posted
Is anyone else curious about Achilles' story pre-Poke/Sister Carlotta, on the streets of Rotterdam? I mean, it's hard to believe that someone with such a brilliant mind and such self-centered ambitious motives would settle for being just another lesser bully on the streets. There has to be something more to it. I'm curious as to where he came from, how he got to where he is at the beginning of Ender's Shadow, and what he was doing once he got there, before he got 'hired' to be Poke's bully. Although it'll probably never happen, I'd definitely be interested in a parallel-prequel about this.
Anybody else have these thoughts, or similar? Or any answers...
Posts: 80 | Registered: May 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
That has always been my biggest problem with Achilles' character.
He is now this hyper-genius who is the arch villian of the world. Yet he seemed pretty much like a petty thug in Ender's Shadow.
Posts: 258 | Registered: Jun 1999
| IP: Logged |
Also, does anyone here think that Achilles would have had/been (depends on which terminology you prefer) a stronger character if he would not have had his gimp leg fixed? It kind of came as a disappointment to me that he would not remain a, those who are sensitive to these sort of things please forgive the term, cripple throughout the entire series, cruel as that may sound; I think it would've been interesting.
Posts: 80 | Registered: May 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
I decided that Achilles was a 'created' genius. In the enriched environment (get smart or die) of the streets, he was smart enough to live, even though he was weak and crippled. Attention was drawn to him because he appeared to have brought 'civilization' to the area, no one at the time realized that he was following Bean's plan. His survival/fighting instincts got him into Battle School, that is what they were testing. The fame of the Battle School got him into powerful positions.
His psychotic nature is very similar to the personality of Hitler or Stalin. His methods are brutal, causing fear, and treacherous, allowing him to flee the destruction he causes.
Posts: 37 | Registered: May 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
It never surprised me - Achilles had what it took to survive. And make a place for himself - it's just that his methods were outside the acceptable range.
Although, I suppose if you wanted to do a comparison/contrast to Ender and Bean, you'd might decide he wasn't so far out of range after all. Just sneakier than Ender and more stupid than Bean.
Posts: 5609 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
I've always thought of Achilles as a sociopath with out a conscience. I'm studying this kinda in my psych class right now, and there seems to be a correlation in intelligence and sociopathic behaviors. So people that are more intelligent are more likely to become the type of extreme sociopaths that kill with out feeling.
When Bean was living on the streets as well he had sociopathic tendencies, with his feelings toward Sister Carlotta and his lack of emotion. It can be argued that Bean found friends in battle school and that's how began to feel, or that it was only in the harsh environment of the streets that emotion had to be suspended for survival.
Regardless sociopaths, especially the more intelligent ones are very good at manipulating people for a few reasons. First is their intelligence. Second they are not bound by the standards of other people. They can unscrupously attack their opponents in ways that are completely with out pity. This helps them to trample others that are in the way. Thirdly they are not hampered by other people. They have only one concern themselves. The reason why Achilles has become the arch-enemy then is because he has built up a network of connections of people that he manipulated into liking them, which makes up for his intelligence being lower than Bean's by his having more power and a greater charisma.
As for why he wasn't more than a lesser bully on the streets of Rotterdam, he derives his power from control of other people. He is intelligent but not as intelligent as Bean, and people on the street have nothing that he can manipulate them to do. They respect only physical strength which he didn't have and he didn't possess the brilliance to find another way to force them to like him. I think that if he had stayed on the streets he would eventually have found himself in a better situation as he got older and found ways to steal and manipulate others, battle school just gave him a chance to raise his ambitions.
Posts: 349 | Registered: May 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
I never understood the killing without feeling part. Isn't killing the inmsane part, the without feeling doesn't surprise me. I guess if I randomly killed someone, I wouldn't feel pity or remorse. But I would never kill someone, it's morally wrong for me, and I would never even get into a fight at school. Murder has never crossed my mind, and I would rather loose everything than do it, but I still wouldn't feel remorse if I did. But I could be wrong, I've never killed someone, I'm just going on gut feeling.
