Reader Journal

The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre
Tzvetan Todorov

 
"Poetics can help us to see the literary quality in bumper stickers, or, conversely, the lack of literariness in the classics themselves. Poetics, truly understood, is a liberation from prejudice, an opening of the mind, creating new opportunities for readers and writers" (vii-viii).
Todorov interprets Aristotle's Poetics as an early form of structuralist theory. He applies a scientific analytical approach to texts in his effort to define the fantastic as a genre. When reading, he searches for principles operating within the texts, rather than specifics. At the start of research, one formulates the question: What defines the fantastic as a literary genre? This raises other questions, such as must one read every work in the genre in order to study it, and how many genres are there? Todorov states his intent to read broad sampling of the works and use the scientific method to make deductions and test hypotheses to verify theories. He further states genres are relativistic, akin to binomial classification. His initial conclusion is theory of genres cannot be strictly confirmed nor invalidated.
That stated, Todorov posits his theory of the fantastic as ambiguity. "The fantastic occupies the duration of this uncertainty. Once we choose one answer or the other, we leave the fantastic for a neighboring genre, the uncanny or the marvelous. The fantastic is that hesitation experienced by a person who knows only the laws of nature, confronting an apparently supernatural event" (25). This definition breaks down into three conditions: (1) the reader must presume the fictional world obeys the same scientific laws as objective reality, so hesitates between natural and supernatural explanations for the story events; (2) a character may also hesitate between the two possible explanation; and (3) the reader will not mistake the text as poetry of allegory. The last defining characteristic of the fantastic in literature is its transitional nature.
At or by the end of a fantastic tale, the story enters the realm of the uncanny or the marvelous, leaving ambiguity behind. The hesitation is over. The uncanny is the realm of the natural, as evidenced by rational explanations for the event. The marvelous is the realm of the supernatural, as evidenced by explanations most often found in science fiction. While there are several types of marvelous, their commonality is based upon the idea that such factors could exist, but do not. Poetry and allegory differ from the fantastic in that there is no hesitation between possible explanations because the situation is at least one degree from acceptable consensual reality.
The main reason poetry and allegory don't work as examples of the fantastic is readers don't wonder about explanations for events in an unreal world. Reader perception is key to the fantastic. The reader must hesitate between the possible explanations as much or more than the characters. Writers of fantastic fiction make this happen by using diction and the speech acts of narrators and characters. Diction allows the writer to make the figurative literal ('go to Hell – there's the door'), to exaggerate for effect, and use figurative language ('if', 'seemed' 'would') to heighten doubt. Literature allows no test for truth, so the writer's responsibility is to craft a tale with validity and proof of internal coherence. When the reader looks back, he or she must be able to see the clues add up to the final explanation, with no contradictions. Writers can work around this through utterances of narrators and characters. The 'I narrator stands for the confused reader. This means, in all but a rare exception, the statements made by the 'I' narrator are not lies. The most popular exception is the narrator in Agatha Christie's The Murder of Roger Ackroyd . Thus, the narrator doesn't lie, characters can lie, and a character who narrates can lie. Overall, the syntactical aspect only works once, as is the case with mystery novels; once you know the answer, you no longer question. There is no tension.
Todorov maintains the themes of fantastic fiction are those of the self and those of the other."The self signifies the relative isolation of man in the world he constructs…The other, in contrast, refers precisely to that intermediary, and it is the third relation which is at the basis of the network. The opposition is asymmetrical; the self is present in the other, but not conversely" (155). Themes of the self center on the relationship between man and his environment via perception. Reality is more subjective than objective. This is often represented by glasses and mirrors. Themes of the other center on man's desire for what is outside of himself. He may not be aware of his desire, but it drives him, transforms him, and becomes increasingly excessive. He wants the other, but he can never have it. A part of himself is missing and he'll never get it back. Still, he desires them and those desires drive the quests of the fantastic.
Why write stories of the fantastic? This genre allows you to write about the forbidden, the taboo, without alienating the reader. The fantastic is a safe zone, were readers can look at racism, bigotry, and other dark aspects of their society from another perspective. When a writer creates a world of the fantastic, the fantastic swallows the world and the reader with it. The writer can raise any question, so long as he or she does not answer that question too soon.

