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28-550: Pelevin traces the absurd fate of the protagonist Omon, named by his policeman father (after OMON , Soviet and Russian special police forces , pronounced " Amon "), placing him in circumstances that are both fantastic and at the same time have recognizable everyday detail. Pelevin uses this story to illustrate the underlying absurdity of the Soviet establishment with its fixation on "heroic achievements", especially in those fields of human endeavor which could be favorably presented to

56-407: A gulag camp. Leo Tolstoy 's War and Peace depicts fifteen major characters involved in or affected by a war. Though many people equate protagonists with the term hero and possessing heroic qualities, it is not necessary, as even villainous characters can be protagonists. For example Michael Corleone from The Godfather (1972–1990) film series (1978–1983). In some cases, the protagonist

84-422: A hero (masculine) or heroine (feminine) protagonist is typically admired for their achievements and noble qualities. Heroes are lauded for their strength, courage, virtuousness, and honor, and are considered to be the "good guys" of the narrative. Examples include DC Comics' Superman (hero) and Katniss Everdeen from The Hunger Games (heroine). An antihero (sometimes spelled as anti-hero) or antiheroine

112-423: A poet named Thespis introduced the idea of one actor stepping out and engaging in a dialogue with the chorus. This was the invention of tragedy, and occurred about 536 B.C. Then the poet Aeschylus , in his plays, introduced a second actor, inventing the idea of dialogue between two characters. Sophocles then wrote plays that included a third actor. A description of the protagonist's origin cited that during

140-477: A radio beacon to a specific point on the Moon and activate it. This he does, even though once he leaves the confines of the hermetically sealed Lunokhod, his protection against the vacuum and the interstellar cold consists of a cotton-filled overcoat and "special hydrocompensatory tampons" (which are really just oiled cotton balls) stuffed up his nose. However, when the time comes for Omon to shoot himself after he places

168-567: A supporting protagonist appears, the story is told from the perspective of a character who appears to be minor. This character may be more peripheral from the events of the story and are not as involved within the "main action" of the plot. The supporting protagonist may be telling the story while viewing another character as the main influence of the plot. One example is Nick in The Great Gatsby . Euripides ' play Hippolytus may be considered to have two protagonists, though one at

196-432: A time. Phaedra is the protagonist of the first half, who dies partway through the play. Her stepson, the titular Hippolytus, assumes the dominant role in the second half of the play. In Henrik Ibsen 's play The Master Builder , the protagonist is the architect Halvard Solness. The young woman, Hilda Wangel, whose actions lead to the death of Solness, is the antagonist. In Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet , Romeo

224-634: A year of physical therapy and exercise to master control of his prosthetic devices. He succeeded and returned to flying in June 1943. Before any intentional amputation can occur, Omon and his friend are whisked out of the academy into a top-secret installation, located under KGB headquarters in Moscow. There, they start preparing for a supposedly uncrewed mission to the Moon . Omon is told that to substitute for researching, building and launching an automated probe,

252-593: Is a main character in a story who lacks conventional heroic qualities and attributes such as idealism, courage, and morality. Examples include Holden Caulfield from The Catcher in the Rye , Scarlett O'Hara from Gone With the Wind , Jay Gatsby from The Great Gatsby , and Walter White from Breaking Bad . A tragic hero is the protagonist of a tragedy. Examples include Oedipus from Oedipus Rex and Prince Hamlet from Shakespeare's Hamlet . The protagonist

280-496: Is his own antagonist). Sometimes, a work will have a false protagonist , who may seem to be the protagonist, but then may disappear unexpectedly. The character Marion in Alfred Hitchcock 's film Psycho (1960) is an example. A novel may contain a number of narratives, each with its own protagonist. Alexander Solzhenitsyn 's The First Circle , for example, depicts a variety of characters imprisoned and living in

308-574: Is human and whose head is that of a falcon . Omon bestowed this surname upon himself, inspired by the fact that the word falcon was sometimes applied to cosmonauts and heroes. Ra is connected with the Egyptian myth of the Sun orbiting the Earth, which connects to Omon's obsession with spaceflight. Later, Ra becomes his call sign for the lunar mission. Together these names relate to Omon's dream of flight and

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336-538: Is in fact only a perception formed in people's consciousness, and can be manipulated to the extent that the question of "true" version of events becomes meaningless. The title, Omon Ra , refers to the main character's given and chosen names. Omon's first name comes from the acronym for a branch of the Russian police force. It was given to him by his father. Ra is an allusion to the Egyptian Sun god, whose body

364-484: Is not always conventionally good. Contrasting the hero protagonist, a villain protagonist is a protagonist who is a villain , driving the story forward regardless of the evil qualities the main character has. These traits can include being cruel, malicious, and wicked. Examples include Humbert Humbert in Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita and Richard III in the eponymous play by William Shakespeare . When

392-641: Is nothing but a glorified illusion. Although children believe that the world holds an infinite number of opportunities for adults, they eventually learn that the responsibility adults have is extremely constraining rather than liberating. Marcel Dorney's theatrical adaptation of Omon Ra was performed by the Restaged Histories Project in Brisbane , Australia in 2006. Protagonist A protagonist (from Ancient Greek πρωταγωνιστής prōtagōnistḗs  'one who plays

