I did a short reading the other evening. Quite short. And to a very small audience - just two others at a local writers' meet-up which, due to the weather being terrible this time of year, only had a total population of five this month - but still worth mentioning nonetheless.
It was a good experience in general, really: I got generally good reviews, and even the "critical" aspect of it wasn't in particular critical, taking the form of nothing more than "you've set the scene with the voice, which perhaps could be pared back just slightly, but what you've written is really effective". That's a paraphrase, of course - but specifically the words "pared", "back" and "slightly" did occur in association with each other.
And I'll be the first to admit it: the manner in which I tell stories is a little bit off-kilter with normal, familiar every-day vernacular. I don't have any issue with that; while I wouldn't set about writing a story set in the Dark Ages in language specific to the Dark Ages verbatim, I would want the language I were to use to fall within the perceptive bounds of the setting. The mode by which people communicate has as much impact on a story as what is being said, albeit in a different way; I'm certainly not suggesting a story can be told merely on the back of how someone speaks, rather than what they say. But it makes total sense: you wouldn't pick up The Odyssey and expect phrases like "How's it going?" to be all too common. Linguistic elements passively shape the perception the reader has of the world they're reading about. I'm sure I've touched in some way on this before, so I won't bother rerunning that race. But I'm open to that kind of critique; I'd rather know how people find reading it than pretend I don't need to know.
It was the first reading I'd ever done, I have to admit, so it was a good learning experience. I was aware the whole time of the speed at which I was speaking, making sure not to fall into the trap of going too fast which I know a lot of people find themselves doing. I've used Audioboo before to do a non-live reading of a poem-story I wrote (and which I'd like to do something with in the future), and I found myself struggling to speak slowly and breathe regularly due to the pressure of having a "perfect" recording. I didn't have that pressure when I did the live reading, oddly enough; I suppose the reality of the situation is that you can always stop and gather yourself while reading aloud in person, but if all you're leaving is a recording...you don't so much have that "hold on a moment" ability.
Anyway, I left the meet-up feeling really proud - the feedback was altogether very positive. The world in the story was correctly judged to be one of foreboding, and of a lurking danger, and of dread - and that really is a key psychological setting of the story. That I had been able to communicate that in the scene I read - or rather, that it had been espied - was really gratifying, particularly since the motive when writing the scene was not specifically to underscore those feelings at all, but to give a voice to a character to whom reference had been made but of whom no real exploration had been done. I feel really glad that the scene has proven itself well-situated enough for there to be congruence between its greater context and the message the scene itself in isolation communicates.
In an unrelated update, except regarding the shared medium (writing) and the notion of paring something down, I entered a severely shortened version of a story about the sea I'm likely to be perpetually writing the longer version of for that "short short story" competition I mentioned a couple of posts ago. I managed to get something several thousand words in length down to 300 (the absolute limit for any valid entry) and then got rid of one word for a grand total of 299. How much of a story can you tell in 300 words? Not much. Well, no, you can tell the entire story, but you can't tell much of it. In any case I'll wait to see whether I'll even generate attention. I have no idea of the calibre of other entries. I'd like to think mine's up there but it really might not be at all!
So, yes - two things writing related. It's good fun.
Thursday, April 30, 2015
Tuesday, April 14, 2015
Lore in absentia
Something that I've learnt is that lore, whatever its form, has to be tangible. I say that because I think at some stage every storyteller has a bit of a moment wherein they think "well, this is how this story is because this is how I say it is"...and while that's true on the most basic and general level (a story is a story because the teller is telling it, and whatever happens does so because the teller says it does), it doesn't ring true when the reader suspends disbelief and lets the world being spoken of become a temporary reality.
We've all (I say, applying broad supposition to my actual and potential audience) seen movies, and we've all watched tv shows - dramas, comedies, mysteries, horrors, etc., etc.. And books, too - I'd say most of us have at least read one book, start to finish. And the thing is, unless we're either gifted with the most powerful of imaginations or cursed with no imagination at all, what happens within the story of a movie, a tv show, a book, or anything else has to make sense. There has to be a progression from A to B that can be demonstrated on some level that doesn't require too much effort to make plausible. The underlying lore of the tale, or the event, or even the characters must be capable of reduction to its most basic form and still make sense. There are notable exceptions, but these exceptions are the ones that lead the viewers or readers (or players) to search for more and to ultimately find it, not search and be given holes in plots and histories that just don't follow through.