Reading Journal – On Writing

On Writing
Stephen King
Paperback, 2^nd Edition
This text is part autobiography, part instruction manual, and part manifesto. As he does in his fiction, King ties the elements together in an intricate weave. Ultimately, it is a love story. King loves stories, the ones he read as a child too sick to attend school, the ones he imagined and wrote when he was learning how to put words together, and those written by popular authors. King loves the language, the way you can string twenty-five words together and create something profound. King loves his wife, who also loves the language.
Are there universal constants for writers? As with King, my earliest memories is of imagining and I read early and above my age level. The stories we read the most as children influenced what we wrote as adults. We tried to copy good stories. We read a published story and walked away convinced we could write a better one. We encountered the philosophy that writing is equivalent to taking dictation from a higher power and rejected the idea. We blend two or more ideas to form the inspiration of a story. We don't always like our story people but the readers in our lives can persuade us to write the story anyway. We are passionate, obsessive, and a high risk for addiction. We are amateur mentalists, attempting to communicate the vision unfolding in our heads as we write to the reader separated from us by space and time.
King uses the metaphor of a toolbox to describe what a writer needs. His first advice is to bring the whole toolbox, not just the tool you think you will need. King's toolbox has four levels: top shelf – vocabulary and grammar; second level – style and paragraph building; third shelf- write real fiction, one paragraph at a time; and fourth shelf- not described, perhaps customized by individual. King emphasizes two differences between writing fiction and nonfiction. In nonfiction, the most important parts of a sentence should be at the end, but the reverse is true for fiction. In nonfiction, the basic unit of writing is the sentence, but in fiction, the basic unit of writing is the paragraph.
King shares his belief system, as applied to writing. "The first is that good writing consists of mastering the fundamentals (vocabulary, grammar, the elements of style) and then filling the third level of your toolbox with the right instruments. The second is that while it is impossible to make a competent writer out of a bad writer, and while it is equally impossible to make a great writer out of a good one, it is possible, with lots of hard work, dedication, and timely help, to make a good writer out of a merely competent one" (136).
To be a writer, one must read a lot and write a lot. Every book teaches a lesson. This book restated advice I already knew, but with explanations that made sense. This book also provided advice I wish I had known before entering the Writing Popular Fiction program at Seton Hill University because it would have made my life easier. I will apply what I have learned to future work and rewrites of the novel I am writing. At present, I am writing my first draft with the door closed, but I feel like I am on Closed Circuit Television.
My advice: Readers, buy this book and be entertained. Writers, buy this book and learn from a master craftsman, then do the exercise on pages 167-170.

Reading Journal – The Onion Girl

The Onion Girl by Charles De Lint

WARNING: SPOILERS

Charles De Lint's novel, The Onion Girl, is ostensibly about Jilly Coppercorn facing her past and starting to heal from injuries to her body and spirit. Jilly is hit by a car, leaving her paralyzed. During the long period of recuperation in the hospital, she gains access to the Dreamlands and searches for healing there. Meanwhile, her sister Raylene, damaged spiritually by abuse and poor choice of friends, finds her way into the Dreamlands. She and others run as wolves and hunt power animals, spilling their blood. Various characters from the Newford series are hunting Raylene and helping Jilly. Jilly sacrifices her health to restore Raylene, deciding to heal herself, while Raylene finds a path to redemption.

Newford, as imagined by De Lint, is a place where Celt and Native American mythical beings wear combat boots and thrift store jeans while they rearrange the universe. Magical creatures are in the parks, on the streets, anywhere in your peripheral vision. The characters featured in De Lint's Newford stories touch magic and are transformed by the experience. Jilly is an artist. Her paintings depict goblins in the sewers, elves hiding among the street people, and other examples of magic that goes unnoticed.

Jilly's role in the previous Newford stories is as a sounding board for those encountering myth and magic. They know they can talk to her about what they have seen because she has painted something similar and is comfortable with the fantastic. Usually the person starts out as one of Jilly's casual acquaintances and think of her as a well-meaning flake, only to change their opinions and consider her an island of sanity in the chaos they've discovered. Myth is messy, with rules that don't make sense to modern minds. No matter what, Jilly remains cheerful and positive in the face of the unknowable, which proves comforting.

Jilly has an interesting set of contradictions. She paints the world as she believes it to be, but has only seen the fantastic as a vague blur in her peripheral vision. She herself does not have a direct transforming encounter until the events in The Onion Girl. Another contradiction is more common. Jilly is a good listener who shares little about her own past, a supportive friend who fears intimacy and a straightforward problem-solver who avoids confronting her own pain. Thus, Jilly is not changed by the fantastic because she is a Teflon girl and nothing sticks to her.

