Subject: RS: Another Stone
From: brinkman@si194b.llnl.gov
Date: 1991-04-19, 15:14
Newsgroups: alt.tv.twin-peaks

   First many plaudits to Bernie Roehl for his elegant analysis of the
Twin Peaks mythos.  Very nicely done and oh so beautiful.

   What follows is an attempt on my part to add an additional stone to 
path.  I had thought out a lot of this before, but a recent posting by
Rich Haller helped to crystallize my ideas.

   As Rich Haller has recently pointed out, approaching the TP universe
with a good vs. evil filter is contrary to the Buddhist belief system.  
Furthermore, since Cooper views Tibet as an analogy to Twin Peaks 
("You'd be amazed at the connection [between TP and Tibet]") and quotes 
(almost identically) from the Book of the Dead, adopting a more 
Buddhist-like framework may be fruitful.

   In Buddhism (as I understand it) the major question is not good vs. 
evil, but harmony vs. dissonance.  The final ideal is to reach a state 
of internal and external balance and to embrace opposites as necessary 
components of the whole.  Within this framework one would tend to treat 
"evil" as an absence of inner balance and "good" as a presence of the same.
In other words, in may prove useful when treating the TP mythos to 
redefine the concepts of good and evil to be synonyms of harmony and
dissonance.

   Let's start by looking at some of the symbols and people in TP that
have been commonly assigned as either good or evil see if this idea holds 
water...

************************************************************************

GOOD SYMBOL:

Trees:  Trees are traditional symbols of nature and harmony. Thus, they
represent good.

EVIL SYMBOLS:

Fire:  A major distinction between Western and Eastern philosophies is 
       the role of rationality within them.  Western philosophies
place primary emphasis on rationality, while Eastern philosphies 
seek balance between rational and irrational components.  Thus, 
fire, a traditional symbol of rationality (e.g. the Prometheus 
myth), represents evil (i.e. dissonance).

Owls:  Once again a symbol of rationality.  See the fire discussion above.

GOOD PERSON:

Cooper:  Cooper's personality can almost be defined by the word "balance".  
 An outward sign of this is his investigational style which is a 
 composite of the rational and the irrational ("...working hand-in-
 hand with the highest levels of intuition..."), and thus Cooper
 represents good.

EVIL PEOPLE:

WE:The character of Windom Earle has to be of the most unbalanced
personas ever to grace American television.  The comparison
between diamond and WE's mind (i.e. cold, hard, and brilliant)
create a picture of extreme rationality (albeit insane extreme 
rationality).  Thus, WE represents evil.

BOB: The fact that Leland had no idea what he had done when possessed 
by BOB (e.g. he did not know he killed Laura) indicates that
BOB is not a unifying force, but a divisive one.  In short, BOB
is the logical end result of disunity and dissonance, and therefore
BOB represents EVIL, EVIL, EVIL.

****************************************************************************

   So far, so good (or at least I can stretch my idea so that it isn't
blatantly incorrect)...

   Since the hallmarks of any successful theory is how well it explains,
unifies, and predicts future events (which is why Monsieur Roehl was so
successful, IMHO), let's now attempt one explanation, one unification and
one prediction.  (Since I am not clear from Fiona's posts whether or not 
the 4/18 episode is fair game for an RS posting, when I use material from 
that show I will surround it with "***".)

EXPLANATION:

   White and black are the symbols of opposites, nothing more and nothing
less.  This fits in nicely with the recent posting of Keith Bitely, where
he points out that white is the presence of all colors while black is the
absence of all colors.  In this view assigning qualities of good or evil
to a symbol, place, person, or object based on whiteness or blackness is
faulty.  This helps clear up some of problems that arise when one defines
white to be good and black to be evil or vice-versa.  Thus, the fact that
Cooper plays the black side in the chess game is not troubling nor is the
fact that he traditionally dresses in black.  

UNIFICATION:

   The Giant and the MFAP become separate manifestations of a common
good.  Their duality is born out in their relative sizes and by the 
fact that the Giant appears to Cooper as a physical being while the MFAP 
is a spiritual manifestation who appears in dreams.  That each of them 
appeals to a separate portion of Cooper's investigative technique (i.e.
the Giant to Cooper's rational side and the MFAP to Cooper's instinctual
side) further supports their assignment to distinct facets of a common
entity.  To sum up, in this view the Gaint and the MFAP represent the 
opposite factions of a single harmonius (and thus good) personality.  

PREDICTION:

   Annie will eventually be proven to be a proponent of evil.  Her rapid
shift between the spiritual world (i.e. the convent) and the physical
world (i.e. Twin Peaks) demonstrate a lack of balance in her life, and 
portend an ominous future role for her character.

***The fact that Annie has disturbed Cooper's equilibrium (she keeps
popping up in Cooper's mind when there is serious work to be done) also 
supports this prediction.  That would make the Giant's "No!" a warning to 
Cooper that he was getting involved with evil.***

**************************************************************************

   Oh well, like I said this is a stone not the path.  I throw this out
in the hope that someone will use this idea to further their own work on
the nature of the TP reality.  Any and all comments would be greatly
appreciated.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Matt BrinkmanInternet: BRINKMAN@EDSEQ1.LLNL.GOV

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