A great example of one of these notable games is the Dark Souls series (if a franchise of two games can be deemed serial): the lore is present, but hard to find, in most parts at least. There are jumps one has to make but only insofar as things being all but said, so the logical conclusion is never stated outright for the sake of confirmation but the signs all point to it anyway. The games have earnt many people fame, at least in their respective circles, and have led to jobs regarding game guide content creation, as well as self-employment opportunities concerning YouTube content creation as well. The presentation of lore in the games and supporting material is done in such a way as to have it in some form of "plain sight", there to be found, but never outright confirmed. Tolkien's works are a bit of antithetical to these games in this regard, in that Tolkien didn't seem to want any guesswork being done - or at least, didn't like the idea of not having resources available to those who wished to engage in further research. The numerous appendices after The Return of the King tell the reader a more complete history of things related to The Lord of the Rings, and that has led the various multimedia works to have been built on the backs of the books being wrought with exceptional detail and richness. A sword is not merely a sword. But then, a sword is not merely a sword in Dark Souls, either; to know the absolute history of it, though, you might find yourself having to interpret hints and suggestions, rather than being told that this person son of that person son of another first obtained it from a smith who had beaten into the blade three different kind of ore sacred to this race, in order for it to be significant and have myriad different abilities. But the case remains that the lore is still there, just dependent on your ability or motivation to find it.
A bad story is, among other things, one that presents information without having set the stage for its inclusion. Well, perhaps not a bad story, but certainly a bad choice made by the author to depend so utterly on something without provenance. Deus ex machina it's called: the phenomenon of an event or plot point that is necessary for progression of the story to come out of nowhere. In terms of the author or creator, it amounts to something akin to throwing one's hands in the air and saying "this is the story because I say it is, and that's all there is to it". In one respect it might be deemed similar to one core aspect of the Anthropic Principle: that the Universe is as it is because if it weren't we wouldn't be here to observe it. That seems to amount to a big fat nothing, and indeed it does in fact amount to a big fat nothing: because it doesn't describe why the Universe is the way it is, but rather that the Universe can be observed as it is. In reality the Anthropic Principle has two major variants (and possibly others I'm not studied enough to be aware of): the Strong Anthropic Principle, which says that the Universe is the way it is and we can observe it that way because it is compelled to align itself with conditions that encourage or necessitate the evolution of life complex enough to exist within it and observe it; and the Weak Anthropic Principle, which says simply that if the Universe were any other way, we wouldn't be around to ask why it is the way it is, and that because we're in a version of the Universe that does allow us to exist then it's obviously a stable, realistic version, and we don't know of any other Universes that don't support life capable of observing it. It's all an interesting notion, but I have a bit of trouble seeing what use it has when trying to actually assess why the Universe has found itself in its current state unless we are to rely on saying "because we are reason enough", or at least, "because it must be observed by something". It's a bit cart-before-horse-ish, equivalent to a reversal of the question "how can we be here?" and its answer "because the Universe is hospitable to life in our form (in a general sense)".
With stories this doesn't really work. You can't just write something and say "well it had to happen that way because if it didn't, this wouldn't have happened, and the whole story would have fallen flat"; you can't say "the ends justify the means". The means have to lead directly to the ends, in summation at least, even if that means you have to invent means to get to an end that are beyond expectation. The means beyond expectation have to make sense in the world wherein they occur, of course - you can't go from everything being normal to suddenly everything being on its head at the end, as the crisis involved in this sudden change is really where a story might begin, or is the consequence of preceding events; deus ex machina isn't really the note to leave a story on.
It's a difficult one, though: how much of a plot does one have to give away without giving too much away or too little? I guess there's a real technique to that. I'm not quite there with the story I'm working on at the moment, but I will be...at some stage. But I've fallen trap to the "well, it doesn't have to make sense given the amount of information presented, so it's fine" thought process, too, particularly in my novella manuscript. I'm glad I saw sense regarding it, even if it doesn't change the ultimate outcome, and even if it's a minor set of details - because what if I were asked about it? What could I say? "I'm not sure myself"? Well...perhaps that would actually be a legitimate reason, provided it's not an excuse: some storytellers (Tolkien) take the position of being the be-all-and-end-all of knowledge on a particular story, while others (From Soft with Dark Souls) take the position of being privy to some information but not all, and thus the reliance on the "who knows?" excuse leads fan speculation, research and debate onwards without any yes or no from on-high. It's a bit of a ruse, of course - for a franchise like Dark Souls, so story-dependent, to make sense, an over-arching story must be fleshed out. Individuals within the story-telling team may or may not know all of the details, but the story is detailed, even if not shared. To be honest I do quite like the idea of a writer taking the perspective of "I am narrating a story, but what I know or don't know doesn't affect the story itself. The story is as the story is" - but the issue again is that when the story is supported only by itself and there is no tangible lore extra to the story...it begins to feel limited.
