Endings – Too Much, Or Not enough?
I read this joke/saying the other day on a Kindle forum regarding the endings of novels :
Americans want a happy ending, Canadians end without answering your questions, Brits just stop writing, and the Russians aren't happy until five generations of the family history has been explored.
I've never heard this before, but I can see that it does holds some truth, and as a British *ahem* writer I can attest to the Brit part. It basically boils down to a cultural perspective of storytelling. The types of stories we tell as a culture are shaped by our national traits. If I can take the US and British aspects of the above, as I have more experience of these two types of novels, I can see the underlying national characteristics regarding the conclusion of novels.
To employ some mass generalisation here, US novels, films and television do in general have neat and tidy endings. Closure is almost demanded by US consumers, the same is not so true with the British. To explore possible cultural explanations to this, you'd have to look at the characteristics of the people. Again, to generalise, the Americans are largely optimistic, one of the reasons we love them. Their 'can-do attitude' and 'have a nice day' has served them well for generations. So, in large, their media reflects this. The British are more world-weary, nay cynical, than that. If they read a novel which ends with the lonely woman desperate to find love getting married to Mr. Right, we'd baulk, throwing it down in disgust with the words 'oh for goodness sake'. Possibly, anyway. 'Happily ever after' endings don't work for the Brits. We prefer '(possibly) happily ever after, but if it ends in tears at least it's realistic'.
The US comedian Greg Proops put it more succinctly – I've paraphrased a line of his stand-up routine here;
An American family go to Disneyland, and while there they see Mickey Mouse. The whole family goes 'omg, look IT'S MICKEY! I can't believe it!' They rush over and get photos and shake hands etc. Whereas the British family see Mickey Mouse and go *whispers* 'Don't look now, but there's some guy dressed as a mouse, for goodness sake! How ridiculous…' and shuffle off in the other direction.
In terms of films, think of the ending to The Italian Job, with Michael Caine and Noel Coward. The coach carrying the gold teeters on the edge of a cliff, and Michael Caine's character says "Hang on a minute, lads – I've got a great idea." Then the credits roll. You never find out if they retrieved the gold or not. By the way, if you haven't seen The Italian Job, and I've spoilt the ending – you're an idiot for not having seen it yet. It came out in 1969. What have you been doing all these years? Caine suggested that the producers did actually film a different ending, where they escape with their lives, but the gold goes off the cliff, to be collected by the rival gang. True or not, that version was decided against.
That's a perfect British ending. Decide for yourself if they got the gold or not. Like the original saying, the scriptwriter simply stopped writing.
Before you start throwing a coach-load of examples of Hollywood TV shows and films with messy-but-cool endings, those are what make the films/shows so good in the first place. The Sopranos? The final episode devided opinion, but I loved it. They avoided the obvious. For that they get a rich tea biscuit. The Wire? Again, I'd expect nothing less from David Simon.
For my part, the end of my novel (work in progress) has a similar ending. Now I think about it, maybe be too similar…! But anyway, rather than conclude all the matters and resolve the issues and conflicts raised, I open up a new channel for the reader to agonise over. This might possibly infuriate some American readers if the above statement is true, but hey, I don't like neat denouements.
As for Canadian writers ending without answering your questions – well, I'd like to know, but I suspect they won't tell me! Classic Russian novels tend to be massive epics like War and Peace and Doctor Zhivago, so the scope for the reader to indulge his/herself in five generations is quite possible. As for their more modern novels, I have no idea.
Endings – neat and tidy or ambigious but realistic?
