WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.740 align:middle line:90% 00:00:01.740 --> 00:00:03.720 align:middle line:84% Fiction writers with no taste or inclination 00:00:03.720 --> 00:00:05.100 align:middle line:84% for the formal constraints of rule of thumb 00:00:05.100 --> 00:00:06.750 align:middle line:84% could do worse than spend an afternoon watching 00:00:06.750 --> 00:00:07.753 align:middle line:90% Chuck Jones's work. 00:00:07.753 --> 00:00:09.420 align:middle line:84% It isn't enough to watch one Road Runner 00:00:09.420 --> 00:00:11.280 align:middle line:90% cartoon or maybe for you it is. 00:00:11.280 --> 00:00:12.880 align:middle line:84% But if you're interested in this, 00:00:12.880 --> 00:00:14.422 align:middle line:84% you need to immerse yourself in them. 00:00:14.422 --> 00:00:16.079 align:middle line:84% There are over 40 Road Runner cartoons, 00:00:16.079 --> 00:00:18.330 align:middle line:84% to see all the conventions, all the restrictions, 00:00:18.330 --> 00:00:20.850 align:middle line:84% to understand the few options of the Road Runner world. 00:00:20.850 --> 00:00:24.120 align:middle line:84% And then to see how again and again they surprise. 00:00:24.120 --> 00:00:25.740 align:middle line:84% The Road Runner saga, Hugh Kenner 00:00:25.740 --> 00:00:27.780 align:middle line:84% wrote, all four plus hours of it, 00:00:27.780 --> 00:00:30.390 align:middle line:84% relies on just one theme seemingly inexhaustible. 00:00:30.390 --> 00:00:33.280 align:middle line:84% That Wile E. Coyote's persistence and pursuit, 00:00:33.280 --> 00:00:36.090 align:middle line:84% and pursuit of what was once a potential snack 00:00:36.090 --> 00:00:39.420 align:middle line:84% and has long since mutated into an ideal conquest, 00:00:39.420 --> 00:00:40.920 align:middle line:84% the viewer of a new installment has 00:00:40.920 --> 00:00:44.537 align:middle line:84% seen it all before and yet seeing none of it before. 00:00:44.537 --> 00:00:46.620 align:middle line:84% That's actually literally true because Chuck Jones 00:00:46.620 --> 00:00:48.720 align:middle line:84% is unlike many animators, made it a point of pride 00:00:48.720 --> 00:00:51.030 align:middle line:84% never to reuse footage or drawings. 00:00:51.030 --> 00:00:52.620 align:middle line:84% Even footage of virtually identical 00:00:52.620 --> 00:00:55.170 align:middle line:84% chases of the Coyote's fall, or the Coyote's fall. 00:00:55.170 --> 00:00:57.480 align:middle line:84% Jones points out that a character runs differently 00:00:57.480 --> 00:00:59.010 align:middle line:84% when he's being chased than he does 00:00:59.010 --> 00:01:00.640 align:middle line:90% when he's chasing something. 00:01:00.640 --> 00:01:01.890 align:middle line:90% If you ever watch Scooby Doo-- 00:01:01.890 --> 00:01:03.845 align:middle line:84% I'm really working with lowbrow side here 00:01:03.845 --> 00:01:05.220 align:middle line:84% but if you ever watch Scooby Doo, 00:01:05.220 --> 00:01:07.440 align:middle line:84% you'll notice they do not bother to make that distinction. 00:01:07.440 --> 00:01:09.570 align:middle line:84% It's just about the cheapest animation there is. 00:01:09.570 --> 00:01:13.260 align:middle line:84% But if you watch Chuck Jones's Road Runner cartoons and most 00:01:13.260 --> 00:01:14.790 align:middle line:84% of the Chuck Jones, you'll notice 00:01:14.790 --> 00:01:17.700 align:middle line:84% that the characters oddly enough are based on life. 00:01:17.700 --> 00:01:20.790 align:middle line:84% And you can look at his notebooks too. 00:01:20.790 --> 00:01:23.100 align:middle line:84% Animation needs to be able to express character 00:01:23.100 --> 00:01:23.920 align:middle line:90% without words. 00:01:23.920 --> 00:01:26.280 align:middle line:84% And since animation is movement, characters 00:01:26.280 --> 00:01:28.050 align:middle line:84% express through the way a character moves. 00:01:28.050 --> 00:01:30.330 align:middle line:84% His notebooks contain countless sketches of hips 00:01:30.330 --> 00:01:33.210 align:middle line:84% and leg bones, feet and shoulders, comparisons 00:01:33.210 --> 00:01:36.510 align:middle line:84% of how say real coyotes look outside, heads 00:01:36.510 --> 00:01:39.840 align:middle line:84% hung down with the way Wile E. Coyote slouches. 00:01:39.840 --> 00:01:42.880 align:middle line:84% All mammals share similarities of construction 00:01:42.880 --> 00:01:44.520 align:middle line:84% so the key is to distinctive movement 00:01:44.520 --> 00:01:46.020 align:middle line:90% or the subtle differences. 00:01:46.020 --> 00:01:48.450 align:middle line:84% If an animator cartoons pays this much attention 00:01:48.450 --> 00:01:50.370 align:middle line:84% to physiology, it stands to reason 00:01:50.370 --> 00:01:51.900 align:middle line:84% that writers of realistic fiction 00:01:51.900 --> 00:01:54.850 align:middle line:84% should be students of syntax and for instance, 00:01:54.850 --> 00:01:59.108 align:middle line:84% in many different ways, a populated room can be silent. 00:01:59.108 --> 00:02:01.650 align:middle line:84% In the days when cartoons were a standard part of the package 00:02:01.650 --> 00:02:03.210 align:middle line:84% film studio sent to theaters, each 00:02:03.210 --> 00:02:04.680 align:middle line:84% was required to be 6 minutes long. 00:02:04.680 --> 00:02:06.450 align:middle line:90% That was the primary constraint. 00:02:06.450 --> 00:02:10.350 align:middle line:90% That works out to 4,320 frames. 00:02:10.350 --> 00:02:12.030 align:middle line:84% Movement, pacing, and rhythm are all 00:02:12.030 --> 00:02:13.680 align:middle line:84% discussed in terms of frames or were 00:02:13.680 --> 00:02:16.080 align:middle line:84% then when it was done actually by drawing. 00:02:16.080 --> 00:02:18.360 align:middle line:84% Wile E. Coyote's inevitable fall off a cliff 00:02:18.360 --> 00:02:20.490 align:middle line:84% requires 18 frames from the fall into the distance 00:02:20.490 --> 00:02:23.520 align:middle line:84% and disappear 14 frames later to hit. 00:02:23.520 --> 00:02:25.020 align:middle line:84% It seemed to me, Chuck Jones said, 00:02:25.020 --> 00:02:27.690 align:middle line:84% that 13 frames didn't work in terms of humor 00:02:27.690 --> 00:02:31.740 align:middle line:84% and neither did 15, 14 frames got a laugh. 