Death as person - A funny part of the story? Or serious stuff?
Death as a person is commonly known to any reader of the "Discworld" series from Terry Pratchett. Also death appears in the series "Supernatural" as one of the apocalyptic riders. Another approach in this case is not known to me.
The thought of death as a "person" is something that follows me through my whole writing life. But there is always the one question: Is death as a person only good for a small funny part of the story (something like "taking out the pressure of the scene") or can death as a person be a serious part of the story?
This is the question to you.
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Anthropomorphic personifications of death are quite old, and the older ones focus on the frightening aspects of death. Look, for example, at Oscar Wilde's The Young King:
From the darkness of a cavern Death and Avarice watched them, and Death said, ‘I am weary; give me a third of them and let me go.’ But Avarice shook her head. ‘They are my servants,’ she answered.
And Death said to her, ‘What hast thou in thy hand?’
‘I have three grains of corn,’ she answered; ‘what is that to thee?’
‘Give me one of them,’ cried Death, ‘to plant in my garden; only one of them, and I will go away.’
‘I will not give thee anything,’ said Avarice, and she hid her hand in the fold of her raiment.
And Death laughed, and took a cup, and dipped it into a pool of water, and out of the cup rose Ague. She passed through the great multitude, and a third of them lay dead. A cold mist followed her, and the water-snakes ran by her side.
Death is one of the four Riders of the Apocalypse. Milton in Paradise Lost describes Death as the son of Sin and Satan, Satan having raped his daughter Sin.
Thus, as you can see, Death Personified can be taken seriously and dramatically. I think Terry Pratchett was actually first to treat Death in a humorous way, moving away from the traditional traits of cruelty and enjoying humanity's suffering to curiosity and love for humanity.
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Discworld aside, as I'm sadly not very familiar with it, I can think of at least two examples of Death personified being an important, serious character:
- "The Book Thief", both the original novel and the film adaptation. While Death is not the main character, he is the narrator, and his role is treated not only seriously, but sympathetically to a degree - at the end of the book, he notes "I am haunted by humans".
- The classic movie The Seventh Seal, and its famous climax in which the protagonist plays a chess match against Death, with the prize being his very life and soul.
So yes, Death personified can certainly be a major, serious part of a story.
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