Death Note for Dummies
I'm tired of people thinking the point of Death Note is "go write people's name in a notebook to kill them", "asking if capital punishment is just", "an ethical debate", and/or "meant just for entertainment."
Don't claim things are overrated unless you understand them first. Note that my observations will be based only on the anime.
I'm also tired of people saying that the second season was pointless, it was meant to mirror something else, I'm aware people are entitled to their own opinions but it's really getting frustrating seeing how some unreasonable people are interpreting 2+2=5.
As Light said it, "Like they would understand... what fools!" (sardonic)
Death Notes ARE REAL.
"A death poem (辞世の句, jisei no ku?) is a poem written near the time of one's own death. It is a tradition for literate people to write one in a number of different cultures, especially in Japan."
"A suicide note is a message left by someone who later attempts or commits suicide."
The writer of "A Hero of Our Time" died after writing it in a situation similar to that described in his book. Also remember how Near made an exact copy of the Death Note at the end even thou it could have been unnecessary in the storyline.
"On July 25, 1841, at Pyatigorsk, fellow army officer Nikolai Martynov, who felt hurt by one of Lermontov's jokes, challenged Lermontov to a duel. The duel took place two days later at the foot of Mashuk mountain. Lermontov chose the edge of a precipice for the duel, so that if either combatant was wounded, he would fall down the cliff. Lermontov was killed by Martynov's first shot. Several of his verses were posthumously discovered in his notebook."
The Death Note... if you touch it you'll be able to see who the Shinigami are.
"The preface is the first and at the same time the last thing in any book. It serves either to explain the purpose of the work or to defend the author from his critics. Ordinarily, however, readers are concerned with neither the moral nor the journalistic attacks on the author--as a result they don't read prefaces. Well, that's too bad, especially in our country. Our public is still so immature and simple-hearted that it doesn't understand a fable unless it finds the moral at the end. It fails to grasp a joke or sense an irony--it simply hasn't been brought up properly. It's as yet unaware that obvious violent abuse has no place in respectable society and respectable books, that education nowadays has worked out a sharper, almost invisible, but nevertheless deadly weapon, which behind the curtain of flattery cuts with a stab against which there is no defense. Our public is like the person from the sticks who, overhearing a conversation between two diplomats belonging to hostile courts, becomes convinced that each is being false to his government for the sake of a tender mutual friendship.
This book recently had the misfortune of being taken literally by some readers and even some reviewers. Some were seriously shocked at being given a man as amoral as the Hero of Our Time for a model. Others delicately hinted that the author had drawn portraits of himself and his acquaintances . . . What an old, weak joke! But apparently Russia is made up so that however she may progress in every other respect, she is unable to get rid of foolish ideas like this. With us the most fantastic of fairy tales has hardly a chance of escaping criticism as an attempt to hurt our feelings!
A Hero of Our Time, my dear readers, is indeed a portrait, but not of one man. It is a portrait built up of all our generation's vices in full bloom. You will again tell me that a human being cannot be so wicked, and I will reply that if you can believe in the existence of all the villains of tragedy and romance, why wouldn't believe that there was a Pechorin? If you could admire far more terrifying and repulsive types, why aren't you more merciful to this character, even if it is fictitious? Isn't it because there's more truth in it than you might wish?
You say that morality will gain nothing by it. Excuse me. People have been fed so much candy they are sick to their stomachs. Now bitter medicine and acid truths are needed. But don't ever think that the author of this book was ever ambitious enough to dream about reforming human vices. May God preserve him from such foolishness! It simply amused him to picture the modern man as he sees him and as he so often--to his own and your own misfortune--has found him to be. It's enough that the disease has been diagnosed--how to cure it only the Lord knows!"
The invisible weapon = Death Notes. The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya IN: God Knows or God Knows: a tragicomedic novel written by Joseph Heller, two of the more moral Death Notes.
Cast and Events
Ryuk = Narrator
Light Yagami = Pechorin
L = Grushnitsky
Justice = Misa Amane/Kiyomi Takada/Sayu Yagami = Princess Mary/Bela/Vera
Mihael Keehl = Kazbich
Nate River = Azamat
What Mello and Near wanted = Karagyoz
Teru Mikami = Werner
Soichiro Yagami/Tota Matsuda = Maksim Maksimich
Naomi Misora = Mermaid
Raye Penbar = Blind Boy
Anti-Kira Group = Everyone Else
The crime Light helped solve = The Fatalist
L Arc = Princess Mary
FBI Arc = Taman
Mello/Near Arc = Bela
Ending = Maksim Maksimich
Ryuk's conclusion = Introduction to Pechorin's Journal
Light/Kira and Pechorin
"There are two men in me--one lives in the full sense of the word, the other reasons and passes judgment on the first. The first will perhaps take leave of you and the world forever in an hour now; and the second . . . the second?"
L said that they cannot catch Kira if it is an entity that travels from person to person, well seems like it really is traveling between fantasy and reality.
Light/Pechorin and L/Grushnitsky
Gurshnitsky "My friend, I hate men in order not to despise them--otherwise life would be too disgusting a farce."
Pechorin "My friend, I despise women in order not to love them--otherwise life would be too ridiculous a melodrama."