00:02:31.740 --> 00:02:33.930 align:middle line:84% The punchline then or total effect 00:02:33.930 --> 00:02:37.380 align:middle line:84% is calculated to within 1/12 of a second in a Road Runner 00:02:37.380 --> 00:02:38.490 align:middle line:90% cartoon. 00:02:38.490 --> 00:02:41.587 align:middle line:84% In his biography, Chuck Amuck, which I recommend, 00:02:41.587 --> 00:02:43.920 align:middle line:84% Jones identifies some of the constraints he gave himself 00:02:43.920 --> 00:02:45.128 align:middle line:90% for the Road Runner cartoons. 00:02:45.128 --> 00:02:47.830 align:middle line:84% One, the Road Runner cannot harm the coyote except by going beep 00:02:47.830 --> 00:02:48.930 align:middle line:90% beep. 00:02:48.930 --> 00:02:51.870 align:middle line:84% Two, no outside force can harm the coyote, only 00:02:51.870 --> 00:02:55.680 align:middle line:84% his own ineptitude, or the failure of Acme products. 00:02:55.680 --> 00:02:58.740 align:middle line:84% Three, the coyote could stop any time if he were not a fanatic. 00:02:58.740 --> 00:03:01.290 align:middle line:84% Repeat, a fanatic is one who redoubles his effort 00:03:01.290 --> 00:03:04.380 align:middle line:84% when he has forgotten his aim, George Santayana. 00:03:04.380 --> 00:03:07.350 align:middle line:84% Four, no dialogue ever except beep, beep. 00:03:07.350 --> 00:03:09.630 align:middle line:84% Five, the Road Runner must stay on the road, 00:03:09.630 --> 00:03:12.300 align:middle line:84% otherwise he would not be called Road Runner. 00:03:12.300 --> 00:03:15.510 align:middle line:84% Six, and this is the strangest one for my money, six, 00:03:15.510 --> 00:03:18.420 align:middle line:84% all action must be confined to the natural environment 00:03:18.420 --> 00:03:21.570 align:middle line:84% of the two characters, the American Southwest. 00:03:21.570 --> 00:03:23.700 align:middle line:84% The natural environment of Road Runner. 00:03:23.700 --> 00:03:25.020 align:middle line:90% You've seen road runner, right? 00:03:25.020 --> 00:03:27.180 align:middle line:84% I mean, you've maybe almost run them over, right? 00:03:27.180 --> 00:03:31.320 align:middle line:84% Not much resemblance to the river. 00:03:31.320 --> 00:03:32.858 align:middle line:84% Seven, all materials, tools, weapons 00:03:32.858 --> 00:03:34.650 align:middle line:84% or mechanical conveniences must be obtained 00:03:34.650 --> 00:03:36.490 align:middle line:90% from the Acme Corporation. 00:03:36.490 --> 00:03:39.030 align:middle line:84% Eight, whenever possible make gravity the Coyote's greatest 00:03:39.030 --> 00:03:40.050 align:middle line:90% enemy. 00:03:40.050 --> 00:03:42.360 align:middle line:84% And 9, the coyote is always more humiliated 00:03:42.360 --> 00:03:44.370 align:middle line:84% than harmed by his failures while he gets 00:03:44.370 --> 00:03:46.440 align:middle line:90% whacked pretty hard. 00:03:46.440 --> 00:03:48.300 align:middle line:84% Those cartoons' constraints were dictated 00:03:48.300 --> 00:03:52.080 align:middle line:84% not by sales departments, not by marketing surveys or audience 00:03:52.080 --> 00:03:54.240 align:middle line:84% polls, they were self-imposed by the artist. 00:03:54.240 --> 00:03:57.330 align:middle line:84% Chuck Jones always said that he and the guys he worked with 00:03:57.330 --> 00:03:59.970 align:middle line:84% didn't made cartoons for kids, they made them for themselves. 00:03:59.970 --> 00:04:02.820 align:middle line:84% They said, we make what amuses us. 00:04:02.820 --> 00:04:04.800 align:middle line:84% For all their looneyness, Road Runner cartoons 00:04:04.800 --> 00:04:07.170 align:middle line:84% are not far removed from the experimental formalism 00:04:07.170 --> 00:04:08.580 align:middle line:90% of the old comic. 00:04:08.580 --> 00:04:11.040 align:middle line:84% Chuck Jones however, was still telling stories, 00:04:11.040 --> 00:04:13.650 align:middle line:84% some post realistic fiction abandons character 00:04:13.650 --> 00:04:17.070 align:middle line:84% in the narrative concentrating instead on ideas, form, 00:04:17.070 --> 00:04:18.690 align:middle line:90% or language alone. 00:04:18.690 --> 00:04:21.839 align:middle line:84% Writers of such work might be more geometers than map-makers, 00:04:21.839 --> 00:04:26.040 align:middle line:84% interested primarily in calculating new projections. 00:04:26.040 --> 00:04:28.665 align:middle line:90% Now we get to this. 00:04:28.665 --> 00:04:31.762 align:middle line:84% This is about the distortion formula we call realism. 00:04:31.762 --> 00:04:33.720 align:middle line:84% Some writers and readers delight in the stories 00:04:33.720 --> 00:04:37.020 align:middle line:84% of novels that bring formal properties to the foreground. 00:04:37.020 --> 00:04:39.180 align:middle line:84% While others, most of us maybe, prefer something 00:04:39.180 --> 00:04:42.780 align:middle line:84% we think of as more natural or something less intellectual. 00:04:42.780 --> 00:04:44.850 align:middle line:84% But realism is perfectly unnatural 00:04:44.850 --> 00:04:47.190 align:middle line:84% and as writers we have to understand how it's created. 00:04:47.190 --> 00:04:48.750 align:middle line:84% We may want the world of our stories 00:04:48.750 --> 00:04:51.690 align:middle line:84% to be rich and complex even unpredictable apparently, 00:04:51.690 --> 00:04:53.550 align:middle line:84% filled with surprise, but surprise 00:04:53.550 --> 00:04:55.020 align:middle line:90% depends on expectation. 00:04:55.020 --> 00:04:57.990 align:middle line:84% If we have no expectations, there's no surprise. 00:04:57.990 --> 00:05:00.960 align:middle line:84% That's why it's hard to tell jokes to dogs. 00:05:00.960 --> 00:05:03.180 align:middle line:84% While we may want to evoke unpredictability 00:05:03.180 --> 00:05:05.130 align:middle line:84% and complexity, we ultimately want our work 00:05:05.130 --> 00:05:06.900 align:middle line:84% to be shapely, in the study of shapes 00:05:06.900 --> 00:05:09.180 align:middle line:90% as the study of geometry. 00:05:09.180 --> 00:05:10.860 align:middle line:84% Given that our capacity for abstraction 00:05:10.860 --> 00:05:12.780 align:middle line:84% is greater than you may realize, it 00:05:12.780 --> 00:05:15.330 align:middle line:84% isn't necessary for a map user to know the first thing 00:05:15.330 --> 00:05:16.950 align:middle line:90% about projection formulas. 00:05:16.950 --> 00:05:19.350 align:middle line:84% A map maker however is obliged to understand 00:05:19.350 --> 00:05:21.210 align:middle line:90% exactly what he's doing. 