| Often, students conceive the Greek notion of Fate (moira) as something indicating the impossibility of human free will. Nothing could be further from the truth. The notion of moira (and atê, divine retribution) must instead be closely wedded to the idea of narrative, of the telling of a story in sacred space. It is not that a character (e.g. Oedipus) must do something, but, rather, that the character already has done something: ritual reactment of a myth tricks the viewer into watching history in the future tense. The fact that the kleos of the character has already reached its (future) audience means that the story (in retrospect) seems an inevitable, or fated, one.
For instance, consider below the affecting clip from Fox's shock reality show Maximum Exposure. From the moment the protagonist (the cameraman) sticks his camcorder in front of the angry llama, you know this is a tale fated to end badly. Note that this does not mean the cameraman had no free will; if anything, he had too much of it.. However, the very fact that that the tale is worthy of repetition (via the medium of the web) ensures that fate will indeed have its slimy, projectile vomiting way. In retrospect (as the voiceover announces), the tale-tale signs of Fate were there, if only the cameraman had the wit to see them: the llama's bulging eyes, the pulled-back ears, the puffed up jowls. Our hubristic cameraman, alas, ignores these sêmata and propels himself ever onward towards his viscuous green-gray destiny.
The student of tragedy will note (after recovering from the horrifying sight) that the cameraman, like the true tragic protagonist he is, extrapolates his individual pathos to a wider, universally applicable moral. It is, he declares, "The sickest, most horrible experience I have ever, ever, dealt with. Probably the worst thing that can happen to a human being." Fated? Yes, but only because captured in a kleos-producing medium.
|
|
