Superman: American Icon Or Global Icon? A Superman Article

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

Superman might be an allegory, if you can establish a one-to-one correspondence between his story and another. But he can't be an allegory for more than one story unless they're also allegories of a single tale.

Superman would correctly be considered to evoke, or to make reference to, other stories and characters - including yes Jesus of Nazareth and Moses the biblical patriarch. But he's not an allegory for any of them.

That's actually only using the running narration as a tool for comparison. An obvious problem arises with the fact that Superman's been around for a century with a lot of renditions of his story coming into play. Finding a specific allegory becomes more of a political dissection that has to derivate multiple variables of the substance to find something that fits.

Then there are multifaceted allegories that transcend one character, like the Klingons.

I don't think you can quantify her in testaments. She is a response to patriarchy by a male feminist with a bondage fetish. I guess what you could say in context of this thread is that Superman fights for a better tomorrow, Wonder Woman fights to protect women. If Wonder Woman was ''old testament God'', she would have cast out Adam and Adam alone.

I mean this is what Themyscira is lol

[Frustration]

That's actually only using the running narration as a tool for comparison. An obvious problem arises with the fact that Superman's been around for a century with a lot of renditions of his story coming into play.

Yes, but there are certain elements which seemingly MUST be present if the character is to be considered Superman. Being sent from Krypton, which was doomed, to Earth. Being found by humans and raised by them with conventional morality for the time and place he lived. Fighting for "truth, justice, and the American Way".

There are deconstructions, like "Red Son", where "Superman" arrives in the Soviet Union and fights for the Soviet Way, instead of American. But in a sense that isn't Superman, just as Krampus isn't Santa Claus.

So: what story would the basic and essential story of Superman be an allegory of? To the best of my knowledge, there isn't one. He's not Jesus because he's not the "son" (whatever that means) of the creator of the universe, and he was sent to Earth for his own survival rather than any benefit to humanity. His powers are extraordinary but not transcending normal reality, and his death is neither the purpose of his existence nor necessary for his role. I could make a similar analysis/comparison with the story of Moses, and Supe just doesn't fit.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

So: what story would the basic and essential story of Superman be an allegory of? To the best of my knowledge, there isn't one. He's not Jesus because he's not the "son" (whatever that means) of the creator of the universe, and he was sent to Earth for his own survival rather than any benefit to humanity. His powers are extraordinary but not transcending normal reality, and his death is neither the purpose of his existence nor necessary for his role. I could make a similar analysis/comparison with the story of Moses, and Supe just doesn't fit.

I've never said that he's a direct Christ allegory. I've always been of the mind that any Jewish prophet is fair game for the construction of his character. The idea wasn't to validate the precise narrative of the bible, but to give a narrative condition that accounts for what people saw. In that sense it's not necessary to make him a Christ centric allegory as far as anything I've said, or especially the movies that have come out. For that matter I don't think he's supposed to validate the Jewish faith in lieu of reflections on Jesus.

[Frustration]

Prophets are sent to deliver messages. Superman wasn't sent to Earth to deliver a message, he was sent to preserve his life.

I don't see how his story can be considered an allegory of the concept of Generic Jewish Prophet, either.

[TGLS]

Prophets are sent to deliver messages. Superman wasn't sent to Earth to deliver a message, he was sent to preserve his life.

Stalin, for all his faults, didn't turn workers who were unable to work into glue and Lenin lived until shortly after the revolution ended. For that matter, capitalists don't eat the meat of communists. Not every allegory needs to be a perfect allegory where everything lines up. The Crucible is about McCarthyism even though McCarthy didn't execute anyone.

[Frustration]

Stalin, for all his faults, didn't turn workers who were unable to work into glue

You're putting an element from the allegory together with an element of the underlying story, which is incorrect.

Stalin did indeed betray the veterans of the Soviet Armed Forces, denying them medical care and in many cases condemning them with trumped-up charges of treason and having them executed. The workhorse in Animal Farm was indeed betrayed by the ruling pigs after he worked himself into decrepitude, denied pasturage and sent to the knacker to be killed and rendered.

Yes, allegories do indeed need to be 'perfect', or they're not allegories. In the example of The Crucible, executions are an allegorical representation of destroying people's professional and often personal lives. One-to-one correspondence. If, hypothetically, the prosecutors used the charges to demand sexual favors of the Puritans, that would break the equal relationship between McCarthyism and the play.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

That doesn't mean that your speculation of specificity is correct.

Again what I said still applies. The mythological aspects applied to prophets could have rather direct parallels with the Kryptonians. Just because we as humans said that "prophets were here to do this" doesn't mean that we have to take a sci-fi based allegory and anchor it their specific word.

[Frustration]

It's not 'speculation', it's how the term is defined. It's meant to be very specific.

As Tolkien famously noted, there is a world of difference between allegory and applicability. You seem to be interested with applicability; that's fine, you just need to stop referring to it with a distinctly different technical term.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

No I'm finding allegory to be much more broad than you're letting on.

[Frustration]

Well, there's nothing more I can do. Enjoy being wrong! I'll just sit back, and watch.