#themes: moon

[swallowerofdharma]

So, this is a post that probably interests only me and myself, but I just want to write down my thoughts about this page again. I was just rereading volume 39, chapter 345 or 360 depending how you count, titled “Great Gurus" 大導師 for other reasons. [Well, it’s a very revealing chapter when it comes to Berserk influences over Elden Ring]. But I really like this page and how the conversation turns personal in this moment. It’s a rare moment of calm, and perceived safety: Guts has accomplished the goal of bringing Casca to Elfhelm and that is a different kind of accomplishment than winning a battle in a fighting for life and death situation. The way the elders of Elfhelm ask about Griffith is devoid of hatred or rage. It’s curiosity even in the face of great peril: the world as they knew it is changing and they won’t have a place in the new world that is coming.

“光の���”とは 何者なのか [Who is the “Falcon of Light”?]

何を渇望して “欲望の 主護��使”として転生し [What did (he) yearn for and reincarnate as the "Guardian Angel of Desire"?]

世界をこの様に 変貌させてまで 欲するものとは 何なのか 教えては もらえぬかな? [Can you tell me what it is that (he) desire so much that (he) would change the world like this?]

On the other hand, in Guts’s mind the words are the following: やれやれ･･･ あいつ グリフィスへの 執着を振り切って ここまで 辿り着いた はずが･･･ [Yare yare… I thought I had made it this far by shaking off my attachment to (that guy) Griffith].

It’s a moment of reflection for Guts too. This is a page where you can feel how much Guts has been thinking about Griffith’s motivations, and everything else. Looking at the word 執着 (shuuchaku), the official translation went with “obsession” to convey that sense of strong “attachment”: Guts used to cling to Griffith to find a sense of purpose beyond pure survival and that hasn’t completely changed. The resources that Guts has are not infinite and that goes for his “tenacity” as well. Clinging to Griffith was easier than clinging to Casca as a source of motivation for fighting every night, if not for the help of the others he would have not succeeded. The sigil that Flora painted over the brand and that Schierke has kept at reapplying, in addition to the grounding power of Schierke’s presence against the counter effects of the Berserker Armor, the reprieve and shield against the nightmares and the evil spirits, the comfort of seeing Casca unafraid around Farnese and the others, all of it helped Guts and reaching Elfhelm had seemed like a diversion away from Griffith.

There are several different words that are interesting to me in this page. And for all the eroticism that the terms “longing” and “desire” suggest, there is something shifting from pure “thirst”, “craving”, “lust” and “greed” to a more metaphysical dimension because of the very inhuman-yet-reincarnated nature of Griffith. Something about this is still connected to Griffith’s “dreaming eyes”, to “ambition” in the sense of “aspirations”, “hopes” and “dreams”.

Elfheim teachers call Griffith 欲望の主護天使 Guardian Angel of Desire [which is the same of Berserk Volume 3 "Guardian Angel of Desire (5)"] while the God Hand salutes Griffith as 渇望の福王(よ) (Oh) Blessed King of Longing/Desire.

“Desire” as a noun in the instances above and as a verb or noun verb “longing” isn’t written in one same way depending upon who is addressing Griffith and what “title” he is addressed by. This use of different epithets in place of the person’s name (antonomasia) is interesting in itself, especially since Guts is one of the very few who is still calling him by his name with familiarity.

欲望 which is used above as a noun by the elders (Guardian Angel of Desire)

渇望 which is used above as a verb by the elders (what does he desire/yearn for?) and as a noun verb by the God Hand (Blessed King of Longing)

In both cases the kanji 望 is used that interest me here and that illustrates that dimension other than mundane that I mentioned. And for the specific detail of containing the kanji for full moon as well: as in previous posts I started to give examples of how much Griffith and Guts as characters are both tied to the moon.

Looking at the brief notes about etymology on Wiktionary:

Originally written 𦣠, an ideogrammic compound (會意 / 会意): 臣 (“eye”) + 𡈼 (“person standing on the ground”) – a person standing up and looking off into the distance. Later 月 (“moon”) was added to produce 朢. The 臣 component is now written 亡, making the current form a phono-semantic compound (形聲 / 形声, OC *maŋ, *maŋs): phonetic 亡 (OC *maŋ) + semantic 月 + semantic 𡈼.

It’s pretty amazing to read that. It’s not the first time I’ve mentioned one of my favorite chapters of Berserk "Homing" 帰巣, chapter 250 or 265 depending how you count and in that chapter Griffith is framed as exactly that: “a person standing up and looking off into the distance” and at the end of the chapter, when it’s night or later the moon is added as well and I have mused about it before, fascinated by the sense of isolation and at the same time longing for connection that the whole chapter communicates.

So why am I acting all pretentious and saying that my day started with me translating Japanese into German? Because there is a German word that evokes similar feelings that is quite impossible to translate and that is Sehnsucht.

While there is an erotic undertone in this kind of longing, it’s more tied to loss. But in other terms, the loss was inevitable, a too encompassing longing was a prophecy for unfulfillment because of how strong the tension of the desire was in a utopian and perfectionist direction: it could not be content with compromise, for something more important than a castle: if you touch me now… (now that I am weak, that I am no longer me).