Jilly's friends are a formidable network of folk with access to world-class transformative power. The Onion Girl is more their story than hers. Her changes are seeds at best. The character who changes is Raylene. Raylene is the one on a quest, although she thinks she is running away. Jilly specifically seeks a quest, but she is really running away.

In interviews De Lint admits to a fondness for Jilly that makes him reluctant to cause her pain or resolve her issues completely. So, he gave her the feature role of a minor character. Minor characters can have goals and need changes but achieve neither. Jilly is still injured and in need of healing at the end of The Onion Girl, although she does resolve to change. If any spiritual advance had been made, Jilly would have been healed by her mythic friends. If she had changed, Jilly would have reached out to Geordie and their mutual unspoken love, but she stays with her safe choice, the one who can't hurt her emotionally because she doesn't need him.

How did the author get away with this? De Lint uses Jilly's story as an umbrella arc, uniting all plots. Jilly's and Raylene's stories together take up less than half of the page count, but are almost seamlessly interwoven to make one sister's story shadow the other. The supporting characters are helping Jilly, hunting Raylene, or both. These supporting characters were once featured in other stories, so De Lint uses thumbnail sketches to establish them in The Onion Girl.

All of this interests me because I am writing an ensemble story with a protagonist who is only capable of limited change, but her actions and the motives behind them drive the story from beginning to end. I can adopt his technique to make my two main viewpoint characters have parallel quests and be shadows of one another. Every character in my ensemble story is affected by the actions of my main protagonist, so an umbrella approach makes sense.

Overall, The Onion Girl was disappointing to me as a Jilly Coppercorn fan who wanted to see her resolve her issues, mildly entertaining as a reader of the Newford stories who loves the quest motif, and invaluable to me as a writer who wants to offer a compelling tale.

Reading Journal – Self-Editing for Fiction Writers

Self-Editing for Fiction Writers

Renni Browne and Dave King

2^nd Edition, paperback

Instructional books that feature tools and techniques to improve the way you write are necessary additions to your bookshelf. This text has several modes of usefulness: (1) Read the book cover-to-cover and think about how many of the tools and techniques can be applied to your work; (2) Do the end-of-chapter exercises 1-2 hours per week and get used to using the tools and techniques; and (3) Use it as a reference when you are stuck.

These instructions will not immediately take your writing to the next level. There are two ways you can use the text to change the way you write – either slow the pace of your writing and learn to use the tools as you go, getting faster with practice; or use it as a revision tool, do the exercises and let the techniques become habit over time. Frankly, I already overthink my writing to the point of compulsive overediting. I need to write my first draft at top speed with no thought of readers or polish. I need to save that for the second or subsequent drafts.

Most of the excellent advice from Browne and King can be summarized in the acronym they provided. RUE = Resist the Urge to Explain. Convert some, but not all, narrative summary into scenes. Allow readers to interpret characters gradually through their actions. Develop characters through use of (1) other characters' viewpoints, (2) dialogues, (3) beats, and (4) character's worldview. Backgrounds and societies count as characters, so the same advice applies. Be aware of proportion and show more of what is important to the story, less of pet interests. Never explain dialogue. Convey information through dialogue by showing a character's background through word choice, cadence, and grammar. Misdirection (through characters lying, hedging, disagreeing, and misunderstanding each other) moves plot without explanation. Interior monologue is a way to tell the reader what this character would never say and beats are pieces of action that show aspects of the character they may not know they have. Use both sparingly. Eliminate repetition wherever possible.

There is good advice on every page. Browne and King use examples of what works and what doesn't. The cartoons in each chapter are funny and provide a shift in perspective that reminds us not to take ourselves so seriously.

I highly recommend this text to anyone with an interest in how fiction writing works.

A Writer’s Look at Soap Characters – Part Two

Jack Harcourt Devereaux, AKA William Earl Johnson

Days of Our Lives

Portrayed by Matt Ashford 1989-1993; 2001-2008

This character has been portrayed by other actors and has more history than I am acknowledging in this post. I choose to concentrate on what I have seen as a viewer during his first run and ignore the rest.

History: Jack's history, as revealed through action and dialogue on Days of Our Lives, is fairly unique and more complicated than I plan to deal with in one small post. In this and the other two posts, I plan to restrict my focus to questions of motive. Jack Devereaux comes to Salem to visit his father, Senator Harper Devereaux, and to renew his acquaintance with Kayla Brady. For story purposes, that's a good start, but it needs more in order to drive plot development. Turns out, Jack fell in love with Kayla when they met years ago on vacation, which moves him from a minor supporting character in Harper's story to a point in the Steve/Kayla/Jack triangle.