As I said, I had a case of this with my novella manuscript - not because it felt limited, and not because I took the "the story is as the story is" approach on any superficial level, but because what I did supply story-wise created the impression that the experiences of a certain character were the result of something in her past which she was only indirectly involved in, having been a child at the time. It was at that point I was prepared to say "that's all she knows, and since this is her (part of the) story, that's all the information I might have to go on in relating her thoughts and feelings". But...I thought about it, and realised that while on the one hand that's perhaps justifiable, on the other it perhaps isn't: I'm not writing an entire story from her perspective, as if I were her, or filtered only through her thoughts and feelings; I'm writing about her, her thoughts and feelings, and importantly about her history as well. Even if the reality of the story is never made clear, because she never knows it clearly herself...that doesn't mean the story doesn't exist by itself. So I had to actually decide what the details of that story were, and as a result I managed to alter what we do find out about the character from her own thoughts and feelings - and it gives us a greater appreciation for the environment she's in, too.
That's probably what it boils down to, really: not so much that lore need be readily accessible, or that it need be accessible in any significant way, but that it be accessible through its existence in absentia. If lore is non-existent, it can't tell anybody anything; whereas if it exists but isn't available, what it doesn't tell an investigator can be as important to the impression left or the information gleaned as what is told. It needs to be tangibly unavailable, I suppose. It can't be a case of "well, nobody knows", because if nobody knows then the story runs no deeper than the paper it's printed on, or the screen it flickers into movement across.
Again I guess this is an issue of how much of a story does one need to reveal without it being too much nor too little. And I guess the answer is some, provided there's more of the story that is actively being withheld as part of the storytelling process; some, as long as it's enough.
How's that for a definite answer? Appalling. But at least you know there's more to it than that.
We've all (I say, applying broad supposition to my actual and potential audience) seen movies, and we've all watched tv shows - dramas, comedies, mysteries, horrors, etc., etc.. And books, too - I'd say most of us have at least read one book, start to finish. And the thing is, unless we're either gifted with the most powerful of imaginations or cursed with no imagination at all, what happens within the story of a movie, a tv show, a book, or anything else has to make sense. There has to be a progression from A to B that can be demonstrated on some level that doesn't require too much effort to make plausible. The underlying lore of the tale, or the event, or even the characters must be capable of reduction to its most basic form and still make sense. There are notable exceptions, but these exceptions are the ones that lead the viewers or readers (or players) to search for more and to ultimately find it, not search and be given holes in plots and histories that just don't follow through.
A great example of one of these notable games is the Dark Souls series (if a franchise of two games can be deemed serial): the lore is present, but hard to find, in most parts at least. There are jumps one has to make but only insofar as things being all but said, so the logical conclusion is never stated outright for the sake of confirmation but the signs all point to it anyway. The games have earnt many people fame, at least in their respective circles, and have led to jobs regarding game guide content creation, as well as self-employment opportunities concerning YouTube content creation as well. The presentation of lore in the games and supporting material is done in such a way as to have it in some form of "plain sight", there to be found, but never outright confirmed. Tolkien's works are a bit of antithetical to these games in this regard, in that Tolkien didn't seem to want any guesswork being done - or at least, didn't like the idea of not having resources available to those who wished to engage in further research. The numerous appendices after The Return of the King tell the reader a more complete history of things related to The Lord of the Rings, and that has led the various multimedia works to have been built on the backs of the books being wrought with exceptional detail and richness. A sword is not merely a sword. But then, a sword is not merely a sword in Dark Souls, either; to know the absolute history of it, though, you might find yourself having to interpret hints and suggestions, rather than being told that this person son of that person son of another first obtained it from a smith who had beaten into the blade three different kind of ore sacred to this race, in order for it to be significant and have myriad different abilities. But the case remains that the lore is still there, just dependent on your ability or motivation to find it.
