The Kilted Writer

The Giver , by Lois Lowry, contains a lot of mind, body, and spirit symbolism on a variety of levels. First is Jonas and his two friends, Asher and Fiona. Jonas is the mind, Asher the body, and Fiona the spirit. Second is Jonas's family. His father is the spirit, his mother is the mind, and the children in the household collectively make up a body character. When examined individually, however, Jonas is the mind, Lily (his sister) is the spirit, and Gabriel (the child from the nursery they are nurturing during the night) is the body. I just glossed over this without giving any real reasons as to why this is true because I want to get into a slightly different topic. In my workshops, I often talk about occupations and their relation to the mind, body, and spirit symbolism. The Giver is a great example of the use of occupations to help strengthen your character symbolism. Spirit characters have a lot of compassion and tend to put their "cause" ahead of themselves. In...

In the last post , I discussed the "parent" level of the family model of mind, body, and spirit as it relates to the popular science show, Mythbusters . Now, I will take a look at the "children" level of the model.  What's interesting about this show is that it's been on the air long enough to see the "children" mature into an independent team. In the beginning, the team did a lot of "behind-the-scenes" work, but were rarely in front of the camera. Their responsibilities were simply to build whatever was necessary. Somewhere around season four, the team moved to the front of the camera, but their responsibilities were still limited. Now, they share almost equal on-screen time and develop tests for their own myths, independent of their "parents," Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage. The Mind Character: Grant Imahara Grant has a background in robotics. On the show, he is often responsible for calculations and scientific...

(Note: This post was originally written in October 2013) First, I want to thank all of you for keeping the blog's stats up while I was away. If you follow me (Kilted Writer) on Facebook, you know I was traveling for my 25th high school reunion. It was a great time, more so than I would have ever expected. Now, though, it's back to work. I want to be as prepared and up to date as possible for my presentation at the Castle Rock Writers Conference on November 23rd. Unlike previous posts, which have focused on "film and fiction" this one will look at the popular series, Mythbusters . This is not a fiction series, but it is produced for entertainment value. Now in its 14th season, I think they've succeeded. Part of that success can be seen in the interactions of the cast members as they set out to confirm or bust various "myths" from all parts of society. The chemistry between the cast members can be partially explained in terms of mind, body...

In a way, Joan of Arcadia is similar to The Mentalist when it comes to mind, body, and spirit.  In The Mentalist , you have a mind character, a spirit character, and then a team that collectively makes up the body character. When you examine the team members individually, though, you see another layer of mind, body, and spirit. In Joan of Arcadia , Will Girardi (Joe Mantegna) is a mind character, Helen Girardi (Mary Steenburgen) is a spirit character, and their three kids collectively make up a body character. When the three kids are examined individually, you can see another layer of mind, body and spirit. The Spirit Character: Joan Girardi (Amber Tamblyn) Joan sees and interacts with God. She will do whatever God asks her to do, but often reluctantly. She often asks "why," but continues forward despite never getting an answer to her questions. God explains that she can see him because she is open to more possibilities than most people. This is undersco...

In the previous post about The Mentalist , I described how the 'team,' collectively, was the body character in one layer of mind, body and spirit. In this post, I will discuss how the 'team,' individually, make up a second layer of mind, body, and spirit. This form of layering is fairly common in depictions of families in film and fiction. Shows like Family Ties or Joan of Arcadia have the same kind of construct, with the mother and father as mind and spirit and the children as the body in the first layer. The children, individually, then make up the second layer of mind, body, and spirit. The Mind Character: Kimball Cho (Tim Kang) One of the classic cop mind characters is Joe Friday. His famous line, 'Just the facts, ma'am,' defines the mind character mentality. Kimball Cho is Joe Friday with a comic twist, but even then, the comic lines are delivered with an air of seriousness. Cho doesn't like to get involved in side issues when...