View from the North 40: Literary analysis of conflict 101

On days we feel the world has too much conflict, it’s good to remember that literary-minded folks, who are rarely good for practical things, remind us that conflict is good because it inspires passion about ideas, people and things. A story without conflict is just a boring list of details — and then everybody dies.

The following news stories illustrate the literary nerds’ five types of conflict.

Man vs. Self

An 82-year-old man in India had his record-length fingernails, that he hadn’t trimmed for 66 years, cut off. This story is in the beginning a case of man vs. man because the man originally started growing the fingernails on his left hand after he accidentally broke a teacher’s fingernail and the teacher scolded that he would never know how hard it is to grow long fingernails.

Challenge accepted, his younger self said.

Ultimately, though, the struggle became about himself because he had to fight increasing pain in his crippled hand, elbow and shoulder and damaged fingertip nerves to stay disciplined. Despite the burden of carrying around a total of 30 feet of fingernails (30 feet = an average of 6 feet per nail — ohmygawd), he was visibly upset about losing the nails. Ultimately, he said he was reassured to know that his fingernails would live on in the Guinness World Record Museum.

I did not make this up — and I’ve been embroiled in my own battle of me vs. my gag reflex since reading about it.

Man vs. Society

The obvious example here is President Trump versus the myriad of people protesting him in London.

Declaring the winner of this real and literal conflict between one orange-haired man vs. a polite society is difficult.

Trump would seem to be the clear winner because, despite all protests foreign and domestic, he is still the president of the United States. But I have to give a moral victory to the Brits, though, just for designing, creating and flying that giant, baby-Trump balloon.

Brilliant, as they say across the pond.

Man Vs. Man

When the article is about a stork and a thief, it would be easy to suspect the conflict is man vs. nature, but no, it’s weirder than that.

A Polish environmental group put a tracker on a stork which migrated to Africa but got mugged in eastern Sudan on its return trip. The tracker’s SIM card was stolen. The thieves have been using the card in a phone, racking up thousands of dollars in charges that the researchers are supposed to now pay because the thieves can’t be found.

Who thinks of doing these things?

No word on whether the stork’s story continues or ended in “then everybody dies” fashion.

Man vs. Nature

New England states have been battling outrageously high temps and dry weather this summer. One man in Vermont decided to fight this flaming Mother Nature hot flash of 102 degrees July 6 by walking through his town of Burlington, Vermont, totally naked — except, of course, for a hat, sneakers and a lime green tote bag.

The local news described him as “underdressed,” but added that the man said he was enjoying himself despite the heat. Sounds like man was the conquering hero this day.

Man vs. The Supernatural

This is another deceptive conflict. A 69-year-old California man stopped to look at a car that was for sale, and without warning he was gored, dragged and trampled by a bull. He lived. This is not a man vs. nature story.

In this story, the “man” of the conflict is actually the bull, and the “supernatural,” well, depends on your level of faith. The man said he survived because of karma: He pulled a woman from a burning building back in the 1970s, and he thought this was karma paying it forward. The doctors, though, say that the guy’s belly fat protected him.

I’m unqualified to judge which is the more supernatural element, but it would be nice to know my belly fat could be good for something.

Bonus Conflict

The modern conflict pits Man vs. Technology. A burglar broke into an escape room business and called 911 for help getting out. An escape room is a live-action game in which a group of people are locked into a room and given a set of clues that will tell them how to get out within a time limit. I don’t know why this is a thing.

The burglar had apparently settled into an escape room for some TV, a beer and a burrito, but when he decided to leave, he found himself locked in. He then panicked and made things worse by breaking off the door knob.

Automatic door locks and a phone GPS won the day.

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It was just a coincidence that all the examples included actual men at [email protected]/.