The author probably hates men and despise women. Schizoid personality disorder and Asperger's Syndrome are closely related, one of those internal struggles between how to choose your appearance to other people.
Reason L/Grushnitsky died
"'Fire!' he replied. 'I despise myself and hate you. If you don't kill me, I'll stab you in the back some night. The world is too small to hold us both...'"
He despises himself because he knows himself too well, that why he hates men to avoid knowing them.
Light/Pechorin's Past
"Yes, such has been my lot since childhood. Everyone read signs of non-existent evil traits in my features. But since they were expected to be there, they did make their appearance. Because I was reserved, they said I was sly, so I grew reticent. I was keenly aware of good and evil, but instead of being indulged I was insulted and so I became spiteful. I was sulky while other children were merry and talkative, but though I felt superior to them I was considered inferior. So I grew envious. I was ready to love the whole world, but no one understood me, and I learned to hate. My cheerless youth passed in conflict with myself and society, and fearing ridicule I buried my finest feelings deep in my heart, and there they died. I spoke the truth, but nobody believed me, so I began to practice duplicity. Having come to know society and its mainsprings, I became versed in the art of living and saw how others were happy without that proficiency, enjoying for free the favors I had so painfully striven for. It was then that despair was born in my heart--not the despair that is cured with a pistol, but a cold, impotent desperation, concealed under a polite exterior and a good-natured smile. I became a moral cripple; I had lost one half of my soul, for it had shriveled, dried up and died, and I had cut it off and cast it away, while the other half stirred and lived, adapted to serve every comer. No one noticed this, because no one suspected there had been another half. Now, however, you have awakened memories of it in me, and what I have just done is to read its epitaph to you. Many regard all epitaphs as ridiculous, but I do not, particularly when I remember what rests beneath them. Of course, I am not asking you to share my opinion; if what I have said seems ridiculous to you, please laugh, though I warn you that it will not annoy me in the slightest."
Shows signs of Asperger's Syndrome.
Light/Pechorin's Motivation
"Can it be, thought I, that my sole mission on earth is to destroy the hopes of others? Ever since I began to live and act, fate has somehow associated me with the last act of other people's tragedies, as if without me no one could either die or give way to despair! I have been the inevitable character who comes in at the final act, involuntarily playing the detestable role of the hangman or the traitor. What has been fate's object in all this? Has it destined me to be the author of middle-class tragedies and family romances--or a purveyor of tales for, say, the Reader's Library? Who knows? Are there not many who begin life by aspiring to end it like Alexander the Great, or Lord Byron, and yet remain petty civil servants all their lives?"
A reference that the author does not really like writing.
"I am very glad of it, for I love enemies, though not in the Christian way. They amuse me and quicken my pulse. To be always on one's guard, to catch every look and the significance of every word, to guess intentions, foil conspiracies, pretend to be deceived and then to overthrow with a single blow the whole vast edifice of artifice and design raised with so much effort--that is what I call life."
Bipolar Disorder...
Reason Light won't make the deal/Why Pechorin won't marry
"I'd make any sacrifice but this--twenty times I can stake my life, even my honor, but my freedom I'll never sell. Why do I prize it so much? What do I find in it? What am I aiming at? What have I to expect from the future? Nothing, absolutely nothing. It's some innate fear, an inexplicable foreboding . . . After all, some people have an unreasoning fear of spiders, cockroaches, mice . . . Shall I confess? When I was still a child, some old woman told my fortune for my mother, predicting that I'd die through a wicked wife. It made a deep impression on me at the time, and an insuperable abhorrence for marriage grew within me. And yet something tells me that her prophecy will come true--but at least I'll do my best to put off its fulfillment for as long as possible."
He likes freedom, probably a sign that the author hates school. Children believe almost anything their told.
"Though I am always ready to risk my life, I am not disposed in the slightest to spoil my future in this world for all time to come."
Light's/Pechorin's view of people
"That is just like human beings! They are all alike; though fully aware in advance of all the evil aspects of a deed, they aid and abet and even give their approval to it when they see there is no other way out--and then they wash their hands of it and turn away with disapproval from him who dared assume the full burden of responsibility. They are all alike, even the kindest and wisest of them!"
He believes all humans are the same.
Teru Mikami's/Werner's interference and Light's/Pechorin's true plan
"You'll spoil everything; you gave me your word you wouldn't interfere . . . And why should it concern you? Perhaps I want to be killed."
The author might have planned what would happen later when he wrote this.
Light's/Pechorin's boredom
"Ah, well! If I must die, I must! The world will lose little, and I am weary enough of it all. I am like a man who yawns at a ball and doesn't go home to sleep only because his carriage hasn't come. But now the carriage is here--goodbye!"
Boredom seems to be as bad as death for some people. "Although boredom is often viewed as a trivial and mild irritant, boredom, and especially boredom proneness has been linked to an amazingly diverse range of psychological, physical, educational, and social problems." Why is school forcing people to be bored then?
