Getoh
Getoh is an acclaimed Totanian playwright and actor, as well as the only truly immortal man in existence. He is a Lizardfolk who was cursed with Life Magic from his God, yet uses it to pursue art and truth. What he calls the meaning of life.
The Dragon Lord Reoma the Wretched attacked and killed the actors with Getoh. It was only Getoh that survived. In the rubble, amidst the people he loved. He questioned how and why. But he had his answer: Item Magic.
At some point, without realizing it, he had picked up an item that granted him the Holy Might of Kadakalan. The power to survive anything. Some say it must've been a fellow actor who gave it to him without him knowing, as a gift of their love and for his work. He would never be able to die, he could live forever and tell stories. But he did not want that.
The Artist's Life
The brilliant artist Getoh was born long before there was record, or rather, all records of that long ago have been long destroyed. For a man who makes such detailed accounts, many expect Getoh to know his true date of birth. He refuses to elaborate on this, with a passage in his play The Korvian's Folly being a very clear allegory for this,"I am Korvian. I live a short life, and must live in the moment. Why should I think of my past? I already know it! So I must dedicate every moment to my present, my future, and what I can learn with the time I have."Getoh's first work is dated in -1364 with the tale of the Sandman. This was the first performance of the show, featuring an Earth Jinn who tricks a Dwarven boy named Klaus into following his instructions, as the rest of Klaus's town begins to fall into a deep dream. The play toys with what is a dream and what is reality, with Getoh's Sandman claiming that reality is only found in the dream. Here is a famous passage, where Sandman puts Klaus to sleep. This also features Getoh's signature iambic pentameter style, also known as verse, which is present in many of his plays. It consists of lines of ten syllables, or five Iambs, with one unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable.
"Trapped in dream, or trapped within your own life,
The question unimportant 'fore the truth
For you are trapped, and I, your savior, free.
Wake, O cursèd one, to reality,
Wake, that thou may face thine dream with penance."
Sandman by Jarhed
First Role
Getoh did not believe he could play the main character of Klaus, as he did not appear to look like a Dwarf, so his first role was that of the titular part of Sandman. Many reviews say his delivery of the lines was moving but clearly the performance of a writer, not an actor. He has since worked to improve this.After the Show
Getoh performed this show with a company of people he loved. He didn't mind the negative reactions some people had, because it was performed with love. However, when the troupe was asked to perform for the Priests of the Lizardfolk God of Survival, Kadakalan, tragedy struck. A tragedy even beyond those written by Getoh.Liver by Jarhed
Famous Works
Getoh has many plays, of which he has written in their entirety and performed in. These plays are of all sorts of different cultures and their oral history, be they true historical tales, folktales, or even stories he made up based on the culture. He puts heavy study into them, and thus is able to make incredible works such as:- A Dreamless Sleep- The Story of the founding of the Kingdom of Man, with the first Human King Gellark Lionrage and the first Court Wizard Varth Dreamless, and Varth's sacrifice of his life and freedom for Humanity.
- Sandman- A Dwarven tale of a man who tries to escape his fate, but ends up falling right into it and, in so, a dream that never ends.
- Auravir and Jennadyl- Auravir and Jennadyl is the most famous love story in the world, the tragic tale of a High Elven man named Auravir and a Dwarven woman named Jennadyl. Their love is taboo, as the two races are at war with each other. The ending just goes to show how not even love can unite these warring races, leading instead to the deaths of the two lovers in a war caused by their matrimony.
- The Korvian's Folly- One of his few plays written entirely in prose rather than verse, a story about a Korvian named Liver who wishes to live entirely in the moment rather than dwell on the past. For this, he is cursed to live forever, yet to never remember any moment before the present one, an immortal amnesiac.
- Much Ado About Goblin- A story of two Goblins who are in love, but do not know how to communicate this love. The time ultimately comes when they are pitted against each other in an eating competition, making the title a double meaning about both the characters (Goblin) and eating (gobblin')
Children
This was clear in his next play, The Korvian's Folly. He wrote of a man cursed with living forever, yet never knowing anything, because he never wanted it to be like this. He wanted a short life to make a few plays, but now the people he wrote them for were gone.
It was through writing this play, though, that Getoh found closure. It took him nearly 400 years to finish, but in that time he was able to process his feelings and, in performing it for the first time, leave the past him behind. To embrace Liver's philosophy (as seen in the first quote) and embrace the future. To learn everything he could.
It was an ambitious role for Getoh to both write and perform, as he was immortal as the Life Mage and Varth was quite the opposite. He was a man who sacrificed his mortality for Death Magic, which allowed him to save the first Human King Gellark Lionrage and found the Kingdom of Man. Getoh studied what people were like when they were close to death for a couple hundred years and, thus, found a better understanding and appreciation for life. His romantic era was over, and he now began to appreciate what he had.
This play became what many call his masterpiece. It was highly lauded, and the performance of it helped the Humans accept the other races. They had appeared in a world of creatures and strange beings, but Getoh's words and oration moved them to tears. Some immigration laws changed, and the Humans were more open in their diplomacy.
Ever since then, Getoh has been known as the world's greatest writer and performer. His name is synonymous with with the medium itself, and anyone who attempts to go into the field is asked if they intend to become "The Next Getoh." Getoh does not want this, he just wants to tell stories of life, of history, and of love. Of everything that makes life worth living, everything he had learned over his life. And he certainly has a lot of life to live.
