Data Bases • Custom Term Papers • Free Term Papers • Free Research Papers • Free Essays • Free Book Reports • Plagiarism? Links • Top 100 Term Paper Sites • Top 25 Essay Sites • Top 50 Essay Sites • Search 97,000 Papers @ DirectEssays.com • Search 101,000 Papers @ ExampleEssays.com • Search 90,000 Papers @ MegaEssays.com Free Essays • Term Paper Sites • Chuck III's Free Essays • Free College Essays • TermPaperSites.com • My Term Papers • Get Free Essays • Essay World • Planet Papers	Search Lots of Essays Back to Subjects - Book Reports Origins of the Shadow in A Wizard of Earthsea Origins of the Shadow in A Wizard of Earthsea Ged, the main character in The Wizard of Earthsea, by Ursula K. LeGuin, through an act of pride and spite unwittingly unleashes a powerful shadow creature on the world, and the shadow hunts Ged wherever he goes. After failing to kill Ged the first time, he learns the only way to destroy the shadow is to find its name. What Ged must realize is the shadow was created by the evil in his own heart. Also, the shadow is not entirely evil, and Ged can actually draw strength from it. In doing so, Ged will realize that the only way to discover the shadow’s name is to discover that he and the shadow are one. Carl G. Jung in Man and His Symbols, describes the shadow as containing the hidden, repressed, and unfavorable “tendencies” of the conscious personality. “Such tendencies form an ever-present and potentially destructive ‘shadow’ to our conscious mind.” This shadow takes form in mythology as a dark, shadowy, and imposing figure or as “the cosmic powers of evil, personified by dragons and other monsters.” (Henderson 111) This shadow is shown to Ged in different forms: “...Like a clot of black shadow, quick and hideous...it was like a black beast, the size of a young child, though it seemed to swell and shrink; and it had no head or face, only the four taloned paws with which it gripped and tore.” (LeGuin 61) As it appeared when the shadow was first created. Later as the shadow pursued him, it held the same form. “The shadow did not have the shape of man or beast. It was shapeless, scarcely to be seen, but it whispered at him, though there were no words in its whispering, and it reached out towards him.” (LeGuin 81). Once Ged stops running, the shadow takes on a more identifiable form “...now some likeness to a man, though being shadow it cast no shadow.” The last form the shadow takes are the images people that Ged has come across in his life, “An old man it seemed, gray and grim, coming towards Ged; but even as Ged saw his father the smith in that figure, he saw that it was not an old man, but a young one. It was Jasper: Jasper’s insolent handsome young face, and silver-clasped gray cloak, and stiff stride. Hateful was the look he fixed on Ged across the dark intervening air...and it became Pechvarry. But Pechvarry’s face was all bloated and pallid like the face of a drowned man, and he reached out strangely as if beckoning...Then the thing that faced him changed utterly, spreading out to either side as if it opened enormous thin wings, and it writhed, and swelled, and shrank again. Ged saw in it for an instant Skiorh’s white face, and then a pair of clouded, staring eyes, and then suddenly a fearful face he did not know, man or monster, with writhing lips and eyes that were like pits going back into emptiness.” (LeGuin 178-179) These are the images that the shadow has taken throughout Ged’s life, and the causes of Ged’s pride and hatred, which released the shadow in the first place. When the shadow was first set loose upon the world Ged studied, and asked everyone what the shadow was, and where it came. “From the wrong side of the world.”(LeGuin 71) said one of his teachers. The unconscious, “after a time of need, usually arises to re-adapt the conscious attitude in a better way to the unconscious factors, therefore, to accept what seems like ‘criticism’ from the unconscious.” (von Franz 171) Not accepting this “criticism” manifests itself as actual events that occur throughout Ged’s life. Ged first calls upon his power when the Kargs attack his village in Gont, and he becomes angry at his own weakness. “It rankled at his heart he should die, spitted on a Kargish lance, while still a boy: that he should go into the dark land without ever having known his own name, his true name as a man. He looked down at his thin arms, wet with cold fog-dew, and raged at his weakness, for he knew his strength.” (LeGuin 8). He didn’t cast the spell to save everyone, but to save himself, and preserve his own life because he knew he was worth more than such a fate. Not accepting this “criticism” also causes the shadow to form both