00:05:21.210 --> 00:05:23.490 align:middle line:84% In the art of the novel, Kundera decries 00:05:23.490 --> 00:05:25.680 align:middle line:84% that historical movement toward verisimilitude 00:05:25.680 --> 00:05:29.220 align:middle line:84% away from what he says is a more important urge that came along 00:05:29.220 --> 00:05:31.650 align:middle line:84% before realism which was the urge toward astonishment 00:05:31.650 --> 00:05:34.440 align:middle line:84% and enchantment, what came from fairy tales and fables and all 00:05:34.440 --> 00:05:36.540 align:middle line:90% those early stories. 00:05:36.540 --> 00:05:38.280 align:middle line:84% He says realism actually smothers 00:05:38.280 --> 00:05:40.590 align:middle line:90% that kind of enchantment. 00:05:40.590 --> 00:05:43.620 align:middle line:84% Mark Twain in his famous essay about James Fenimore Cooper's 00:05:43.620 --> 00:05:46.560 align:middle line:84% literary offenses where he rails against romanticism, 00:05:46.560 --> 00:05:49.140 align:middle line:84% his call for accuracy in detail and an observation 00:05:49.140 --> 00:05:51.510 align:middle line:84% of the natural world can lead, Kundera 00:05:51.510 --> 00:05:54.660 align:middle line:84% might say, to submission to the oppression of actuality. 00:05:54.660 --> 00:05:56.793 align:middle line:84% But that doesn't mean we need to reject realism, 00:05:56.793 --> 00:05:59.460 align:middle line:84% only that to practice it we need to keep in mind the distinction 00:05:59.460 --> 00:06:01.740 align:middle line:90% between realism and reality. 00:06:01.740 --> 00:06:03.720 align:middle line:84% To confuse the two is to mistake the difference 00:06:03.720 --> 00:06:06.540 align:middle line:90% between art and life. 00:06:06.540 --> 00:06:08.250 align:middle line:84% The geometry of realism dates back 00:06:08.250 --> 00:06:10.380 align:middle line:84% to the dawn of perspective, which 00:06:10.380 --> 00:06:12.780 align:middle line:84% is a distortion formula designed to fool the eye. 00:06:12.780 --> 00:06:14.280 align:middle line:84% Probably all of you did in art class 00:06:14.280 --> 00:06:16.920 align:middle line:84% at some point, the old lesson of drawing 00:06:16.920 --> 00:06:20.267 align:middle line:84% a road that met in the distance at a point, right? 00:06:20.267 --> 00:06:21.850 align:middle line:84% Or maybe you even did the next lesson, 00:06:21.850 --> 00:06:24.420 align:middle line:84% which is draw a building, the angles of which 00:06:24.420 --> 00:06:27.760 align:middle line:84% aim toward that same point, single point perspective. 00:06:27.760 --> 00:06:29.910 align:middle line:84% And so the back of the building would be shorter 00:06:29.910 --> 00:06:31.313 align:middle line:90% than the front of the building. 00:06:31.313 --> 00:06:32.730 align:middle line:84% The building would get more narrow 00:06:32.730 --> 00:06:34.355 align:middle line:84% as it aimed toward the vanishing point. 00:06:34.355 --> 00:06:35.310 align:middle line:90% Did you do that? 00:06:35.310 --> 00:06:36.690 align:middle line:84% Some people are looking as if they know what it is. 00:06:36.690 --> 00:06:37.140 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:06:37.140 --> 00:06:37.640 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:06:37.640 --> 00:06:39.330 align:middle line:84% So basic lesson in perspective, right? 00:06:39.330 --> 00:06:42.510 align:middle line:84% Which is training, including the unfolding the eye. 00:06:42.510 --> 00:06:45.100 align:middle line:84% But of course, we know that no where 00:06:45.100 --> 00:06:48.060 align:middle line:84% we've been on meets at a point in the distance, right? 00:06:48.060 --> 00:06:50.310 align:middle line:84% The distance side of a building isn't shorter 00:06:50.310 --> 00:06:52.380 align:middle line:84% than the side nearer to us, right? 00:06:52.380 --> 00:06:55.500 align:middle line:84% So what we're trying to create for the eye isn't what exists. 00:06:55.500 --> 00:06:56.655 align:middle line:90% In fact, it's a deception. 00:06:56.655 --> 00:07:00.700 align:middle line:84% We're trying to mirror how we perceive the world. 00:07:00.700 --> 00:07:02.820 align:middle line:84% Thanks to the artists of the Italian Renaissance 00:07:02.820 --> 00:07:04.710 align:middle line:84% primarily, perspective was developed 00:07:04.710 --> 00:07:06.390 align:middle line:90% as a tool and a method. 00:07:06.390 --> 00:07:08.580 align:middle line:84% To understand the goal was enough. 00:07:08.580 --> 00:07:10.470 align:middle line:84% Artists actually had to train themselves 00:07:10.470 --> 00:07:12.717 align:middle line:84% in this way of seeing so they could portray on canvas 00:07:12.717 --> 00:07:13.800 align:middle line:90% what they knew to be true. 00:07:13.800 --> 00:07:18.150 align:middle line:84% And if you ever tried to draw almost anything in perspective, 00:07:18.150 --> 00:07:20.700 align:middle line:84% you realize that what you know about the object often 00:07:20.700 --> 00:07:23.190 align:middle line:84% makes it difficult for you to draw in perspective. 00:07:23.190 --> 00:07:25.950 align:middle line:84% You have to forget that and stare more and more carefully 00:07:25.950 --> 00:07:28.020 align:middle line:84% at what you're seeing in order to see 00:07:28.020 --> 00:07:32.790 align:middle line:84% how curves work in space, how foreshortening works other. 00:07:32.790 --> 00:07:34.570 align:middle line:84% That's why some of us say we can't draw. 00:07:34.570 --> 00:07:38.040 align:middle line:90% I mean, we can't do that thing. 00:07:38.040 --> 00:07:39.550 align:middle line:84% Brunelleschi, who was a goldsmith 00:07:39.550 --> 00:07:41.280 align:middle line:84% turned architect is credited with being 00:07:41.280 --> 00:07:44.040 align:middle line:84% the first to portray three dimensional objects on two 00:07:44.040 --> 00:07:45.540 align:middle line:90% dimensional surfaces. 00:07:45.540 --> 00:07:48.540 align:middle line:84% The mathematical perspective, a calculated illusion 00:07:48.540 --> 00:07:50.280 align:middle line:84% dominated the visual arts to the point 00:07:50.280 --> 00:07:52.350 align:middle line:84% that other methods of representation 00:07:52.350 --> 00:07:56.040 align:middle line:90% seemed and still seem unnatural. 00:07:56.040 --> 00:07:57.720 align:middle line:84% Alberta's veil, what you're seeing 00:07:57.720 --> 00:08:00.960 align:middle line:84% demonstrated there in this object world of print, 00:08:00.960 --> 00:08:02.460 align:middle line:84% and you can see straight on there. 