Haha I appear to be stalking you today or something, but every time I stop back to check my email or flick through the flist, you seem have to posted something fascinating.
Seriously, I am in love with you for this. The combination of pietas and patriapotestas is possibly the best explanation of John's actions I've ever heard. The idea of patriapotestas is so in line with the show in some ways, that a daughter can find a way to marry out of her father's family, but a son is stuck under that thumb forever. I'm thinking of all these single mothers and strong women Sam and Dean sort of flash past on the road, freeing them from their literal monsters, but the two of them trapped in this loop of John's power forever, even after his death.
And John - unable to distinguish between duty and love. His essential disowning of Sam, and the handling of Dean's near death. You lay it out so beautifully. I love that idea of him as Aeneas, pater Aeneas, scrabbling to remember Creusa, sort of bound by the dead. And I can really see him - John that is - finding a Dido figure at some point and just forcing himself to move on. Sam's betrayal feels like a betrayal, because in a way, John's sacrificed everything for his (Sam's) future.
Sort of extrapolating from this I guess, you could cast the tense relationship between father and sons on SPN as a conflict between Greek and Roman values. Sam coming of age and needing to strike out on his own. Dean operating on this exalted sense of love and emotion. Hector could have his emotional moment with Andromache, and leave to die, abandoning his son and that future. John can't - he's already traded one for the other.
So basically, rawwr, you're amazing. And my John love has inched up because of this.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2007-01-22 01:29 am (UTC)Seriously, I am in love with you for this. The combination of pietas and patriapotestas is possibly the best explanation of John's actions I've ever heard. The idea of patriapotestas is so in line with the show in some ways, that a daughter can find a way to marry out of her father's family, but a son is stuck under that thumb forever. I'm thinking of all these single mothers and strong women Sam and Dean sort of flash past on the road, freeing them from their literal monsters, but the two of them trapped in this loop of John's power forever, even after his death.
And John - unable to distinguish between duty and love. His essential disowning of Sam, and the handling of Dean's near death. You lay it out so beautifully. I love that idea of him as Aeneas, pater Aeneas, scrabbling to remember Creusa, sort of bound by the dead. And I can really see him - John that is - finding a Dido figure at some point and just forcing himself to move on. Sam's betrayal feels like a betrayal, because in a way, John's sacrificed everything for his (Sam's) future.
Sort of extrapolating from this I guess, you could cast the tense relationship between father and sons on SPN as a conflict between Greek and Roman values. Sam coming of age and needing to strike out on his own. Dean operating on this exalted sense of love and emotion. Hector could have his emotional moment with Andromache, and leave to die, abandoning his son and that future. John can't - he's already traded one for the other.
So basically, rawwr, you're amazing. And my John love has inched up because of this.