He believes, because Harper and Angelica have told him throughout his life, he is better than most people. He must be a better choice for Kayla than Steve, the drifter with one eye and no job, who seems to do nothing but hurt Kayla's feelings. His experience as a politician's son has given him the skills and morals to use manipulation as a means to get what he wants. The tension increases when Jack learns he is dying. He emotionally blackmails Kayla into marrying him and does not release her from her promise when he goes into remission.

He is saved from becoming an irredeemable villain by his devotion to Kayla. When he has fully recovered but she appears to be suffering a fatal illness, he offers to let her out of the marriage if it is making her sick. He is also willing to wait until she is comfortable before consummating the marriage. Her stated refusal to exit the marriage and implied willingness to be his partner convinces Jack that she is the key to his happiness. He reveals his longing for a loving family when hers welcomes him on Christmas. When he discovers at the worst possible time and in the worst possible way that she has been lying to him and having an affair with Steve, he rapes the woman he loves. That act changes his life forever.

At first, he tries to reset his life, to reclaim Kayla and erase his crime through her forgiveness. Then he denies it ever happened, trying to rewrite history. When that doesn't work, he blames Steve for setting up the circumstances that led to the crime and devotes himself to making Steve miserable in any way he can. While this is going on, he romances Melissa Horton because he needs to be loved and she is another avenue to gain information about Steve and Kayla. It is only when Harper Devereaux is revealed to be a serial killer who has targeted Kayla as his victim that Jack gives up the idea of staying married to Kayla. Harper is the man who defined Jack's character, values, and worthiness; if he is a monster, Jack must be a monster, too.

Attempting to have a career in politics only to have it destroyed by revelations of evil deeds reported by the press makes a great motive to become a newspaper publisher, especially since buying half of the newspaper means burying some stories that put him in a bad light. Revenge against the Hortons for Melissa's public humiliation does not make him feel better, but at least he is being active. Jack takes an active role in the daily operations of the Spectator in order to antagonize Diana, the other owner. He discovers a talent for investigative journalism and editorial writing that surprises those who think they know everything about Jack. In his early days at the Spectator, Jack embraces his status as a pariah and uses the truth as a weapon, the way he sees it was used against him in the past.

He has his first conversation with Jennifer Horton and his life changes again. She is the first person who does not approach him wrapped in fear and/or anger. She could see him as a monster, since she knows what he did to Kayla and Melissa, but Jennifer judges people based on her personal experiences with them. She is his type – young, blonde, intelligent, stubborn, and loyal. She is not in the enemy camp, never actively involved in what Jack sees as unwarranted attacks on his person, character, and reputation. He notices her, especially when she is grateful for his advice and thrilled to be published. He tells himself he can still be the town's truth-telling pariah and be this feisty young woman's mentor. When she is disappointed in his decisions, he reconsiders them. He sees in her the idealist he was before he discovered everybody lies. He wants to protect her from the pain he suffered. He wants to be the person she thinks he is. He wants to keep her for himself, but he knows one day she will see the monster everyone else sees and she will leave him. Everything Jack does from the moment he accepts his love for Jennifer is at least partially based on his longing for her love and his fear she will stop loving him.

Revealed onscreen: Most of the motivations noted in the above text is revealed onscreen through dialogue. Others point out his motives and he either agrees or disagrees in ways that let the audience know he is lying. He is told he is scared of being happy because he thinks he doesn't deserve it or someone will take it away. He admits he is afraid of being a violent abuser like his birth and adoptive fathers; he has no idea how to make a marriage work or be a father.

Interpretations: Jack Devereaux was written into the show as an obstacle to the romance between Steve (Patch) Johnson and Kayla Brady. Judging by the pattern set by other romantic storylines on the show, Jack was supposed to start out as a sympathetic character and transform into a villain to be defeated by the hero and his lady. Had Matt Ashford proven to be a less charismatic actor, the character would have been killed or driven out of town, to return when a villain was needed again. Instead, he was allowed to slowly, realistically evolve into a hero in his own right. He was also part of one of the last true super couples of daytime when he was paired with Jennifer Horton, as portrayed by Melissa Brennan Reeves. In fact, it was the reaction to the chemistry between the characters that convinced the writers to develop storylines showing his changing attitude. Jack's evolution from self-centered villain to dedicated hero was driven by the character seeing himself through the eyes of Jennifer Horton, first trying to change her low opinion of him and then trying to live up to her good opinion. To read more about how this evolution took place and other viewers' interpretations of the character, please hurry to Devoted to Devereaux (http://thedeverauxclan.yuku.com/bthedeverauxclan), a fan site dedicated to Jack and Jennifer Devereaux, as portrayed by Matt and Missy.

