Myth and heroes : how has our vision of heroes evolved through time ?

Synthèse notion

Oral Bac Anglais

Myths and heroes :

Today, i’m going to talk about the notion of myths and heroes . To begin with, i would like to give a definition of the notion. 

A myth evokes, the human condition in general. Its history passed on, at first orally and then embodied by a hero, a place or a community. To question the myths, it’s to be interested in the heroes and in the narratives which establish a collective identity. The universal character of the myth allows to highlight the particular way,  every cultural area interprets the human experiment and builds works to express it. Every period borrows and updates certain myths or creates new.                                                                                                                                     A hero can be a fictitious or real character who marked the tradition, the history, the everyday life. The popular culture and the counterculture do not stop producing their own heroes (folklore, comic strips).

In relation to the notion, we can wonder , how has our vision of heroes evolved through time ?                                                                                                      From the traditional warriors to the modern saviors .

1. Traditional hero

The word "hero" appeared for the first time in Homère's narratives. Indeed, the Greek Hero of the antiquity sets up as model the warrior, who become an idealized image of the man. Further to a victorious fight, the warriors of the winning camp applauded their leader. At this time the Greek society puts forward the military jobs.

Thus the hero constitutes an mirror of the Greek society because he reflects an ideal military by the strength, the courage. And an political ideal because he possesses generally a link with the power or it’s himself the leader of the city.

The antique hero always wished an honorable and glorious death, to stay in the history. Achille is a typical example of this will, having the choice between an honorable death but at the price of a short life or a long but dark life, this last chosen the glory of a fast death. The cult returned to these symbols is a way to make them continue through times and beyond their death.

For exemple, in class we’ve study the story of William Wallace, a Scottish knight,  who became a central early figure in the wars to secure Scottish freedom from the English, becoming one of his country's greatest national heroes. He was seen by the Scots as a martyr and as a symbol of the struggle for independence, and his efforts continued after his death.

1. Modern hero

But over the centuries, the slaying hero gradually fell out of fashion, thanks in large measure to the horrors of World War I and Vietnam. Our ideal of the hero morphed instead into a courageous soul who is no less afraid of death but more focused on saving lives than taking them. Like Irena Sendler, a Polish nurse during the Second World War, who save two thousand and five hundred childnfrom death in her toolbox.