The Common Hero

"There are sins or (let us call them as the world calls them) evil memories which are hidden away by man in the darkest places of the heart but they abide there and wait. He may suffer their memory to grow dim, let them be as though they had not been and all but persuade himself that they were not or at least were otherwise. Yet a chance word will call them forth suddenly and they will rise up to confront him in the most various circumstances, a vision or a dream, or while timbrel and harp soothe his senses or amid  the cool silver tranquility of the evening or at the feast at midnight when he is now filled with wine." 

I found this quote during my research for my paper in Ulysses. Joyce's words struck deep. Here was someone who lived years ago but still able to reach to the depths of my soul and say something so profound that it brought tears to my eyes. Joyce was able to describe the inner apocalypse better than I have ever heard or probably will ever hear. His words bring to mind the epicness of an apocalypse within the soul. One word seems to have the power to drag each of us down to the depths of the Underworld but we all have the power to rise up and create a sense of tranquility from this pit of suffering. Suffering truly is what an apocalypse is. It is painful to gain knowledge as is shown from our fall from grace and from Fredrick Turner's talk.

However, one thing separates Joyce's words from that of the epics that we have discussed. His is works represents the common man, not the hero. Or maybe I should say not the hero in the sense that we normally think of him. Joyce reveals to all of us that the common man is the hero. His words above have finally called that knowledge forth within me. It has been a painful and harrowing experience to get to that knowledge but it was worth the struggle. Everyman is the hero. It seems weird to come out and blatantly state something so profound. Because everyman can fall to the depths of the Underworld through his own apocalypse, he gains the power to become the hero in his own story. Maybe the greatest stories are not of traveling to far off lands and battling dragons but going deep within the self to battle the inner demons. Of going deep into the collective unconscious and coming back with a greater base of knowledge that is able to be shared and hopefully say the one word that will spark someone else's apocalypse. Thus we are all the Common Hero, not because we are all average but because we all share the journey of creation, initiation, and apocalypse.