Tyler Durden, Trickster.

Abstract

Paul Radin’s Winnebago Trickster Cycle is the template for the trickster character. Through his actions and values (if he has any), one comes to know the eponymous character’s defining traits. Coupled with an understanding of liminality as defined by both Arnold van Gennep and Victor Turner, this thesis utilizes both the base characteristics of the trickster figure as well as an analytical framework of the trickster provided by William J. Hynes and William G. Doty to define Tyler Durden from Chuck Palahniuk’s Fight Club as a trickster. Support for his dubbing as trickster comes in the form of character studies on Loki, Mary Poppins, and Peter Pan wherein they too are given the same treatment by other authors and are similarly categorized as tricksters.