Characters and their representation

Characters and their reprensation

Rise and Fall

Into this notion, characters and their representation the character can be interpreted as “the hero” and their representation as their “behavior”.

As we know, there are many types of heroes, myths and legends, but also the anti-heroes and many others. We are going to study the rise and fall, in other words the heroes with a rise in power then a downfall or inversely.

But more specifically with the function of "hubris", is to define as strong pride, a self confident or arrogance. It’s represents the excess and its wrongdoing. We would then follow through the play how the hero would overcome a tragic situation, trying to manage his excess.

Problematic: So, come then a question, how can a protagonist go from the top to the bottom (hell) ?

The plan will be in two axes, the first will show the different function of hubris and the second part will show how the hubris leads to tragedy, downfall.

We have 3 characters, Dorian Gray, King Lear and Damon Salvatore; with them we can see 3 types of hubris.
Damon and King Lear have similarities, in the book Vampires Diaries or the series, Damon is very arrogant, he just thinks about himself as King Lear, both know they are beautiful, powerful and want recognition, they expect compliments, King Lear will give the biggest part of his kingdom to the one who will compliment him the most, he said “Great rivals in our youngest daughter’s love” (L.18). In the series Damon will be elected the most beautiful party of the city and will wonder if this title was really necessary, as if it was evidence. So with the two we see two types of hubris, close but not the same.
With Dorian Gray we see another type of hubris, less accentuated. Maybe Dorian needs recognition as King Lear and Damon but on the contrary, he does not make his decisions alone, Lord Henry influenced him. Lord Henry is obsessed with the beauty of Dorian, who does not know the power of that, and when Dorian seen the painting of him, he’s quite shocked because he not realized his beauty before this moment “The sense of is own beauty came on him” (L.76). So Dorian becomes hubris because of Lord Henry, he becomes aware and will play his beauty, we see another type of hubris.

We have seen the "good" sides of the function "hubris" or it is primarily a flaw. Indeed, the 3 characters will fall because of it. For King Lear it's because his arrogance is going to lead to his downfall into the tragic ending: the suicide of his youngest daughter, he is pushing his royal power to the extreme. Damon him, because of his selfishness will prefer to kill the brother of Elena rather than Elena while this one had forbidden it, it will also kill the best friend of his brother because this one criticized it on his physique and his arrogance (look at the pictures of Damon), he killed her to prove that her ego was not to be tested.

Dorian will become someone he was not, we can think that this is not his true nature, he is just influenced by Lord Henry, he sees as his mentor.

His beauty will push him to an egocentrism and ask for recognition which will lead him to his fall. He becomes the opposite of what he was.

So, finally we can see a protagonist can be at the top when he does not pay too much attention to him but hubris prove, them to go down when they are obsessed by their egos, their beauty, or simply their impact, their power.

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