Light's/Pechorin's last thoughts
"Why have I lived? For what purpose was I born? There must have been a purpose, and certainly fate must have something noble in store for me, for I am conscious of untapped powers within me . . . But I didn't figure out my destination. I allowed myself to be carried away by the temptation of vain and frivolous passions. I emerged from their crucible hard and cold like iron, but gone forever was the ardor of noble aspirations--life's finest flower. How often since then have I played the role of an ax in the hands of fate! Like an instrument of execution I have fallen upon the heads of the condemned, often without malice, always without regret . . . My love has never made anyone happy, for I have never sacrificed anything for those I loved; I have loved only for myself, for my own pleasure. I have striven only to satisfy a strange craving of the heart, greedily absorbing their emotions, their tenderness, their joys and sufferings--and have never been fully satisfied. I have been like the starving man who falls into a stupor from sheer exhaustion and dreams of luxurious foods and sparkling wines--exultingly he shovels in these ephemeral gifts of the imagination, and seems to feel better--but when he awakes the vision is gone . . . and redoubled hunger and despair remain!"
Signs of remorse, feelings of worthlessness of being unable to do anything for anyone. Is aware he is selfish but believes it is human nature like hunger, necessary. Also a reference on escapism contrasting with reality, making reality seem worse than it really is.
Hero or Villain?
"Perhaps I will die tomorrow, and there won't be anyone left on earth who understands me fully. Some think of me worse, others better, than I really am. Some will say: he was a good fellow; others: he was a scoundrel. And both will be wrong. Is it worth the trouble to live after this? And yet you go on living--out of curiosity, in expectation of something new . . . How ludicrous and how vexatious!"
People weren't meant to judge each other, as no one can completely understand an other person. I wonder why I even try to understand other people's ideologies... maybe because I don't have any of my own...
Death Note and The World
Death Note controversy
People's Republic of China
Some schools in Shenyang, People's Republic of China have banned the manga after some of their students started to tease friends and teachers by altering a notebook to resemble a Death Note and writing their names in them. The newspaper Shenyang Night Report called Death Note "poison, creating wicked hearts". One major Chinese newspaper felt that the ban is an overreaction and is inappropriate.
Beijing also has a ban on "horror stories" around schools to protect the "physical and mental health" of students, which includes local adaptations of Death Note. China itself is likewise trying to weed out pirated copies of the books and television series, as well other Japanese horror magazines, where no legal publication house prints it. Wang Song of the National Anti-piracy and Anti-pornography Working Committee has said that the series "misleads innocent children and distorts their mind and spirit".
Belgium
On September 28, 2007, two notes stating "Watashi wa Kira dess" (a more phonetic spelling of 私はキラです or "Watashi wa Kira desu," meaning "I am Kira" in Japanese) were found near the unidentified remains of a Caucasian male. Nothing was found on or near the victim besides these two notes. Belgian police are investigating the matter further.
United States
A senior at the Franklin Military Academy in Richmond, Virginia was suspended after being caught possessing a replica Death Note notebook with the names of fellow students.
In South Carolina in 2008, school officials seized a Death Note notebook from a Hartsville Middle School student. District officials linked the notebook to the anime/manga. The notebook listed seven students' names. The school planned a disciplinary hearing and contacted the seven students' parents. The principal, Chris Roger, sent letters to all the students' parents saying "Regardless of the origin of the book, we take the situation very seriously. The safety of our school family is always our top priority. We treat situations like this the same as if a student called in a bomb threat or brought a weapon to school. While there may not be any serious intent to do anyone harm, we cannot and will not take that chance with our students. We will take all steps necessary to ensure our students' well-being."
In Gadsden, Alabama, two 12-year-old sixth grade boys were arrested for possessions of Death Notes that listed names of several staff members and fellow students. According to Etowah County Sheriff's Department Sgt. Lanny Handy, the notebook was found the previous afternoon by a staffer. The students were suspended from the county's schools. The students, their parents, and school officials had met with Handy and a junior probation officer.
In Gig Harbor, Washington, one middle school student was expelled and three were suspended on May 14, 2008 for having their own Death Note books. A father of one of the students said that the notebook was "an outlet for frustration from about two years of bullying."
My thoughts on it
Is Light a criminal? Writing into a notebook knowing someone will die from it. It's metaphoric that writers can be potentially more dangerous than serial killers. Are criminals meant to die? Metaphoric to people who can't tell fantasy from reality and really do get "killed" by a book. The people who pretend to be Kira, metaphoric to those in reality that think they can judge others even thou they just write the names of everyone they don't like without even knowing anything about them. The people living in fear of the Death Note is metaphoric to those in reality who see what fantasy can cause and banned it. The media is really like the Kira followers in the book, their blindly following it's popularity without knowing it's underlying message. The Shinigami are those in reality that do not even care what effect fantasy can cause on people seen as they just write for the sake of living forgetting their original purpose, Ryuk being one of the few exceptions. The people who are against Kira are those in reality who cannot see that Death Note serves as a reminder to those indulged into fantasy not to take it too seriously even thou it is a fantasy in itself as capital punishment is a reminder not to commit murder even thou it is murder in itself. And finally it's ironic that the writer of Death Note is really like Light that found the Death Note some day dropped by Ryuk and is writing into the Death Note with no guidelines on how he should use it, he is capable of judging people he haven't meet by their reactions to his book through the media, he might have been the ideal person to find it, he's even not using his real name, pretends to be L and reminiscent of L after being the one to kill him in his book. L saw that it really could have been divine judgment, but no person should have the power to judge others.
