Katherine Frances's Blog, page 62
March 17, 2018
Deus Ex Machina
What is it?The term and it’s origin come from Greek theater. It means literally “a...
Deus Ex MachinaWhat is it?
The term and it’s origin come from Greek theater. It means literally “a God from a machine”, which is believed to refer to the literal crane that would hold an actor (presumably playing a God) over the stage and lower him down. In Greek theater it wasn’t uncommon to solve a conflict with the intervention of a God. Gods don’t need a reason to intervene, especially in Greek mythology, and their motives are as fickle as a brooding teenager’s, so they could be introduced suddenly (the audience was assumed to understand them as characters already) and could solve a seemingly unsolvable plot. Understanding what this term meant in origin is important to understanding what it means today in reference to modern literature.
Today Deus Ex Machina in literature means something very similar. It’s a convenient resolution that usually comes about at the climax, and basically out of no where, with no build up or explanation. For example the “it was all a dream” plot twist in cinema is widely considered a Deus Ex Machina for it’s sudden and unforeseeable resolution to all the the built up conflict of the story. A better example:
The Wizard of Oz: In the film at least, we are never clued in that the Wicked Witch’s one weakness is water (that’s a tongue twister). Water will literally melt her to a puddle, and it is never hinted at prior to it’s use to kill her. Dorthy douses her with water on accident when she is trying to put out the scare crow, which leads to her destruction, and the resolution of the conflict.
What’s wrong with it?The problem with an ending like The Wizard of Oz’s ending, is that it often feels cheap to the reader. Just because this is a fictitious world and anything can happen, doesn’t mean the reader will necessarily believe it. If something feels too perfect or too easy, it breaks the reader’s extension of disbelief. In other words, it takes them out of the story.
It also tends to rob the story of any kind of thematic moral. We generally want our stories to have an ending that feels fair to our main characters. We want them to get what they deserve, whether that’s good or bad. More relevantly, we want them to get what they earned. If a character is given a convenient ending they didn’t work for, it feels like they didn’t earn their resolution, and therefore there doesn’t appear to be any character arch or growth. It turns the characters into plastic toys attached to strings that the writer tugs around, rather than motivated beings. This is arguably the biggest crime of the Deus Ex Machina, because characters feeling interesting and real is probably the most important thing in a story.
Are there exceptions?Of course their are! When is a writing rule ever without exception? The most obvious exception to this rule is a Deus Ex Machina being used purposefully in comedy. An over the top resolution that feels utterly undeserved to the bumbling characters is fine, if not good in a lighthearted comedy where the plot convenience is used almost as a form of satire making fun of stereotypes. This is probably not the only exception to the rule, but it is probably the most popular.
Now, you might be thinking, shit, I definitely ended my WIP with a Deus Ex Machina, but don’t give up yet! All is not lost. There are a few things you can easily do that should enable you to fix most Deus Ex Machinas–that won’t require you to entirely rewrite your plot.
Tune in next week and I will be posting about specific ways to edit your WIP so that your ending doesn’t come across Deus Ex Machina-y.
kristensnotebook:
“Poetry is plucking at the heartstrings, and making music with them.” — Dennis...
“Poetry is plucking at the heartstrings, and making music with them.”— Dennis Gabor
March 16, 2018
TELL ME FLUFFY, HAPPY THINGS ABOUT YOUR OCS
they’re never happy sorry
the-entire-eternal-spiral:
Morally grey: A character who does too much bad to be a good person, but...
Morally grey: A character who does too much bad to be a good person, but does too much good to be a bad person.
Sympathetic villain: A character who is a bad person, but whose backstory/character arc makes you feel sorry for or sympathetic towards them.
Anti-hero: A character who does bad things to achieve a good goal.
Anti-villain: A character who does bad things to achieve a goal that they believe to be good, but is actually messed up.
Just plain annoying: A character who does bad things to achieve a bad goal but has one throwaway line about a hard childhood that is expected to put them into one of the aforementioned categories when in reality it just makes them annoying
ripleybeatsthor:
No men here.
They stood like Russian dolls. Each one a smaller more undone version...
No men here.They stood like Russian dolls. Each one a smaller more undone version of the one before.
The youngest ones cried, they shook uncontrollably like sheets flapping wildly on a washing line. The women simply had the sorrowful eyes of people that knew better than to plead for a deal they had no bargaining chips for.
Tales of the Northmen had prepared the elders for this moment, but no stories could adequately describe the way the men moved like stacks of sharp ice, how they pierced the air as frost does, as winter can. They were menacing in ways even educated women were wary of.