00:08:02.460 --> 00:08:04.172 align:middle line:84% Alberta's veil is essentially a grid 00:08:04.172 --> 00:08:05.880 align:middle line:84% that you would look through and then use. 00:08:05.880 --> 00:08:08.640 align:middle line:84% You could actually place strings on different parts of the grid 00:08:08.640 --> 00:08:10.770 align:middle line:84% and then attach him to the paper that you were working on 00:08:10.770 --> 00:08:13.020 align:middle line:84% and use that to draw lines from what you were looking 00:08:13.020 --> 00:08:15.090 align:middle line:84% at through the grid onto a piece of paper 00:08:15.090 --> 00:08:20.310 align:middle line:84% so that the grid itself became a kind of mirror or glass, 00:08:20.310 --> 00:08:22.440 align:middle line:84% a plane of transformation in order 00:08:22.440 --> 00:08:27.090 align:middle line:84% to put what you saw under the flat page. 00:08:27.090 --> 00:08:28.050 align:middle line:90% And it still serves. 00:08:28.050 --> 00:08:31.200 align:middle line:84% A variations on this serve is a kind of training device. 00:08:31.200 --> 00:08:32.860 align:middle line:84% A realistic painting is a kind of map 00:08:32.860 --> 00:08:35.309 align:middle line:84% drawn on an imaginary window based 00:08:35.309 --> 00:08:36.720 align:middle line:90% on the geometric projection. 00:08:36.720 --> 00:08:39.330 align:middle line:84% So what's the equivalent of this in fiction writing? 00:08:39.330 --> 00:08:42.240 align:middle line:84% What are the tools by which we create realistic fiction? 00:08:42.240 --> 00:08:44.670 align:middle line:84% If we hold up Alberta's veil and try to write a story 00:08:44.670 --> 00:08:46.500 align:middle line:84% instead of make a painting, how do we 00:08:46.500 --> 00:08:50.930 align:middle line:84% transcribe what we see and hear and touch and smell and think? 00:08:50.930 --> 00:08:52.680 align:middle line:84% Clearly this is more complicated than just 00:08:52.680 --> 00:08:54.780 align:middle line:84% wrapping a sheet of paper around the globe 00:08:54.780 --> 00:08:56.657 align:middle line:84% or trying to put something onto a flat sheet 00:08:56.657 --> 00:08:58.740 align:middle line:84% because when we're doing that, when we're drawing, 00:08:58.740 --> 00:09:00.532 align:middle line:84% we're only trying to fool one sense, right? 00:09:00.532 --> 00:09:03.570 align:middle line:84% We're only trying to fool our eye. 00:09:03.570 --> 00:09:06.240 align:middle line:84% A realistic writing evokes the world in all its dimensions, 00:09:06.240 --> 00:09:08.790 align:middle line:84% physical space, time, sound, smell, 00:09:08.790 --> 00:09:10.530 align:middle line:84% through the abstract code of those inky 00:09:10.530 --> 00:09:13.200 align:middle line:84% squiggles the letters and words we put in the page. 00:09:13.200 --> 00:09:15.240 align:middle line:84% Far from being natural or straightforward, 00:09:15.240 --> 00:09:17.755 align:middle line:84% realistic work may be the most deceptive 00:09:17.755 --> 00:09:19.380 align:middle line:84% as it goes to great lengths and heights 00:09:19.380 --> 00:09:21.528 align:middle line:84% in which to conceal its geometric underpinning. 00:09:21.528 --> 00:09:23.820 align:middle line:84% For instance, dialogue and fiction is not true to life, 00:09:23.820 --> 00:09:24.862 align:middle line:90% you all know this, right? 00:09:24.862 --> 00:09:26.760 align:middle line:84% Dialogue in realistic fiction edits 00:09:26.760 --> 00:09:29.250 align:middle line:84% out all the ums and errors and mispronunciations 00:09:29.250 --> 00:09:32.520 align:middle line:84% and false starts of sentences in our regular speech, right? 00:09:32.520 --> 00:09:35.220 align:middle line:84% It's tidied up in the same way that we tend to edit that out. 00:09:35.220 --> 00:09:36.780 align:middle line:84% If we're trying to listen to somebody 00:09:36.780 --> 00:09:38.905 align:middle line:84% and we're trying to gain content, we edit that out. 00:09:38.905 --> 00:09:41.193 align:middle line:84% If you're in a boring class and you're 00:09:41.193 --> 00:09:43.110 align:middle line:84% getting exasperated with the teacher, in fact, 00:09:43.110 --> 00:09:44.400 align:middle line:90% you count those things, right? 00:09:44.400 --> 00:09:46.025 align:middle line:84% How many times did you pull in his ear? 00:09:46.025 --> 00:09:47.820 align:middle line:84% How many times did he say, and now? 00:09:47.820 --> 00:09:49.170 align:middle line:90% You know whatever it is. 00:09:49.170 --> 00:09:51.295 align:middle line:84% My son plays these games in his high school classes 00:09:51.295 --> 00:09:52.620 align:middle line:90% all the time. 00:09:52.620 --> 00:09:55.957 align:middle line:84% But in fiction, we tend to edit those things out. 00:09:55.957 --> 00:09:58.290 align:middle line:84% And also we have all the conventions of putting dialogue 00:09:58.290 --> 00:09:58.800 align:middle line:90% on the page. 00:09:58.800 --> 00:10:00.820 align:middle line:84% We have indentation, we have quotation marks, 00:10:00.820 --> 00:10:02.580 align:middle line:90% we have attribution, right? 00:10:02.580 --> 00:10:05.400 align:middle line:84% We said, he said, he asked, she said, 00:10:05.400 --> 00:10:07.230 align:middle line:84% which are meant to be invisible and we're 00:10:07.230 --> 00:10:10.530 align:middle line:84% trained we're taught not to say things like, he exhorted, 00:10:10.530 --> 00:10:12.960 align:middle line:84% she maintained, he amplified, things 00:10:12.960 --> 00:10:15.990 align:middle line:84% that draw their attention to the attributive. 00:10:15.990 --> 00:10:18.540 align:middle line:84% And we can depart from those conventions but once we do, 00:10:18.540 --> 00:10:21.600 align:middle line:84% either people say nasty things about us at workshop 00:10:21.600 --> 00:10:24.605 align:middle line:84% or they'll say, why are you taking me out of the story? 00:10:24.605 --> 00:10:26.730 align:middle line:84% Why are you taking me out of the dream of the story 00:10:26.730 --> 00:10:29.280 align:middle line:84% and drawing my attention to that? 00:10:29.280 --> 00:10:31.710 align:middle line:84% Dialogue and fiction is also purposeful in a way actual 00:10:31.710 --> 00:10:33.132 align:middle line:90% speech usually isn't. 00:10:33.132 --> 00:10:34.840 align:middle line:84% Among other things, it reveals character, 00:10:34.840 --> 00:10:39.370 align:middle line:84% it expresses conflict, and it conveys necessary information. 