# Literary characters who come to symbolize the opposite of how they were portrayed. **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 24, 2010, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304 "2010-06-24T01:52:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Rrose\_Selavy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bcef8e/32.png) [@Rrose\_Selavy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rrose_Selavy)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/161 "2010-07-14T19:07:23Z")
In the movie “The Day the Earth Stood Still” Gort symbolizes the robotic servant. In the original short story by Harry Bates , “Farewell to the Master” , it is Gort , not Klaatu. who is the “master” . - ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/162 "2010-07-14T19:24:42Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > It is about the question of evil: Why do bad things happen to good people? Job is the essential good person who has bad things befall him, not because he has sinned and offended God, but merely because shit happens. “Shit happens” is passive. It avoids assigning an actor. What happens to Job is active. God \*makes \*shit happen. ---
**Author:** ![Rrose\_Selavy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bcef8e/32.png) [@Rrose\_Selavy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rrose_Selavy)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/163 "2010-07-14T19:34:24Z")
> [@](#): > > rhubarbarin said: > > Quote: > I don’t find it plausible that rats would eat off someone’s face like cartoon piranhas, so it seemed a totally irrational fear to me. Irrational fear is still fear. The point of Room 101 where the torture takes place is that it contains what a person fears most- The “worst thing in the world” . So if eg. Smith had a phobia of butterflies they might have been used (though probably not for the necesssary literary dramatic purposes) - ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/164 "2010-07-14T19:36:23Z")
> [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > “Shit happens” is passive. It avoids assigning an actor. What happens to Job is active. God \*makes \*shit happen. Well, he has his guy Satan do the actual scutwork. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/165 "2010-07-14T19:43:02Z")
Not exactly what the OP asked for but will mention anyway: Salieri was a competent composer and mainly a skilled teacher who seems to have had no real enmity with Mozart in real life, but is remembered due to his literary avatar from _Amadeus_ as an obsessed mediocrity. Also from Shaffer, the personalities of de Soto and Pizarro are reversed in _Royal Hunt of the Sun_: in the play Pizarro is the advocate for the emperor Atahuallpa and plays Pilate in looking for ways to keep him alive while de Soto is the more bloodthirsty “the king must die” conquistador, though in reality the positions were closer to reversed (de Soto wanted him alive, albeit as a puppet emperor, while Pizarro wanted him dead to create a power vacuum). ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/166 "2010-07-14T19:44:41Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Well, he has his guy Satan do the actual scutwork. Bureaucratic evil is the worst evil. Hijack: Did you task some of your bees to come after me yet? Because apparently I have wasps living in the spot where my A/C and whatnot vents to the outside at my apartment, and I’ve noticed a few hovering outside the windows at work… twenty stories up. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/167 "2010-07-14T19:44:54Z")
> [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > “Shit happens” is passive. It avoids assigning an actor. What happens to Job is active. God \*makes \*shit happen. You just motivated me to go back and take another look at [the story](http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=job%201-2&version=NIV), and I noticed a weird thing that I don’t remember seeing before: it’s unclear, even ambiguous, who actually makes the shit happen: God or Satan. [QUOTE=the book of Job] (from Chapter 1) 9 “Does Job fear God for nothing?” Satan replied. 10 “Have you not put a hedge around him and his household and everything he has? You have blessed the work of his hands, so that his flocks and herds are spread throughout the land. 11 But **stretch out your hand and strike everything he has** , and he will surely curse you to your face.” 12 The LORD said to Satan, “Very well, then, **everything he has is in your hands, but on the man himself do not lay a finger.** ” Then Satan went out from the presence of the LORD. (from Chapter 2) 3 Then the LORD said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil. And he still maintains his integrity, though **you incited me against him to ruin him** without any reason.” 4 “Skin for skin!” Satan replied. “A man will give all he has for his own life. 5 But **stretch out your hand and strike his flesh and bones** , and he will surely curse you to your face.” 6 The LORD said to Satan, “Very well, then, **he is in your hands; but you must spare his life**.” 7 **So Satan went out from the presence of the LORD and afflicted Job with painful sores from the soles of his feet to the top of his head.** 8 Then Job took a piece of broken pottery and scraped himself with it as he sat among the ashes. [/QUOTE] (bolding mine) ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/168 "2010-07-14T19:46:04Z")
