taotrooper | More symbolism in illustrations, yo

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More symbolism in illustrations, yo

I don't know if anyone has noticed this...

You know the ~~Shipping Picture of Doom~~ couch illustration, right? There's a hidden symbol in it! Just bear with me and use your imagination. OK, take the picture. Erase the background from your minds, and keep Yuuko, Clow and Mokonas. Now think in black and white: that is, forget the blue and red details in the outfits.

Are you done? Do you know what this is?

A yin yang.

Like that one.

I'm not mad. The wizards' outfits are the blobs, and the Mokonas are the small circles of the opposite color. And see how Yuuko, dressed in black, holds white Mokona (aka Soel), and both are adorned in red. And how Clow, dressed in white, holds black Mokona (aka Larg), and both are adorned in blue. We know how red and blue, white and black, are colors that combinated, in CLAMPverse, indicate polarity. Extra cookie if you can remember the Ten no Ryuu and Chi no Ryuu illustrations were they're dressed in red and blue, according to the side they're fighting. And do you recall Kerberos/Yue - Ruby/Spinel combination? The Light and The Dark cards?

And the way they hold the Mokonas makes them really look like a yin yang. See my pretty gif above for reference.

Anyway. This is the yin yang meaning, resumed since I have my last class in half an hour. From dictionary.com:

Main Entry: yin-yang
Function: noun
Definition: in Chinese philosophy, the two cosmic forces of creative energy, yin being feminine/negative and yang being masculine/positive, from which everything originates and depends on the interaction of the opposite and complementary principles

And of course, yang (masculine, active) is the white one (Clow), while yin (feminine, passive) is the black one (Yuuko). No, I'm not theorizing, the white side is actually the yang side, which is the possitive. I've read a lot about yin-yang in my life, you can believe me in that one. And the same goes with the yin side, just the contrary.

So, Clow and Yuuko are a huge yin yang. Yeah, that fits a lot. And makes the inner fangirl squee as "yin and yang are opposite yet complementary: can't live the one without the other" *winks*

Ooh, and do you remember how I was saying Soel (white Mokona) was like Clow, while Larg (black Mokona) was like Yuuko? Need I say more?

God, I love CLAMP hidden symbolisms!

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*_* I'm absolutely in love with this theory!!! It makes sense, a lot of sense. And it explains why on earth Clow is suddenly dressed in white.

(Let's just hope this is CLAMP's madness and not ours.)

Yes! Clow is in white because he's the guy *grins* And guys -> masculine -> yang -> white. Hohoho.

And besides, Clow has a more positive view on life, while Yuuko's rants are almost negative. Even though Clow's powers are of the Darkness, they can't be darker than Yuuko's.. can't they? And in Chinese philosophies, the sun is yang and the moon is yin. Remember my "sun = Clow, moon = Yuuko" theory?

Another thing: Yue was yin. Yue -> Yukito -> priest!Yukito -> moon powers -> Yuuko again.

This must be CLAMP's madness. It's too much of a "coincidence", it all clicks.

yes, but about the relation between moon/sun and yin/yang, you'll notice that Ruby Moon is Moon / Yang and Suppy is Sun / Yin, so the analogy doesn't always have to work this way...

I never said anything about Ruby Moon and Spinel Sun. They are the exception behind the rule. If grammars can have it, why can't CLAMP?

They are really Kerberos/Yue opposites. My theory? I guess Eriol didn't want to make the same guardians all over again. So he inverted everything (polarities, personalities, colors...). And in that way, he watchs his back against Yue saying "you made another me, you @#$%*&!". Sorta. So I can understand why it's so different in that case.

I was talking about the true meaning of yin yang and how it's seen in the East. And as the sun is hot and active, hence it's yang. And as the moon is cold and passive, hence it's yin.

But since this was on Clow (pre-Eriol) time, it's safe to say it will fit in this case.

That Eriol wanted Keroberos/Yue's opposites is a good psychological explanations, but as far as symbolism goes, I think it's rather poor.
In CCS one of the main thing is the blending of Asian and Western (Hermetic, mostly) esoteric systems. The Yin-Yang is part of the chinese divisions, while the Sun-Moon duality is western one.
If Sun was always equal to Yang and Moon to Yin, why bother having both ?
Besides, Clamp gives other clues of different kind of Moon energies (about Syaran's reaction to Yue and Kaho)
Hum, much rambling, what I do mean is... I think in the Clamp metaphysics in general we have enough matter to wonder wether or not the Sun-Yang and Moon-Yin analogies always work, or wether they're transversal.
You were talking earlier about the similarities between Ruby Moon and Yuuko after all (which i agree with ^^)...

By the way, I find those kind of symbolical discussions fascinating, so I hope you don't mind. I have a tendancy to argue for arguing's sake so i don't want to annoy you ^_^

No, that's OK, it's interesting. ^^

I think yin yang may have nothing to do with the person/creature's sun or moon energy, though. The "sun is yang and moon is yin" is just something Chinese think as true, since for them the day is yang and the night is yin. They have clearly divided what's yang and what's yin in nature (lakes, mountains, really, everything). It's more of a philosophical issue of putting the dual forces idea: just delimitate them both. Sort of making it good vs. evil, so common in religions (and this theory is quite present in almost every Chinese religion).