[atsubie]

۫ 新月 ℳ𝖾𝗋 𝖽𝖾 𝖼𝗅𝖺𝗂𝗋 𝖽𝖾 𝗅𝗎𝗇𝖾 . ࣪

᭨ ⃟⃜ ུ۪𔓕 𝗐𝗁𝖾𝗇 𝗍𝗁𝖾 𝗆𝗈𝗈𝗇’𝗌 𝗈𝗎𝗍, 🌑ᛝৣ ۬۟

ᭊ⬤ᰯ 𝖻𝖺𝗍𝗁𝖾 𝗂𝗇 𝗆𝗈𝗈𝗇𝗅𝗂𝗀𝗁𝗍 ִ ◞ ۫

[drownthehatch]

[sweetmelodygraphics]

[grimalkinscribbles]

Mhin: The Hermit

[kazimo]

His Highness Yin Yu

[lyss-butterscotch]

Hades style portraits for the doomed siblings

[hisbodycorpse]

A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night. ⎯⎯ ⠀🪓

♰ຶ ⠀ㅤㅤ ▃ #𝕾͙̦ͥ̍𝐚̵͟𝐰̵ 🔪 , 寫的 第三本書. ᵋ 𝟑͟𝟐

[crabsnpersimmons]

Happy Halloween from the "Have You Eaten?" Boys!

[merrigel]

I want it back = I drag its dead weight forward

[isaacz]

These are not finished in the slightest but i wanna share anyway, rainworld doodles cuz i've been playing alot with friends lately First couple of designs are: five pebbles, no significant harrasment, seven red suns and looks to the moon respectfully. And as for the slugcat, thats my oc, his name is rascal and he's part lizard, his ability is that his stomach is basically a hammer space and can keep any items inside, literally any, like give 5 spears to this mf he can keep it for u(also he's moons body guard AHEM AHEM). The other slugcat is my friends oc @sleeepybacon :D

[swallowerofdharma]

So, what is Berserk about after all?

Please be considerate to me, don’t repost this, don’t share it outside of tumblr, don’t copy parts of it, thank you.

I have read really funny critiques and reviews of Berserk. Often they would refer to Miura supposedly saying that he didn’t plan everything out and they would use this statement to support their argument that after the Golden Age arc the story just looked like it dragged on. One, don’t ever fully believe what artists and writers say about their work. Second, without a proper conclusion it is impossible to make that kind of judgement and the story is ongoing. Then, not having a plan or having just vague ideas and taking inspiration here and there isn’t how manga works or how it gets published. When asked in an interview why he started creating Haibane Renmei as a doujinshi, Yoshitoshi Abe replied: “With mainstream publishing, it would've been difficult to do it with that avenue because of this particular approach with everything being adlibbed. I don't know how the story will be developed, how it's going to end up, or what the ending's going to be. If you go to a mainstream publisher, by their general approach, they have to know what the characters are, who they are, what the story's going to be, and how the story's going to develop so they know if there's going to be a serial, continuing storyline. They need to know how it's going to go”. Even though plans can be renewed and renegotiated, Miura still needed to make solid advanced plans and decisions and respect deadlines and page quotas. Even without considering this, the world building of Berserk seems too intentional and coherent to me to think that he didn’t really know how the story would go. Granted he created a reality that could be changed and bent by the human imagination and psyche, from the inside. This happened to be a brilliant choice for a long project like the Berserk manga.

I once read a review that pointed out the weakness of the later arcs and episodes, making the hypothesis that Miura was influenced by the success of stories like One Piece and Pirates of the Caribbean. I can’t really say that I share this opinion, either. Reviews like these make me smile, because they reveal how people missed a very big clue that Miura never really hid. Berserk was inspired by the story of Peter Pan as told by J.M. Barrie and reinterpreted in several different ways, not only visually. He went as far as dedicating to it the Lost Children chapters, immediately after the Eclipse, when the tension of the story was higher than it ever had been. We should read the Lost Children as an homage to the story of Peter Pan and Wendy that plays into the already disquieting themes of the original in darker tones and with much more horrifying elements; but we should also pay great attention to the Lost Children chapters as an important recontextualization of the events of the Golden Age arc. While I want to dedicate proper analysis and attention to this, I am going to add here that in Peter Pan we already had the pirates, the islands with hidden caves and the mermaids. The journey to Skellig island and Elfhelm had to be long enough for Moonlight Boy to make an appearance at least twice before the big reveal of his full identity the third time, and since he can only appear on nights of a full moon, Miura had to make the readers feel that time had passed. But Guts had always belonged in Neverland.

In my rudimentary outline of various elements that contributed greatly in building the world and story of Berserk, I actually ran out of space. And I want to properly address the various points and develop them more. For the moment I just really wanted to show that Miura had a very strong grip over the story and that he was really attentive to nuances. I said to myself, if I want to criticize the writing in Berserk at least I have to make sure I understand it to a sufficient extent.

Also I really wanted to at least give an idea of how important a role Shōjo manga had to Berserk. I hope to be able to fully explore this element soon.

[1000sunnygo]

Shanks and Rosinante are the same age.

Bless this tweet for putting their ages together.

These two men were born in the same year. At the same place. As younger brothers of morally corrupt older brothers proud of their Celestial lineage. Both became deeply involved with a young "D" approximately around the same time. Both stole a legendary devil fruit in the exact same year, 13 years before the start of the story, when Luffy was 6 and Law was 13.

I've been thinking about it all day.

[wardinespurrit]

redid my hms designs. i go on a ramble in the tags beware

[minicronch]

his poor old mans heart is also plane-shaped

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

I came here for the silly haha doodles, but I've stayed for the absolutely blazing commentary in the tags. Your analysis of this story is so so so good! Thanks for all the work and thought you put into this!

I am just a silly little comics blog. I am not hiding anything in the tags, no way. Never.