Quote:
Originally Posted by Galadriel55
I have to admit I don't really understand what the word "relate" means, not only here but in a more general way too. Is it that you don't think you'd have done the same or felt the same? Or that you don't understand the character? Don't like the character? I think that you don't have to feel close to the character to understand him and like him, even though you might disagree with him. I like Turin, but that doesn't mean I'm going to start acting like him. I was going to lead this to something else, but I lost my thought, so I'll just stop rambling...
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This is a great point. I think the notion of 'relating' to characters tries to express a whole gamut of feelings in one concept. On the one hand there is a sense of whether or not a reader engages with the character - whether or not the character is interesting. There is also the question of how alike to the reader the character is. The more alike, the more easy it is to see oneself in the same situation. Then there is the question of whether or not a particular character exhibits likable character traits. Could we imagine having a beer with this character? I think that's what a lot of people mean when they say "relate".
There's another dimension too - a moral dimension. I think plenty of people would say that they "relate" to Frodo or Sam partly because they embody the kinds of ethical lives that we'd like to live. Not only them, but also Gandalf, Faramir, etc. They are all characters who respond to the presence of the dominating One Ring "correctly" within the moral frame of the story - that is, they either do not inhibit or actively work toward its destruction.
A character like Turin, on the other had, does not embody our sense of moral worthiness. Like the characters in
Game of Thrones he exhibits impatience, petulance, annoyance, apathy and faithlessness. He is quick to anger, violent and at turns careless or self-righteous and self-pitying. He is therefore less easy to "relate" to - he grates against our moral intuitions.
At the same time, I've read elsewhere that for some readers, he is easier to relate to precisely because he exhibits these natural psychological tendencies more readily than Frodo or Sam do, who remains steadfast in their quest until it is completed (perhaps, psychologically, an unrealistic expectation for any person). Perhaps, therefore, a sense of psychological "realism" makes Turin more human and therefore more "like us".
Anyway, I am rambling, but the complexities of reader response are I would say related to the complexities of human psychology. When we say we relate or say we fail to relate to characters we are responding to a complex set of variables - likableness, moral expectations, wish fulfillment, our own moral codes, etc.