THE

NOTESONCRAF FORYOTING\TRITER

as famous as-arcacherof creativewriting based own works. In this Practical'instructive handbook' he gave, he explains' on the coursesand seminarsthat of ;i-piy and cogently, the principles and techniques good wrltlng.

ALMOST JOHN GARDNER\TAS was for his as he

gets "It will fascinate anyone interested in how fictiur writer it will bacome a put ogether For the young '.r...rri'ru handbook, a tttttt iudge, an encouraging invesfriend...in che first half of the book, Gardner is. In the secondhalf' he treats rigatesiust what fiction filled with sJecific'technicalmatters. The Art of Fioion is licrure, counsel,wise encouragement'" -John lJHeureux, The New YorkTinet BooAReaiew not iust "A denselypackedbook of adviceto all writers, and.funny' and young onar...It is serious'Provocativ it to anyorrewho caresabout lirerature"' i ...5--*a -Margaret Manning, The BoslonGlobe "He lap out virtually everything a Persor-lmight want to k ro* ltbout] how to sayit, with good and bad examin a ple, and iudgments falling like autumn leaves Ncrvemberstorrn." Post -William McPherson,The Washington "The next best thing to a graduate workshop i" T' tionwriting. Dra*iig on examplesfrom Homer to Kafka of to Joyce Caiol Oat.t,-Gardner unravels the-mpteries diction and point of view'" structute, plJt, se.tterrce -Book-of-the Month Club News

Inc' dcsign by Keith Sheridan Associates, C-over

JheART-

,fFICTION
Notes on Gaft for YoungWriters

JOHNGARDNER

VintageBooks A Divisionof Random House New York

CoPytight Fim VintageBooksEdition,Jrnuary 1985. of @ rcSrby th6 Estate JohnGardner.All rightsreserved Copyright and undei Internationel Pan-American Random in Published the United Statesby Conventions. by in House,Inc, New York, andsimultaneously Cenada Limited,Toronto. Origindly RandomHouseof Cenada by published Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. in tp8+ is Gratefulacknowledgment madeto the following for to permission repri-ntpreviouslypublishedmaterid: and Farar, Srraus Giroux, lnc.: Excerptfrom'Views of Mv FatherWeepins" from Ciry Life,'copyright@ 1969, by Reprinted permision of r6loby Donald'Barthelme. and Farrar,Straus Giroux,Inc' This pieie first appeared inThe New Yorker.Excerptfrom "i'he FancyWoman' fromThe CollectedStoriisof PeterTaylor,copyright by by renewed1968 PeterTaylor. Reprinted r94r,1969, and of permission Farrar,Straus Giroux,Inc. Inc.: Excerptfrom SettmGotbic Toles, RandomFfouse, copyrightiqr+ by HarrisonSmithanil by IsakDinesen, 'Robert Inc.,cofyright renewedI96ub-yIsak Haas, Inc. House, Reprinted peimilsionof Random bv Dinesen. or From the Iirtroductiorito Superfiction tbe Ameicert An StoryTmnsformed: Anthology,by JoeD*id by copyright 1975 JoeDavidBellamy. Bellamy, @ House, Inc. of Repriited b! permission Random ExcerptfromThe Gentleman Simon& Schuster: ftom by Frrnciscoby IvanBunin,translated OlgaSharae' San Pres,Inc. Square by copyright @'1963 Washington 'Rcpiinted of by peimission Simon& Schuster. Library of Congres Catalogingin PublicationDrtr Gardner, John,1933The en of ficdon. index. Includes t. Fiction-Technique.I. Tide. 1985 8o8.1 %-+ooo6 PN3355.G34 (Pbk.) ISBN o-39a-7zs++-r of the Manufacturedlin United States America

To allmy aedive+riting nde*s, ml m allny fellau urcbertof cteaive witkg

Contents

Preface [trl
PART I

Theory Notc onLitemry-Acsthetic t Aexhaic Lmt rnd Aninic Mlnery |ll Drern ItZJ z BuicSkilb,GnrqcndFictionas bgl 1 lnnest ndTnnb q MetafiertoarDeconsttaetion, anillwing Aroand [8:]
PART N