00:10:39.370 --> 00:10:41.370 align:middle line:84% Another example, the descriptions of characters. 00:10:41.370 --> 00:10:42.510 align:middle line:84% We describe characters, some people 00:10:42.510 --> 00:10:43.968 align:middle line:84% know what they look like, they have 00:10:43.968 --> 00:10:45.662 align:middle line:90% an idea of how to picture them. 00:10:45.662 --> 00:10:47.370 align:middle line:84% We provide that information to the reader 00:10:47.370 --> 00:10:48.372 align:middle line:90% in realistic fiction. 00:10:48.372 --> 00:10:49.830 align:middle line:84% When the description of a character 00:10:49.830 --> 00:10:52.860 align:middle line:84% is important, when we need to remind the reader or something, 00:10:52.860 --> 00:10:55.290 align:middle line:84% we have to decide how often to return to it 00:10:55.290 --> 00:10:57.980 align:middle line:90% and how to emphasize it. 00:10:57.980 --> 00:10:59.760 align:middle line:84% If you read Treasure Island for instance, 00:10:59.760 --> 00:11:02.550 align:middle line:84% and Stevenson's trying to remind us 00:11:02.550 --> 00:11:04.080 align:middle line:84% of what Long John Silver looks like, 00:11:04.080 --> 00:11:06.780 align:middle line:84% he's got that peg leg you might recall, and he's got the patch. 00:11:06.780 --> 00:11:08.110 align:middle line:90% He's a fearsome creature. 00:11:08.110 --> 00:11:09.960 align:middle line:84% He has to come back to those details, 00:11:09.960 --> 00:11:12.720 align:middle line:84% often enough to remind us not so often that we're 00:11:12.720 --> 00:11:16.510 align:middle line:84% conscious of being reminded again and again. 00:11:16.510 --> 00:11:18.760 align:middle line:84% Much of what we learned is fundamental to good fiction 00:11:18.760 --> 00:11:20.343 align:middle line:84% writing from descriptions of character 00:11:20.343 --> 00:11:22.960 align:middle line:84% and avoiding stereotype and conveying mood through detail 00:11:22.960 --> 00:11:24.700 align:middle line:84% and not calling attention to the way 00:11:24.700 --> 00:11:26.440 align:middle line:90% we describe how people talk. 00:11:26.440 --> 00:11:30.370 align:middle line:84% It's fundamental to the distortion formula of realism. 00:11:30.370 --> 00:11:32.487 align:middle line:84% Can we write that formula out in so many words? 00:11:32.487 --> 00:11:33.820 align:middle line:90% Well, people do it all the time. 00:11:33.820 --> 00:11:36.190 align:middle line:84% Every handbook about good fiction 00:11:36.190 --> 00:11:37.870 align:middle line:84% that's talking about realistic fiction 00:11:37.870 --> 00:11:41.440 align:middle line:84% is, in essence, an attempt to spell out the formula used 00:11:41.440 --> 00:11:43.570 align:middle line:90% for realistic writing. 00:11:43.570 --> 00:11:45.340 align:middle line:84% Mark Twain's essay on Fenimore Cooper 00:11:45.340 --> 00:11:48.100 align:middle line:84% is ultimately less about Fenimore Cooper or even about 00:11:48.100 --> 00:11:50.770 align:middle line:84% romanticism than it is about the assertion of a new aesthetic. 00:11:50.770 --> 00:11:53.860 align:middle line:84% Mark Twain was in his own way defining the rules for his work 00:11:53.860 --> 00:11:56.840 align:middle line:84% and encouraging others to join them. 00:11:56.840 --> 00:11:57.340 align:middle line:90% All right. 00:11:57.340 --> 00:11:59.340 align:middle line:84% Now relatively few people, particularly realist, 00:11:59.340 --> 00:12:02.110 align:middle line:84% are likely to create a series of charts and graphs 00:12:02.110 --> 00:12:04.330 align:middle line:84% or models or constraints for their work. 00:12:04.330 --> 00:12:07.630 align:middle line:84% They're not likely to work the way writers of the Oulipo work. 00:12:07.630 --> 00:12:10.720 align:middle line:84% But many writers do work in a way like that, 00:12:10.720 --> 00:12:13.300 align:middle line:84% charting and graphing the way they compose even if they 00:12:13.300 --> 00:12:14.680 align:middle line:90% don't actually make drawings. 00:12:14.680 --> 00:12:16.780 align:middle line:84% So for instance, the most obvious example, perhaps 00:12:16.780 --> 00:12:19.120 align:middle line:84% is a sonic writer, somebody who's 00:12:19.120 --> 00:12:21.010 align:middle line:90% writing a number of sonnets. 00:12:21.010 --> 00:12:23.093 align:middle line:84% At some point, the sonnet form is in your head, 00:12:23.093 --> 00:12:25.510 align:middle line:84% you know how it works, you know the rhythms of the sonnet, 00:12:25.510 --> 00:12:28.300 align:middle line:84% you know where the turn in the argument occurs in a sonnet, 00:12:28.300 --> 00:12:30.700 align:middle line:84% you have the rhyme scheme of the sonnet in your head, 00:12:30.700 --> 00:12:33.250 align:middle line:84% and you begin to think in that pattern, 00:12:33.250 --> 00:12:34.720 align:middle line:90% and you begin to apply it. 00:12:34.720 --> 00:12:38.300 align:middle line:84% Sometimes the poet choose a particular form made up 00:12:38.300 --> 00:12:40.450 align:middle line:90% of smaller parts of the form. 00:12:40.450 --> 00:12:42.430 align:middle line:84% For the Divine Comedy, Dante chose 00:12:42.430 --> 00:12:46.150 align:middle line:84% to project the world of the poem via form of his own three 00:12:46.150 --> 00:12:49.300 align:middle line:84% sections of 33 cantos, plus 1 introductory canto 00:12:49.300 --> 00:12:50.410 align:middle line:90% to make it even hundred. 00:12:50.410 --> 00:12:53.470 align:middle line:84% He wrote the poem in three lines stanzas and rhema 00:12:53.470 --> 00:12:56.830 align:middle line:84% using an 11-syllable line with the accent on the 10th, 00:12:56.830 --> 00:13:00.792 align:middle line:84% a form he created for himself for that work. 00:13:00.792 --> 00:13:03.250 align:middle line:84% Novelists probably have to think about this more than short 00:13:03.250 --> 00:13:05.560 align:middle line:84% story writers because it's hard to keep a novel in your head. 00:13:05.560 --> 00:13:06.850 align:middle line:84% So at the very least, you have to start 00:13:06.850 --> 00:13:09.100 align:middle line:84% to think about structure and form and pattern. 00:13:09.100 --> 00:13:11.615 align:middle line:84% You have to start to think about chapters and organization. 