Reviewer Perspective - Themes, the Wounded Cynic

Every Monday I offer a reviewer's perspective on reviewer stuff such as ... themes and archetypes. Remember the Innocent, the Protector, and the Rebel? Here's the Wounded Cynic. He is sometimes what the Innocent, either Wounded or Fearless, matures into. Other times, he is what the Protector or the Rebel becomes if he experiences a shattering loss of self and purpose due to betrayal or failure.

The Wounded Cynic is a compelling character. He's been so damaged either through victimization at the hands of others or through guilt at his own unforgivable actions that he thinks he has lost all hope of redemption. Of course no one is completely beyond redemption, and that is why you find the Wounded Cynic at the heart of redemption stories.

Often the Wounded Cynic reluctantly takes on the role of Protector. In protecting, or even sacrificing himself for, an Innocent, he can often redeem himself. Our m/m genre is essentially a romance genre so usually the loss of life is kept to a minimum. In our fiction, you'll usually see the Wounded Cynic redeemed by the love and faith of the Innocent young man who has come into his life.

The intersection of Wounded Cynic and Protector is an uneasy one because some of their key traits are mutually incompatible. The Protector is defined by his devotion to duty and his belief in himself and in the worth of the one whom he is protecting. He is a knight or a priest with a cause that sustains him.

The Wounded Cynic, on the other hand, feels bitterness, disillusionment, and resignation – all things from which the Protector is in turn protected from by his belief and devotion. The Wounded Cynic has nothing to believe in. Therefore, he has reached a Dark Night of the Soul that has possibly been stretching on for years. Sometimes the Wounded Cynic has become so warped by his nihilism that he has become a villain and a destroyer.

In other stories, the Wounded Cynic and the Rebel have some overlap. This is because both types share a need to tear down the establishment. The crucial difference is that the Rebel wants to offer something better to stand in its place. The Wounded Cynic often just wants to see everything burn.

He's too disillusioned to see the point in creating anything once the destruction is complete. On a superficial level, the Wounded Cynic and the Rebel both enjoy cultivating a provocative persona that challenges people's belief and shakes up the status quo.

When looking through all the m/m fiction I've reviewed, I thought for sure that I would encounter the Wounded Cynic all over the place. After all, that is a classic romance plot: the cynic redeemed through love. I was very surprised to find only a few examples of the Wounded Cynic. [I don't allow my blog posts to be copied in full. Please click here to see how to use an excerpt/blurb.]