Back to the Beginning: How Creation Myths Affect Character Motivation
By Kelsey Allagood | August 21, 2021 |
If you’re struggling with character motivations, sometimes it helps to go back. Waaaay back.
I don’t mean to that character’s childhood: even farther back. Back to the absolute beginning of time.
This may seem like overkill, especially if you’re not writing speculative fiction. But if your characters grew up in any culture at all—and I hope they did, unless they were born and matured inside of test tubes in an off-planet laboratory, in which case, you’d better be prepared to write about the psychological implications of that mess—then their culture will have some sort of explanation for how their world started.
And the story of that creation myth will have shaped a great deal of your character’s culture, from morality to ethics to social behavior.
For a contemporary example, all you have to do is look at an “Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve” protest sign to see how creation myths still have a very real impact on modern life.
Not all creation myths need to be weaponized by those intending to do harm to others, of course, but it certainly does happen. And if you are writing speculative fiction, and you’re creating new worlds from whole cloth, it’s even more important to think through the implications of the political, religious, social, and economic systems you’re creating. If you don’t, you risk both writing a world that feels incomplete and, more importantly, potentially doing harm to real people.
How? I think some speculative authors are wont to take the lazy way to making “diverse” worlds, and cultures into their books that are thinly-veiled analogues to real-world peoples. One of the problems with this approach, of course, is that these analogues tend to reduce those “other” cultures to stereotypes, and frankly, it’s 2021 and we should all move past stereotypes in our writing.
Plus, as I say above, creation myths can help you work through your character’s motivations by exploring the foundations of their moral system.
Plus, it’s fun.
(That last one might be subjective.)
What Even Is a Creation Myth?
Creation myths are symbolic narratives of how the world began, and they are super important to how your characters view themselves and their roles in the world. Characters don’t need to be religious to be affected by creation myths; they don’t have to believe them as truth, or even think about them at all. But even if faith does not play an important role in your character’s life, which is completely valid, their worldview will be shaped by the beliefs of those that surround them. Characters can choose to reject the worldview they were raised with, or work within it, but something’s going to exist there whether they like it or not.
How Did It All Begin?
In your character’s culture, how do people (I’m going to use “people” in this post, but replace with fae, orcs, or whatever) believe they came into existence? Who was The First Person?
You’ve got Adam and Eve.
You’ve got Rangi and Papa.
You’ve got Vishnu and Lakshmi.
You’ve got the Sumerian debate between sheep and grain.
You’ve got earth mothers and spider women.
Find your fantasy culture’s creation myth. If you’re already far along in your worldbuilding/writing, work backwards. What kind of creation story would a tribe of Norse-inspired raiders have? (Hopefully there’s krakens.)
Do You Have a World Tree or a Spinning Black Hole of Chaos?
Even more esoteric: in the beginning was—what? The Word? The Way? Chaos? The abyss? If you like typologies, anthropologists like Marta Weigle have proposed several over the years that you can find through a quick Google.
Some common motifs include:
- Secretion: Humans are created from the emissions of gods, such as Spider Grandmother.
- Earth-diver: A diver, such as a bird or amphibian, plunges through a primordial ocean and brings up sand or mud from the seabed, which becomes the terrestrial world.
- Emergence: People leave a cramped, womb-like world for a wider, well-lit world, such as in Diné Bahaneʼ.
- Ex nihilo: Creation out of nothing. Central to Christianity, Islam, and Judaism, but also to some Sumerian, Egyptian, and Babylonian myths.
I don’t like typologies except as the barest of jumping-off points, so once I have a vague idea of a culture, I like to just play around in my head until I land on something that feels right.
Pro tip: Because cultures are not monolithic, most civilizations had several versions of creation myths. Why not make up a couple for your story? What happens when believers of the different myths clash?
Once you’ve settled on a typology for your world, start thinking about how that typology might affect your characters. Some examples:
- If some of your characters believe that an omniscient being created the world ex nihilo, might they also believe that said omniscient being is the only one that could destroy their world? How might that affect these characters’ ability to fight a terrestrial Big Bad intent on destroying their world?
- What might a coming-of-age ceremony look like in a culture that teaches humans emerged from a primordial ocean?
- What sort of governing structures might be more likely to take shape in a civilization that believes their world came from the triumph of order over chaos? Might there be factions that would prefer a return to chaos?
Why bother with creation myths?
You may never actually write the creation myth in your book. But allow me, if you will, to quote the illustrious and infallible journal Wikipedia: “An origin myth often functions to justify the current state of affairs.”
Think about examples in your own culture where creation myths have been trotted out to prove a modern point. I’m sure you can think of at least one.
Questions to consider about your creation myths:
- How do these origin myths inform the current state of affairs in your world? Is the monarch supposedly descended from a deity? Or was your tribal confederation created from the body parts of a goddess? (I’m not saying these are the only things that make sense in these cases. Try to upend expectations!)
