Triple Stream

A Case for a Return of the Hero

We have seen a conspicuous loss in the stature of individual men despite the material achievements of our age. I happened to come across three literary studies – ‘The Unheroic Hero’, ‘the Vanishing Hero’ and ‘Decline of Hero’. Ours is a barren age of mediocrity without heroes who shaped early 20th century thought and habit. It is sad to realize how qualitatively the world has changed in a generation. We had Vivekananda, Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Patel, Rabindranath Tagore etal in India, Lloyd George, Winston Churchill and Clement Attlee in England, Abraham Lincoln, Jefferson and Franklin Roosevelt in United States. There were also heroic men like Napoleon, Hitler and Stalin. Outside politics we had men like Einstein, Raman, Freud, etal. Some of these stalwarts influenced the world for good and some for evil. But each of them had heroic stuff and bestrode the world or his own country or his chosen field of activity, like a Colossus. We have today Lilliputs who are incapable of imprinting the stamp of their personalities on history. When Danton, the great French statesman was asked by the Judge of the Revolutionary Court before his execution, “What is your address?” his proud and confident reply was: “IN THE PAGES OF HISTORY”! Do we have such stalwarts today? One felt the potent influence of such personalities on one’s life. That is why there is a common saying: “History is about chaps and geography is about maps”.

We not only do not have heroes and really great men but we are suspicious, intolerant and jealous of them. This is an anti-hero age. It is difficult for the narrow-minded men to understand or put up with heroes. Heroes prevent people from living in their comfort zones and try to raise their sights and expand their mental horizon. Common people want security and status-quo. The heroes live dangerously and prefer opportunity to security adventure to dull routine and sacrifice to survival. Great men make small men painfully aware of their smallness. Puny persons are not at ease in the company of great men. It even causes feelings of resentment and hostility.

Democracy has produced diminutive men who try to lead the country by following the mob, but not from the front. After the World War II, we have seen that the leaders who had led their countries to victory were rejected on some pretext or other. England removed Churchill, the French rejected De Gaulle, the Chinese repudiated Chiang Kaishek, Stalin was replaced by Kruschev. The excuse trotted out was that the modern world has no need for the cult of the individual and collective leadership was the order of the day. The age of the average man has come with a bang. The new philosophy is, the world does not need geniuses but can manage with good natured block heads who are afraid of taking bold decisions but eager to please the majority. Modern democracy instead of giving every one a fair opportunity encouraged people to claim “equality” as an excuse for bringing all men down to their own level.

In a democracy the power of the majority is so absolute that the rights of the individual no longer count. James Bryce, the author of ‘American Commonwealth’ titled a chapter “WHY GREAT MEN ARE NOT CHOSEN PRESIDENT”. We find things are much worse in India. Our democracy is mobocracy or “functioning anarchy”.

Modern historians say, no individual is indispensable and history is not made by men but by the inexorable laws of nature and economics. One man is as good as another. They argue that the presence of a hero does not make any difference.

They want men who watch things happen and let things happen instead of making things happen. Marxism believes that economic forces and production methods determine the course of history. We should know, if individuals do not make history and contribute to the advent of change, it will only lead to fatalism. It is like saying that some other person would have created a feeling of nationalism and interpreted the Upanishads and Shankara’s Vedanta in the same manner, if Vivekananda was not born! It is like believing that any other writer would have produced Shakespeare’s timeless plays, even if Shakespeare did not write them. The theory of dispensability of the individual is a logical fallacy – a specious plea.

Heroes are creators of history, not its slaves. Heroes are necessary but not hero-worship. The individual plays a decisive role where alternative paths of development or problem solving are available. Crisis management and conflict resolution require the role of the leader. The hero holds the people to a high standard and takes them to the limit. He sets goals and paces himself against the clock.

Today we do not have real heroes but ‘position leaders and designation leaders’ who glitter on the seats of power temporarily and fall like the flying fish which splash into their native puddles after flying for a while.

Card board heroes of the tinsel world are our icons and role models today. In addition to them we have the American Superman syndrome. We have Batman, Captain Marvel, the Hulk, Spiderman, Captain America and other super heroes. The case for heroes is not a case for blind hero-worship. However, tame surrender of decision, slavish submission to leadership and unquestioning obedience to the man/woman in power are the chronic maladies of the Indian democracy. Capacity for dissent is the hall mark of true democracy. The leader can rule only by consent and co-operation, not by exercise of authority. Unfortunately sycophancy is the chief bane of democracy today. Spineless politicians, cronies and obsequious men who once belonged to the Court of Versailles and the Mughal Darbar have not changed in the several millennia. Over-acted compliance is a characteristic of fawning courtiers in India. They are a flock of sheep.

Emerson said “Every hero becomes a bore atlast”. Therefore he should follow the culture of consultation and the mantra of decentralization. History shows that it is possible to have heroes without making them gods.

Committees and conferences cannot produce insights, creative ideas and vision. The dynamic intervention of an individual is necessary to tackle political, moral and intellectual questions without yielding to pressures. If we do not recognize the role of heroes and great men, we tend to develop self-adulation and a Narcissus complex. What is worse than hero worship is self-worship, a greater evil. Emulation of great men helps us to reach our highest potential and climb peaks of excellence. As Emerson said, “Great men exist that there may be greater men. We feed on greatmen”. History is not a game of chance or a pre-meditated drift. Let us not be complacent by thinking that we can get on without great men.

I thought, a case can be ventured for a return of the hero. Heroism has become a relic of the past. Men’s actions are not as much responsible as they are explainable. In literature the word ‘hero’ began to mean simply a central character instead of a great man or hero. We want the second coming of the hero for whom security is not enough, contentment is not enough and survival is not enough. There must be a constant Kinetic experience in the mental realm. In his play ‘Man and Superman’ George Bernard Shaw expresses his opinion that the world needs super men. He goes to the extent of saying “We should breed supermen like horses and roses”. He said this because there was no cloning in his time! A hero need not be a dictator or a superman.