My take: I think Jack suffers from cognitive dissonance and bad timing.

The bad timing seems to be a storytelling byproduct. He came to town at the time when Steve as having doubts about his worthiness. He asked Kayla to marry him shortly after Steve found out Jack was really his baby brother. He found out about Kayla's affair less than one day before she was going to tell him about it. He allowed himself to dream of a future as Jennifer's husband the day he killed his father. He pushed Jennifer away at the time she was deciding whether to do a dangerous favor for a friend. He proposed to Jennifer while she was still suffering from PTSD from being held hostage and raped. It got to the point where when Jack said he had a good feeling about something, I immediately expected disaster.

The cognitive dissonance comes from being raised by lying politicians who expected him to believe their lies even when he knew the truth. He was raised by a man who told him the Devereaux family was better than most people, but Jack was still not quite good enough to be Harper's son. He has vague emotion-based memories of life as baby Billy Johnson, enough to have felt loved by his mother and older brother, only to lose them. Camille Harcourt was nice to Jo when she accepted the ring Jo left for Billy and was probably a loving parent, but she died, abandoning Billy like his first caregivers.

Jack learned how to treat people by an arrested adolescent who equated material goods with affection. Angelica Devereaux taught Jack women will not tell you what they want but they expect you to give it to them anyway. She taught him how to flirt, manipulate people and situations to get what you want, and how to throw money at a problem. Jack was taught about ethics, civic duty, and social responsibility by people who gave them lip service to present a positive image to the press. Jack was an insightful child and adult, with a working blarney detector. The people who raised him lied to him with nearly every word and he was expected to believe them despite proof to the contrary. I seriously doubt Justin Kiriakis was Angelica's first extramarital affair. Harper Devereaux did not have a sudden psychotic break and decide to poison Kayla; the smoothness of his actions denotes experience.

Before arriving in Salem, he had taught himself to ignore his instincts and his observational skills in order to believe Harper's words and earn his love. Jack was not comfortable in his skin or in the world because he was surrounded by lies he couldn't let himself acknowledge. He wanted to marry Kayla because he wanted to be part of an honest loving family. She lied to him and he ignored every sign of it until presented with irrefutable proof. He saw the last evidence of human honesty destroyed and lost his mind. He believed in Harper's innocence until faced with incontrovertible proof of his crimes. He believed in Angelica's unconditional love for him until she proved her priorities had shifted by appointing Justin as Alexander's godfather. By the time he fell in love with Jennifer, he had reversed his outlook on life; instead of ignoring the bad in life, he ignored the good.

Young Jack was mostly ignored by his parents, who were busy with life on Capitol Hill. What does life on the Hill teach? Never let them see how you feel. Never let anyone know they have hurt you. Get even, and then get ahead. You're only as good as your last win. Style matters more than substance. Jack never saw evidence of schemes hurting others until he saw Diana on trial for shooting Roman. When he was attacking Salemites, they didn't let him see he'd succeeded in hurting them. Diana did not hide her pain. Understanding his action led to her pain was the first step in Jack's reeducation. By dragging Jack along in every crusade she took part in, Jennifer showed him good people with flaws, people who were trying to live the best life they could. Jack learned not everyone is playing a game, which helped ease his cognitive dissonance and let him use his powers of observation to form opinions about people.

Jack has values, holdovers from Harper and Angelica, such as the need to accumulate wealth and the inclination to lie his way out of trouble. Other values he learned from life as a Horton-by-marriage, such as if you see a problem, do something about it and family is the top priority. These conflicting values that motivate Jack's character and influence his actions can drive any number of plots.

A Writer’s Look at Soap Characters – Part One

When you learn how to write research papers, one of the first things you are told is to find what the experts have written on the topic. Doug Marland was "one of the greatest head writers ever" according to professionals in the industry. His advice is fifteen years old, but still relevant.

