Ask the Author: traveller
| Interviews by Fans | |
|---|---|
| Title: | Ask the Author: traveller |
| Interviewer: | |
| Interviewee: | traveller |
| Date(s): | September 10, 2007 |
| Medium: | online |
| Fandom(s): | Supernatural |
| External Links: | interview and comments are here, Archived version |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
traveller was interviewed for Supernatural Roundtable.
Some Excerpts
my favourite kind of story to tell is one that feels true. I know, I know. but I mean it. honestly I haven't written terribly many things with big action sequences, I'm not sure I'm equipped to? I love to read them, a good plotty story that moves and moves is always fun, but if there aren't those little moments of revelation then I am left unsatisfied. there is a lot of stillness in what I write, I think in part because we don't get to see it on the show. I'm interested in stillness, I'm interested in what's in peoples' heads. Dean's in particular. ;)
danny had asked: tell me something. do you think there are Powers That Be in the SPN world? my reply was,well, as a great man once told me, in the construction of a cosmology if you define an absolute good then an absolute evil is automatically created, that is: an absolute must have an opposite. so the converse must be true: since in SPN we have an absolute evil (and yes, many gray areas in between, see vampires, helpful spirit) we must by definition have an absolute good. see also Ahura Mazda versus Ahriman if you don't like the God v. Devil matchup. polytheistic cosmologies rarely have absolutes, their angels and demons, so to speak, tend to exist on spectra of good and evil more closely reflecting humanity's own tendencies along those lines.
now, if you're asking in the Whedonesque sense of the term, do I believe that there are Transcendental Overdudes guiding the fates of the people in the SPN universe, I'm going to reserve judgement. there is not a lot of evidence supporting predestination regarding any of them, but on the other hand whatserface, Tessa, spoke as though there was a plan -- at least regarding life and death. the life/death balance apparently required by the reapers is an interesting argument for a plan, but that could be a universal constant and not the machinations of any particular being(s).
the problem is, of course, that SPN doesn't know what its cosmology is, yet -- the campfire tales are still being told. they are figuring out the rules as they go, and I don't frankly know if they will set many rules. this is why it is so easy to argue both sides on Sam's "chosen" status, there's all kinds of evidence and circumstance, but it's not written anywhere. if this were a Jossverse, there'd be scrolls, perhaps a stone tablet, or maybe just a rilly big book. (or at least a spoken prophecy of some kind: save the law student! save the world!)
there's a question of inevitability. Sam has asked, why do I see things if I can't prevent them? he has prevented, though. that suggests that the things he sees are not inevitable. but casting aside the visions and any and all theology, (to paraphrase a greatly under appreciated film) all things which have occurred are inevitable because they have occurred, and all things which will occur are inevitable because they will occur. that idea is fatalistic but also more than a bit entropic -- it isn't about a great plan, shit just happens. que sera, que sera.
so in short, I don't know. if I am to believe in the SPN universe as an autochthonous entity, divorced from the beliefs and intentions of Kripke &co, then I believe that there probably are higher powers because there are lower powers, but I need to see more to know for sure. if I am to consider the creator(s), then I say I don't know because they don't know. either way I guess I remain firmly agnostic.