The dragon roars from inside the cave, a thief in his hoard. Animals scurry from the grunts of apex predators, battling next to a river. The monster rumbles into the longhouse and finds a warrior lying in wait.
In this Myth & Ink series on action, we’re going to break combat down to its character building and psychological components, ways to integrate combat into prose with a balance of choreography to allow readers their own visualizations and how the aftermath of conflict can and should, lead to character growth.
Then, once those parts are tackled, we’ll talk subversion and combat from a villainous bent. This series is going to take multiple weeks, and today’s Myth & Ink is our introduction to the mythology behind combat, and how it’s shaped the hero’s journey.
Combat is one of the earliest and most prevalent tensions in storytelling. From cave paintings of hunting scenes to ancient tales like the death of Tiamat in the Enuma Elish, Gilgamesh versus Enkidu in the Epic of Gilgamesh, to the labours of Hercules, violence has tested and revealed the character of those embroiled within it, since the beginning of human story.
Exercise
In 30 seconds, list as many heroes from myth & literature you can remember.
Break them down: What commonalities do they have? What differences?
Take a look at your list, and spend ~ 5 - 10 minutes creating a ‘consummate hero’ from the pieces you learned.
In mythology, multiple cosmogonies (creation stories) begin with the destruction of chaotic forces, through often pugilistic means. Odin and his brothers Vili and Vé killed the chaotic Ymir, to craft the world around us out of Ymir’s blood and bones and flesh, in Norse and Germanic myth. In ancient Mesopotamia, the primordial mother goddess Tiamat was defeated in battle by Marduk, after the death of her consort Apsu drove her to transform into a dragon and lash out at her children. The sun god Ra, often accompanied by his son Set (yes, the same Set who murdered Osiris and tossed the many pieces of his body away), battled Apophis every night, eventually defeating the destructive worm so dawn might come. The act of the sun rising in Ancient Egypt was proof their beloved Ra won another in the nightly dust ups.
Heroes were known for their epic successes in battle, for the valiant deeds done and villains or monsters culled. Beowulf defeated Grendel and Grendel’s mother and saved Hrothgar and eventually returned to the Geats both proud and eager to rule with honour… only later to be finally defeated by a dragon in another act of self-sacrifice.
Coming from a species who developed to fear predators in the dark, this heroic aspect plucks upon something eternal and instinctual. There will always be dangers in the night, and in all hours. It is the state of the universe that our cosmos is both imperfect and fuelled by a cycle of decay, rebirth and growth. Since the earliest times, we’ve built houses and society around us to push the predators out and back. We have streetlights and gates, thick walls and sprawling cities. The dangers in the night have shifted, some becoming internal, others becoming the people on the far side of a long valley, but regardless of whether it’s a pack of wolves or a lascivious eye in an unlit alley, they exist in perpetuity.
The danger, and thus the impetus to fight against it remains, and it always will.
Although in history, combat was a more masculine affair, it loses none of its value when women too picked up the sword, the bow or the gun. We have war goddesses as well as war gods, fewer of them, but they exist. As a female and a martial artist, I find the psychology of traditional masculinity, protecting the whole from the dangers which threatened, to be a fascinating exploration. To be the shield of the community, the warriors who protected others who were seen as less dispensable, is in itself a noble act. There’s a purity to self-sacrifice, to picking up spear or pilum, sword or gun, to protect those who cannot protect themselves. In its purest form, combat is a bulwark to be used when the danger is seemingly insurmountable or lethal. A survived event, which in the essence of the Warrior Archetype, ought to lead to a peaceful life thereafter. The warrior must not stay at war for their entire life.
They must conquer the dragon, the beast or enemy, and then be allowed the peace which comes from civilian life. Usually in myth and folklore, this includes a Knighthood or Kingship, marriage to the lauded woman in the mix, or a bit of land to return to and become a farmer with a family. It’s never intended for war to last forever.
It’s never intended to be at the fight, freeze or flight stage of psychological stimulation forever. As writers, this is reflected in the waves of tension we crest and recede in our work. A novel which is a perpetual scream in one tone is overwhelming. On the flip, a novel without tension at all entices a usually smaller crowd.
I’ve watched over the years as protagonists without violence peppered up and there’s a place for that, as there’s a place for all things in the creative sphere, whether those things have a vast audience or not. For the course of this series, we’re talking stories with bite. Heroes of any persuasion, who have things to fight against, and need to raise their fists.