 

How Not To Wreck A Show

 

By Douglas Marland Watch the show. Learn the history of the show. You would be surprised at the ideas that you can get from the back story of your characters. Read the fan mail. The very characters that are not thrilling to you may be the audience's favorites. Be objective. When I came in to ATWT, the first thing I said was, what is pleasing the audience? You have to put your own personal likes and dislikes aside and develop the characters that the audience wants to see. Talk to everyone; writers and actors especially. There may be something in a character's history that will work beautifully for you, and who would know better than the actor who has been playing the role? Don't change a core character. You can certainly give them edges they didn't have before, or give them a logical reason to change their behavior. But when the audience says, "He would never do that," then you have failed. Build new characters slowly. Everyone knows that it takes six months to a year for an audience to care about a new character. Tie them in to existing characters. Don't shove them down the viewers' throats. If you feel staff changes are in order, look within the organization first. P&G [Procter & Gamble] does a lot of promoting from within. Almost all of our producers worked their way up from staff positions, and that means they know the show. Don't fire anyone for six months. I feel very deeply that you should look at the show's canvas before you do anything. Good soap opera is good storytelling. It's very simple. Douglas Marland is considered by many as one of the greatest head writers ever. Marland was a former head writer of As The World Turns, Guiding Light, and General Hospital. He worked as a writer on Another World and co-created Loving. He won multiple Emmy awards and Soap Opera Digest awards. Marland, a former actor, loved daytime. He passed away on March 6, 1993. This article was published in the April 27, 1993 issue of Soap Opera Digest. Thanks to SEW for providing a copy of the article.

 

I don't write for soaps. I don't plan to write for soaps. Why do I care whether or not the industry is meeting the standards set by the late Doug Marland?

"Good soap opera is good storytelling." Good fiction is good storytelling. When I watch the soaps and I see what is working and what clearly isn't, I can apply it to my own work.

What I am studying now is character. Character drives plot. Motive drives character.

Soaps are good venues to study character. Most of the shows have characters that range from believable to ridiculous, from transparent to mysterious, and from paragon to pure evil. They can be compelling in the hands of good writers and painful to watch in the hands of the uncaring.

My personal favorite characters are the ones with identity crises. Show me a character who is a stranger to himself and you have a viewer. How do you show aspects of a character and keep them hidden from that character? How do you let the viewer know what drives a character and leave the character in the dark or in denial about his motives? How much do you leave to the viewer's imagination?

Questions, questions, questions. How I love to speculate.

In the next sections, I will speculate about three characters whose identity crises caught my attention. From Days of Our Lives, I will examine Jack Devereaux, as portrayed by Matt Ashford. This character was onscreen for a long time, but is presently off the canvas. From One Life to Live, I will examine Victoria Lord Davidson, as portrayed by Erika Slezak. This character has a long rich history and a major mental illness that is often used to generate plot. Also from One Life to Live, I will examine Jessica Buchanan Brennan, as portrayed by Bree Williamson and formerly Erin Torpey. This character grew up onscreen and is presently central to an ongoing storyline. I will look at their history, what was revealed onscreen, how others interpreted the narratives, and how I would shape their motives if I were writing for them.

This is a thought experiment. I do not own the characters, nor do I wish to make any claims.

A Writer's Look at Characters in Soaps

I read a lot of message boards devoted to commentary on television shows. When a new character appears, there is excitement and hope. We want to be entertained. Soap operas have a loyal fan base, since most viewers are second or third generation fans, so there is more tolerance and patience than viewers show for primetime dramas. When hopes for a new or returning character are dashed, some viewers blame the actor for not having the talent to play complex roles and others blame the writers for how the character comes across on screen.

There is something compelling about a soap character. He is the combination of the writer who created him, the actor who portrays him, any other actor who portrayed him, the past and present story he drives or supports, and the interactions with other characters (and the actors who portray them) in his world. Chemistry between actors can affect the direction of storylines. Chemistry between characters can transcend bad writing. Some actors have the talent and charisma to dominate every scene, with or without dialogue.

How would you write for characters dependent on so many outside factors? I think writers may need to change directions in a story because it is not working out and knowing why it isn’t working would ensure the next version will work. There are only two ways to write for characters with so many variables. The first option is to base storylines on character history and traits that are constants and let the actors find ways to make the stories work. Most major problems occur when characters act out of character for no apparent reason. The second option is to make brainstorming character-driven stories a team effort. Bring in the actors involved in the potential storylines, sit them down with the writers who know their histories and work out the details before the scripts are written. Actors who have played their roles for decades know what their characters would or would not do in any given situation. New actors might appreciate direction from veterans.

I know that’s a lot of work, but the finished product is a show people are dying to watch.

