Vogler Annotated Bibliography 10/6/08

Vogler, Christopher. “Refusal of the Call and Meeting with the Mentor” The Writer’s Journey: Mythic Structures For Writers 3rd Ed. Studio City, CA: Michael Wiese Productions, 2007. 49-80.
Summary
In the first chapter Vogler discusses the Refusal of the Call stage of the Hero’s Journey. The importance of this stage is showing the danger of the journey and the Hero sanding at the threshold of fear and the understandable reaction would be fear and hesitation. This stage shows the audience the risk of the adventure and that the journey is a danger filled high stakes gamble where the hero could lose his life or fortune and not just a frivolous adventure. The first way that Vogler talks about refusing the call is avoidance by the hero. They do this by hesitating, showing reluctance, or flat out refusing the call. Often the refusal is brought on by past experience and the protests continue until the Hero’s Refusal is overcome either by some stronger motivation that raises the stakes such as the death or kidnapping of a friend, or the Hero’s inbred taste for adventure or his sense of honor and pride. Also the stronger the Refusal, the more the audience enjoys seeing it overcome. The most common Refusal of the Call is the Hero listing several weak excuses that are temporary roadblocks that are removed by the urgency of the quest. Another important fact is that persistent Refusal leads to disaster. Continued Refusal is a mark of the tragic hero. If he continues to refuse the Call they will suffer the fate of a tragic hero. Only if the Hero finally accepts the Call to Adventure will they avoid the tragic hero fate. Occasionally there is also a conflicting set of Calls and the Hero will have to choose which path to travel down. Refusal of the Call is usually a negative stage in the Journey, but there are times when the Call is a temptation from a villain to get the Hero into a dangerous situation, when this happens the Refusal is a positive stage in the story. Another case of a positive Refusal of the Call is when the Hero is an artist than it is sometimes necessary for the artist to refuse the Call of the outside world to answer an inner Call. A twist on the Refusal stage is when there is a willing hero who accepts the Call without question, when this happens the Refusal is shown through the fate of other characters that represent the Refusal and show the dangers of the Journey. Once the Hero accepts the Call it is common for the Hero to encounter a Threshold Guardian who’s role is to block the Hero’s adventure to test the Hero’s commitment. A mentor can become a Threshold Guardian to try and block the Hero from going down a path to actions that society doesn’t approve of. The last thing mentioned in this chapter is the secret door phase where the Hero inevitably does something he is told not to do because of human’s inexorable curiosity.
In the next chapter Vogler discusses the Meeting with the Mentor stage of the Journey. Sometimes refusing the call can be a good choice if the Hero hasn’t had time to prepare for the unknown that the Hero is about to venture to. It is often necessary for a Mentor to appear and teach the Hero what the Hero needs to survive his adventure. The mentor can supply the items, knowledge, and confidence needed by the Hero. The majority of stories are constantly elaborating on the relationship between the Hero and the Mentor. Even if there is no contact with a physical Mentor the Hero always encounters some source of wisdom before committing to an adventure. Mentors in myth and folklore are often characters with some connection to the supernatural such as witches, wizards, witch doctors, shamans, spirits, magical creatures like centaurs, or the gods themselves. The original prototype for the Mentor archetype is Chiron the centaur from Greek mythology; unlike other centaurs who are wild and savage Chiron was a gentle and thoughtful creature, but not without a savage streak. He serves as a link between humans and the supernatural powers of nature and the gods. He taught his heroes-in-training the skills that the heroes would need as they went on adventures. The Mentor archetype is so commonly used that the writer must be careful not to fall into the stereotypes of the role and surprise the audience by defying the archetype while still representing it within the story because of the audience’s familiarity with the role. The audience doesn’t mind being mislead about the Mentor as life is often filled with surprises, so it can be acceptable to have a Hero led into a life of crime and sin; You can make the audience think that they are seeing a kind, helpful Mentor and then reveal the Mentor to be something quite different. The Hero-Mentor relationship can take a deadly or tragic turn if the Hero has violent or ungrateful tendencies, or if the Mentor changes into Villain or betrays the Hero. Another tragic ending to the relationship can be if the Mentor is overprotective of the Hero that the Mentor trained. Some stories are Mentor-driven and end with the succession of the mentor by the trainee of the Mentor. Mentors can be considered Heroes who have been down the Path of the Hero and have knowledge and experience to pass down to the next Generation of Hero. The Mentor is a role that will appear multiple times in the story and appears very frequently because of their usefulness to storytellers. No matter how the archetype is personified in the story, the Mentor’s energy is always present to advance the story and give the Hero the knowledge and tool he needs to survive his Journey.
Reaction
I found this section very engaging as it made me think about the different ways to make stories more interesting by varying these early stages and the archetypes contained in these sections. The different variations of these two stages also brought movies to my mind for each of the variations, which kept me involved in the reading and kept me engaged. Most of the examples worked for me, but might not work as examples to a large portion of the younger generation using this book. The only complaint is the constant use of the wizard of oz as an example, it would be nice to see some more variety in the main examples in the chapters, although I understand wanting to have a single constant example it becomes tempting to just skip the section when I see the headline.
Questions
1. What are some instances of the Mentor convincing the Hero to Refuse the Call?
2. What are some reasons for not having the Meeting with the Mentor until later in the story?
3. Are there times when the Hero is a mentor to a member of the younger generation and through teaching gains the knowledge and power to complete his own Journey?