Kaspar/Casper

Some people have asked me why I named my main character “Casper.” Even my dad, who liked the novel, was curious about two Midwestern evangelicals choosing such a name for their son, a name which most any American will immediately associate with a certain friendly ghost.

Admittedly, there have been moments that I’ve been embarrassed to stick with this name. It’s so writer-y. Why didn’t I pick a normal name like Peter or Jack? In earlier drafts, I took time to explain away the origin of the name by way of a conversation with Reagan (incidentally, it was their first date, which also got cut.).

But I realized I was only doing so to avoid being laughed at. I didn’t want people thinking my protagonist had a weird name, or that I was being pretentious or something. In the end, I decided to keep the name and not apologize for it.

To tell the truth, his name ended up Casper, but it used to be “Kaspar.” The character first walked into consciousness about 15 years ago, and he wasn’t even the main character. His brother, Niklas, was. It was a fantasy story of fraternal rivalry, revenge, and forgiveness, set in vaguely medieval Europe, like most fantasy I’ve read. The idea wasn’t bad, but I gradually became less interested in the virtuous first-born Niklas, and more invested in the journey of the brooding, passed-over second-born, Kaspar.

Mind you, none of this made it to the page. All of this was in my head. Stories I told myself while I drove to work, cleaned my apartment, and later, washed crib sheets and baked muffins.

By the time I sat down and began to write, Kaspar had become Casper, and the medieval backdrop had been torn down and replaced with one I knew well – present-day America. Casper could still be the brooding younger brother, but this time, his journey would not be to find the hidden phoenix eggs and then confront the evil sorceress whom he had paid (in a fit of jealousy) to turn Niklas into a hideous beast. I didn’t have the strength or worldbuilding ability to tell that story anyway.

See, I had wanted to tell a story in a fantasy setting not because I particularly wanted to explore and create a new world (one of the defining characteristics of the genre), but because I was afraid. I was afraid to tell a story of God’s hunt for man, because I didn’t think I could do it in a way that wasn’t pure, eyeroll-inducing cheese.

Trust me, the first draft was pretty much that. I made every mistake I had wanted to avoid. The protagonist changed from a pretty realistically selfish man to a paragon of virtue, practically overnight. From that point, his main adversaries were external. Namely, his selfish wife had to completely change before he could have a happy ending.

It was hardly the ending I had wanted when I set out.

The problem? I was writing angry.

Deep down, I blamed other people for my spiritual failings. If only this person had been different…if only my church had been different…if only this circumstance would have been different…

The truth is, my spiritual failings were just that — mine.

“What’s wrong with the world? Dear sirs, I am.”

God has had to completely remove my heart of stone and replace it. He has had to break through my Pharisaical plaster, scour away the whitewash, and reveal to me not only the depth of my wretchedness, but the depth of His suffering to pay for it. The depth of His mercy.

When I revisited the draft after several years, I was appalled at what I found. So appalled, that I ended up re-writing the entire thing.

In the rewrite, I found myself writing thankful. Thankful for my parents, for my Sunday school teachers, for my friends and family, for my church (past and present), my Bible study group…for all the people God has used to goad me along this journey. For God Himself.

“Thy mercy is more than a match for my heart, which wonders to feel its own hardness depart.”