psychologically, and in mythology as Ged’s pride wouldn’t let him accept that Jasper is as powerful, or more powerful than he is. The more his pride filled him the more”...hate and rage were gone, replaced by utter certainty. He need envy no one. He knew that his power...was greater than it had ever been, filling him till he trembled with the sense of strength barley kept in check. He knew that Jasper was beneath him...no rival but a mere servant of Ged’s destiny.” (LeGuin 59) The pride in his own heart, set the shadow loose upon the world, and he has only himself to blame as Ged is told what the shadow is, and where it came from by Archmage Gensher. “You summoned a spirit of the dead, but with it came one of the Powers of unlife. Uncalled it came from a place where there are no names. Evil, it wills to work evil through you. The power you had to call it gives it power over you: you are connected. It is the shadow of your arrogance, the shadow of your ignorance, the shadow you cast. Has a shadow a name?” Although humbled this “criticism” is still not accepted, and is manifested again when Pechvarry’s son is sick and Ged, “...seeing the trust Pechvarry had in him, Ged did not know how he could disappoint them. He mistrusted his own judgment, and thought perhaps the child might be saved, if the fever could be brought down.” (LeGuin 80) This time his pride had built an image in Pechvarry’s mind that Ged could do anything, and Ged, against his better judgment let that image persuade him to try to save the boy’s life. It is these “criticisms” in the that if left hidden or repressed can create a negative shadow in the unconscious. The shadow appears to be only a negative, and destructive force psychologically, but just as the ego contains negative and destructive attitudes, the shadow may contain good qualities, such as normal instincts or creative impulses. However these impulses may exist in a way that make them difficult to integrate them into normal life. The “ego and shadow, indeed, although separate, are inextricably linked together in much the same way that thought and feeling are related to each other. The ego, nevertheless, is in conflict with the shadow in what Dr. Jung calls a ‘battle for deliverance.‘ in the struggle for primitive man to achieve consciousness. ”(Henderson 110) “When an individual makes an attempt to see his shadow, he becomes aware of (and often ashamed of) those qualities and impulses he denies himself but can plainly see in other people-such things as egotism, mental laziness, and sloppiness; unreal fantasies, schemes, and plots; carelessness and cowardice; inordinate love of money and possessions-in short, all the little sins which they might have previously told themselves: ‘That doesn’t matter; nobody will notice it, and in any case other people do it too.’” (von Franz 174) In which case the shadow remains unconscious in the individual for an untold amount of time. “The hero on the contrary, must realize the that the shadow exists and that he can draw strength from it. He must come to terms with its destructive powers if he is to become sufficiently terrible to overcome the [shadow]. I.e., before the ego can triumph, it must master and assimilate the shadow.” (Henderson 112) This is seen in how Ged’s shadow although dark, and frightening had brought out admirable qualities in him: It has removed the pride from his head, had taken the hatred in his heart, and Ged became able to face his fears. “In silence, man and shadow met face to face and stopped. Aloud and clearly, breaking that old silence, Ged spoke the shadow’s name and in the same moment the shadow spoke without lips or tongue, saying the same word: ‘Ged.’ And the two voices were one voice. Ged reached out his hands, dropping his staff, and took hold of the shadow, of the black self that reached out to him. Light and darkness met, and joined, and were one...’Estarriol’, he said, ‘look, it is done. It is over...the wound is healed...I am whole, I am free.’” (LeGuin 179-180) On the condition that one succeeds in assimilating and integrating the conscious mind the lost and regained contents. Since they are not neutral, their assimilation will modify the personality, just as they themselves will have to make certain changes. “If we could see our shadow, we should be immune to any moral and mental infection and insinuation.” (Jung 79) Bibliography: A Wizard of Earthsea, Ursula K. LeGuin, published by Bantam Spectra Books. Fantasy Novel Man and His Symbols, edited by Carl G Jung and M.-L. von Franz, Joseph L. Henderson, Jolande Jacobi, Aniela Jaffe, published by Dell Books, non fiction Word Count: 1499
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