I Read Therefore I am Smart
The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks and Miyamoto’s hush-hush Zelda sequel on the Wii may not arrive until the end of this year and sometime next year, respectively, but if you’re itching for a healthy dosage of Hylian helpings in any available form, why not set down the controller and pick up a book?
“The Legend of Zelda and Philosophy: I Link Therefore I Am” is a collection of short essays from various authors discussing Nintendo’s infamous series and its connection to philosophy.
The book, part of Open Court’s “Popular Culture and Philosophy” series, takes a deeper look at the heroes, villains, art, themes and settings of the Zelda series to discuss the games’ moral, societal, religious and logical impact on us: the players.
Each of the book’s nine sections contains two to three chapters of engaging discourse wherein a chapter’s author presents an aspect of a Zelda title (or multiple titles) and poses a philosophical question relating to the subject, followed by philosophical analysis that sometimes suggests possible answers.
The chapters range from 10 to approximately 20 pages and are written in a collegiate tone applying analytical tools obtainable from lower-level undergraduate philosophy courses. For those with little to no experience in the teachings of Plato, Aristotle and like, “I Link Therefore I Am” utilizes an accessible approach whereby the writer first foundationally presents the necessary tools for the selected job, complete with the necessary instruction manuals, followed by a critical-yet-comprehensible application to hopefully complete the selected mental task.
A good majority of the articles discuss appealing topics that are sure to draw in the attention of veteran gamers. Readers are challenged with questions such as whether any or all of the pieces of Triforce possess inherently good or evil characteristics. Is the Triforce of Power inherently evil because power corrupts, or can the Triforce of Courage be just as evil?
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