[UA] Achetype: The Soldier (War)

[eti at mb.sympatico.ca]

First, I would like to append a massive "thank you" to none
other than the lovely and modest Rick Neal for his assistance
with the drafts of The Soldier.  I meant to give him crazy mad
props on the original post, but my goddamned Web mail client
choked and died.  Right.  With that out of the way...

The Unknown Soldier idea is an interesting one, Minister of
Stuff, but the way I see it, the Idea of the Unknown Solider is
meant to impress on the survivors that "this was a real person,
and that real person died for *you*, and this real person stands
in for all the other real people who died for *you* even though
you don't (or didn't) know them personally."  Massive symbology,
you're absolutely right - sort of a well known, quasi-worhipped
nonentity: everyone knows of the Unknown Soldier, but who *was*
the Unkonown Soldier?  Oh, right.  He's unknown.  You know... 
He might even just be a casket full of bricks, but there is
still that cachet of syntactic meaning that is *so* the focus
for magickal power in UA.

That having been said, I think that the Unkown Soldier isn't so
much an archetype on its own (it is a consciouly created
institution, after all), so much as it's an aspect of the
broader Soldier archetype, or an expression of people's
appreciation of the archetype.  However, I do think it'd be damn
cool if, somewhere out there, there's an, no, *the*  Unknown
Soldier made incarnate by the belief and support of the general
population...  

_____________________
Erik Isford
Read too many old DC comics.

Royal Minister of Stuff <yokeltania at yahoo.com> wrote:
>You know, maybe "unknown soldier" would be a better
>approach to this archetype.  Imagine if the soldier
>was someone who had to follow conflict -it didn't
>matter what cause or nation.  The unknown soldier
>would be a guardian of other soldiers and a reflection
>of the highly-romantized "commarederie" of troops
>under fire.

>Rather than a nation, the Unkown Soldier would arrise
>from the ranks of a troop or unit, particularly one
>which disliked or distrusted this person.

>In this case, Roland the Headless Thompson gunner
>might be the revenant of an Avatar who would fit
>nicely into an international campaign.



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