Welcome one and all to the newest (or one of them) addition to the Basara Temple, the soapbox. Basara fans who have an opinion, statement, story (but not fanfic, that goes on the special fanfic page), or just anything they want posted somewhere can e-mail it to me, and I'll put it up here! I'm hoping that this will become a weekly thing, so new reads should be posted over the weekend when I have more time. ^.^

The very first submission to the soapbox is, again, by my good friend Kaede of Kaede's Lair. She wrote up a Basara Dramaturgy, which details parallels she found in the plot and characters to literature and mythology. My inane side-comments are in blue.

by Kaede-dono

Nagi, Sarasa's friend and blind prophet, is an important part in Basara. He tells of the two twins of destiny.The prophet usually plays a big part in stories. In Noh drama, a prophet, priest, or wise old man assists the waki, or main character, by giving him important knowledge that will guide the waki in time. In Greek mythology, the Oracle of Apollo is highly respected and tells the future. In Voodoo traditions, a dancer will often be possessed by a spirit and speak as if they themselves are the god, foretelling what will come to the people.The most interesting example is Teiresius from the Oedipus cycle. A blind prophet, in Oedipus Rex he grants Laius and Jocasta a warning about their infant son, that he will kill his father and marry his mother. Oedipus is left to die when he is rescued by kind peasants far from the city. After he grows up, he talks to Teiresius again, who gives him the same prophecy. In Antigone, Teiresius arrives to warn King Creon of the wrong he has done Antigone, the daughter of Oedipus and Jocasta, but it is too late for Antigone. While everyone else dies, Teiresius is seemingly immortal. He will always be there, making his gloomy predictions. For even though he is blind, he has more sight than those with both eyes. Also, Nagi tends to be... well, as Ageha said, "Oh, I thought I saved a lady." [HEY! Don't tell me no one else thought Nagi was a chick! I thought he was a woman until I saw him in the male hot spring with Kakujii, and I nearly fainted.] Even Teiresius is that way. According to mythology, Teiresius happened upon two snakes mating, and he hit them with a stick. He turned into a female for a while, and then ran into the snakes again. He hit them with a stick AGAIN, and turned back into a male. Zeus and Hera were having problems with their love life, so they asked Teiresius, who knew both the male and female perspective. The question was "Who gets more sexual pleasure, a male or female?" Teiresius answered that the woman gets nine times more pleasure than the man, and Zeus punished him by making him blind. (One can only wonder how Nagi became blind... something makes me think it has to do with Shiro no Ou and her dad... x.x) [BAD Kaede, BAD. Putting traumatizing spoilers in your soapbox speech...shame on you.]

Magical twins have always been a part of mythology. From Remus and Romulus, the mystical founders of Rome, to Susan and Sharon of the Parent Trap [What's with the weird modern-movie analogy? I see no such corollation. -.-;;], there is something special about twins. We have the Gemini constellation in honor of two such twins [The Gemini twins are Castor and Pollux, BTW]. Occasionally twins will "switch" identities or change their own identities. This has happened many times, from Viola in Twelfth Night, the two hapless pairs of twins in A Comedy of Errors, to Roland and his brother in The X-Files' "Roland". But truly, the best example would be Viola. She dresses as a man to see Duke Orsino, who she ultimately falls in love with. She courts a lady for Orsino, but the lady falls in love with her instead. How similar to Sarasa, who disguises herself as Tatara in order to raise the spirits of her villagers and to take on Aka no Ou, who she doesn't know is her little *ahem* boink-buddy, Shuri. Tsk tsk. It's kind of OBVIOUS that Aka no Ou and Shuri are the same PERSON, but maybe she's too busy cracking up over his stupid hats to realize that it's Shuri under that stupid hat... [Yes, Shuri's helmet-things are very stupid and phallic, and I probably should write something for the soapbox about Basara character analyzation with Shuri wearing his stupid, flashy helments to make it appear that he's a good lover, which we will not speak of right now. *coughcough*]