> [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > Bureaucratic evil is the worst evil. > > Hijack: Did you task some of your bees to come after me yet? Because apparently I have wasps living in the spot where my A/C and whatnot vents to the outside at my apartment, and I’ve noticed a few hovering outside the windows at work… twenty stories up. Those aren’t mine. That happened to me in a twelfth-story apartment once, though. Eventually we found that there was a bee hive on the roof. ---
**Author:** ![TGWATY](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b5e925/32.png) [@TGWATY](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TGWATY)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/169 "2010-07-14T19:48:56Z")
Tarzan First book is the familiar story, close to what we get in Greystoke and the Disney Tarzan, except Tarzan has to follow Jane to America to win her, but then decides that Jane’s fiancee really is better suited for her and gives her up. In the second book we see Tarzan smoking, drinking absinthe, playing cards and going up against Russian spies. Eventually he does settle down with Jane in England, taking his place as Lord Greystoke. Later they move to a plantation in British East Africa. And while he does end up fighting Germans in a loincloth in WWI, he serves in uniform in WWII. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/170 "2010-07-14T19:49:49Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > You just motivated me to go back and take another look at [the story](http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=job%201-2&version=NIV), and I noticed a weird thing that I don’t remember seeing before: it’s unclear, even ambiguous, who actually makes the shit happen: God or Satan.(bolding mine) Bear in mind that Satan, in the Book of Job, is not the enemy of God; he’s clearly a member of the celestial retinue. (Nobody yells “Security” when he shows up, after all.) But it’s clear to me that Satan is doing the actual smiting, as God sets conditions as to what he can do. (“Yeah, take all his stuff and murder his kids and servants, but don’t touch his body.” “Okay, since he’s still hanging in there, you can torture him personally, but don’t kill him.”) Nothing Satan does to Job is not ultimately God’s will. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/171 "2010-07-14T19:51:09Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Bear in mind that Satan, in the Book of Job, is not the enemy of God; he’s clearly a member of the celestial retinue. (Nobody yells “Security” when he shows up, after all.) But it’s clear to me that Satan is doing the actual smiting, as God sets conditions as to what he can do. (“Yeah, take all his stuff and murder his kids and servants, but don’t touch his body.” “Okay, since he’s still hanging in there, you can torture him personally, but don’t kill him.”) Nothing Satan does to Job is not ultimately God’s will. In the apocryphal version Job is in a stall in the men’s room when he overhears Satan acknowledging he’s lost the bet and giving God his winnings- one dollar- after which he decides to take revenge against them both. ---
**Author:** ![Sr\_Siete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@Sr\_Siete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sr_Siete)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/172 "2010-07-14T20:07:08Z")
> [@TGWATY](#): > > Tarzan > > First book is the familiar story, close to what we get in Greystoke and the Disney Tarzan, except Tarzan has to follow Jane to America to win her, but then decides that Jane’s fiancee really is better suited for her and gives her up. In the second book we see Tarzan smoking, drinking absinthe, playing cards and going up against Russian spies. Eventually he does settle down with Jane in England, taking his place as Lord Greystoke. Later they move to a plantation in British East Africa. And while he does end up fighting Germans in a loincloth in WWI, he serves in uniform in WWII. Not to mention that a lot of Tarzan’s adventures were a lot less rooted in the real world than people thinks and derived into straight science fiction and fantasy: a witch doctor made him immortal, he fought the Ant Men and traveled to the Earth’s core… ---