A Writer's Look at Writing for Soaps

I watch daytime dramas. I don’t watch the same ones year after year. I watch a show that catches my interest and I will follow it until whatever caught my attention resolves, dissolves, or evolves into something I can’t stand to watch. I watch as a writer. How did the writers construct this storyline? How did they coordinate the intertwining storylines so that two disparate characters are going through the same kinds of problems without being repetitive? How did such a fresh, innovative idea go so wrong?

To my knowledge, daytime dramas have a head writer, an on-site writing staff, and off-site freelance writers. The head writer meets with the on-site writing staff to share ideas for future storylines. The head writer chooses witch storylines to use and writes an outline for the next 6-12 months. The on-site writing staffs flesh out the outline to a detailed synopsis and timeline. Once the synopsis is approved, the writers then develop expanded summaries for each storyline and decide who writes what storyline. Once the assignments are handed out, the writers work on scripts for each day their story will be on the air. A lot of writers are touching each script before the show airs. Unsurprisingly, mistakes happen.

As a writer, I look at the stories played out and I think of what is wrong and how to fix it. All good stories are character-driven. No exceptions. If someone is acting out of character, there must be a reason and the reader or viewer must know what it is, or at least have that fact acknowledged. Readers and writers have a contract; the reader agrees to suspend disbelief and the writer promises to present a good story with consistent rules. These rules govern character, plot, setting, and genre. If you promise your reader a love story and your main character kills his love interest, you have broken the contract. If your main character is the chair of her local chapter of PETA and she wears a fur coat to dinner at a steakhouse, you have broken the contract.

Writing for soaps must be challenging, in that the daily scriptwriters have incredibly tight restrictions on what they can or can’t write in order to not contradict previous and future scripts. Soap audiences appear to be more lenient and accepting of these restrictions. The problem is leniency should not be a loophole in the contract. Shows have bibles, books that give complete histories of each set and character, past and present, as well as complete detailed storylines from the show’s inception to present day. Each bible should be accurate and up-to-date. Each writer should own a copy, as should each actor. Take a weekend and read it. Use it as a reference. The writer responsible for making sure the scripts work together should also make sure they don’t contradict the show’s bible, like newspaper fact-checkers do before a story goes to press.

A writer lies for a living. The contract states the lie has to be believable.

What is 'A Writer's Look'?

I have stories in my head. They are constant background chatter from the moment I wake up until I fall asleep. The stories I dream are gone before I am awake enough to get them on paper. I am a storyteller by nature. When I look at the world, I see it as a writer. Everything I experience has story potential, from the way the barista at Starbuck’s wears her hair to the traffic pattern between my home and the local high school.

A large part of writing is editing. Seeing the world through a writer’s eye is also revising and editing for content. When I look at written stories, go to the movies, or watch television, part of me is breaking down what I view into its component parts: setting, character, and plot. I evaluate it as though it was a story I was asked to edit. What works in the story? What needs improvement?

People have mixed feelings about seeing movies with me.

I thought I would share my thoughts on aspects of stories I have seen as well as those I have read. I will be writing about characters and storylines I do not own or have any rights to change. These are thought experiments and their purpose is to tone the muscles of my imagination.

They may also be fun to read.

Book Review: Stardust

Stardust
Neil Gaiman
Avon Fantasy
ISBN 0-380-80455-7

Warning: SPOILERS

Stardust is an original fairy tale set in Victorian England. Tristran Thorn, son of Dunstan Thorn of Wall and Lady Una of Stormhold (Faerie), goes on a quest to retrieve a fallen star to get his heart's desire, only to discover no heart is what it seems, even his own.

The dying Lord of Stormhold throws the stone representing his power and knocks the star from the sky. Tristran learns the star has become a woman with a broken leg and an obligation. He used a babylon candle to reach the star, but they have to reach Wall on foot. A witch tries to trap the star and take her heart as a way to gain youth, but Tristran rescues her, burning his hand while they escape. His rescue obliges her to stay with him as they travel to the place where Faerie meets England. By the time they reach Wall, Tristran must decide whether he wants to seek Victoria's hand in marriage or stay in Faerie with Yvaine, the star.

There are subplots about Lady Una's enslavement, Septimus and his brothers seeking the stone of Stormhold, and the obligations created by taking or saving a life. Gaiman's tale has witches, ghosts, a unicorn, animal transformation, revenge, skyships harvesting lightning, and magical lore.

This is Tristran's story. He is the main protagonist and most of the novel is written in his point of view. In my opinion, the most interesting character in the story is not the hero but the object of his quest, the star Yvaine.