- How do the origin myths of different cultures clash? What happens when the monarchy tries to impose themselves on the tribal confederation? (I will note here to consider, even if you’re “creating” a culture, the real-world influences you’re drawing from and to sit with whether you are the right person to be telling this culture’s story. Don’t hurt real people.)
- How much of the origin myth is history? How much is fact? How much is pure mythological wish fulfillment? How has the story been altered or exploited by current affairs?
- Is there a culture that has a concept of evolution? How does that affect those who cling to the creation myth?
Creation stories have an impact on how your characters conceive of their places in the world. Is there a lot of Chosen One mythology in their background? What if there’s not, but your story requires a Chosen One?
Have you developed a creation myth for your story? Let me know in the comments!
[coffee]
Kelsey Allagood (she/her) is a writer, occasional photographer, and trained political analyst specializing in the causes of war and systemic oppression. This background led her to begin writing fantasy fiction steeped in the anthropology of conflict.
Her writing can be found in literary magazines such as Barrelhouse, GRIFFEL, Menacing Hedge, and Wanderlust. Her photography has been featured in RESURRECTION mag. She has also written on peaceful resistance movements, art as a form of political resistance, and countering violent extremist ideology.
Kelsey has a Bachelor’s Degree in international and cultural studies from the University of Tampa and a Master’s Degree in conflict resolution from Georgetown University.
She lives in Maryland with her husband, mother, and a rescue dog named Henry.
A creation myth. That’s a thought. Because if my character does believe the alpha is the only one who can destroy her world, then she would believe she has the power to stop the evil being killing her family.
I’m bookmarking this post. For when I return from vacation.
So glad you found the post helpful, Alice!
How I love this post, Kelsey! In my first novel, the MC is a teen raised by a very Catholic mother and a dad whose past is steeped in magic and myth. This contrast in cultures is the bedrock of the story, but so many delicious and unexpected side-conflicts have arisen from the main one. For me as a reader, even a whiff of an underlying creation story not only gives characters believable motivations but also gives the story more depth. I also love when a book opens a doorway for me into another belief system. Down the years, my world has expanded because of stories that offer this! Thank you for a wonderful essay!!
Oh I love it when worldviews collide in a story! It just feels so true to life, even when those worldviews come entirely from an author’s imagination. Glad you enjoyed this post, Susan!
Thanks for a great post. I actually spent time doing this for a WIP last year, and created a world timeline in excel. There were two benefits. I ended up with a richer understanding of my characters, and it alleviated a lot of lock-down boredom!
Frankly, I get so much enjoyment out of fleshing out the worlds I create even if readers will never see 99% of the details. It does make a perfect lockdown activity, ha!
Thank you, Kelsey! This is a perfectly timed reminder to plant my rear and finally—finally!—put together the pieces. At present, I have seven different beliefs in place for multiple cultures, some more developed than others. They’ve evolved as I’ve built my series, but there are holes here and there. I know that if I focus on this, which has been on my mind all summer, I have at least 75% of the work already done.
There are also some gaps, places I know an unnamed belief(s) would fill, especially in Pannulus, which is an archipelago and where real krakens exist (along with serpents, hydras, and giant squids). Thanks to you, too, I’m struck by my omission of Ryzer in all this. It’s the literally blue moon that only appears for one month out of every three.
Krakens!!
I’m happy you found this post motivating, Christina! Sounds like you have a lot going on in your book, but that makes for such a rich and interesting backdrop, I have no doubt that putting all the pieces together will be well worth the effort!
Best, most thought-provoking article I have read in quite a while. Thank you.
Thank you so much, Michael!
Kelsey, this is brilliant. I know as novelists we always have a lot of balls in the air, sometimes more than we can manage, but your approach taps into the character’s idea of what it means for her to be human, who she sees as her kind (or tribe), who is not her kind or tribe, and what conflicts that might (read: should) present in the course of the story. That’s deep stuff, which can only make the character more fascinating, more profound, more compelling.
This was a great read. Thanks.
Seconding David here. What a juicy post this is, Kelsey — a fine stew of an essay. Thanks for all of the deep thoughts, pushing us to get to know our characters at a foundational level. Thanks so much.
Thank you, thank you, Therese, you’re too kind!
David, thank you! Maybe it’s my conflict resolution background talking, but I firmly believe that every story is enriched by characters who know their group identity/identities, even if that’s not the main point of the story. It’s such a fundamental part of being human, that ingroup/outgroup identification. So glad you enjoyed this!
Evolution itself can function as a creation myth used to justify “the way things are”, e.g. a man telling his partner that he cheated on her because evolution didn’t “intend” for men to be monogamous.
That doesn’t necessarily check out, scientifically speaking, but that doesn’t stop people saying it.
Absolutely! In fact, I’d say it works even better that way, because most creation myths don’t check out scientifically, ha! Thanks for this great point, Deborah.