Stevens 22: Fiction as a Motivator

It is impossible to walk into a movie theater, to sit in front of the TV, to read a gripping novel without, in some way, becoming the characters before you. They are everything you want to be; they present a better version of yourself, a Romantic visage of life at its most breathtaking. Inevitably, then, we want to become these characters.

Often, the characters we see and read are impossible to become. You may adore Harry Potter—as I do—and you may have hoped against every rational thought that Hagrid would burst in on your eleventh birthday and, in an ominous rumble, declare you to be “a wizard.” But this will never come to pass. Captain America and Gandalf and Ash Ketchum are fantasy.

The truly interesting question is thus: what realistic character would you be? Why?

Therefore, I choose Will McAcoy, of  HBO’s The Newsroom. He is brash, outgoing and committed to journalistic integrity in the face of a profit-driven cable news system. He often stumbles on his idealistic struggle, but he responds by doubling his efforts and never quits. I admire him for making large sacrifices—namely in ratings and popularity—in order to pursue a quixotic and probably unattainable goal.