00:13:11.615 --> 00:13:13.240 align:middle line:84% You have to start to divide the work up 00:13:13.240 --> 00:13:15.520 align:middle line:90% in some way for yourself. 00:13:15.520 --> 00:13:18.910 align:middle line:84% We might resist imposing a strange constraints 00:13:18.910 --> 00:13:21.790 align:middle line:84% on the work, such as every chapter has to be 32 pages, 00:13:21.790 --> 00:13:23.980 align:middle line:84% or every chapter has to take place in an hour. 00:13:23.980 --> 00:13:26.950 align:middle line:84% But some writers, for instance, Jane Smiley, Robert Boswell, 00:13:26.950 --> 00:13:29.290 align:middle line:84% give themselves that assignment when they're stuck. 00:13:29.290 --> 00:13:30.040 align:middle line:90% I say, all right. 00:13:30.040 --> 00:13:32.200 align:middle line:84% This has to be a one scene chapter. 00:13:32.200 --> 00:13:36.010 align:middle line:84% Or all right, this needs to have an extensive passages 00:13:36.010 --> 00:13:37.612 align:middle line:90% of exposition. 00:13:37.612 --> 00:13:39.070 align:middle line:84% They assign themselves those things 00:13:39.070 --> 00:13:42.407 align:middle line:84% in part to work against their tendencies. 00:13:42.407 --> 00:13:44.740 align:middle line:84% And that's one of the reasons to go through your writing 00:13:44.740 --> 00:13:49.033 align:middle line:84% if you're a realistic writer in particular, to spot tendencies, 00:13:49.033 --> 00:13:50.950 align:middle line:84% things that you might not have consciously put 00:13:50.950 --> 00:13:53.590 align:middle line:84% in the work but things you recognize in the work. 00:13:53.590 --> 00:13:55.840 align:middle line:84% If you realize for instance, that all your scenes tend 00:13:55.840 --> 00:13:58.300 align:middle line:84% to be about two pages long, which might just 00:13:58.300 --> 00:14:00.430 align:middle line:84% happen unconsciously, if you realize 00:14:00.430 --> 00:14:02.530 align:middle line:84% that your sentences tend to be perfectly balanced, 00:14:02.530 --> 00:14:04.090 align:middle line:84% if you realize when you write list, 00:14:04.090 --> 00:14:06.100 align:middle line:84% you tend to put three items in a list 00:14:06.100 --> 00:14:08.560 align:middle line:84% because somehow in your head that's 00:14:08.560 --> 00:14:10.035 align:middle line:84% what makes an even rhythm or that's 00:14:10.035 --> 00:14:12.160 align:middle line:84% how you're able to work a certain kind of surprise. 00:14:12.160 --> 00:14:13.780 align:middle line:84% You can go back and analyze your work 00:14:13.780 --> 00:14:15.767 align:middle line:84% and spot those unconscious tendencies 00:14:15.767 --> 00:14:17.350 align:middle line:84% and then decide what to do about them. 00:14:17.350 --> 00:14:19.090 align:middle line:84% You may love them and you may wish 00:14:19.090 --> 00:14:21.460 align:middle line:84% you were unconscious of them, or you 00:14:21.460 --> 00:14:24.010 align:middle line:84% may realize that by habit you're doing some things that 00:14:24.010 --> 00:14:26.950 align:middle line:84% are constraining the work, even without intentionally putting 00:14:26.950 --> 00:14:29.440 align:middle line:90% constraints on the work. 00:14:29.440 --> 00:14:32.440 align:middle line:84% Milan Kundera says that he found out 00:14:32.440 --> 00:14:34.180 align:middle line:84% that he writes most of his novels 00:14:34.180 --> 00:14:37.330 align:middle line:84% in seven parts only when he read a critic's 00:14:37.330 --> 00:14:38.320 align:middle line:90% essay about his work. 00:14:38.320 --> 00:14:40.570 align:middle line:84% And he was talking about the mathematical underpinning 00:14:40.570 --> 00:14:41.145 align:middle line:90% of his work. 00:14:41.145 --> 00:14:43.270 align:middle line:84% And Kundera read it and he never thought about that 00:14:43.270 --> 00:14:44.710 align:middle line:84% and he's always absolutely right. 00:14:44.710 --> 00:14:48.010 align:middle line:84% And then he had to decide, well, so do I stop? 00:14:48.010 --> 00:14:50.530 align:middle line:84% And then he said, no, it's inbuilt, it's hardwired. 00:14:50.530 --> 00:14:52.660 align:middle line:84% He thinks that way, he works that way, 00:14:52.660 --> 00:14:54.608 align:middle line:84% but being aware of it, he started 00:14:54.608 --> 00:14:56.900 align:middle line:84% to think about how he could make use of it differently. 00:14:56.900 --> 00:14:59.233 align:middle line:84% And so it doesn't mean you need to run from those things 00:14:59.233 --> 00:15:00.830 align:middle line:90% that you find in your own work. 00:15:00.830 --> 00:15:03.100 align:middle line:84% Some of you probably know Edgar Allan Poe's essay 00:15:03.100 --> 00:15:05.170 align:middle line:84% on the philosophy of composition about The Raven. 00:15:05.170 --> 00:15:08.530 align:middle line:84% Where he says that he thought through every single thing 00:15:08.530 --> 00:15:09.610 align:middle line:90% he did in that poem. 00:15:09.610 --> 00:15:13.870 align:middle line:84% Most people seem to feel that he probably came back to the poem 00:15:13.870 --> 00:15:16.930 align:middle line:84% and read that after the fact but who knows. 00:15:16.930 --> 00:15:20.020 align:middle line:90% Poe loved games and puzzles. 00:15:20.020 --> 00:15:23.180 align:middle line:84% Poe, as you may now put an ad in a Philadelphia newspaper 00:15:23.180 --> 00:15:26.110 align:middle line:84% for six months offering for people to send him 00:15:26.110 --> 00:15:29.348 align:middle line:84% cryptograms to decode because he fancied 00:15:29.348 --> 00:15:30.640 align:middle line:90% himself quite a master of this. 00:15:30.640 --> 00:15:33.910 align:middle line:84% He also liked Houdini, went around debunking magic acts 00:15:33.910 --> 00:15:34.850 align:middle line:90% and things like that. 00:15:34.850 --> 00:15:36.880 align:middle line:84% So he thought about things very differently. 00:15:36.880 --> 00:15:40.330 align:middle line:84% But he said that in The Raven, he wanted beauty, 00:15:40.330 --> 00:15:43.268 align:middle line:84% and sadness, melancholy, he wanted a pivot upon which 00:15:43.268 --> 00:15:44.560 align:middle line:90% the whole structure would turn. 00:15:44.560 --> 00:15:46.990 align:middle line:84% He wanted a single word, sonorous, and susceptible 00:15:46.990 --> 00:15:48.790 align:middle line:84% to a protracted emphasis, and then 00:15:48.790 --> 00:15:53.050 align:middle line:84% he thought that R is the most progressive consonant, that O 00:15:53.050 --> 00:15:54.910 align:middle line:84% is the most sonorous vowel, and of course 00:15:54.910 --> 00:15:57.415 align:middle line:84% the only word that would work would be, nevermore. 