God and Superheroes
At his blog, Christopher Priest recently discussed a conflict he had with an editor while working on a novel that included The Spectre as a character. The issue was whether it was appropriate for Priest to mention God within the context of the story.
Actually, as I explained to him, I was only trying to be as truthful to the Spectre character as I could. Since World War II, the Spectre has worked for, well, God. I wasn't ever allowed to call the Spectre's boss “God in the book because it made this editor a staunch atheist— uncomfortable. But the Spectre has always worked for God and has, as a result, always know there is a God and known God. I told my editor, respectfully, that this is just the fundamental basics of the character, not some agenda of mine.
This entry has already provoked quite a lot of debate at Priest's site. He has gone on to elaborate on his own views on spirituality and science in subsequent posts.
So what do you think? Is mentioning God, within the context of a Spectre story, proselytizing or merely being true to the character.
posted by Unknown @ 1:47 PM
4 Comments:
I don't think it's proselytizing. When will people understand that just because you don't believe in a religion it doesn't mean that the religion doesn't exist. Just because you don't believe in something doesn't mean it must never be spoken about in your presence. I don't believe in a lot of things that modern organized religion believes in, but I don't have a problem with them believing and participating in what they believe even around me. Things don't always have to fit a certain point of view.
I don't think it's proselytizing any more than the various writers of Wonder Woman have been promoting ancient Greek religious beliefs. Atheistic zealots are just as irritating to me as their religious counterparts, sometimes.
Although a monotheistic, Biblical God does sort of present problems in a shared-universe setting, at times. It can be kind of hard to reconcile all the various interpretations of the divine together. (Does Neil Gaiman's Death welcome people into the Heaven of the Spectre's God? And is that the same heaven that Zauriel came from, and how does he relate to the angels from Hellblazer...and so on.)
I think DC (since we're talking about the Spectre) has tried to be pretty consistent about its afterlife. I particularly remember a Captain Atom arc which featured both Gaiman's Death and Nekron, a "lord of the dead" from an old Green Lantern Corps miniseries.
But no, I don't think it's prosletyzing either if the Spectre works for an all-powerful supreme being ("The Presence"). In terms of the celestial organizational chart, the Presence would be at the top, followed by the Endless, and then the various pantheons. Zauriel and the Spectre both work for the Presence. That pretty much locks DC into a monotheistic cosmology, but it still frees DC from specifically endorsing one of the monotheistic religions.
Nope, not proselytizing.
It would be like writing a priest, minister, or rabbi character and not allowing them to mention God.
Just my two cents,
puff
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