Upon viewing the Supernatural episode “The Monster at the
End of This Book,” along with reading Ambrose Bierce’s short story “An
Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” I found myself contemplating whether fate could
be altered, as well as the relationship between illusion and reality. In
Bierce’s short story, we see that no matter how hard he tries, a man’s fate is
not determined by the individual, but rather by outside circumstances. In Supernatural, demon-hunting brothers Sam
and Dean realize that their lives over the past four years are actually being
documented in a series of books. Once they finally find the author, he informs
the brothers that once he drinks himself to sleep, visions of their lives
appear in his mind; the author then transforms his visions into written work. Sam
and Dean try to alter fate by reading the author’s work before it takes place,
but are ultimately unsuccessful in their endeavors. I think that fate is simply the course that one's life takes, and therefore cannot be altered.
In addition, I noticed that in
both Supernatural and Bierce’s short
story, the line between reality and illusion is often blurred. Bierce takes the
reader on a wild ride, shifting from the present to the past to the assumed-present, which is actually Farquhar’s
imagination, and then back briefly to the present. Bierce mentions a “gray-clad figure” and the figure’s dark gray eyes in his writing; perhaps he uses the color
gray as a motif to symbolize a blurry, hazy time period that is distinct from reality and illusion. In
comparison, the author of the Supernatural books as well as the two figures
must deal with the author’s psychic visions of the brothers’ lives, another
alternate form of reality. I would argue
that most people believe that illusion and reality are two separate concepts
that are often opposing. However, does illusion ever permeate into reality?
Illusion is a phenomenon that is clearly drawn from reality, as one cannot exist independently of the other. Therefore, the lines between
illusion and reality seem to be a lot less defined than one might expect.
I find your interpretation of fate quite interesting. If fate is just the way the events in our lives play out, then there is no trying to fight fate. It’s just going from point A to point B. And even if we do try to evade certain outcomes, it doesn’t matter because no matter what we do, fate is just how things end up. I wonder though, if there were a foolproof way to see into our futures, wouldn’t most of us try to alter fate in some way, especially if the outcome were a bad one? Because we don’t know our fate, we can easily say that fate is just how the events in our lives unfold. I just wonder if this interpretation would be different if we did gain insight into our futures. Also, I really like your point about reality and illusion being intertwined. You’re right that illusion can’t exist without reality. Furthermore, can’t illusion just be thought of as a way to escape reality?
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