Proces Notes theFictional on Enors tgZl 5 Cormnon 6 Teclmirye Uztl 7 Plotting b6tl Ex*cises bgfl Inder lzolJ

Preface

Thi$ is r book designed teachthc seriousbeginnirg wrircc to dre art of fiction I esunrefrom the ouset that the would-bc writer rsing this book cen becomer succesful vniter if hc wents m, sinqemostof the peopleI've known who rranted to bccomewriterg knowing what h meent,rlid becomewriters About dl that b requiredis that thc would-be writc understandclearly what it is that he wrrts ro becomeaud whet hs must do to become If no mener how hard hc tries he simply it qurnot do whet he mus do, thb book wi[ h.lp hir understrod why he \rns not sent into the world to bc r writer but for sorneotlrr noble purpooa Books on midqg tend to mstc much of how dilficult it is o becomer succesful writer, but the truth is draq though thc ability to vnite well b pertryrr giftJike the ability to ple)'basketballwe[ or to outgues thc stoct mark*-writing ability b mainly a product of good teachingsupponedby a deepdown love of writing. Thoogh learningo write tekestime md r grert deal of pnaicc, writiog op to the rrcrldb ordinary sundardsis frirly eeqy.As r metterof fect, mostof the bools onefindsin drugstores, supcfmarLets, evensmall-townpublic librariesrrc nor welt wrhend m rt ell; I snart chinp with e good creetire-vriting tc.ctrcs

ir

Preface
md r recl lovc of sining rround bangingI typcwriter oould hlvc wrincn bools vasdy morc intcrestingrnd clcgane Moct grown-up bchavior,when you comcright down to it' is decidPeopledon't drivc their czrsaswell, or wash cdly second-clas. as their ccn aswell, or eat eswcll, or cvenplay thc harmonica This is not to $ry poplc well asthcy would if thcy had sensc. rrc tcrriblc rnd should be replaccdby machincs;peoplc arc cxccllent rnd admirablccreaturesieffciency isn't cverything. But for the scriorsyoung writer who wantsto get publishc4 it to is encouraging know that most of thc profasional writers out thcreareptsh-overs The insuuctionhereis not for cvery kind of writer-not for the writer of nurscbooksor thrillen or Porno or thc cheapcr sort of sci-fi-though it is mrc that what holds for the most scriouskind of fiction will gcncrally hold for iunk fiction as wcll. (Not cveryoneis caprblc of writing iunk fiction: It re' quira an ruthentic iunk mind. Most oeativc-wrfuingteachgn of hevchad thc cxpcrience occasiondlyhelpingto produce,by in The most eleganttechniqucs the rccidcntnr pornographer. elegant througha iunk mind,becomc world, filtcred iunk techwhatcvcruseit may bc to others,is niqua.) What fosaidhcrrc, literary artiss. saidfor thc clite; that is, for serious in Thc instruction is presented nvo somcwhatoverlapping pans.In Part One, I prcsentr generalthcory of fiction" r much how it works-than closcrlook at what 6cdon is-what it does, is usual in bool$ on craft. Undcrstandingvery clcarly what 6cdon "gosfor," how it worls asr modeof thought, in short what thc ert of fiction is, is the first steptoward writing well. In Pan Two, I dealwith specifictechnicalmattersand ofrer writing orcrcises. I to Needless sey' neithersectionof this book is exhaustive. have havc includcd here everything that, over the ycars, I to found it necessery sty es a crcativc-writing teacher.Some thingr ultimetely of great imPoftanceI have found it not ncccsaly to &ly; so thcy are not in this book. Let me give rn