00:15:57.415 --> 00:15:59.290 align:middle line:84% And he goes through the whole poem like that, 00:15:59.290 --> 00:16:00.850 align:middle line:84% talking about how he constructed it. 00:16:00.850 --> 00:16:03.610 align:middle line:84% Believe it or nay, even if you look back at it afterwards, 00:16:03.610 --> 00:16:06.260 align:middle line:84% it describes the poem accurately. 00:16:06.260 --> 00:16:09.730 align:middle line:84% And so it's one description of a writer's understanding 00:16:09.730 --> 00:16:12.828 align:middle line:84% of the analytical underpinnings of his own work. 00:16:12.828 --> 00:16:14.620 align:middle line:84% Nabokov talks about coming up with the name 00:16:14.620 --> 00:16:17.360 align:middle line:84% for the main character of his most famous novel. 00:16:17.360 --> 00:16:20.420 align:middle line:84% For my nymphet, I needed a diminutive with a lyrical lilt 00:16:20.420 --> 00:16:21.110 align:middle line:90% to it. 00:16:21.110 --> 00:16:24.410 align:middle line:84% One of the most limpid and luminous letters, 00:16:24.410 --> 00:16:28.430 align:middle line:84% is L. The suffix ita has a lot of Latin tenderness and this I 00:16:28.430 --> 00:16:30.950 align:middle line:90% required too, hence Lolita. 00:16:30.950 --> 00:16:32.450 align:middle line:84% However, it should not be pronounced 00:16:32.450 --> 00:16:34.700 align:middle line:84% as most Americans pronounce it, Lolita, 00:16:34.700 --> 00:16:37.700 align:middle line:84% with a heavy clammy L and a long O, no. 00:16:37.700 --> 00:16:40.670 align:middle line:84% The first syllable should be as in lollipop, 00:16:40.670 --> 00:16:44.150 align:middle line:84% the liquid and delicate, the li not too sharp. 00:16:44.150 --> 00:16:46.310 align:middle line:84% Spaniards and Italians pronounce it of course 00:16:46.310 --> 00:16:49.910 align:middle line:84% with exactly the necessary note of archness and caress. 00:16:49.910 --> 00:16:51.770 align:middle line:84% Another consideration was the welcome murmur 00:16:51.770 --> 00:16:55.580 align:middle line:84% of its source name, the fountain name, those roses and tears 00:16:55.580 --> 00:16:57.050 align:middle line:90% in Dolores. 00:16:57.050 --> 00:17:00.260 align:middle line:84% If you study a book, you know he loved anagrams, roses and tears 00:17:00.260 --> 00:17:01.390 align:middle line:90% in Dolores. 00:17:01.390 --> 00:17:03.140 align:middle line:84% Also of course he learned English actually 00:17:03.140 --> 00:17:05.598 align:middle line:84% before he learned Russian even though he grew up in Russia. 00:17:05.598 --> 00:17:10.369 align:middle line:84% And he was very self-conscious of his use of English and-- 00:17:10.369 --> 00:17:13.120 align:middle line:90% who are those letters with? 00:17:13.120 --> 00:17:16.520 align:middle line:84% The Nabokov-Wilson Letters, Edmund Wilson. 00:17:16.520 --> 00:17:19.520 align:middle line:84% The collection of their letters that you can read 00:17:19.520 --> 00:17:22.543 align:middle line:84% debate a tremendous length points of grammar and syntax. 00:17:22.543 --> 00:17:24.960 align:middle line:84% Nabokov was very self-conscious about his use of language. 00:17:24.960 --> 00:17:27.710 align:middle line:84% And so we can believe that he deliberated for some time 00:17:27.710 --> 00:17:30.350 align:middle line:84% over the name of that girl and how it 00:17:30.350 --> 00:17:31.850 align:middle line:90% had to function in the novel. 00:17:31.850 --> 00:17:35.090 align:middle line:84% And that's a kind of mapping of a world and-- 00:17:35.090 --> 00:17:40.440 align:middle line:84% of a word rather and its possible effects in his novel. 00:17:40.440 --> 00:17:42.890 align:middle line:84% And of course Nabokov was unusually analytical 00:17:42.890 --> 00:17:45.020 align:middle line:90% about his work 00:17:45.020 --> 00:17:45.800 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:17:45.800 --> 00:17:47.090 align:middle line:84% I'll show you one different kind of example 00:17:47.090 --> 00:17:48.150 align:middle line:90% of this sort of thing. 00:17:48.150 --> 00:17:50.210 align:middle line:90% We'll see what comes up. 00:17:50.210 --> 00:17:52.190 align:middle line:90% No, not exactly that. 00:17:52.190 --> 00:17:53.810 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:17:53.810 --> 00:17:57.650 align:middle line:84% So this is a little bit about form or about space. 00:17:57.650 --> 00:18:02.550 align:middle line:84% Here we have a dot, not particularly interesting. 00:18:02.550 --> 00:18:06.820 align:middle line:84% Two dots or-- right, maybe just two dots. 00:18:06.820 --> 00:18:07.320 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:18:07.320 --> 00:18:08.160 align:middle line:90% Fine. 00:18:08.160 --> 00:18:10.350 align:middle line:90% What do we have here? 00:18:10.350 --> 00:18:11.190 align:middle line:90% Yeah, right? 00:18:11.190 --> 00:18:13.500 align:middle line:84% We don't of course, we have three dots, right? 00:18:13.500 --> 00:18:15.087 align:middle line:84% But everyone sees a triangle, right? 00:18:15.087 --> 00:18:16.170 align:middle line:90% So now a triangle's there. 00:18:16.170 --> 00:18:17.340 align:middle line:84% What's interesting to me about this 00:18:17.340 --> 00:18:19.350 align:middle line:84% is one dot doesn't really do anything for us, two dots, 00:18:19.350 --> 00:18:19.530 align:middle line:90% I mean. 00:18:19.530 --> 00:18:20.520 align:middle line:84% Maybe you're interested, maybe you're not. 00:18:20.520 --> 00:18:22.350 align:middle line:84% I mean, you're not thrilled but maybe you're interested, 00:18:22.350 --> 00:18:23.058 align:middle line:90% maybe you're not. 00:18:23.058 --> 00:18:24.840 align:middle line:84% Three dots, you see the triangle, right? 00:18:24.840 --> 00:18:25.715 align:middle line:90% The triangle's there. 00:18:25.715 --> 00:18:27.420 align:middle line:90% You can hardly help it. 00:18:27.420 --> 00:18:29.490 align:middle line:84% There's a tension though because there's 00:18:29.490 --> 00:18:32.250 align:middle line:90% that space between the dots. 00:18:32.250 --> 00:18:34.547 align:middle line:84% Once the triangle is there, it's uninteresting again. 00:18:34.547 --> 00:18:36.130 align:middle line:84% I mean, it's OK if you love triangles. 