Antihero Explained

An antihero (sometimes spelled as anti-hero)[1] or anti-heroine is a main character in a narrative (in literature, film, TV, etc.) who may lack some conventional heroic qualities and attributes, such as idealism, courage, and morality.[1] Although antiheroes may sometimes perform actions that most of the audience considers morally correct, their reasons for doing so may not align with the audience's morality.[2]

Antihero is a literary term that can be understood as standing in opposition to the traditional hero, i.e., one with high social status, well liked by the general populace. Past the surface, scholars have additional requirements for the antihero.

The "Racinian" antihero, is defined by three factors. The first is that the antihero is doomed to fail before their adventure begins. The second constitutes the blame of that failure on everyone but themselves. Thirdly, they offer a critique of social morals and reality.[3] To other scholars, an antihero is inherently a hero from a specific point of view, and a villain from another.[4] This idea is further backed by the addition of character alignments, which are commonly displayed by role-playing games.[5]

Typically, an antihero is the focal point of conflict in a story, whether as the protagonist or as the antagonistic force.[6] This is due to the antihero's engagement in the conflict, typically of their own will, rather than a specific calling to serve the greater good. As such, the antihero focuses on their personal motives first and foremost, with everything else secondary.[7]

History

An early antihero is Homer's Thersites, since he serves to voice criticism, showcasing an anti-establishment stance.[8] The concept has also been identified in classical Greek drama,[9] Roman satire, and Renaissance literature[8] such as Don Quixote[9] [10] and the picaresque rogue.[11]

An anti-hero that fits the more contemporary notion of the term is the lower-caste warrior Karna, in The Mahabharata. Karna is the sixth brother of the Pandavas (symbolising good), born out of wedlock, and raised by a lower caste charioteer. He is ridiculed by the Pandavas, but accepted as an excellent warrior by the antagonist Duryodhana, this becoming a loyal friend to him, eventually fighting on the wrong side of the final just war. Karna serves as a critique of the then society, the protagonists, as well as the idea of the war being worthwhile itself - even if Krishna later justifies it properly.[12]

The term antihero was first used as early as 1714,[13] emerging in works such as Rameau's Nephew in the 18th century,[8] and is also used more broadly to cover Byronic heroes as well, created by the English poet Lord Byron.[14]

Literary Romanticism in the 19th century helped popularize new forms of the antihero,[15] [16] such as the Gothic double.[17] The antihero eventually became an established form of social criticism, a phenomenon often associated with the unnamed protagonist in Fyodor Dostoyevsky's Notes from Underground.[8] The antihero emerged as a foil to the traditional hero archetype, a process that Northrop Frye called the fictional "center of gravity".[18] This movement indicated a literary change in heroic ethos from feudal aristocrat to urban democrat, as was the shift from epic to ironic narratives.[18]

Huckleberry Finn (1884) has been called "the first antihero in the American nursery".[19] Charlotte Mullen of Somerville and Ross's The Real Charlotte (1894) has been described as an anti-heroine.[20] [21] [22]

The antihero became prominent in early 20th century existentialist works such as Franz Kafka's The Metamorphosis (1915),[23] Jean-Paul Sartre's Nausea (1938),[24] and Albert Camus's The Stranger (1942).[25] The protagonist in these works is an indecisive central character who drifts through his life and is marked by boredom, angst, and alienation.[26]

The antihero entered American literature in the 1950s and up to the mid-1960s as an alienated figure, unable to communicate.[27] The American antihero of the 1950s and 1960s was typically more proactive than his French counterpart.[28] The British version of the antihero emerged in the works of the "angry young men" of the 1950s.[9] [29] The collective protests of Sixties counterculture saw the solitary antihero gradually eclipsed from fictional prominence,[28] though not without subsequent revivals in literary and cinematic form.[27]

During the Golden Age of Television from the 2000s and into early 2020s, antiheroes such as Tony Soprano, Jack Bauer, Gregory House, Dexter Morgan, Walter White, Don Draper, Marty Byrde, Nucky Thompson, Jax Teller, Alicia Florrick, Annalise Keating, Selina Meyer and Kendall Roy became prominent in the most popular and critically acclaimed TV shows.[30] [31] [32]

