Majora's Mask The Absurdity

[Din Akera]

Absurdism was an artistic and philosophical movement of the 19th Century in which theater, art, literature/poetry, dance, and all art forms dipped into the world of nonsense and "the absurd". Movements, phrases, and characters were meant to convey ideas, or emotions on some level, but most commonly, they were not meant to convey anything at all. There was no purpose to the artistic choices. For anyone who has studied theatre and art history, I'm referring to the Dada and Bauhous movements.

"The Absurd" refers to the conflict between the human tendency to seek inherent meaning in life and the human inability to find any. In this context absurd does not mean "logically impossible," but rather "humanly impossible." The universe and the human mind do not each separately cause the Absurd, but rather, the Absurd arises by the contradictory nature of the two existing simultaneously.

This is one of the better explanations of this concept, as it is a fairly abstract, but studying it provoked the thoughts on our beloved Majora's Mask. We try with all our might to explain the oddities of this game. The moon, the children, the portal, the mask salesman, and much more, with theories of metaphors and integration of themes from the game into these abstract concepts that we come across. But what if "the absurd" was all it was meant to be. It was not truly meant to have a meaning, but represent the absurdity of alternate worlds/dimensions. Maybe there was no intention for us to comprehend; an abstract concept that has no true base. As the quote suggests, it is human nature to want to explain things and create meaning and concepts for the representations brought to us, even when we are not intended too, or not capable of comprehension.

Even though Majora's Mask was released at the turn of the 21st Century, and is therefore way out of the time frame, I do not think it to absurd (lol) that this piece of art could be representative of this movement. Artists of all calibers and disciplines experiment throughout the ages and test their hand at the different forms of their art. What better way to improve? And as it turns out, it was one of the best games in the series, a great leap of Nintendo to try a new art form with an existing idea.

I know you might think I'm crazy, but put that aside and think about it for just a minute. Maybe it could be possible. Of course we will all continue to try and decipher the code, but just maybe the absurd is the only intention to be discovered.

 

[Azure Sage]

You could be right. This is the first I've heard of the Absurd, but from what I can gather, it goes hand-in-hand with Majora's Mask. Take the Happy Mask Salesman for example. He went to great lengths to get Majora's Mask even though he knew it was dangerous, and he was stupid enough to not take good enough care of it and ended up losing it in a mugging by Skullkid. That is certainly Absurd.

 

[Reignbow]

That's an interesting connection. A lot of things from the game remind me of absurdist literature as well. The Woodfall scrubs immediately identifying and punishing the monkey for the missing princess is like when the chaplain in Catch-22 (awesome book, by the way) is blamed because of the faulty military bureaucracy for ridiculous charges.

I feel there are more examples, but they're not coming to me right now. Something to do with circular reasoning or just general non sequiter, maybe?

 

[Djinn]

I think you might be right. I have thought that Majoras Mask was definitely inspired by Alice In Wonderland. Which was considered one of the original novels of absurdist fiction. Majoras Mask began with Link copying Alice in falling down the rabbit hole and emerging in a strange dreamlike world. Filled with nonsense characters and strange happenings all around him.

Absurdist fiction is a genre of literature, most often employed in novels, plays, or poems, that focuses on the experiences of characters in a situation where they cannot find any inherent purpose in life, most often represented by ultimately meaningless actions and events. Common elements in absurdist fiction include satire, dark humour, incongruity, the abasement of reason , and controversy regarding the philosophical condition of being "nothing."http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction#cite_note-0 Works of absurdist fiction often explore agnostic or nihilistic topics.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdist_fiction

This does sound a lot like Majoras Mask when you think about it. It looks like we can now add video games to the list.

Various masks that transform Link into different people of different species, a moon falling out of the sky apparently with evil intent in it's eyes. Constantly reliving the same three days over and over again. Aliens, strange monsters, a kingdom of wooden people, fairies exploding into tinier fairies, desert thieves living on the sea, and a canyon full of dead souls of a past empire.

And from all of these one cannot help but look for some type of explanation or meaning behind it all. Do the masks represent struggling with one's own unknown identity? And what is the skull kid? A mischievous prankster that is genuinely evil or misunderstood? Or is he Link's opposite? Link is a child hero that lives to help others and rescue those in need while the skull kid is an unruly child that causes trouble everywhere he goes not caring for the consequences. We might never know due to the nature of the game. It leaves us guessing at the meaning behind the themes little over a decade later. And it just might be possible that we may never truly know. It's absurd.

 

[Din Akera]

Alright I wanted to add something and I will place it down here so it won't be missed.

For me, i have always though MM to be a dream that link has while riding Epona through the woods, which explains the absurdity of it. it is subconscous arousal of the mind form his last adventure. that is why everything is analogous to OoT and Hyrule. his mind is pulling things it know sand placing them in a new order and a absurd pattern. His rational mind sorts it the way it did the last problem it had (saving hyrule) and we get this wonderful story that has some holes in it becuase of the irrationality of the subconcious. Therin, the absurd stands as the only meaning for the metaphors and representations in the game

No, the absurd has no meaning. It stands for what as actors we perceive as fun because you are not tied to anything. there is no higher organization that you are tied to and have to respect. everything just is what is is and can be as it be no matter how irrational it appears to the rational mind

 

[Djinn]

A dream would explain quite a bit. The world of Termina does appear like a dream, almost nightmarish in places. But the appearance of everyone Link met in Hyrule in different forms and lives, still familiar but different in many ways.

At this point Link's life is a dream. He saved Hyrule and became the hero of time only to whisked back to the forest where he came from and only he remembers the entire event. The land and it's people exist as if nothing ever happened and Link's quest never occurred. Plus he might be confused of his identity, he went from a Kokiri child to a Hylian adult in an instant, then a Hylian child living among non Hylian Kokiri. This same confusion could be playing out in Termina. There he was a Goron, a Deku Scrub, a Zora, and a Deity, all while transforming from adult to child over and over again. Wearing their faces over his in the form of a mask.

In this context, a dream where Link is the hero again makes sense. His subconscious creating these events based on his experiences in Hyrule when he was the Hero of Time.

 

[DLC]

Wow. THat is such a great theory. And that would explain all the repeated characters and how everything is so: Absurd?