Romantic Era
This period is considered Getoh's romantic period, where he wrote many plays about love. His most famous is Auravir and Jennadyl, about an Elven man and a Dwarven woman falling in love and starting a war. This came at a point where Getoh was a bit pessimistic about love. After some hundred, nearly a thousand, years alive, he had been with many women. Lizardfolk have harems, after all, because they need to keep their population up or they'll go extinct. But he had found attachments fading slowly. He still had the perspective of a romantic, but he also knew that all love ended in death. There is a famous scene, where the two lovers are meeting on a battlefield to disguise the true purpose of their getting together. Men and women are dying around them as the lovers swap sonnets, including Auravir's sonnet, which is as follows:Auravir and Jennadyl by Jarhed
"The Light of Light Magic could strike me hereSome say this is meant to be the arrow of Ishtar's Messenger of Love, but Getoh meant a double meaning. As Auravir is eventually killed by his own King, who tries to shoot Jennadyl. Auravir jumps in the way, turning away from Jennadyl to get the arrow. Getoh meant this as both a criticism of love and of war, concepts that meant nothing to a man who could live forever. Wars ended, love died, and still Getoh lived. How romantic, right?
Blindness take mine eyes and darken my world
Still I would see thine face in my mirror
Still my mind would conjure your face, a pearl.
Let my King's arrow strike me down today
If mine eyes are to ever leave your face."
Living For Life's Sake
This would not last forever. Getoh was always influential, but this influence reached its peak (which it has never declined from) when he wrote his first human play, A Dreamless Sleep, where he starred as the Court Wizard Varth Dreamless.Varth Dreamless by Jarhed
Appearance
Getoh is of average height for a Lizardfolk, being around 5'6" and of average build. He is also of a subspecies of Lizardfolk called Chameleons, allowing him to blend in with his surroundings. He says these things are best, because he is able to be anyone and take on any role. When he is not wearing a costume, he is likely to be found wearing a bright, colorful outfit of some sort. He will also likely wear his scarf made of crocodile tails, which he purchased with much of his excess money. He likes people to recognize him when he is not in costume, so his outfit can be called quite flamboyant for this reason.Greatest Work
In his masterwork, A Dreamless Sleep, there is a famed monologue by the character Varth Dreamless. Getoh both wrote this part and originated it in its first performance. This monologue, of contemplating whether Varth should end his life for the greater good or live, where he curses the Gods, is the culmination of everything in Getoh's life. For that, this article shall end with his greatest work. Varth's Soliloquy."What curse afflicts our being more than life,
For life is the beginning and the end
Of the Gods hellish, heavenly curses
On the state of innocent noble men.
There is no way we make it out of here,
The Goblins are too numerous and strong,
Even my strength is not enough for them.
Yet, Morrigan has offered me power,
Of which I would be a fool to decline.
Yet am I a fool for considering
Her offer with such weight as I do now?
The words of Gods carry with them power,
Power of which I lack as Varth Dreamless
But what is Varth Dreamless but a wizard
And what a wizard but a noble fraud?
Is there nobility in sacrifice,
Or is the noblest end prolongéd?
Death is the gift, both the power and the
Punishment, that I stand to gain from her,
Her who is death incarnate, and I life,
Yet I am to death as she will to life,
The harbinger and herald of future
Announcing life and death respectively.
I am not ready for death, these hands of mine
Stain themselves not with blood of the blasphemed
But with the lifeblood of such worldly men
And women that I do protect alone.
To accept is to court death, to court death
Is to except life in some small doses
In exchange for the world I so desire.
Curse you, cruel Gods, for I wish to be there
Beside you in the Heavens above, naught
Any worry but worship and such praise,
For the worry you send for us to bear.
Grant me seat among your counsel, wise Gods,
So I be free of mortal suffering
And become the dealer, not the dealist,
A name at the footnote of history
Trampled over by greater, wiser men.
Allow me a fate above marble clouds
Beyond this life you damn me to, as I,
Forced to stare Mistress Death in her cold eyes,
And yet still, allow me seek refusal.
Nay, it is not my place to refuse her,
Such an offer comes as often as the
Dawn of man on a new and strange planet.
Aye, what good is the life of a Dreamless
If the dreams of all others are trampled?
Fall now, myself, into an endless sleep,
A dreamless sleep, of which I will not wake!
For Nerodil, for Gellark, for you all,
I condemn myself to death a thousand times
And Humanity, I condemn to life."
Oh nice! I love that he's a playwright! Having samples of his plays is a nice touch and a very interesting read. Some of these would be plays I would love to read in full! Nicely done. I did wonder, with such a long and famous career... did he have any rivals along the way?
Thank you. I studied dramatic literature and such, so I was happy to apply my knowledge and time spent in that with my world building and make some of my own. To be honest, I have heavily considered actually writing some of these, and this may be what pushes me over the line to actually do it. that would be very fun! In his earlier years, there were likely some rivals that just were lost to history due to how ancient he is, and after long enough, the historically recorded "rivals" that did come were likely considered to just be more successors or contemporaries than rivals, because many have the view that no one could live up to such a wise, old writer.