What makes a dragon? Steve Hayes challenges his readers with this question as his novel, The Year of the Dragon, unravels, and its characters are forced to face the beast in numerous ways. It stalks them down the story-line with hunger in its eyes, but it also prompts the rising up of Saint George and courage in its prey.
Once a dragon is born, it will only grow if not acknowledged. Jordan Peterson deals with this in his lecture on Slaying The Dragon Within Us, which points out the trait inside each of us to raise up the beast while pretending that it isn’t there. Peterson uses the children’s book, There’s No Such Thing as a Dragon, to draw a picture of what these creatures can become if not acknowledged, as well as the perceived naivety of those who see the dragon for what it is.
Hayes’ dragon shows itself in the mess it leaves behind- its footprints. First, the murder of a man, then of an entire farmstead, a kidnapping and an appetite for the entrails of a boy. The dragon is in the police force of Apartheid South Africa and in the teeth of the crocodiles that infest a river. Its eyes are in the eyes of the people that feed it.
Peterson’ s dragon shows itself in how it takes over a family’s home. A dragon filling a house makes all things- even the smallest of things- near impossible to do. Living in a house where things unsaid and things undone, or things that cannot be undone or unsaid, are not dealt with, takes up a lot of space and damages the people meant to be living there. In the children’s book, it takes only the acknowledgement of the house-sized beast to shrink it down to a manageable thing.
Denis Walters, a character in Hayes’ book, grows in his ability to acknowledge the dragon. When he sees it for the first time- the day he meets the little boy that he eventually gives his life to save- he is subconsciously led to meet the beast as its ancient foe; Saint George- lance and all. In acknowledging that the dragon is there, Denis is able to meet the thing as its polar equal. Together they rise, and together they fall.
“Dragons hoard gold because the thing you most need is always to be found where you least want to look” – Jordan Peterson
What is the treasure that each of these dragons hoard? In the legend of Saint George, the medieval damsel in distress is the prize to be won, but further than that, it’s the prize of love and acceptance from the woman, with the bonus of adoration and fame from the people. That’s the real, coveted gold. Not so different from what Peterson’s dragon’s growth is owed to, the hero most wants acknowledgement.
This brings to mind a more recent dragon encounter, that of Smaug in the lonely mountain. How much unfinished business does it take for a dragon to grow so big and destroy so many lives? How much power must it have been given to lord over so much of what the people need, so much of what they treasure? This beast is brought down by a man who least wants to go near it. His reverence is wise, and he is rewarded as the hero. Love and adoration, even power, is his freed treasure.
Peterson is right, in that each of us is guilty of growing the dragon and climbing over couches and through windows instead of reaching down, patting it on the head and letting it know that it is seen. Hayes is also right, in that the dragon brings out the dragon slayer in those of us who do see it. Every time you look it in the eye, it loses power, it gets smaller, and those of us willing to bring it down, to give our life to the cause of slaying the monster, may very well lose our life, yet in so doing, gain it.
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