Lest We Forget

Lest We Forget

If you think about all the stuff that goes on around us, it's little wonder that our brain only registers a small percentage of it all. And then it's pretty darned selective when it comes to slotting this decanted stuff into our memory. I have thoughts on resonance and space to come shortly.

In the meantime, I've been wondering about this for ages:

"If in the first act you have hung a pistol on the wall, then in the following one it should be fired. Otherwise don't put it there."

Yes, you'll recognise it for sure: it's Chekhov's gun.

First of all, it's a rather one-sided argument. We're familiar with the importance of the MacGuffin. A MacGuffin is a gun that isn't fired. Agent Cox showed me the benefits of the MacGuffin (Torak's fever for example!). Murakami is the MacGuffin king. He lays down plot device after plot device and seldom takes them to any sort of resolution. And yet, on mentioning this to Murakami fans, they're always surprised. They never notice.

Because it's startling how quickly we forget stuff. That woman who phones the protag in chapter one of Murakami's The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles is quickly forgotten, and then pops back once or twice more in the novel to no further avail. She is eaten up by whatever thread immediately takes her place. Our focus is diverted. But, when she was there, she certainly had me turning the page.

A lecturer once explained to us art students that most people will take in the first few minutes of a lecture and then start to flag. It's ironic that I can't remember how many minutes. I think it was about seven.

The part of Chekhov's Gun that has been baffling me is this bit:

...in the following one...

Really? If I introduce a gun in one act, I should have it fired in the next act (MacGuffins aside)?

Why the next act? Why not the next chapter or the last chapter?

My problem has been compounded by the variations of the quote across the internet. You can find quotes without any regard for the timing aspect, and quotes that refer to 'earlier' and 'later', or the 'first act' and 'the third act'. Indeed, we all see the world very differently. So I'll have to defer to wikipedia. :-)

So can we really be anything like specific?

Speaking of focus, have you noticed how you'll happen upon a certain word - one that you perhaps haven't heard for a good long while - and then it'll keep popping up throughout the week?

All that stuff happening about us and we're conditioned to notice only a fraction of it.

Which ties in with my recent thoughts on first-person narrator dictating style. Here's an example:

This is the view from my bus-stop. I see this scene every week day morning.

What do you see?

My brain likes words. Here's what it sees. Within the word assuRANCE (on the Pearl Assurance House) are the letters that make the word NACRE which is another word for mother-of-pearl. Coincidence eh! But look over there at that cANCER Research shop. The word NACRE is in there too! Oh, and just to the right of the Cancer Research Shop is a dry ClEANeRS. NACRE again.

Would my protag see this?

Doubtful. His mother died of cancer. It's constantly on his mind. He'd see the Cancer Research shop. And he has a thing for umbrellas, so he'd see that woman with the umbrella.

So perhaps it's not so curious that, whilst watching Seven this evening, I noticed that Detective David Mills spoke very briefly of his wife twice before setting off on that final fateful journey. Because the viewer's brain needed to be set up for the next scene. (And note how her mention is dubiously crowbarred in!)

More curious is the fact that, on finishing Seven, I switched over to ITV to see a reconstruction of some murder in which a woman's head was discovered in a box.

All I'll dare to conclude for now is that, very soon before you present that reveal, you'll need to prepare the reader for it, at least on a subconscious level (or prime them if you prefer). You can separate the introduction to that gun from the firing of that gun by as many words as you so please, provided that the reader is primed and expectant just before it goes off. And often this requires an amount of repetition.

Writing is a temporal art: like music, it moves through time. But what is in the reader's head at any given moment? How the blazes should I lead him from one thread to the next, and/or how long can/should I hold out on him?

There will be more thoughts soon, when I'm not so tired. I'm going to bed. G'night.

A Checklist

Here's an interesting guide compiled by Jessica Faust and designed to give her interns something tangible with which to assess the merits of a submission.

• What was the book about?

• Did the overall idea seem different and unique?

• Was it a common theme, but executed in a unique way?

• What did you think of the author’s voice?

• Did the characters seem real and likable?

• Was the plot seamless and did it make sense or were there a lot of holes?

• Did the multiple plotlines blend together to create a whole book or did they seem choppy and disconnected?

• Did the dialogue seem real and believable or did it feel forced?

