Exercise 1

 

A book I love has to be The Hobbit, one of my favourite childhood books.

 

 

Step 1: The Ordinary World

Bilbo: Bilbo does his best to fit in with other hobbits. He doesn’t really want an adventure nor to leave his lovely Shire, but he gets talked into it.

Step 2: The Call to Adventure

Something comes along that changes the ordinary world for the hero. This can be something external or internal—either way, the hero must face change.

Bilbo: Thirteen dwarves, including their king and a wizard knock down his door, calling him to his adventure.

 

Step 3: Refusal of the Call

The hero is scared of the unknown waiting for him. He’ll try to turn away from the journey, albeit briefly. This can also manifest as the hero being uncertain toward the danger ahead. Bilbo:  flat out refuses and tries to get the dwarves and wizard to leave before his journey even begins. Then, on the journey, he’s tempted to leave again. All this poor Hobbit wants is his pipe of weed and some supper.

 

Step 4: Meeting with the Mentor

A seasoned world traveler, usually in the form of an old wise man, comes along to aid the hero with his wisdom who is Gandalf the Grey.

Step 5: Crossing the Threshold

By the end of the first part of the hero’s journey, he is leaving the ordinary world and off into the wilderness on a journey with thirteen dwarves. He is not very good at camping, or at thieving, or at not being eaten by trolls. He’s pretty unfamiliar with everything once they leave the Shire.

Step 6: Tests, Allies, and Enemies

Bilbo: The dwarves are friends. Trolls are not friends. Goblins are pretty much always the enemy too. Gollum, or Smeagol, is really also foe. Dragons are a test!. Gandalf is both a savior and a friend and also a test at times.

Step 7: Approach

Bilbo: Bilbo gets some elven armor and a sword that lights up around Goblins. It’s useful, but maybe not that useful around dragons. He and the dwarves also hatch a plan for Bilbo to steal the gem from the dragon it does not  really go according to plan, like life.

Step 8: The Ordeal

This is towards the middle of the hero’s journey, generally. This is where the hero must confront death or one of his greatest fears. This is also where the hero finds new life.

Bilbo: Being stuck in the cave with Gollum is his fear, but his rebirth comes in the form of a golden ring in his pocket.

Step 9: The Reward

Treasure! Or something like that?

Bilbo: Treasure but the dragon is still alive. Smaug smells you and knows you’re there,  be careful about celebrating the return of the dwarf king.

Step 10: The Road Back

Bilbo: There is a fight with Smaug dragon and the human town of Lake Town and the elves of Mirkwood all get involved. A conflict over the treasure before the road back can be taken.

Step 11: The Resurrection

After the hero is tested once more, he makes a final sacrifice and is able to then return home. Any conflicts that were in the ordinary world are now solved, either internal or external. The hero is reborn and is a person with a deeper knowledge or understanding in comparison to the hero that set off in the beginning of the story.

Bilbo: Bilbo leaves his dwarf friends to aid the humans and elves in the fight against Smaug. Bilbo could have been safe, as he’d wanted to be all along (albeit at his home, not in the Lonely Mountain with the king of the dwarves, Thorin), but instead he learns to do what is right and battles with goblins, wargs, and the dragon without thinking of his own safety. After the battle, Bilbo is reborn as a more confident Hobbit who no longer cares for “respectable” appearances. He often dreams of returning to the land of the elves and living among them, or smoking weed from his pipe with Gandalf.

Step 12: Return with the Elixir

Bilbo: Actual treasure, the ring.  He  now does not fit in with his society, for it is very odd to have a Hobbit that likes to go on adventures and readily brags about it.

Now comes the really difficult part coming up with my own plot!! It is definitely not my forte! Here goes very brief but an idea from history.

A Byzantine princess is adopted by the Catholic Church in Rome. She is beautiful and has a brother who marries her off to the Russian Prince of Muscovy. His mother is a traditional Russian woman and does not approve of him marrying a Roman. The princess renounces Catholisism and converts back, which angers her brother and church who send an assassin to kill her. The assassin falls in love with the princess’s maid whose daughter is in his accomplic’s hands. The prince and his brothers fall out over inheritance, the brothers join the tartars to fight their brother. The Prince’s son marries another beautiful princess who is into Cabalist beliefs and proceeds to drive father and son apart so that the son can take the throne. There is intrigue and battles resulting in the death of the son and the Prince’s mother retreating to a convent.  The brothers make up and acknowledge the Prince’s son as heir. The maid in order to save her princess throws herself and her assassin lover from the belfry tower of the church the princess built. The princess in an act of mercy persuades the prince not to execute her son’s wife despite her plots and her actions leading to the death of their son. The princess and prince live out their lives ruling Muscovy, their grandson inherits becoming Ivan The Terrible