Another controversial book
"The Sorrows of Young Werther was Goethe's first major success, turning him from an unknown into a celebrated author practically overnight. Napoleon Bonaparte considered it one of the great works of European literature. He thought so highly of it that he wrote a soliloquy in Goethe's style in his youth and carried Werther with him on most of his campaigns as an adult. It also started the phenomenon known as the "Werther-Fieber" ("Werther Fever") which caused young men throughout Europe to dress in the clothing style described for Werther in the novel. It also led to some of the first known examples of copycat suicide; supposedly more than 2,000 readers committed suicide."
First generation cosplay. Writing the cause of death = copycat suicides <> coincidence. The writer might of found this power amusing so he included it into Death Note.
Shinigami's true purpose
"Romanticism is a complex artistic, literary, and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in Western Europe, and gained strength during the Industrial Revolution. It was partly a revolt against aristocratic social and political norms of the Age of Enlightenment and a reaction against the scientific rationalization of nature, and was embodied most strongly in the visual arts, music, and literature.
The movement stressed strong emotion as a source of aesthetic experience, placing new emphasis on such emotions as trepidation, horror, and the awe experienced in confronting the sublimity in untamed nature and its qualities that are "picturesque", both new aesthetic categories. It elevated folk art and custom, as well as arguing for a "natural" epistemology of human activities as conditioned by nature in the form of language, custom and usage.
Our modern sense of a romantic character is sometimes based on Byronic or Romantic ideals. Romanticism reached beyond the rational and Classicist ideal models to elevate medievalism and elements of art and narrative perceived to be authentically medieval, in an attempt to escape the confines of population growth, urban sprawl and industrialism, and it also attempted to embrace the exotic, unfamiliar and distant in modes more authentic than chinoiserie, harnessing the power of the imagination to envision and to escape."
A lot of modern writers have forgotten their purpose as Shinigami that have no reason for existence. Ryuk was depressed seeing how everyone around him didn't seem to care, a romantic in a world full of realist...
"Realism in the visual arts and literature is the depiction of subjects as they appear in everyday life, without embellishment or interpretation. The term is also used to describe works of art which, in revealing a truth, may emphasize the ugly or sordid."
The reality in Death Note/The source of the writer's ideas
Death Note
Fantasy: A black note book that can kill a person with his name and face.
Reality: A story capable of forever changing a person's life with the image of the person it targets.
Death Note language for Death Note users
Fantasy: The code used between people that know of the existence of Death Notes.
Reality: The metaphorical language used between writers.
How to use
Fantasy: Instructions on how to use the Death Note
Reality: Instructions on how to write a story that has a potential to kill people.
How it works
Fantasy: The Death Note works in ways unimaginable to fulfill what is written, the default is a heart attack, a natural cause. When the Cause of Death is written it'll be fulfilled if possible.
Reality: The power of writing works in ways unimaginable to fulfill it's intentions, the default is natural changes in the target's life that are unnoticeable unless you're aware of it. "If you build it, he will come".
Targeting
Fantasy: You need to have a name and an face of the person in order to kill them.
Reality: As writers to have the image of the person's character in order to target them with it.
Controlling
Fantasy: The person does exactly as the book depicts.
Reality: Some person does exactly as the book depicts. Death Note did a good job as some people are actually writing names into a notebook they made.
Effect
Fantasy: In the case of Death Note, death.
Reality: Changes the lives of the targets, for better or worse.
Recognition
Fantasy: You need to own a Death Note and have Shinigami eyes in order to see who else has one.
Reality: You need to be knowledgeable of the literature used to see it.
Many Death Notes
Fantasy: More than one Death Note, not all Death Notes come with a "How to use" page.
Reality: Other stories out there that can cause invisible but noticeable effects on people, some well known examples are: The Sorrows of Young Werther, Neon Genesis Evangelion, The Day After Tomorrow, A Christmas Carol, Romeo and Juliet, Journey to the West, and probably the best known one - The Bible.
Time needed
Fantasy: There is a forty second gap between writing and it's effect, if the cause of death is written, the writer will have to wait for it to take effect.
Reality: There's time needed before the story will take the intended intentions, if what is wanted is written than the writer will have to wait for it to happen.
Death Note immunity
Fantasy: All people with a name and a face are subjective to it's effects, therefore those without a proper name cannot be affected.
Reality: The people that the power of writing cannot affect are those with their identity destroyed, psychopaths - which are also immune to psychotherapy. Watch "Monster" and notice how many they mention not having a name.
Ownership
Fantasy: Very vague between user and Shinigami.
Reality: Vague as well between user and creator.
The main character
Fantasy: Light, receives a Death Note stolen by Ryuk from some other Shinigami.
Reality: The writer of Death Note, reads a book by Lermontov borrowing the concept of a Byronic Hero from Lord Byron.
Light's Death Note
Fantasy: Light's Death Note made it clear he was using it against criminals even thou he became one himself. Comes with a "How to use" page.
Reality: Targeting delusional people but has become delusional himself. Comes with a description of the Death Notes.