What I find most intriguing as a writer is how little the story reveals about Yvaine. When I first read Stardust, I was enthralled by the setting and magical exposition. I felt sympathy for Yvaine’s pain and bitterness over being captured. I laughed when she insulted Tristran. I was afraid when she walked into the witch’s trap and did not know it. I admired her bravery and stoicism as she recovered from her injury and learned about life on the ground. I shared her sadness at meeting Victoria and her joy at seeing Tristran return to her. Even the epilogue was bittersweet, in that she was happy with him until he died and she carried on as ruler, but still walked to the highest peak to look at the stars still in the sky.

When I read it again to review it, I was surprised to find Yvaine on less than one hundred pages of Gaiman’s novel. Sentences from her POV add up to less than five paragraphs. Was I reading something in Stardust that wasn’t really there? I looked at other reviews, for the book and the motion picture, and found Yvaine to be one of the most popular characters. How could this be? The reader knows more about Tristran and the witch who wants to eat Yvaine’s heart than we do about Yvaine.

I read it again. The sparkle of magical lore was a little dim because I had just read it; instant replay is never as good as the first sight. I discovered during the first 2/3 of the novel, I was shown Yvaine’s pain and resentment over her capture by Tristran, with a casual mention that she seems more human and less ethereal during the day. She shares her obligation to return the stone to its rightful owner (she just knows), tells Tristran she plans to work against his plan every way she can while throwing mud at him and calling him every name in the book. Later, after Tristran saves a unicorn at her request and she has a chance to ride, she offers him a seat on the animal and shares the knowledge that she eats only darkness and drinks only light. She also admits to being scared, lonely, and miserable in a momentary lapse lasting less than one page.

At the next plot point, she escapes and ends up at an inn created by the witch who wants to cut out her heart. The witch provides most of the information about the star’s state of physical, mental, and emotional well-being. After all, a healthy and happy star provides youth and strength for a longer period of time. I, the reader, see Yvaine through the witch’s eyes, but my sympathy grows.

Tristran rescues her, injuring his hand by making it a temporary wick for the Babylon candle, and sends them to another setting for the last 1/3 of the story. Yvaine tells Tristran they now have a mutual responsibility/obligation to one another according to the laws of her people. Once she stops fighting Tristran, she starts healing and learning about the world around her. She makes friends with the only woman aboard the airship, tries on dresses, has the splint removed, and limps without crutches. Yvaine notices the bird/woman chained to a witch’s caravan, actively takes care of Tristran when he is transformed into a dormouse for the last leg of the trip to Wall, and she sings every chance she gets.

Once they reach Wall, Yvaine expresses emotions, from her misgivings about crossing to her sadness when speaking to Victoria. She does not hide her relief at Tristran’s return, her happiness at being with him, or her sadness when he finally dies. At this point, she may not age, but she has become human by loving one. Gaiman shares this with me, the reader, in lines dropped throughout the story, like chocolate chips in cookie dough, making the story more sweet and rich.

I loved reading this modern fairy tale and I highly recommend it to fantasy lovers everywhere.

My own blog? But, what if I break the Internet?

I am a mechanical jinx. In my 38 years on the planet, I have killed more machines than any given demolition derby.

My very first snow cone machine exploded during a family cookout. I went through eleven EZ Bake ovens before my mother forbade me to touch them, which made my sisters happy.

As a teen, I learned that hand-held games developed problems if I played them too long. I bought three portable cassette players per year until the technology changed.

The iPod has survived nine months without major incident. It doesn't always sync playlists, which has baffled the Help section of iTunes.
I have blown the motors of four blenders, destroyed two microwave ovens and five toasters.

My last coffee maker (no one will buy me another one) had a nervous breakdown. I would set the machine to brew and nothing would happen. Five minutes later, I would remove the plug from the outlet and I could hear the coffee brewing. My mechanic friend said it was the strangest electrical short he had ever seen.

My computers and software develop glitches that also do not make sense. This only seems to happen after I spend a lot of time inputting data. Surfing or lurking doesn't activate the jinx. I only get viruses after I install antivirus software. The first time I switched from WordPerfect to Microsoft Word, the documents would only save in foreign languages. My college IT professor fixed the problem, but said it was a first for him, as the default language is English.

There are more horror stories linked to the first time I attempt to work with new technology. I used to be more pessimistic about the outcome, but wireless technology has been good to me so far.

Still, this is my first real foray at making a home online. I am keeping my fingers crossed. The Internet is bigger and more complex than any technology I have interacted with in my life. It's got to be tougher than my jinx.