**Author:** ![Mister\_Rik](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mister_rik/32/491_2.png) [@Mister\_Rik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mister_Rik)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/173 "2010-07-14T20:08:21Z")
> [@pepperlandgirl](#): > > Indeed. It was a great joke for all involved that Sancho would be a governor. They basically treated it like they couldn’t think of anything funnier. Plus the Duke that made him governor was engaged in a long-term plan to humiliate Quixote… > > I think that Cervantes did a good job of keeping the extent of Quixote’s insanity ambiguous. Sometimes, he seemed to be utterly crazy. At other points, especially in part 2, he seemed to be somewhat aware of the fact that he was the butt of multiple jokes. I see from the posts here that I’m going to have to read Don Quixote again. I read it once as a youngster (it may have been an abridged “young readers” version, I can’t remember, but it was before I started keeping track of every book I read at age 13), and I suspect I was too young to grasp it properly (or the possibly-abridged version I read managed to miss the point). I came away thinking Quixote simply had really, really poor eyesight. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/174 "2010-07-14T20:18:01Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > In the apocryphal version Job is in a stall in the men’s room when he overhears Satan acknowledging he’s lost the bet and giving God his winnings- one dollar- after which he decides to take revenge against them both. God is Mortimer Duke??? ---
**Author:** ![Death\_of\_Rats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a6a055/32.png) [@Death\_of\_Rats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Death_of_Rats)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/175 "2010-07-14T20:29:41Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > In the apocryphal version Job is in a stall in the men’s room when he overhears Satan acknowledging he’s lost the bet and giving God his winnings- one dollar- after which he decides to take revenge against them both. Wow, that does explain why God’s Orange Juice Conentrate investments tanked! ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/176 "2010-07-14T20:37:55Z")
> [@Rrose\_Selavy](#): > > In the movie “The Day the Earth Stood Still” Gort symbolizes the robotic servant. > In the original short story by Harry Bates , “Farewell to the Master” , it is Gort , not Klaatu. who is the “master” . > > - Well, that’s the twist at the end. But in the film, IIRC the hierarchy is not addressed: we simply assume that Gort is the servant. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/177 "2010-07-14T20:40:08Z")
With regard to the OP, would John Rambo fit the bill? In the first movie, he goes to great pains to not kill people - though he doesn’t stop them dying - but in the later movies he’s a killing machine. ---
**Author:** ![Sr\_Siete](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@Sr\_Siete](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sr_Siete)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/178 "2010-07-14T20:47:47Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > With regard to the OP, would John Rambo fit the bill? In the first movie, he goes to great pains to not kill people - though he doesn’t stop them dying - but in the later movies he’s a killing machine. Naw, he tries to avoid killing American policemen. Vietcong are fair game. Rambo would fit with the OP in the sense that he’s used to describe somebody with gung-ho recklessness, but in the first one he was barely more than a confused moron in a bad situation. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/179 "2010-07-14T20:55:47Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > Captain Nemo is probably generally thought of today as a scientist/inventor who was far ahead of his time, but in origin he was not only that, but also a terrorist (if a rather sympathetic one). In both the book and the Disney movie, Nemo is a crusader against imperialism and goes out of his way to destroy the warships of colonialist powers; the other characters are captured by him when he attacks the US warship _Abraham Lincoln_. It’s thus rather ironic that the United States named its first nuclear submarine the _Nautilus_ after his ship. How is Nemo a terrorist? When does he violate the laws of war? ---
**Author:** ![Rrose\_Selavy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bcef8e/32.png) [@Rrose\_Selavy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rrose_Selavy)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2010, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304/180 "2010-07-14T21:01:29Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > Well, that’s the twist at the end. But in the film, IIRC the hierarchy is not addressed: we simply assume that Gort is the servant. That’s my point. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/literary-characters-who-come-to-symbolize-the-opposite-of-how-they-were-portrayed/544304.md?page=10)