proyas' tutor and also a father figure. His influence causes Proyas' first conflicts between what he has been taught is morally right and the insights of dialectical critical thinking.
Mimara has a difficult relationship with Akka.  But it too settles into a father-daughter and mentor-student pattern.

Mimara reaches towards self actualization through reflection on the ways she has survived her traumatic past prompted by Akka and most of all, the quirri. 
This 'drug' provides her with deeply intuitive insights that transform her world view.  For others it seems to have a much less transformative effect.

For Proyas, Kellhus' teachings are also more than the drug-like effects they have on others.  He gains a confirmation of his devotion to piety that does not contradict his burgeoning awareness of his agency.

In both cases, Mimara and Proyas are ignorant of how Kellhus is manipulating them, yet their agency continues to flower even as they serve Kellhus' ends.
Proyas leads his armies to unite the Three Seas whilst Mimara slogs through the north dispelling ancient horrors that could destroy civilization.
Each of them glimpses Kellhus' hand, but continues.

Examples of Mimara's agency are a lot more common, mainly because she has so much PoV.
Banishing the Wight is the most obvious example, but this is minimized because what actually happens is well obscured.
Throughout WLW, she is constantly able to manipulate others. Getting info from Sarl, Incariol and even the thing called Soma.
But the most striking example is when, faced with her rape and murder, she is able to exercise her agency to forgive her attackers. A difficult thing for even the most spiritual person.

Now consider Proyas' most significant example of personal agency in PoN, when he is moved to rape and murder but forestalls his actions to take the pious route and help his avowed 'enemies' to escape.  It doesn't seem any where near as important, but besides Mimara, Cnaiur (who is mad) he is the only character who is explicitly shown to take a moral alternative. 

Perhaps there is a link between Proyas/Cnauir's relationship and Mimara/the skin spy?

Proyas is supremely useful to Kellhus because it seems they will remain allies even when all pretense is dropped.  Will this prove to be the case with Mimara as well?
(Obviously this is making the assumption that Kellhus isn't planning to betray everyone.)
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Wilshire

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« Reply #1 on: September 09, 2014, 07:59:07 pm »
Wow, there really is way more there than I initially expected.

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Proyas leads his armies to unite the Three Seas whilst Mimara slogs through the north dispelling ancient horrors that could destroy civilization.
Each of them glimpses Kellhus' hand, but continues.

This bit was the only real part I found issue with. Proyas isn't really leading an army is he? He's under the direct orders of Kellhus and children. I'm not so sure he has a lot of room for critical thinking. Even if he is, I think that Mimara parallel is a stretch, as she isn't doing much else other than following Akka because she's got no where else to be.

Other than that, bravo. I'm going to be trying to guess the trajectories of their stories based on what happens in the other's chapters in TUC.
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Cüréthañ

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« Reply #2 on: September 10, 2014, 12:48:26 am »
Point is that they are both on missions dictated by Kellhus. They both experience a moment when they clearly realize that they are being manipulated, but choose to continue.
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Wilshire

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« Reply #3 on: September 12, 2014, 12:40:49 pm »
When does Mimara actually acknowledge that she could be under Kellhus' influence? I always got the impression that she was more ignorant of that fact than Proyas. I know Akka tells her that this is the case, but does it sink in?
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« Reply #4 on: September 12, 2014, 01:50:09 pm »
Shit, I'm not sure tbh, I'll look for something concrete later but I think its after she discovers that the Captain is Zaudunyaini or when she is tricking info out of Sarl.

Once they tie up Akka and continue on and she discovers they are imperial agents positioned to watch the wizard in the first place it is pretty obvious anyway.
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Wilshire

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« Reply #5 on: September 12, 2014, 06:04:04 pm »
Oh yeah I guess that's true. But even then, post-library she might again be under the illusion that she's back in control. Though I think she might be more in control of her own destiny than most because of her JE. Maybe that's just another illusion though. Whoever pulls the strings of the JE controls her more completely I guess.
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« Reply #6 on: September 12, 2014, 11:03:55 pm »
Actually, the point of my original allusion was that they both have Kellhus' influence revealed to them but don't care/change their behaviour, and manage to retain a level of moral agency within their actions.
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