Mind/Body/Spirit Societies
(Note: This post was originally written in January 2013) I am back from the holidays and will try to get back onto my regular Tuesday/Friday posting schedule. I have a three-part post I will be doing covering Veronica Roth's Divergent , but before I get into it, I want to introduce the idea of mind, body, and spirit societies. I will use J.R.R. Tolkien's Middle Earth as my example, here. The Hobbit is a well-known story, so I have no qualms including 'spoiler' information here. In a mind-body-spirit society, one race or class of individuals is defined by its overall characteristic traits. One race or class is known to all as the keepers of knowledge, for example. They bring reason to the corporate discussion and their input is often the source of conflict in a story. In SF or Fantasy, they are usually long-lived and maybe even immortal. In Middle Earth, the mind race is the race of elves, and in The Hobbit , it is the elves who advise against retaking the...