?reface

cmmpla Thc skillful writcr mey play gameewith narativc *yles and poina of view. Hc man for instencc uscthc tonc of thc old Germentalc-tcller ("At thc nrn of thc ccntury, in thc provincc of D--, tkrc lived . . J'), and hc mxy usc that tong which suggests great ruthority, in r story wherc in thc end wc discoverthc narrator to bc unrcliablc.For the writer who has thoroughly digcsted rhe principlc offered in thit boolq it should bc unnecesaryto call rnention to whet thc weirdly ironic usc of tonc and stylc mrst do to the narretivc. the Seizc trunk of rny scicnce securelnrnd you haveconuol of its branches. I may aswcll edd that I do not givc much emphasis hcrc to thc variors forms of unconventionalfiction now popular in universitics Sincc mctafction b by nemre r fiaion-like critique of conventional f,ction, and sinceso-caltcd dcconstructivc fction (think of Roben Coover'sstory "Noah's Brother") uscsconventional methods, scems mc more important that it to young writcrs undcrstandconvendonalfiction in dl is conr plcxity than that thcy bc roo much distractcdfrom the fundamcntal. This book rnd thc cxerciscs rhe cnd of it havcbccn uscd ar for many ycars in thc various univcnitic wherc I've taught creativcwriting, most recently SUNY-Bingh:rmtor\and rt thc Brcad Loaf Writers' C-onferencgand at universitic whert friends of mine havc aught crcativc writing. In is underground designation "Thc Black Boolq" it has had e wide as circulation emongwriters and tcachers, most of them not people I knoq friendsof friends.I've gonenperiodiccomments on thc book's effectivencss, et the edviceof othcrs who havc and usedit I've rcviscd both the main text and thc exercises again and again.I do not publish it now because seems me to it to haveat lasrreached pcrfection-for all I know, all the changes may havcmadeit a hymn to confusion-but becausc conI'm vinccd that in its prescntstageit's good enoughand, so far rs I'm amrc, the mosthelpfulbookof its kind.

!l

hefae

o adic vcrsion*I hrd m oPafttgsection how trnsomc crcetivc uidng oughtto beuugln-+hc ProP6uscof b- rnd how out-of-clzscxercises, muchshouldbe rcquiredof otubc whetthe propertoneof r worbhop should .od so dents, of forth. I thoughtthe dirusion imporambecarse the wiilo writing clnnot reallybc ryreadml*rken notionthet "creative evenby crcetivewriting ooghg" rn opinionofteo exprescd since liesomit that teachers drc endI've droppcd scction In of cidcthedomain thisboo\ whichis simplyhowto s'rite fio (n in tio. Anyoneinterested hesringmy o,pinions m$terl nore angrntiel from how one shouldonduct e wrfuers' or I write with I Pncil' PGIL one worbhopto whether should bookof mine(answen in can6nd theur enother r typeuniter, ot rsted afterrcedinSF lcctures)' moct to questions commonly OaBeconkgaNovelist.

NOTESON LITERARY-AESTHETIC THEORY

AestheticLaw

andArtisticMysrcry

Whrt thc bcginningwriter ordinarily wantslr e sct of nrlc on whet to do and whrt not to do in writing 6ction. As wc'll scc, oomc general principlcs can bc sct down (Thingp to Think About When Writing Fiaion) andsomcvcry gcneralwarnings can bc offercd (Thinp to Watch Out For); but on thc wholc thc searchfor aesthcticabsolutcs a misapplicationof thc is unitcr'r cncrgy. When one beginsto be prsuaded rhrt certain things must nevcr be done in fiction and cenain other things must alweys bc done, one has cntercd the first stegeof aesthctic anhritb" thc diseasc that cnds up in pcdantic rigidiry and thc etrophy of intuition. Evcqy truc work of an-and thus cvcry ettcmpt at art (since things mcant to bc similar must submit to onc standard)-must bc iudgcd primarily, though not exclusively, its own laws.If it hasno laws,or if its laws by arcincoherent, feils-usually-on thatbasis. it Trustwonhy aathetic universals cxist, but they exist at do such r high level of absuectionas to offcr almostno guidencc to the writer. Mosr supposed aesthetic ebeolutes prove relative undcrpressure. They'rc lrws, but thcy slip.Think, for instancc, of the wcll-known dicrum that all cxpectarions raisedby thc work of fiction mustbc srtisficd,cxplicitly or implicitln within