00:18:36.130 --> 00:18:36.630 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:18:36.630 --> 00:18:37.410 align:middle line:90% It's fine. 00:18:37.410 --> 00:18:39.840 align:middle line:84% But there's no tension to that figure, 00:18:39.840 --> 00:18:42.140 align:middle line:84% it's relatively dull in this sense. 00:18:42.140 --> 00:18:43.890 align:middle line:84% As soon as you start to erase parts of it, 00:18:43.890 --> 00:18:45.120 align:middle line:90% tension is introduced again. 00:18:45.120 --> 00:18:47.162 align:middle line:84% You look at that and if I'd shown you that first, 00:18:47.162 --> 00:18:49.770 align:middle line:84% I would argue you'd probably still all see a triangle, 00:18:49.770 --> 00:18:52.770 align:middle line:84% even though there's no triangle there. 00:18:52.770 --> 00:18:55.710 align:middle line:84% When you erase a little bit more or much more, 00:18:55.710 --> 00:18:57.900 align:middle line:84% well, who knows if you would have seen a triangle. 00:18:57.900 --> 00:18:59.442 align:middle line:84% Somebody would have seen it, somebody 00:18:59.442 --> 00:19:00.570 align:middle line:90% would have seen Napoleon. 00:19:00.570 --> 00:19:02.640 align:middle line:84% But you could see almost anything 00:19:02.640 --> 00:19:04.770 align:middle line:84% with a couple of lines segments here. 00:19:04.770 --> 00:19:06.300 align:middle line:84% I mean, at this point, maybe there's 00:19:06.300 --> 00:19:09.157 align:middle line:84% a triangle on the page, maybe with something else entirely. 00:19:09.157 --> 00:19:11.490 align:middle line:84% Now if you think about this in terms of form and fiction 00:19:11.490 --> 00:19:12.960 align:middle line:90% or even in poetry, right? 00:19:12.960 --> 00:19:15.060 align:middle line:84% The questions that come to mind for me are these. 00:19:15.060 --> 00:19:17.730 align:middle line:84% What does it take to suggest the shape to the reader 00:19:17.730 --> 00:19:19.110 align:middle line:90% or to the viewer? 00:19:19.110 --> 00:19:22.885 align:middle line:84% When is the shape vague or undetermined like this? 00:19:22.885 --> 00:19:24.510 align:middle line:84% Does that say triangle to every reader? 00:19:24.510 --> 00:19:26.460 align:middle line:90% Probably not. 00:19:26.460 --> 00:19:28.212 align:middle line:90% When is it usefully ambiguous? 00:19:28.212 --> 00:19:30.420 align:middle line:84% So when could it be a triangle and when is there room 00:19:30.420 --> 00:19:31.590 align:middle line:90% to do something else to it? 00:19:31.590 --> 00:19:34.410 align:middle line:84% And when does it become explicit or essentially explicit 00:19:34.410 --> 00:19:36.270 align:middle line:90% so there's no tension left? 00:19:36.270 --> 00:19:38.460 align:middle line:84% I was talking to a student at New Mexico 00:19:38.460 --> 00:19:41.910 align:middle line:84% State who was turning in his thesis, a novel, next week. 00:19:41.910 --> 00:19:46.020 align:middle line:84% And he's writing he says an experimental meta fictional 00:19:46.020 --> 00:19:48.750 align:middle line:90% satiric science fiction novel. 00:19:48.750 --> 00:19:49.410 align:middle line:90% He was writing. 00:19:49.410 --> 00:19:51.330 align:middle line:84% And he said the problem is that when 00:19:51.330 --> 00:19:52.620 align:middle line:90% you give it to the workshop-- 00:19:52.620 --> 00:19:54.150 align:middle line:84% they have a big master's workshop there where 00:19:54.150 --> 00:19:55.192 align:middle line:90% you read the whole novel. 00:19:55.192 --> 00:19:57.570 align:middle line:84% They said people thought he had written it for himself, 00:19:57.570 --> 00:19:58.617 align:middle line:90% they didn't get it. 00:19:58.617 --> 00:20:00.450 align:middle line:84% The problem was they couldn't see the shapes 00:20:00.450 --> 00:20:02.160 align:middle line:90% that he saw in it, right? 00:20:02.160 --> 00:20:03.572 align:middle line:90% It was still interior. 00:20:03.572 --> 00:20:05.280 align:middle line:84% And so these are the questions we come up 00:20:05.280 --> 00:20:06.155 align:middle line:90% with again and again. 00:20:06.155 --> 00:20:08.040 align:middle line:84% When have we conveyed enough to the reader 00:20:08.040 --> 00:20:09.930 align:middle line:90% and when we have fallen short? 00:20:09.930 --> 00:20:12.618 align:middle line:84% The first word of a short story, once. 00:20:12.618 --> 00:20:14.160 align:middle line:84% Well, that's an interesting of course 00:20:14.160 --> 00:20:16.170 align:middle line:84% because we're so prepared for once upon a time. 00:20:16.170 --> 00:20:19.200 align:middle line:84% But once doesn't imply a shape of a story, right? 00:20:19.200 --> 00:20:20.190 align:middle line:90% It may just start as. 00:20:20.190 --> 00:20:22.320 align:middle line:84% Even the first sentence doesn't imply 00:20:22.320 --> 00:20:24.040 align:middle line:90% a complete shape for a story. 00:20:24.040 --> 00:20:27.390 align:middle line:84% But as it goes on, no matter how linear or fragmented or collage 00:20:27.390 --> 00:20:29.070 align:middle line:84% like the story might be, the reader 00:20:29.070 --> 00:20:31.740 align:middle line:84% works to find the story shape because we want to fine shape. 00:20:31.740 --> 00:20:33.000 align:middle line:90% We want to understand why. 00:20:33.000 --> 00:20:35.370 align:middle line:84% You watch a movie and you see a close up on a character, 00:20:35.370 --> 00:20:36.853 align:middle line:84% you say, aha, important character. 00:20:36.853 --> 00:20:38.770 align:middle line:84% We say, I think that's an important character. 00:20:38.770 --> 00:20:39.770 align:middle line:90% And then things move on. 00:20:39.770 --> 00:20:41.537 align:middle line:84% Has anybody here seen the movie, Memento? 00:20:41.537 --> 00:20:42.870 align:middle line:90% Five, six years old, little odd? 00:20:42.870 --> 00:20:43.860 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:20:43.860 --> 00:20:45.720 align:middle line:84% It's an unusual movie and it teaches us 00:20:45.720 --> 00:20:47.190 align:middle line:90% how to read it as we see it. 00:20:47.190 --> 00:20:49.500 align:middle line:84% And we're learning how to understand it 00:20:49.500 --> 00:20:52.050 align:middle line:84% over those first 10 minutes as we 00:20:52.050 --> 00:20:53.940 align:middle line:84% start to see how we're supposed to understand 00:20:53.940 --> 00:20:56.090 align:middle line:90% it's moving through time.