Over at We Aren’t Dead Yet, we’ll be doing a deep dive into Cozy Fantasy soon, so absolutely check out that Creator Guide, when it comes out (and while you’re at it, please subscribe).
And yet we would be remiss to neglect combat as power grab, or combat in its more destructive, nonsensical forms. There’s a toxic side too, and we’ll explore the toxic separate from the ideal in another Myth & Ink, later on.
In the epic poem Beowulf, our titular hero leaves his home with the Geats to rescue Danish King Hrothgar from the murderous monster Grendel. Every night in Hrothgar’s gleaming hall of Heorot, Grendel skulks and ravages. He eats the killed, drags warriors out in bloody stains. The Danes are a people defeated with a King at his end, gripping to the last vestiges he has to keep his hall alive.
Beowulf comes to honour Hrothgar and slay the foul beast, and yet the combat itself takes up relatively little of the epic poem. Surrounding the battle are verbal jousting matches, proof of bravery, tales and stories while the Queen pours mead in her hall. The human antagonist of the earlier section, Unferth the Coward, gives us the definition of a dishonourable man: one who challenges without the substance to back it up, one who lies and ‘gives away his sword’, as Unferth let go of his. This giving away of his sword was symbolic of the fact a warrior never went around unarmed. Unferth betrayed his fellows by refusing to fight, out of self-preservation, and then attempted to dissuade others from viewing Beowulf favourably, until he was swatted down. Beowulf handled the verbal attack with might and grace. He proved himself, and set Unferth back to his dishonoured place. After Grendel’s death, Hrothgar warns Beowulf to let go of pride, for youth lingers but for a while, and the spear point of age will come, brave warrior, to carry him away.
The lasting power of Beowulf lies in its combination of bravery, combat and philosophy to live by within its predominantly masculine sphere.
This is where combat can live in our stories. As proud defence of others, as a defeat of the monster, a check for the unjust and reminder that victory well won includes the courage and poise to respect those around who owe you their continued protection. A warrior is meant to protect through his action, to find ulterior methods when those methods can stand, but who do not hesitate to wield their sword, when necessary.
Although the world has changed from the much more pugilistic ways of the Anglo-Saxon culture (written down by a Christian monk, Beowulf has its origins in pagan oral tradition), humanity doesn’t change as much as we think.
Instinct remains. The need for protectors is universal.
It’s the checks and balances of Hrothgar and the other men in the mead hall which ensure Beowulf’s journey included as much ethical and moral foundational grounding as it did ripping Grendel’s arm off his body and beating him to death with it, in a fight I still consider epically punk.
What we can take to our work is this: violence and combat is a necessity of many stories. Unchecked, it’s gratuitous gore, flung in our faces which while good for a visceral shock, is barely memorable. How many B Movies have come and gone, that we can’t even remember the titles of ten years past?
Exercise
Think of your protagonist. What worldview do they have? What do they believe is the point of life? What are they in the story to do or learn?
Who are the people/person who can check them?
Why act? What part of their past built them up to becoming what they need to be in battle?
We wouldn’t care so much about John Wick if we didn’t see him first as a bleeding widower palming his cell phone for an image of his deceased wife, after avenging the puppy the mobster’s son killed so callously. And yet, John Wick is our avenging hero, he enacts vengeance upon the deserving, while defending himself.
Building a character meant to function in the protagonist’s warrior mode ought to mean building someone with firm moral and ethical expectations in combination with their grit and combat skills. This is a person, who knows what they believe enough to discern when to speak peacefully and when to stand with raised fists. As we see from John Wick’s continued movies, there was a penalty to his violence he needed to survive. In the superhero movies of the last decade, a larger threat always met the vanquishing heroes another time.
Beowulf ended up an old King dying to protect his people from a dragon angered by a thief, who tried to take from the hoard. Yet, Beowulf defended, as King Leonidas the First of Sparta defended at Thermopylae.
Next week, we’re going to expand on action, by diving into Leonidas and the 300, and by taking a solid look at Marduk from the Enuma Elish. Hit me up in the comments if you have any questions, and if you want to be part of this dialogue, please join our Beautiful Machines Discord Server.
Thank you for wielding pen and shield for another episode of Myth and Ink. If you liked what I had to say, please give this a like and subscribe, and I’ll see you next week. Battle on.
