cybrxkhan
Asian Xwedodah
One man's trash is another man's treasure; beauty in the eye of the beholder; etc.
Anyhow, life-changing stuff? For fiction, I have a few works of fiction I call my personal "Gods of Fiction." They are not called Gods just because I like them per se or because they are well-crafted (and in fact being good stories isn't technicallya requirement), but because they represent important influences on my life and my creative writing/imagination/what have you. I don't really think these things are necessarily something that others might enjoy, much less appreciate the way I do - these things, I think, are very personalized and individualized - thus not quite ansewring the OP, but I feel like it would be nice ot mention them here.
Anyways, these "Gods" are, in semi-chronological order:
1. Grave of the Fireflies. When I encountered this at ~8 years of age, it was a rather sobering and shocking experience, particularly since, well, I was a little kid. It was the first step in helping me learn a bit more about the real world and the fact that it wasn't Disney. Of all the things on this list, it is probably the most depressing, and something I would actually recommend to everyone. I believe even the great movie critic Roger Ebert considered it one of the greatest movies of all time, so despite being, well, technically an anime, this is not something that should be taken lightly, at all.
2. Lord of the Rings I came across slowly during my late Elementary School and early Middle School years. What it did for me was introduce to me the idea not so much that there could be other beautifully crafted worlds - any good work of fiction can do that - but that in these worlds, one could put in history, geography, politics, mythology, language, and more. In other words, LotR introduced me to conworlding, one of my grand hobbies. And conworlding, in the way that sci-fi has done for some in science and humanities, has allowed me to appreciate many aspects of the real world by analyzing them in a made-up one - in other words, a perfect laboratory for trying to understand a myriad of things. Conworlding, and the creative writing it is so closely related to, also was an important way for me to creatively let off steam during my teenage years. I still say to this day that the creator I aspire to be like is Tolkien, not so much because of the writing, but because of the conworlding.
3. Romance of the Three Kingdoms. For those who don't know it's considered one of CHina's four great classical novels, and in some cases the greatest one, and it is widely appreciated across the Sinosphere (i.e. China, Korea, Japan, Vietnam). My dad bought an English translation of it for me during my 7th grade. Like LotR, it ignited my imagination and made me think history no longer as a bunch of facts (albeit interesting ones), but as a living, breathing narrative and epic, something that could be spun into literature. In many ways, while LotR may have prepared me for it, it was RotK that laid the foundations for my interest in creative writing, as much of my early creative writing tried to emulate the historical epic style of it. Another important effect RotK had for me was that it also helped make me more aware of being Asian and all that, and it did turn me into a bit of a Sinophile during my middle school years.
4. Azumanga Daioh. Now we get to the more interesting stuff. Azumanga Daioh is an anime series, and, if you know anything about it, not entirely something that sounds like life-changing, deep material, although it apparently has had a lot of influence on many anime that came after it. My favorite cousin forced me to watch it during the summer after my ninth grade (I didn't watch any anime out of my own volition until after high school, which is quite strange considering most of my Asian friends watched anime to some degree growing up and even now). It is ultimately a comedy, indeed, but a comedy in the style of Seinfeld: nothing much happens, per se.
It taught me a few things, however. Firstly, to not take things too seriously, to be more easy-going and laid-back sometimes. Life isn't always a struggle, a terrible thing to be constantly cynical at. A fortune cookie message I got around this time, I think, summarizes the issue well: "For those who feel, life is a tragedy. For those who laugh, life is a comedy." Secondly, for my creative writing, it introduced the novel idea that I didn't need grand plots and sweeping epics to make a good story; in fact, the simple and the whimsical and be just as enjoyable and even profound. This "slice of life" style, which is so rampant in contemporary anime (and American sitcoms, coincidentally, in my opinion) but rarely developed successfully, was also something I added to my reportoire of creative writing (or tried to).
5. The Catcher in the Rye is a rather controversial book - you either love it or hate it. I can understand why people hate it, and won't go into that here, but for me, I loved it. It was assigned to me in English class during 10th grade, and for me it was the finest piece of characterization I ever came across. In fact I admit I can't think of a book I read more quickly than that.