420-464: Is the character whose fate is most closely followed by the reader or audience, and who is opposed by the antagonist . The antagonist provides obstacles and complications and creates conflicts that test the protagonist, revealing the strengths and weaknesses of the protagonist's character, and having the protagonist develop as a result. The term protagonist comes from Ancient Greek πρωταγωνιστής ( prōtagōnistḗs )  'actor who plays

448-419: Is the protagonist. He is actively in pursuit of his relationship with Juliet, and the audience is invested in that story. Tybalt, as an antagonist, opposes Romeo and attempts to thwart the relationship. In Shakespeare's play Hamlet , Prince Hamlet, who seeks revenge for the murder of his father, is the protagonist. The antagonist is the character who most opposes Hamlet, Claudius (though, in many ways, Hamlet

476-455: The Party prefers to use people, trained for "heroism", to fulfill the tasks nominally performed by machines, such as rocket stage separation, space vehicle course correction and so on. Soon Omon indeed seems to be launched to the Moon, strapped into a seat inside a Lunokhod , which he is meant to drive like a bicycle on the lunar surface. He is the final piece in a multi-stage mission to deliver

504-401: The absurd military system he must go through to achieve it. Throughout much of the novel, Pelevin establishes space travel as a metaphor for maturation and heroism as one for responsibility. In the beginning of the novel, Omon straddles the boundary between childhood and adulthood. He yearns to become a cosmonaut and a hero; however, when he has the opportunity to do so, he realizes that heroism

532-423: The beacon, according to his orders, the gun he was given for the purpose misfires. Omon finds himself not on the Moon at all, but in an abandoned subway tunnel, where he had been driving his Lunokhod all along, ignoring all signs which might have given him a clue as to his real whereabouts. He tries to escape and is chased and shot at, but he manages to find his way into the "normal" world again, coming up into one of

560-480: The book was awarded with two literary prizes, the "Interpresson" and the "Bronze Snail". The book is narrated in the first person. It is a coming-of-age story, or Bildungsroman . The protagonist is Omon Krivomazov, who was born in Moscow post- World War II . The plot traces his life from early childhood. In his teenage years, the realization strikes him that he must break free of Earth's gravity to free himself of

588-431: The cadets. These amputations come as a reference to a famous Soviet ace-pilot Alexey Maresyev , who, despite being badly injured in a plane crash after a dogfight, managed to return to Soviet-controlled territory on his own. During his 18-day-long journey, his injuries deteriorated so badly that both of his legs had to be amputated below the knee. Desperate to return to his fighter pilot career, he subjected himself to nearly

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616-564: The chief or first part', combined of πρῶτος ( prôtos , 'first') and ἀγωνιστής ( agōnistḗs , 'actor, competitor'), which stems from ἀγών ( agṓn , 'contest') via ἀγωνίζομαι ( agōnízomai , 'I contend for a prize'). The earliest known examples of a protagonist are found in Ancient Greece . At first, dramatic performances involved merely dancing and recitation by the chorus. Then in Poetics , Aristotle describes how

644-402: The demands of the Soviet society and the rigid ideological confines of the state. After finishing high school, he immediately enrolls in a military academy. Omon soon finds that the academy does not, in fact, create future pilots, but instead exposes cadets to a series of treacherous trials, beginning with the amputation of both of their feet. The goal of the trials is to manifest Soviet heroism in

672-466: The early period of Greek drama, the protagonist served as the author, the director, and the actor and that these roles were only separated and allocated to different individuals later. There is also a claim that the poet did not assign or create the protagonist as well as other terms for actors such as deuteragonist and tritagonist primarily because he only gave actors their appropriate part. However, these actors were assigned their specific areas at

700-403: The first part, chief actor') is the main character of a story. The protagonist makes key decisions that affect the plot , primarily influencing the story and propelling it forward, and is often the character who faces the most significant obstacles. If a story contains a subplot , or is a narrative made up of several stories, then each subplot may have its own protagonist. The protagonist

728-422: The outside world—science, the military, and most significantly space exploration . The book met with a significant success in the early post-Soviet cultural landscape and continues to be reprinted. An excerpt under the name "Lunokhod" was published in 1991 in the magazine Knowledge is Power and in the collection Blue Lantern . A variation of the book was published in the magazine The Banner in 1992. In 1993

756-419: The stage with the protagonist always entering from the middle door or that the dwelling of the deuteragonist (second most important character) should be on the right hand, and the tritagonist (third most important character), the left. In Ancient Greece, the protagonist is distinguished from the term "hero", which was used to refer to a human who became a semi-divine being in the narrative. In literary terms,

784-553: The stations of the Moscow Metro . One of Omon's "teachers" explains the idea behind the charade: even if the fact that the Soviet Union is a champion of peaceful space exploration holds true only inside a person's head (namely, the hero's; no one knows of him or his mission apart from its organizers), this is not any different from it being the reality. The reality, when it concerns subjects not capable of being experienced,

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