See also

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Anti-Hero . https://web.archive.org/web/20200806044801/https://www.lexico.com/definition/anti-hero . dead . 6 August 2020 . . . 26 September 2020.
  2. Book: Laham. Nicholas. Currents of Comedy on the American Screen: How Film and Television Deliver Different Laughs for Changing Times . 2009. McFarland & Co.. Jefferson, North Carolina. 9780786442645. 51.
  3. Kennedy . Theresa Varney . 2014 . 'No Exit' in Racine's Phèdre: The Making of the Anti-Hero . . 88 . 1 . 165–178 . 10.1353/tfr.2014.0114 . 256361158 . 2329-7131.
  4. Klapp . Orrin E. . September 1948 . The Creation of Popular Heroes . . 54 . 2 . 135–141 . 10.1086/220292 . 143440315 . 0002-9602.
  5. Waskul . Dennis . Lust . Matt . August 2004 . Role-Playing and Playing Roles: The Person, Player, and Persona in Fantasy Role-Playing . Symbolic Interaction . 27 . 3 . 333–356 . 10.1525/si.2004.27.3.333 . 0195-6086.
  6. Petersen . Michael Bang . An Age of Chaos? . 2019 . RSA Journal . 165 . 3 (5579) . 44–47 . 26907483 . 0958-0433.
  7. Klapp . Orrin E. . 1948 . The Creation of Popular Heroes . American Journal of Sociology . 54 . 2 . 135–141 . 10.1086/220292 . 2771362 . 143440315 . 0002-9602.
  8. Book: Steiner . George . Tolstoy Or Dostoevsky: An Essay in the Old Criticism . 2013 . Open Road . New York . 9781480411913 . 197–207.
  9. Web site: antihero . Encyclopædia Britannica . 14 February 2013 . 9 August 2014.
  10. Web site: Wheeler . L. Lip . Literary Terms and Definitions A . Dr. Wheeler's Website . . 3 October 2013.
  11. Book: Halliwell . Martin . American Culture in the 1950s . limited . 2007 . . Edinburgh . 9780748618859 . 60.
  12. Book: Kotru, Umesh . Karna The Unsung Hero of the Mahabharata . Zutshi . Ashutosh . 2015-03-01 . One Point Six Technology Pvt Ltd . 978-93-5201-304-3 . en.
  13. Web site: Antihero . Merriam-Webster Dictionary . 31 August 2012 . 3 October 2013.
  14. Web site: Wheeler . L. Lip . Literary Terms and Definitions B . Dr. Wheeler's Website . . 6 September 2014.
  15. Book: Alsen . Eberhard . The New Romanticism: A Collection of Critical Essays . 2014 . . Hoboken . 9781317776000 . 72 . 20 April 2015 . Google Books.
  16. Book: Simmons . David . The Anti-Hero in the American Novel: From Joseph Heller to Kurt Vonnegut . 2008 . . New York . 9780230612525 . 5 . 1st . 20 April 2015 . Google Books.
  17. Book: Lutz . Deborah . The Dangerous Lover: Gothic Villains, Byronism, and the Nineteenth-century Seduction Narrative . 2006 . . Columbus . 9780814210345 . 82 . 20 April 2015 . Google Books.
  18. Book: Frye . Northrop . Anatomy of Criticism . 2002 . . 9780141187099 . London . 34 . registration.
  19. Book: Hearn . Michael Patrick . The Annotated Huckleberry Finn: Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (Tom Sawyer's Comrade) . 2001 . . New York . 0393020398 . xvci . 1st . registration.
  20. Book: Ehnenn . Jill R. . Women's Literary Collaboration, Queerness, and Late-Victorian Culture . 2008 . . 9780754652946 . 159 . 7 April 2020 . en . Google Books.
  21. News: Cooke . Rachel . The 10 best Neglected literary classics – in pictures . 7 April 2020 . . 27 February 2011.
  22. Book: Woodcock . George . Twentieth Century Fiction . 1 April 1983 . . 9781349170661 . 628 . 7 April 2020 . en . Google Books.
  23. Book: Barnhart . Joe E. . Dostoevsky's Polyphonic Talent . 2005 . . Lanham . 9780761830979 . 151.
  24. Book: Asong . Linus T. . Psychological Constructs and the Craft of African Fiction of Yesteryears: Six Studies . 2012 . Langaa Research & Publishing CIG . Mankon . 9789956727667 . 76 . Google Books.
  25. Book: Gargett . Graham . Heroism and Passion in Literature: Studies in Honour of Moya Longstaffe . 2004 . Rodopi . Amsterdam . 9789042016927 . 198 . Google Books.
  26. Book: Brereton . Geoffrey . A Short History of French Literature . 1968 . . 254–255.
  27. Book: Hardt . Michael . Weeks . Kathi . The Jameson Reader . 2000 . . Oxford, UK ; Malden, Massachusetts . 9780631202707 . Reprint . 294–295.
  28. Book: Edelstein . Alan . Everybody is Sitting on the Curb: How and why America's Heroes Disappeared . 1996 . Praeger . Westport, Connecticut . 9780275953645 . 1; 18.
  29. Book: Ousby . Ian . The Cambridge Paperback Guide to Literature in English . 1996 . . New York . 9780521436274 . 27 .
  30. Web site: Reese . Hope . Why Is the Golden Age of TV So Dark? . . 31 October 2021 . en . 11 July 2013 . A new book explains the link between the rise of antihero protaganists and the unprecedented abundance of great TV (and what Dick Cheney has to do with it)..
  31. Faithfull, E. (2021). How House brought the "savant anti-hero" into the mainstream and changed TV dramas. www.nine.com.au. https://www.nine.com.au/entertainment/latest/house-savant-anti-hero-medical-drama-9now/0e030210-8bfe-424f-b687-f2e36e6f0694
  32. Pruner, A. (n.d.). Hear us out: Gregory House was TV's last great doctor. https://editorial.rottentomatoes.com/article/hear-us-out-gregory-house-was-tvs-last-great-doctor/

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