The villagers had been interrupted at dinner, grabbed by the arms or hair by men with silver blades and axes, then thrown into a haphazard line along the edge of the river. The fires still smoked and the untended vegetables soon gave off the acrid, ashy smell of burnt food. It was in some respects a very fitting odour, for it was the smell of ruin and lack of care.
Isobel wondered idly if lines such as this were their usual precursor to execution, if maximum psychological distress was always the goal. Her heart clenched at the thought, what kinds of people used their strength like this?
“Where are the men?” Demanded the Northman with angry copper hair and thick bull neck.
“There are no men here.” Answered Isobel, her voice having a noticeable effect on her people; cries died down to whimpers, tears turned to salt on skin.
“LIES!” The Northman roared. His pupils widened, swallowing his iris’ and likely the hope of most who crossed him.
But Isobel remained calm, the presence of children confused strangers, they always did. But she was not there to offer an explanation and she was unwilling to risk further fear in the minds of the babes who were still learning to trust in the strength of the family.
“You need to leave.” She said quietly. He did not draw his weapon, but he did laugh. His third mistake if Isobel was to keep score.
He grabbed her hard by the throat, quickly, unexpectedly. Blood roared in Isobel’s ears like pressurised steam escaping a kettle. A child wailed, Ben it sounded like, and Isobel felt her patience split away from her like oil atop water. She made no attempt to move his hand, but made a mental note to ensure he regretted the touch before the night was out.
Isobel stared at the man who thought he held her life in the palm of his hand. His thoughts, memories, dreams and fantasies were sewn with thick dark thread into his eyes, like constellations only she knew how to read. She snaked through him swiftly, as the grasshopper in the fields he once ran through as a boy and as the bluebottle landing upon each of his unmoving victims. She saw what his plans were for her, she saw the brutally violent end he had in mind for her family.
She saw how this would go, were she defenseless.
-
The river rippled.
The river swelled.
The river quaked from within.
Fish burst to the surface like silver arrows shot with heaven in mind. They leapt up at first. And then they leapt for the shore that would surely kill them.
Toads oozed over the banks, spilling around the feet of the increasingly placid villagers, the amphibians were a pulsing mass.
The Northman dropped Isobel, shock and fear now evident in his expression.
“Sorceress.” He whispered to himself, backing up.
She smiled and with one blink she and the others were gone. The toads began to croak, they sang in chorus, in tandem, in eerie unison. They sang…names? The Northmen could not be sure. The marooned fish seemed to gasp for air in the most terrifyingly loud wretched lurches for life. They were unrelenting, each of their desperate grapples for survival felt like echoes of death in the men’s heads. It was unbearable.
A thick fog rolled in around their ankles, it doubled and tripled masking them from one another until each was alone in an impenetrable grey wasteland. Disorientation swept them; panic and dread becoming airborne. They whirled around in confusion, attempting to find an escape but calls for help were unexpectedly muted and the other senses failed or misfired. Power ebbed away and weapons became useless in suddenly impotent hands.
They stumbled about like wounded prey, constantly hearing the horrific chanting of the toads, the ghoulish gasping of the fish, the Northmen’s names being groaned out ritualistically, unceasingly.
By the time each one reached the river, he jumped in, welcoming the escape. The strangers had quickly found out that fear is a galloping horse dragging the brain into depths it does not wish to go.
As the last Northman hit the water, the fog dispersed, the fish dissolved into stones and the toads turned to mud where they stood.
And the submerged intruders would never return to the surface again.
riskfulings:
&. ARGUING STARTERS.
“i can’t believe you.”
“are you serious?”
“we’re not...
&. ARGUING STARTERS.
“i can’t believe you.”
“are you serious?”
“we’re not finished. i’m not just going to let this go.”
“so you don’t trust me?”
“fuck you.”
“you know me! and the fact that you still think i’d do that hurts the most.”
“i miss the old you. i don’t want the person you’ve become.”
“you never understand.”
“you said the same thing last time.”
“i’m so tired of constantly doing this with you.”
“you don’t even try to see it from my perspective.”
“i’m not apologizing.”
“hell if i care.”
“this is fucking bullshit.”
“why are you always the one who’s breaking my heart?”
“i can’t do this anymore.”
“you don’t mean that.”
“i hate you.”
“you never keep your promises.”
“out of all the things you’ve told me, what was true?”
“i can’t even look at you.”
“do you even love me anymore?”
“i’m fucking done.”
“i shouldn’t have ever trusted you.”
“you’re being unfair.”
“i’m not going to keep being your little secret. i deserve better.”
“i’m leaving.”
“just… just go.”
“i thought you’d be the one to make me happy.”
“you don’t even pretend to care about me.”
“i don’t even remember the last time you told me you loved me.”
“don’t go.”
“i never asked for this.”