As for its influence on my life, I like to think of it as the more sobering, angsty half to Azumanga Daioh. Whereas The Catcher in the Rye showed me the dark side of things, so to speak, Azumanga Daioh showed me the light side. It made me truly ponder about life for the first time (regardless of whether such pondering was adolescent or not - it was at least a start), and, it also made me not want to be an angsty teenager, which would have important ramifications for me psychologically in various aspects of my life in the coming few years. In terms of creative writing, it also made me realize the importance of characterization.
6. Samurai Jack is something I added as a God of Fiction because I don't like the number six and I wanted #7 to not be #6. However, I won't deny that over the years it has had its importance to me and I've always considered it something of a demi-god. Its importance, however, is more in the realms of conworlding and creative writing. It just gave me a lot of ideas, that's all; and as such I suppose it's the "weakest" of my Gods of Fiction.
7. Last on the list (so far) is an anime series named Hyouka. Like Azumanga Daioh above, this one was a bit of a surprise to me, since I wasn't really expecting any anime to make that big of an impact on my life. But this one did, very much. I wouldn't recommend it to most people, even those that don't mind anime; it's very slow, and when I say slow, I seriously mean it. Think of the slowest-paced work of fiction you can think of; Hyouka will make it look like a Hollywood action movie. That's not to mention not a lot of people would agree with the fact that it's well-written or a good story. Fair enough, I suppose, it's not to everyone's taste. Anyhow, I came across this a couple of years ago, and it helped, in a sense, bridge the gap between the darkness of The Catcher in the Rye and the lightness of Azumanga Daioh for me, by introducing a more sober, moderate, bittersweet middle. It's difficult for me to exactly explain why it resonated so much with me, perhaps because I am still struggling psychologically and emotionally with some of the things I relate it with.
Whatever it is, it made something *click* in my mind - that *click* helped me slowly realize that something had not been right since I started college, that there was something deep inside me that bothered me. This *click* eventually led me to realize I needed to see a counselor/psychologist, and I am quite glad I did, as I was diagnosed with mild anxiety and depression. Which all makes Hyouka seem like a rather depressing series; it's not. On the contrary, it does the slice of life thing pretty well: quietly observing the little things. It never threw at me any obvious "deep" message, or profound insight; it slowly warmed me up over time. Every time I watched an episode, I found myself bored at first, yet, by the episode's end, I felt as if I watched something amazing; it is, I assure you, an addicting feeling. In fact the entire series was like that - at first I found the series passable (which I suppose translates to "good" for a normal person) but not memorable, yet as time went on I liked it more and more, until literally the last five minutes of the last episode convinced me this was truly the first God of fiction I had encountered in years.
To be honest, I'm still not sure what exactly it did to and for me. I still sometimes call the current phase of my life the "Age of Hyouka." Perhaps, in a way, it was the thing that helped me break free of my childhood and begin my path into adulthood. I don't know. It's a strange thing. In a way it actually left me with more questions than answers about life, about myself, about my past, my present, my future. But maybe that's how it's meant to be. Again, I don't really recommend this to most people, but I do wish there were more people I could talk to it about. I sincerely think I haven't delved into how much an effect it's had on me at an emotional, even spiritual level (and as someone who isn't the most religious person, I don't say that lightly).
Anyhow, I've rambled long enough about all these Gods of Fiction. I've never really written about them much before, come to think of it, despite the influence they've had on my life to varying degrees. What I would like to emphasize is that I love these stories not because they were good or profound per se; in fact, some might even say some of these aren't that profound to begin with. They were profound because I made them profound.
I suppose this has always been my issue with fiction. I might read the greatest story ever made, but if I don't make it great for myself in some way, then it simply isn't great. It is very easy for me to be bored or at best indifferent to a lot of fiction - an old game my friends and cousins would sometimes play with me is to see whether I'll actually like a book, a movie, an anime, anything, and almost always the answer will be something like "meh." My Gods of Fiction aren't great because they are inherently great; they are great because I (or my experiences) made them great. Oddly there is something that sounds existentialist about that, but I won't say further because my knowledge of philosophy is limited.
Good grief that was the longest rant I've typed in years.
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