Broken hearts???

Aurora Skye

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Can Demons have their hearts broken? Seriously, I have a female Demon character about to fall foul of a rather (let's change that rather to extremely) attractive male character. If she were human one would hear the shattering of her heart for miles. The question seems to be this; follow female traits or demonic ones? .....Or can I blend them? What's more plausible? Aaaaaargh !
 
Have you ever read Richelle Mead's Succubus series? There's a bunch of supernatural creatures, some formerly human, others not, all with recognisably human traits. Characters are people on some level, otherwise how can we identify with them?

Go with what feels right for the character. You could always have her commenting that her heart would break, if she had one, although that would be a wee bit cliched. ;)
 
Only you can answer this question. It's your world. Your demons. Your choice. And the last thing you want to be is Cliche and follow the formula that one would expect for a 'demon'.

Your idea of being able to hear it shattering a mile away is a good example of exaggeration. You could apply this to a demon. If they're meant to suffer, then maybe their suffering comes from amplified feelings which could lead to an interesting character and a difficult life for the demon and the people around her.

But, like I said, it's whatever you want it to be. It's fiction.
 
Like Christian said - your world your rules.

A demon in my urban fantasy was raised by a human family and has feelings the same as us. Demons raised in demon families have their humanlike emotions trained out of them.
 
Well... what is the pump that circulates demon blood? There has to be one, even demon physiology will need energy sources into tissue and waste away... And since most demons are actually either mammallian or reptilian, I think they'd have to have hearts...:) (Dionne Warwick did it so much better then Cilla Black, doncha think?)
 
From a purely writing point of view, what suits your story/where do you want to take it? Murderous rage or moping in her bedroom to Radiohead? Which gets the desired effect?
 
As Alchemist points out, a broken heart can take many forms. Could the feeling be one of betrayal?
 
Traditionally demons are not biological at all, and don't require circulatory organs or anything equivalent. They are angels, part of the host of the fallen, existed before conditions existed for life, and don't require endocrine systems or emotions.

Succubi accept human seed from male donors and transform into incubi to deliver it to receptive females, thus eliminating the physical problems of how a rich man's daughter can get pregnant by erotic dreaming; they have no generative power of their own. And no gender; presumably an exclusive homosexual male sinner could get a male succubus (although the equivalent female transfer would be a bit more complicated to arrange.

Angels are, apparently, capable of love and pity, though the former was not intended for human consumption. Presumably this capacity remains with them through the fall, although they're a bit less likely to indulge after. Whether this translates as anything a human would recognise is less clear; if you fell in love with an ant, how would you make your affection clear? Being angelic they're not quite omnipotent, but the higher ranking ones (strict hierarchical organisation among each of the hosts; I'm not dead certain any of them have free will. That would complicate an affair) are very ineffable.

Angels of course will not indulge; for them it would be bestiality. A demon might find bestiality attractive for its own sake, then get trapped in it's early programming to be capable of love.
 
Chrispencate - Regarding angels I think you're ignoring the difference between eros (carnal desire) and agape (spiritual love, roughly). (I'm no classical scholar, but I believe the two are distinct in classic Greek and there is no general word.)

From what I know of Christian angels (very limited indeed!) they would certainly be capable of agape but perhaps not of eros. For the latter they might not have the equipment, for a start.

Finally, there are a great number of varieties of demon. Christian-tradition demons are rather different from Arabic or Chinese ones.
 
From a purely writing point of view, what suits your story/where do you want to take it? Murderous rage or moping in her bedroom to Radiohead? Which gets the desired effect?

Moping is hard to carry off, though - most readers like an active character, so if you go that route you need to find a way to keep our engagement.
 
i believe that as a fallen, she could quite literally have a change of heart. it would be up to you whether that change would suffice to redeem her. but should you require a parting of the two characters, that could be a useful premise.

it truly is a matter of the heart. you may ask yourself how much heart you expect your character to have.
if it helps any, in the omnibus angels and demons, the demons were seen as an opposing high tech emotionless race on a planet shared between them and humans... and humans were seen as brutish and unevolved for showing emotion.
 
you'll also want to address or at least track what subcontextous messeges could be found. how would he deal with her version of affectionate? does he even survive it? does she care? or have him preserved and continues to love his empty form? if he survives, does their relation deepen in any way? how do they change eachother? why? and to what extent?
if they are "star crossed" what stands in their way? is it internal or external to their relationship? do they try to over come it? how far? why does it fail? what are the consequences?
 
Can Demons have their hearts broken? Seriously, I have a female Demon character about to fall foul of a rather (let's change that rather to extremely) attractive male character. If she were human one would hear the shattering of her heart for miles. The question seems to be this; follow female traits or demonic ones? .....Or can I blend them? What's more plausible? Aaaaaargh !

And right there, you have a possible answer. She feels her heart is broken, but as a demon she "knows" this is impossible. All those emotions were burned out of her kind in the Fall. So it can't be love. It can't be...

...so why can't she stop thinking about him?

I also remember a little saying something about Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. If she's both Hell and woman, his life is about to get very, very interesting (and possibly very very short).
 
I agree with the consensus: it's your story, it's your demon. Besides, it is the human characteristics of demons and aliens that let us identify with them and find them interesting characters, especially, as Overlord suggests, there is a mystery or contradiction associated with those human characteristics.
 
My understanding was that demons were all about instincts and uncontroleld desires and emotions.. cant see why they cant also suffer from having their greatest desire denied them.

Its a bit like saying they cant get angry or dissapointed if their fowl plans are scuppered by "good". A broken heart is just an emotional state - demons experience emotion (hate, rage, lust, jealousy etc) .
 
[FONT=&quot]I would think you could move into a blended world by having the two co-exists; animal instincts of desire lust and animalism needs with human feelings and the longing for true feelings. Maybe intertwining a manipulative love. I would think with a blended there could be more inner conflict between real love and the instinctual desire for evil (Since she is a Demon and all). [/FONT]
 
Hi,

Like the others it's yourstory.

But just on the angels not having love for people, can I remind you that according to Genesis they did - "The sons of God found the daughter's of men fair". That's where the nephilim came from after all.

There are a great many different conceptions of what angels are, and so if demons are fallen angels, you can have just as many ideas of them. Just make the character consistent and real.

Cheers, Greg.
 

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