Human stupidity
Fantasy: "No matter how stupid people are someone will eventually notice that someone's targeting the criminals."
Reality: Notice that some delusional people are actually making fake Death Notes and have been "killed" by a book?
Light telling people his plans
Fantasy: Light tells L of his real plans after L started suspecting him as being Kira and that he wanted his position.
Reality: The writer wrote down all of his plans to confuse the viewer's spirit.
Light's self-deception
Fantasy: He forgets from discarding the Death Note and denies Kira.
Reality: The writer might not even notice his other half's plans.
Shinigami
Fantasy: Most Shinigami don't even care about the effect the Death Notes have on the human world. Ryuk, Rem, and Jealous being a few exceptions.
Reality: Most writers of the past don't seem to care what happens as a result of their work. Those that we remember are exceptions.
Shinigami's immortality
Fantasy: Shinigami cannot be killed by normal weapons, and cannot be seen by those that haven't touched a Death Note.
Reality: True writers write stories that cannot be oppressed by force, their influence cannot be seen by those who haven't witnessed the power of writing.
Death of Shinigami
Fantasy: They write for someone they care about or their time runs out from not killing too long. The life spam of the person killed is added to the Shinigami's life.
Reality: They writer clearly states what the story is about, or their work is forgotten from having no readers. A reader that reads the book gets "killed" and their life spam is added to the writer's.
Alternative to kill a Shinigami
Fantasy: Destroy their notebook so they cannot write anymore names and will eventually die.
Reality: Burn the writing, happened throughout history and is still happening to this day.
X-Kira
Fantasy: Someone that received his Death Note from Light and helps him with his plans. He ends up ruining some of his plans as they had different views of utopia.
Reality: Someone that learns of the power of writing from his Death Note and writes his own story. It'll end up ruining some of his ideologies as they are different people.
Death Note Manga = 2003-2006, Code Geass = 2006-2008 (OP: Colors, "Right now I feel like I can change the world.")
Other Kiras
Fantasy: The owners of Death Notes that do not show up in the show.
Reality: People that know that writing can potentially kill people and use it for their own ends.
Light's sanity
Fantasy: Light's sanity cracks at the end from realizing reality. A guilty executioner.
Reality: Using the Death Notes drains the writer's sanity as a cost. A delusional writer.
Irony
Fantasy: As seen
Reality: Has been
The Ethical Debate
THERE IS NO ETHICAL DEBATE
"Romanticism is precisely situated neither in choice of subject nor exact truth, but in the way of feeling."
"Many intellectual historians have seen Romanticism as a key movement in the Counter-Enlightenment, a reaction against the Age of Enlightenment. Whereas the thinkers of the Enlightenment emphasized the primacy of deductive reason, Romanticism emphasized intuition, imagination, and feeling, to a point that has led to some Romantic thinkers being accused of irrationalism."
People have debated for over centuries. Notice the pun on Light's name and Enlightenment?
Reason for hiding identity
"Anti-intellectualism describes a sentiment of hostility towards, or mistrust of, intellectuals and intellectual pursuits. This may be expressed in various ways, such as attacks on the merits of science, education, art, or literature.
Anti-intellectuals often perceive themselves as champions of the ordinary people and egalitarianism against elitism, especially academic elitism. These critics argue that highly educated people form an isolated social group that tends to dominate political discourse and higher education (academia).
Anti-intellectualism can also be used as a term to criticize an educational system if it seems to place minimal emphasis on academic and intellectual accomplishment, or if a government has a tendency to formulate policies without consulting academic and scholarly study."
"Populism is a discourse which supports 'the people' versus 'the elites'. Populism may involve either a political philosophy urging social and political system changes and/or a rhetorical style, deployed by members of political or social movements competing for advantage within the existing party system."
"Popular culture embraces a sentimental image of the clown; writers reproduce that sentimentality in the jester, and academics in the Trickster." ED: Alumina, "I’m a Trickster who doesn’t know loneliness", "Like they would understand... what fools!"
A sentence from another Death Note, "the little brown compact handbook": "In some cultures it is considered unnecessary or impolite for a writer to have an opinion or to state his or her main idea outright."
The term anti-intellectual is like the phrase anti-hero, other anti-intellectuals know that it implies anti-intellectuals are partly intellectuals. Anti-intellectual does not mean nonintellectual. It helps understand terms such as anti-police and anti-criminal. Anti-criminal would be a better term to describe Light than criminal. L and Light are both anti-intellectuals against each other.
No one has the right to take another life, but what to you do to someone that has taken that right? Light decided to become the one to take full responsibility for everything. It's a trade off of life, kill one save a thousand, save one kill a thousand.
The main difference of the three groups:
Nonintellectual <> Intellectual <> Anti-intellectual
Feeling <> Reason <> Intuition
Religion <> Science <> Philosophy
Time-Traveler <> Alien <> Esper
Past <> Present <> Future
Body <> Mind <> Spirit
Robot <> Android <> Cyborg
ID <> Ego <> Super-Ego
Histrionic <> Dependent <> Avoidant
Fantasy <> Science Fiction <> Supernatural Fiction
Time-Travelers - Just passing by the plane of time. Studying God is their answer to why they're stopped on the plane of life. Their is dispute among them about which one.