flTEORI ON NOTES LTTEMRY-AESTITETrc

thc fiction-the idea,to Put it anotherw.y' thet all legitimatc howmisedin the reader'smind must be answered, questions nrbtly, insidethe work. Thrs, for examplgif we arc told wer thn a shirifi in a given story has r Ph.D. in philoaophy'an expecution is raisedthat philosophy will somehowhelp him in dohis fob. If philosophyis neveragainmentioned the story no reveals imporand if the most carefulscrutiny of the story t $t wey in which philcophy hasbearing'we feel dissetisfie4 annoyed.The story has,we say, Iooeeends The writer hr thc done his work carelesly, cynically. We may susPcct wont him, that he'sin it for the monen that he scornshis reeder'r of intelligencg that his shoddy crafnmanshipb intentional end malicious-in fact that he ought to be deponed.If he preten& to high seriousness-ifhe writes not Nmy$e{f story but sorne him s a thing evidently meantto Pastas ert-we denourrce donzel We're not talking here self-deluded faki a pretentious, rbout superficialslips lite-h Absdottt, Absalon!4^tllrnefs wood rn4 in as descriptionof r house built of, in one Passegc of thi,skind, es for slip of anoth"r place,stone.For mistakes the tongue, the sympatheticrerder makessilent correctios thet ofiend in e would-bewort of ert .re seriour The mistakes as slipo in reasoning, when someider or event is inuoduced that ought to changethe outcomebut then b forgonen' u for never recognized what it s, by the writer. And so it hr wery questirn cometo bJaxiometicthat r work shoulderffiwer fulfill themselve* that all of r work'e elemensshould it raises, Butbittme? No one will deny thlt the principle b useful' especidly abore c when applied in obvious wayq es in the exampleswhen Chikhov showsus the gun ostentatiusly loadedin Act One of Tbe Seagtll.No one will deny that eachtimc a writer he's believes completed. new work, he ought to loot it over in that thc the light of this generalprinciple.But the fact remains absolutg since from tlrc luppfu aestheticlaw is far from havechovmimprtiencewith i: bqgl""l"g of time greet unfuers

Aenhaic ltu ard Ardtt c Mlnery

E"ery rcadcr Homer's of ltiadb stirreal sk whether to Achillc lcally lovesBriseus simplythinls of her-+s Aganremnon or does-esr war priza The point b importantbecause pro it foundlyrffectsour iudgment Achillc'chancter. If he both of hvesBriseus cpnsiders his righdul prize (asof counc and her sheb), we haveadeguete motivation hisrvithdrawdfron for t{revnr, r withdrawel mustresultin the deeth ftirnd!. thet of If hc does lovc her,lre b lik.ly ro soem us petty md not to vindictive, sulkychild too sensitive, for r Grech about r even hb honor. Criricalgd will andHomer's highvaluetion hb of herohrd usto es$rmc Achillc does tlut loveBdserudrough dso,rs thenrenty-fourthbookmrkcscleer, cxaggemtcc he tho vdueof honor thesonbestowed othersBut erctpt onog of by b-"dy, thrcughthe mouthurd p,cnnt view of e sccondery of chrnctcr (Achilles'friendhtroHoc), Homcrrcfr$cssny d irvr to otu questioo. esif the whoh mattfr scerndo him It's bcnesth eph dignir'', mcrctcr-tablcgoslp pbrhepc, torm s scholars ergud Greekherocs heve thought unmenl)r c.rl it to veqymucheboutwomenOr, on the otherhand, pcrhapwitb $ a*p Tnseof whatb right rnd hb Grcekcouirty oi love'r placein the all-cnrbncing ordcr of Zers (r subiect-ue*erl in trc OQssey), Homerwouldbc shockd by o* doubrof hb hero'cgrcat-heenedness; b perhap hc thoughtAchillef thet lovc went without srying.But c'hatcvcrhb reason, Homcr gives only whathnokks thinla-.or clrirm he thi"t t in r rs rituetionthlt rright inclinhin o llF{nd offerg in hb osn no voioe, clue Tate another,more modernexamplaIn Slnkespcercl Hlrnlf wc mmrally askhow it b thrlwhen shipped o ofi whrt b mErntto bc hb deatb the rsually indecisivc princc to with Trnqges hobt his cnemies thcir oumptlrd-cn evcnt thettekcs p1".. 9ff sagean{ rt least thesurviving in tcrr, gtt oo resl qplanrtion.If prcsod,Sihakespearc sayth.t- tro might erpects to recognize thefor out-foxed anold modfh rs that b lioemture-h could mdrc up 6G tiremG dcreibif bc hrd