• Were you able to easily figure out what happened or did the author keep you guessing?

• Is this a book that would seem to have viability in the market?

• Are there other popular books you could relate this to?

• Are there too many similar books to make this stand out?

• What is the author’s platform? If nonfiction, is this an author with a great deal of visibility in the market (TV, radio, speaking engagements, etc.)?

• Has the author been previously published? With whom?

• How was the writing? Did the writing feel professional, like you were reading a published book, or amateurish?

Don't forget to include blue cheese in your novel.

Breaking Rapport

Note to self: Delete temporary internet files.

It was lovely breast-stroking into an old neighbour at the pool yesterday. I caught up with the educational and recreational exploits of his kids (I babysat for them and now they're teenagers; there's nothing more effective for making one feel one's age) and he gave the lowdown on life in the Promenade. He finished his lengths and left the pool, and I planned to stay in a bit longer. However, the pool attendant called me over and explained that the pool was double-booked: I could stay in the deep end whilst a baptism took place in the shallow end. I would've stayed, but there's something odd about swimming in front of fifty or so churchgoers. So I got out too.
And there we were, my old neighbour and I, towelling ourselves opposite one-another. The conversation began again, but this time rapport was well and truly shattered. He looked at the wall behind me as he spoke, and I looked somewhere near his hair. Off came his trunks. I found myself speaking over him and the conversation staggered and stuttered. Off came my trunks. Then a silence, followed by a bit of whistling and then a brief and courteous farewell.

'You're only supposed to shave the bloody sides off.'

Conversely, this is beard week, in which several work chummies and myself will be pruning our beards each day, depilating our way from today's full beard through to Friday's pencil moustache. Tomorrow is The Man Who Would be King day. Why? Not sure, but you can bet there'll be rapport oozing from such mimicry.

Ripples

This set was used in the movies The Incredible Shrinking Man, and The Amazing Growing Surgery.

This year's Man Booker award goes to Aravind Adiga.
Chair of the judges, Michael Portillo, said of Adiga's The White Tiger:

'In the end, The White Tiger prevailed because the judges felt that it shocked and entertained in equal manner.'

There's something to consider.
He continued:

'The novel [deals] with pressing social issues and significant global developments with astonishing humour.'

Okay, loads more to consider.

The global developments bit interests me.
No idea where I read it, but I was fascinated by the idea of events growing from a personal to a global significance.
Our protag's quest would open with a small/personal significance, and this would gradually grow throughout the novel, the ramifications spreading their tentacles outwards, affecting other people, perhaps ultimately affecting the whole world/universe/of existence, etc.

Take James Bond.
We find him chasing Mr Little who is attempting to steal a little book. On thwarting him, James discovers that Mr Little is working for Dr Big, and Dr Big needs the little book to gain access to a big facility. James catches up with Dr Big, only to discover that he is working for Hugo Huge, and Hugo needs to access the big facility to take control of a huge satellite. But it is Boris Gargantuan who needs the big satellite to wreak gargantuan havoc ...

Mr Little never works for his friend, Mr Equally-Little, nor does he work for Professor Miniscule.

Bigger and bigger.

'But what about The Incredible Shrinking Man?' I hear you declare (or, at least, you might do when I attach a picture of The Incredible Shrinking Man to this post).

Well, an ordinary man is engulfed in a mysterious mist and shortly after finds that his clothes don't fit him anymore (for which he has my sympathies). The problem affects him alone. He visits his doctor and the problem is now shared with the doctor. Then he confides in his partner and she too is embroiled. Then her brother, and then several more doctors. Soon, the world's press is camped out on his doorstep (and he even shares his problem with a midget woman who is passing by with the circus).

He might be shrinking, but his predicament balloons: at first it is his, and ultimately the entire world is in on it. (Unfortunately, he falls into the basement and everyone forgets about him.)

Yep, it's that forward momentum again: things growing and taking on ever-increasing significance (at a controlled pace).

This is where things get scary!
I'm finding something of a hesitation within me as my protag's deeds begin to move beyond the confines of his immediate existence. I can visualise a radius around him; he becomes the epicentre of an earthquake.
He is reasonably easy to control, but now that this radius expands to absorb others, I'm having to make lots of important choices about what to mention and what to ignore ... and how I might retain full control of this explosion!