Aliens - Possesses advanced technology however may be a bit prioritized with collecting data of natural phenomenons. Sees God as the ability to generate irrational data, a threat, some deny it's existence, some want to read more before judging.
Espers - Fights in closed space against the monsters.
Closed space - a gray and depressing world that espers can see and enter, if left unchecked will expand into reality and consume the world. Monsters - Created by human vices for the purpose of expanding the closed space = people that have lost faith in humanity. Espers that become monsters will be psychopathic and immune to other espers.
It shares many ideas as Death Note.
"Derrida (whom older professors often think of as 'the enemy')"
"Sometimes we may be unsure of what is effected, though we are sure that there are effects."
"You have to pay the price to read the price displayed."
"Some take it as a sign of his genius and others as a sign of his derangement."
"Without a kind of obscenity, one could not write about one's mother and her death"
"Asks the most adventurous and the most risky questions about our tradition, about our institutions, about our way of teaching, and so on."
"About what we have forgotten and, perhaps to our peril, ignored." Signs of another anti-intellectual. Repeating history... follow this observer's words if you wish to avoid it - Albert Einstein:
"Imagination is more important than knowledge"
"The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education."
"Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods."
"Let every man judge according to his own standards, by what he has himself read, not by what others tell him."
"Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind."
"Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere."
"Only a life lived for others is a life worth while."
"If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough."
"The only real valuable thing is intuition."
"Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding."
"It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity."
"If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it?"
"Sometimes one pays most for the things one gets for nothing."
"Few are those who see with their own eyes and feel with their own hearts."
"The world is not dangerous because of those who do harm but because of those who look at it without doing anything."
"Once we accept our limits, we go beyond them."
"No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it."
"I have no particular talent. I am merely inquisitive."
"It's not that I'm so smart, it's just that I stay with problems longer."
"Never do anything against conscience, even if the state demands it."
"Everyone should be respected as an individual, but no one idolized."
"If the facts don't fit the theory, change the facts."
"Any man who reads too much and uses his own brain too little falls into lazy habits of thinking."
"Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning."
My guess on the writer's identity
I have no idea, but here's some anime that shares some ideology with Death Note...some are other Death Notes, others are people against him, basically people related to these would probably know.
Monster (Suicidal tenancies, Psychopath without a name controlling serial killers and other things behind the scenes. What writers can be and how they might have more than one name. Wolf and Johan is referring to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe the writer of The Sorrows of Young Whether, Adolf comes from Old High German for "noble wolf" (Adel = nobility + wolf). The "how Hitler took control" is a reference to Hitler's book: "Mein Kampf (English: My Struggle/My Battle) is a book by Adolf Hitler. It combines elements of autobiography with an exposition of Hitler's National Socialist political ideology. Volume 1 of Mein Kampf was published in 1925 and volume 2 in 1926." both Death Note users) Aquatic Language (Aquatic Language = Death Note Language = Dream Language = Deconstruction Language = Universal Language = The Original Language) Pale Cocoon (Extremely high levels of romanticism) Library War (Media against government, freedom of expression or censoring of Death Notes) The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya (Writing = God = Creation, espers, aliens, time-travelers, observer) Neon Genesis Evangelion (He who wishes to create must first feel the torment of God. The loss of sanity) Yami to Boushi to Hon no Tabibito (Worlds in books, "The War of the Worlds" + Mass hysteria = Separation of the worlds. Writers = creators or escapist. Creations = part of the writer) Code Geass (Lelouch = Bobby Fischer as in personality, ethnicity, intelligence, chess, deported from Japan after using Geass on a few people. Geass = a demagogy + hypnosis, they are as real as and of the same nature as Death Notes, psychotherapy, propaganda, and advertisement) Code Geass R2 (Geass canceler = the understanding of psychology, there's dilemma over removing Geass from people as outside of order is chaos, Double-edged sword) Code E (type E, science and happiness, Read or Die style, Double-edged sword) Read or Die OVA (Geniuses = Recreate the world, Ludwig van Beethoven = leading figures in the transition from Classical to Romantic eras, Romanticism = subliminal suicide song which is one of its possibilities) Vampire Knight (Suicidal tenancies, Zero's condition, noble vampires, pure vampires, vampire hunters, level E = military power + hunted by both sides) Read or Die TV (Writers and readers, books find those that wish to know the truth. Revenge = level E's story = betrayal by noble vampires) Jigoku Shoujo (Death requests on internet, sacrificed + observing revenge = nihilism, Double-edged sword) Yume Tsukai (Dreams, fantasy, feelings, and reality. Sigmund Freud + "Field of Dreams". Nightmares = closed space, OP: Dream Maze, Light and Darkness Dance + ED: Alumina "I had a dream that no one else could have" = Esper's dream. Episode 9 = Espers failed to help Light from Darkness, Frozen feelings = Death Note immunity = Psychopathy = Self Destruction. Path of Life, double-edged sword) Gate Keepers (Gates + minus gates, minus gates = human sins > invaders, aired: 2000, successful student protest in China: 2003 + China's ban on Death Note = Invisible war between Order and Chaos, Double-edged sword) Gate Keepers 21 (Gates = Negative effects, dual gate keeper = foresight + darkness, humans becoming invaders, eliminating invaders = unseen murderers) Hikaru no Go (Same illustrator as Death Note, less controversial Death Note + obvious effects = testing of the Death Notes...) School Days (Delayed air date of final episode + axe incident = knowledge of Death Notes) Full Metal Panic! (Delayed air date after plane hijackings known as 9/11. Story setting: Nuclear Weapons and Afghanistan - the fifth Middle East war, China split north and south, Cold War continues. Story plot: starts with a plane hijacking. Civilians holding keys to secret technology called espers, imagination as power = Death Notes) Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann (Beast men vs Spiral vs Anti-spiral. Fighting, will power against will power, psychology against psychology, story against story, Death Note against Death Note. Stasis quo political, social, religious, scientific and philosophical views. If it were to change a revolution is inevitable. Reject saving the world and ends up as "nobody". Nobody notices the war between chaos and order, as such as I'm nobody to you)
The war between Order and Chaos
Irony = those society rejects = those that end up with the power to decide the direction society will go. Unfortunately they don't feel like putting anymore effort into trying to improve it, some even wish to destroy it. Hitler = rejected twice by the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna (1907–1908). Trying to improve society = human sacrifice, crucifixion, death by poison, exile, arrest, witchcraft and heresy accusations, treason charges, book and human burnings, discrimination, deportation, and criminal treatment.