As a half-Chinese man, Clow had grown up hearing about these beliefs. And you know the Li clan, those who dress their children up with yin yang symbols all over the battle costumes. So it makes sense he wanted to give the sun guardian a yang personality and abilities, and his moon guardian a yin personality and abilities. That should be the conception of sun and moon he had learned from his childhood.

Now, why Eriol's guardians are like that? I still think it's because what I told you. I doubt Eriol really wants to be seen as "Clow II", even though he behaves like he does (he's such a contradiction!). And something tells me he may want to experiment when creating his shiny new guardians. You know, "what would happen if the moon guardian has a yang personality? Ooh, let's find out, it might be fun!" Doing the same guardians with different look all over again could be boring for him.

And about Ruby looking like Yuuko. It's more of a head thing: the front side of her hairdo with the bangs, the way she smirks when she's up to something. And the butterfly wings, yeah. And the reddish eyes. Apart from that, there's not a lot. I wouldn't like to see Nakuru drinking: that would be soooo scary.

The comparison came from the first time I saw a HOLiC illustrarion (the one with the cat ears and the chains). You know how CLAMP fans immediately compare the looks of new characters with older ones? Well, for me it was sort of "OMG! She looks like black-haired!Nakuru! And he looks like a pissed-off!teenager!Eriol!!". Silly me.

*nods* Okay for chinese attributing yin and yang for lots of things... I just assumed the sun and moon division went beyond the taoism frame because it was listed separately (and because it does feel very hermetic)

You make a good point about Clow's upbringing, however it's again a psychological analysis. I assumed that, for the use of symbols, the authors think more about what they want to convey in their stories than what the characters they're writing would have thought of. If you see what I mean.
However, I suppose the ying and yang representation is sufficiently important in japanese culture as well to assume that Clamp considered the yin-moon / yang-sun analogy as there by default, before thinking of the alternative one. But I think the fact that they did mean we shouldn't totally overlook it.

I have no idea wether we can relate a little bit or not at all yin and yang with people having moon energy. I'm proposing a possible interpretation since we know there's several kind of moon energies (it might be based on the whole different phases of the moon for all i know)

Ah, but I think there's more than the hairdoes. Obviously, Ruby Moon is much more hyper, but there's a sense of mischeviousness, teasing people, and minding more than your own business which is very similar.

You're choosing the wrong person to argue, as I have no clue about human psychology at all ^^U

Blame it on my psychology teachers at high school: they were philosophy college students, both of them -___-u So instead of discussing the usual topics of the subject, they made us read Plato and Descartes and things like that. What kind of luck ^^U... The only psychology thing they taught us was Freud, uh.

And I'm studying a scientific career at college (you don't need psychology to handle a computer, that's what they think at least).

So really, I have no arguments this time, since I'm at a loss. Sorry to disappoint you.

I don't really understand. I wasn't saying we should talk about psychology. I was saying I thought your own analysis was too focused on the /character/'s reasons (hence, their "psychology") while I thought symbols often had more to do with the authors' agenda.

I wanted to go father away from psychology.

Now the one who doesn't understand is me. I thought you were saying my reasoning crashed from a psychological point of view or something like that. That's why I defended myself saying I don't know anything about formal psychological analysis, which is true.

But really, I'm confused. What do you want to discuss again? You're saying I'm rambling more about the characters than the symbolisms, un? Is that it?

OK, let's talk about symbols. But I think I have nothing more left to say, since I'm not CLAMP and apart from them wanting to Eriol doing it, no clue about the true reasons of the inverted polarity of Spinel and Ruby, or if sun and moon powers are actually linked to yang and yin. I didn't create the world, it's all full of plotholes ^^;

I thought you were saying my reasoning crashed from a psychological point of view or something like that
I was saying exactly the reverse ^^

okay, i guess that ends the conversation, because i don't have much more idea either about the explanation.

Sorry u_u
I have to go to bed anyway. I'll see you around ^_^

Perfectly fitting. And a very clever remark.

Lots of Clamp couples seem to work on a duality basis.

Not only couples (now I'm thinking of Seishirou/Subaru xD), just in general. They love to use duality and yin yang and opposites.

And as more esoteric certain work of theirs is, more dual references.

True ^^ I was thinking about SeishirouxSubaru indeed, but also about FyexKurogane (not technicaly a couple ^^) even TouyaxYukito are obvious oposite in term of personnality.
X is full of duality (Hinoto and Kanoe on the ethearal-asexual- / material-sexualized) basis; twin stars etc. in general.

Wow, cool. Kudos for finding such neat symbolism. I love CLAMP. XD

Ah! A perfect excuse to look at that picture again. ("No, no -- I'm not drooling, really. I'm examining the symbolism, yes.")

Well, it's a perfectly valid excuse if you ask me XD
I just don't need one to see the picture, as I printed it and now it's pasted on my school folder, where I happen to save every single paper.

That's how I came up with the theory, really. ~~Drooling between classes~~

We know how red and blue, white and black, are colors that combinated, in CLAMPverse, indicate polarity.

Indeed; like in Tokyo Babylon illustrations with Hokuto (red) & Subaru (blue), and ditto for S/S. ^__^ With yin yang symbolism there too...

Now that I think about it, yeah, there's too much of a complementary use on blue and red on CLAMP illustrations. Uh-huh.

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More symbolism in illustrations, yo

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