Posts: 103 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
The with out feeling is actually more part of the insanity than the murder. The 'official' name for sociopathy is "Antisocial Personality Disorder" and these people are just that. They literally reject society and all of the rules and morals that are a part of human society and make up their own. When they kill someone they feel justified because that person has broken the arbitrary rules they make for themselves. In Achilles case they got in his way and he was so important that they deserved to die.
If you're interested in it here's a good link I found. (I hope it works)
quote:Originally posted by pwiscombe: That has always been my biggest problem with Achilles' character.
He is now this hyper-genius who is the arch villian of the world. Yet he seemed pretty much like a petty thug in Ender's Shadow.
And a (ten?)-year-old petty thug. For the age he'd managed to survive to, he was doing pretty well! He wasn't in Bean's category for IQ, but then Bean was almost dead from starvation at four.
Posts: 69 | Registered: Jan 2007
| IP: Logged |
posted
Bean wondered why Achilles hadn't gotten a crew of his own as well. I think he just attributed it to Achilles being too stupid to think of it, but still smart enough to recognize a good plan and make it his own.
Posts: 197 | Registered: Jan 2007
| IP: Logged |
posted
Achilles isn't supposed to be a super-genius or anything. He's smarter than average, and he was doing okay on the streets despite being a cripple. He got to do what he liked (killing people) without a lot of hassle. Eventually he probably would have developed or joined a serious criminal organization, but he was still just a kid back when Carlotta discovered him.
There isn't anything insane about the simple fact of being causally linked to the death of another. Almost all humans are, particularly in the globalized world of today. Don't we hear arguments equating various politicians or corperations and even their constituents/customers to mass murderers because this or that policy causes or fails to alliviate human suffering? These arguments are overblown, but they touch on an important truth, that most humans do kill other humans at random by virtue of the lifestyles they choose to lead.
Nor is it technically insane to feel no remorse over causing the death of another person. It's merely socially dysfunctional to admit that you've killed without remorse, because it negatively affects your ability to make useful social alliances in most situations. Achilles didn't admit he was a remorseless killer until that information was forced out of him, and afterwards he used it to his advantage. I don't think that his behavior can be termed "insane". His overconfidence was pathological, and resulted directly in his death, but that's a different issue.
Posts: 763 | Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged |
quote:Achilles isn't supposed to be a super-genius or anything.
Actually, he is. He's not the superest of super-geniuses, but he's still a super-genius. He's like Aquaman or Hawkman: still technically a superhero, even if you wouldn't want him to be the one assigned to your case.
quote:I don't think that his behavior can be termed "insane".
I think sociopathy can be safely called "insane," actually.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
What I've always wondered is: How did Achilles end up on the streets? From the account Bean later gives Petra, there is no way any infant but himself would have survived on the streets without being severely malnourished--enough to leave him permanently mentally handicapped.
To me this means Achilles had caretakers--probably until he was at least 4 or 5 years old. Were they his parents, or was he in an institution of some kind? What were they like? Who was the first person he ever saw die?
There's no answer in the books, I just wonder, that's all.
Posts: 368 | Registered: Dec 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Probably all of the kids living on the street had caretakers till they were old enough to live on the streets
Technically, "super genius" is generally considered to be a person whose IQ can't be measured by normal means. Achilles might easily qualify as a genius, which would make him a one in 300 (or so) mentally. He might have been on the high end of the genius scale, maybe possessing a one in a million intellect. I frankly doubt that, because Battle School didn't select based solely or even primarily on general mental abilities, but on the basis of specific personality characteristics combined with mental ability. The thousand or so kids in Battle School weren't all one in a million even by that specialized standard.
Anyway, Bean claims that Achilles isn't a super genius. He would be the one who would be best able to make that judgement, and thus I'll rest it with him.
And if there's anyone that it isn't safe to call insane, sociopaths qualify Posts: 763 | Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