We're on the brink of a global revolution, such as the industrial, scientific, cultural, social, and military ones of the past. Unfortunately not even the Death Note users can predict if the outcome will be creative or destructive, it is everyone's choice to support order or chaos, one person can't make a difference, but those that they touch will touch others as Chaos Theory claims.
Chaos Theory = Fatalism with free will, insanity but true as Time. Time = Created for Chaos Theory to give everyone free will over the future in a fatalist universe. Order and Chaos coexisting. The original sin = dividing the Universe into Order and Chaos, eating the apple from the tree of knowledge.
The Absolute Terror Fields is the trenches of Order and Chaos, in between suffers crossfire from both sides, "no man's land". It is the only place true peace can be obtained, which happened before during Christmas Eve 1914, and 1915. Level 10, entering comes with great risks. The End of Evangelion the last choice will either return the person to level 1 or get crushed by Order or Chaos.
No one has been able to beat the game of Life, as mortal death is inevitable, popularity = their game score. The Tree of Life is the game board of Life, the only divine object in this universe. If anyone beats the game of Life the world will end.
The closest one to date is Jesus currently scoring about 27% (out of 6.7 billion) of the maximum and what a lot of people consider God. His reincarnation is proof of how close he was. The only mistake he made in his calculations is the discovery of modern psychology by Sigmund Freud, canceling his Geass. His foresight and Death Notes of his still remain.
The Absolute power, the entity that travels from person to person, is absolutely corrupt for trying to end the world, Order and Chaos prevent it. The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, either we keep the world happy or we let the absolute power destroy it, simple as that.
Some of the top scorers so far are Jesus = Eastern Religion, Buddha = Western Religion, Socrates/Plato/Aristotle = Philosophy, Einstein = Philosophy and Physics, Galileo = Science, Newton = Physics, Mozart/Beethoven = Music, Bobby Fischer = Chess, Friedrich Nietzsche = Modern Philosophy, Hitler = Politician, Sigmund Freud, Modern Psychology, writers, directors, actors, singers, artists, entrepreneurs, athletes, humanitarians, doctors, and some from the lower scoring worlds.
Score changes = time between the war of Order and Chaos. Forgotten = Score reaching zero. Chaos uses Death Note language, the universal language, to preserve information. While Order tries to preserve information by setting standards and regulations. Information = The World = The Score. In the end of time the Universe will decide who remains based on the score. The Utopia all the high scorers seek is the prize.
Knowledge of Order and Chaos
Level 1. Love thyself, Total Consciousness Four levels of Order
Level 2. Judge for yourself, Power of Wisdom
Level 3. Love others, Power of Love
Level 4. Dream, Power of Vision
Level 5. Have control, Power of Intention Four levels of Chaos
Level 6. Writing and creating, Power of Creation
Level 7. Immortality, Power of Eternal Now
Level 8. Defeatism and acceptance, Observational Power
Level 9. Finding the line between Fantasy and Reality, Power of Manifesting Level of Fantasy and Reality
Level 10. Uniting the worlds of Fantasy and Reality. Power of Healing. Destroying Order and Chaos, Accomplishment of the Divine Plan
The four Worlds, Nonintellectual, Intellectual, Anti-intellectual, Observers will be given to those that remain.
The End of Evangelion choose individualism at level 10, Seperated from the sea of people, became an observer, Level 1.
Code Geass choose collectivism at level 10, Suzaku killing Lelouch. Couldn't unite Fantasy and Reality.
Death Note choose neither at level 10, Light killed L then killed by Near. United Fantasy and Reality couldn't destroy Chaos and Order.
Choosing both would get destroyed by Order and Chaos like those in the past.
Conclusion
Death Note, to explain it in one sentence it is: literally about writing causing deaths. Seems like Light really did make the world fools. The writer did a good job relating his fantasy and reality into his book with a lot of metaphorical references. I'm just amazed how many people miss such an obvious point.
