In reference to: https:In reference to: facebook.com/groups/6757450 … 179039777/
“And the point is (as Koester explicitly points out (to explore the Book of Revelations as a work of literature responding to the times it was written in and apply the motifs and archetypes involved to their various manifestations throughout our cultural history. We see it, for instance, in Dante’s Divine Comedy that runs from the descent into Inferno to Purgatory into Paradise. And we see the same thing at work in a movie like David Lynch’s Blue Velvet that is capped off by an entrance into a severed ear and an exit from it.”
Now what I want to go into today is the Dante archetype (that which I believe to be rooted in apocalyptic literature (in the expression we’re most familiar with and which has been with us throughout our cultural history: that of the basic plot line which starts with an intro (a standing order (then moves on to crisis (the parallel of Dante’s decent into inferno (which works into a peak until the denouement comes (the parallel of Dante’s Purgatory (and we reach a point of reordering which parallels Dante’s Paradise.
Now I haven’t the time to draw it out for you. But I’m sure you’re familiar enough with it to imagine a straight, horizontal line (a standing order (that suddenly turns upward then descends into another horizontal straight line: the standing order after the event or crisis. Now what I need you to do is take a mental copy of that graph and flip it down. This is the Dante Archetype that describes what the descent into chaos that is going on as the surface action (the plotline (escalates. It’s basically a kind of mirror revision of the classic plotline: a plotline mirrored in the underworld of chaos.
And to illustrate, I return to David Lynch’s Blue Velvet. It starts with a standing order: a kind of 50’s idealization. The crisis and escalation starts with the protagonist’s father having a stroke and his discovery of an ear in a field. And note Lynch’s symbolism at work in the camera descending into the ear –that which is clearly Freudian in nature. From that point on, it is an escalation of events on the surface while, in the subtext, chaos is incrementally unleashed –that is with temporary reprieves with Laura Dern’s character. Eventually, events come to a peak (a kind of apocalypse (and the denouement arrives (that is with our exiting of the ear (and a new order (a temporary Paradismo (is established.
Of course, Blue Velvet is only a more obvious expression of the mirror plotline I am describing (what can also be thought of as the apocalypse motif or archetype). The same thing is all over our narrative tradition. Sam Ramie’s A Simple Plan is another good example. And we can clearly see its roots in the tragedies of Shakespeare –most notably Macbeth.
The point I am trying to make is that the apocalypse archetype is clearly very deeply rooted in our psyches.