A bad story is, among other things, one that presents information without having set the stage for its inclusion. Well, perhaps not a bad story, but certainly a bad choice made by the author to depend so utterly on something without provenance. Deus ex machina it's called: the phenomenon of an event or plot point that is necessary for progression of the story to come out of nowhere. In terms of the author or creator, it amounts to something akin to throwing one's hands in the air and saying "this is the story because I say it is, and that's all there is to it". In one respect it might be deemed similar to one core aspect of the Anthropic Principle: that the Universe is as it is because if it weren't we wouldn't be here to observe it. That seems to amount to a big fat nothing, and indeed it does in fact amount to a big fat nothing: because it doesn't describe why the Universe is the way it is, but rather that the Universe can be observed as it is. In reality the Anthropic Principle has two major variants (and possibly others I'm not studied enough to be aware of): the Strong Anthropic Principle, which says that the Universe is the way it is and we can observe it that way because it is compelled to align itself with conditions that encourage or necessitate the evolution of life complex enough to exist within it and observe it; and the Weak Anthropic Principle, which says simply that if the Universe were any other way, we wouldn't be around to ask why it is the way it is, and that because we're in a version of the Universe that does allow us to exist then it's obviously a stable, realistic version, and we don't know of any other Universes that don't support life capable of observing it. It's all an interesting notion, but I have a bit of trouble seeing what use it has when trying to actually assess why the Universe has found itself in its current state unless we are to rely on saying "because we are reason enough", or at least, "because it must be observed by something". It's a bit cart-before-horse-ish, equivalent to a reversal of the question "how can we be here?" and its answer "because the Universe is hospitable to life in our form (in a general sense)".
With stories this doesn't really work. You can't just write something and say "well it had to happen that way because if it didn't, this wouldn't have happened, and the whole story would have fallen flat"; you can't say "the ends justify the means". The means have to lead directly to the ends, in summation at least, even if that means you have to invent means to get to an end that are beyond expectation. The means beyond expectation have to make sense in the world wherein they occur, of course - you can't go from everything being normal to suddenly everything being on its head at the end, as the crisis involved in this sudden change is really where a story might begin, or is the consequence of preceding events; deus ex machina isn't really the note to leave a story on.
It's a difficult one, though: how much of a plot does one have to give away without giving too much away or too little? I guess there's a real technique to that. I'm not quite there with the story I'm working on at the moment, but I will be...at some stage. But I've fallen trap to the "well, it doesn't have to make sense given the amount of information presented, so it's fine" thought process, too, particularly in my novella manuscript. I'm glad I saw sense regarding it, even if it doesn't change the ultimate outcome, and even if it's a minor set of details - because what if I were asked about it? What could I say? "I'm not sure myself"? Well...perhaps that would actually be a legitimate reason, provided it's not an excuse: some storytellers (Tolkien) take the position of being the be-all-and-end-all of knowledge on a particular story, while others (From Soft with Dark Souls) take the position of being privy to some information but not all, and thus the reliance on the "who knows?" excuse leads fan speculation, research and debate onwards without any yes or no from on-high. It's a bit of a ruse, of course - for a franchise like Dark Souls, so story-dependent, to make sense, an over-arching story must be fleshed out. Individuals within the story-telling team may or may not know all of the details, but the story is detailed, even if not shared. To be honest I do quite like the idea of a writer taking the perspective of "I am narrating a story, but what I know or don't know doesn't affect the story itself. The story is as the story is" - but the issue again is that when the story is supported only by itself and there is no tangible lore extra to the story...it begins to feel limited.
As I said, I had a case of this with my novella manuscript - not because it felt limited, and not because I took the "the story is as the story is" approach on any superficial level, but because what I did supply story-wise created the impression that the experiences of a certain character were the result of something in her past which she was only indirectly involved in, having been a child at the time. It was at that point I was prepared to say "that's all she knows, and since this is her (part of the) story, that's all the information I might have to go on in relating her thoughts and feelings". But...I thought about it, and realised that while on the one hand that's perhaps justifiable, on the other it perhaps isn't: I'm not writing an entire story from her perspective, as if I were her, or filtered only through her thoughts and feelings; I'm writing about her, her thoughts and feelings, and importantly about her history as well. Even if the reality of the story is never made clear, because she never knows it clearly herself...that doesn't mean the story doesn't exist by itself. So I had to actually decide what the details of that story were, and as a result I managed to alter what we do find out about the character from her own thoughts and feelings - and it gives us a greater appreciation for the environment she's in, too.
That's probably what it boils down to, really: not so much that lore need be readily accessible, or that it need be accessible in any significant way, but that it be accessible through its existence in absentia. If lore is non-existent, it can't tell anybody anything; whereas if it exists but isn't available, what it doesn't tell an investigator can be as important to the impression left or the information gleaned as what is told. It needs to be tangibly unavailable, I suppose. It can't be a case of "well, nobody knows", because if nobody knows then the story runs no deeper than the paper it's printed on, or the screen it flickers into movement across.
Again I guess this is an issue of how much of a story does one need to reveal without it being too much nor too little. And I guess the answer is some, provided there's more of the story that is actively being withheld as part of the storytelling process; some, as long as it's enough.
How's that for a definite answer? Appalling. But at least you know there's more to it than that.
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