There are way too many books and media for one person to read, you do not find the Death Notes, the Death Notes find you.
"'Radium engines' in the 1930s were the stuff of science fiction, such as was being written at the time by Edgar Rice Burroughs. H. G. Wells included air-dropped 'atomic bombs' in his 1914 novel: The World Set Free."
"As fate or coincidence would have it, in reality the physicist Leó Szilárd read the book in 1932, conceived of the idea of nuclear chain reaction in 1933, and filed for patents on it in 1934."
"A famous usage was by the aging Erich Ludendorff, who was for a time a strong supporter of the early rise of Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany. After learning of Hitler's appointment as Chancellor, he expressed his disappointment to German President Paul von Hindenburg: 'By appointing Hitler Chancellor of the Reich, you have handed over our sacred German Fatherland to one of the greatest demagogues of all time. I prophesy to you this evil man will plunge our Reich into the abyss and will inflict immeasurable woe on our nation. Future generations will curse you in your grave for this action.' Hitler indeed would become regarded as perhaps the epitome of a demagogue, having successfully risen to power through appeals to the ethnic and nationalistic prejudices and vanities of the German people."
Seeing destruction of the world = price paid for having foresight. All the genius level villains in history that tried to change the world had foresight. Here's one.
Friedrich Nietzsche (1889): "Nietzsche sent short writings — known as the Wahnbriefe ('Madness Letters') — to a number of friends (including Cosima Wagner and Jacob Burckhardt). To his former colleague Burckhardt, Nietzsche wrote: 'I have had Caiaphas put in fetters. Also, last year I was crucified by the German doctors in a very drawn-out manner. Wilhelm, Bismarck, and all anti-Semites abolished.' Additionally, he commanded the German emperor to go to Rome in order to be shot and summoned the European powers to take military action against Germany."
Obviously saw the inevitable World Wars, no one ever listens to the observers until it's too late... "Democracy: The God that Failed". Democracy is just the civil war of Chaos' Death Notes: The Audacity of Hope, Hard Call, My Life, A World Transformed.
Death Notes(Chaos) is the power of Shinigami, which will bring immortality until forgotten.
The Geass(No man's Land) is the power of Kings, which will bring the user to his own destruction.
Foresight(Order) is the power of Fate, which will bring the inevitable.
The highest scorers are those that control them.
"Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results" - Albert Einstein
And here's the situation the world is heading:
The Large Hardon Collider + Uncertain scientific advance = Science Fiction Weapons of mass destruction
Weakening of economy + High inflation rate + Low birth rates + Rising nihilism = Recession
The Reappearance of the Death Notes + Anti-intellectualism = Large amounts of closed space in reality
Lost faith in democracy + Rising Drug/Prescription Drugs/Crime Rate + Bad educational system = Rising amount of monsters
Lust + Gluttony + Greed + Sloth + Wrath + Envy + Pride = Sins
Those were the conditions before WW1 and WW2, now it's going to be WW3.
The History of Anime's concepts
"Hikikomori" existed in Europe, during the romantic era, after first generation cosplay and copycat suicides as a result of "The Sorrows of Young Whether". "Crime and Punishment" the story of a socially withdrawn person committing crime and ends up insane.
"Be not content with the best book; seek sidelights from the others; have no favourites." - Obviously saw the dangers of Death Notes as with many other observers.
"Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men."
"There is no error so monstrous that it fails to find defenders among the ablest men."
Hey Guys!
As there has not been any improvement with mass messages issue, Canon Pairings Club wasn't able to continue our tournament with the couples... Nevertheless, we want to continue it. The only way we came up with is MASS MAILING :) So, those of you who are willing to continue to vote in our matches, please send me your email address. I assure you, it will be used for matches notifications ONLY. If there will be a certain number of addresses which allow us to continue, we will restart the votings!! In case not, the waiting for the mass msg will continue..
P.S. Those of you who aren't aware, we also made a HUUUGE list of all known canon couples, HERE You are welcome to nominate more ;))
Good day to you. I find it best to applaud you on your input in regards to Death Note on your profile page. You have done your research well. Some of the points you've presented were already known to me when I too attempted to do a little research on the historical origins that influenced the making of Death Note. But I must say that your research was far more deep and enlightening than mine. Well done. :]
Quite an awesome list of favorite characters you have there. I'm also liking the wikipedia links with the anime, wish I could be as creative with my profile.
All Comments (25) Comments
And dat 91.1% compatability.
Hey Guys!
As there has not been any improvement with mass messages issue, Canon Pairings Club wasn't able to continue our tournament with the couples... Nevertheless, we want to continue it. The only way we came up with is MASS MAILING :) So, those of you who are willing to continue to vote in our matches, please send me your email address. I assure you, it will be used for matches notifications ONLY. If there will be a certain number of addresses which allow us to continue, we will restart the votings!! In case not, the waiting for the mass msg will continue..
P.S. Those of you who aren't aware, we also made a HUUUGE list of all known canon couples, HERE You are welcome to nominate more ;))
High
xD
wow.
It's unparalleled sight
Joined MAL one day after you.
Born on the same year.
Have a 83.7 compatibility.