THEoRY oN NCnEs LITEMRY-AESrHETIc

to-and that the point throughout b hot Hrmlct'r indccisivcncssin gencral(any princc wonh hb salt cm knock off r pair enxfawningundcrlinp) but hissclf-dcstructivc of hfucncmy's that of violrtdilemma, e mctaphysical iety ashe faces specific ing law for a higher law in an uncertain univcrsc; that b' of murderingr stepfathcr and king on thc say-so r ghoct. (I simplify, of coursc.The proofs arc clcar cnoughfor thc ratior alisi Horatio; but Horatio b not Hamlet. The center of every and fo play, as of all grert litererure, character; Shakapcarcan rage, and indecisivcnesthat rahe the it is Hamlct's panic, qucstion of whet madc him act so decisivcly this once-the docs not answcr.) But thc explanation questionShakapearc mouth is probably not thc true one. I'vc put in Shakespeareb The iruth is very likely that almostwithout bothcring to think s.w it out, Shakespcarc by a flash of intuition thrt thc whole was unimportant,off the pint; and so like Mozen, quction straight to thc hcan of tic white shark of music,he snapped the ma$cr, rcfusingto let himselfbc slowed for an instant by of trivial questions plot logic or pychological consistencyunlikely to come up in the rush of dramq though questions they do occur to us tll we Porc over the book. Shakespeare's insti"ct told hinr, "Gct beck to thc busines bctwecn Hamlet as and,sudden lightning,hc wasback. andClaudius," This refusalto be led ofi to the uivial b commonin grat literaturq as is its comic opposite,the cndlcsly claboratcdcxplanationof the obviouswc find in, for instancg thc opentnq Lhapt.t of Trbtrmr Shandy.This is no proof that thc general principlc with which wc bcgen+he principle that e work it to itroutd in somcway givc answers the questions raises-is and But the examplcof Homer, Shakespeare, othcn valuelcs. bc ecthctic laursczn comctims suspcrdcd. thrt docs suggest acsthcticlaws of courscmcenstaking rccognizablc Suspending to risks,end thc teachcrwho wishes phy it safcmay say to hb but sudcnts, "That's dl right for Shakcspcarc, nc for e bcginner." Thc trouble wittt ttris solution is that it uics to rcach

Aesthetic andArrtnic Mystny Lsl)t

thc an of fiction by shrinkingthc art, making it something moremenageable no longerart. but Art depends heavily on feeling,intuition, taste.h is feeling, not somerule, that tells the abstract painterto put his yellow hereand there,not there,and may later tell him that it should havebeenbrown or purplcor pea-green. feelingthat makes It's the composer breaksuqprisingly from hiskey, feelingthat givc the writer the rhythmsof his sentences, pafternof riseand the fall in his episodes, proportions alternating the of elements, so that dialogue goeson only so long beforea shift to descriprion or narrative summary some or physical action.The greatwriter hasan instinctfor these things.He has,Iike a greatcomedian, an infellible sense timing. And his instinct toucheseveqy of thread of his fabric, even rhc murkiest fringes of symbolic structure. knowswhen and whereto think up and spring He sulprises, thme startling leapsof the imaginationthat characterizeall of the very greetest writing. Obviously is not to imply that cool intellectis uselesto this the writer. What Fancy sends, wrirer must order by Judgthe ment He must think out completely, coolly as any critiq as what his 6,ctionmeans, is trying to mean.He must complete or his equations, think out the subtlesr implications what hc's of said,get at the uuth not iusr of his characters action but and also of his fiction's form, remembering that neatness can bc carried too far, so thar rhe work beginsto seemfusy and overwrought,anal compulsivc,unspontaneous, rememberand ing thaq on the other hand, messis no adequrtealternative. He must think ascleanly asa mathematician, he must also but know by intuition when to sacrificeprecisionfor somehighcr good, how to simplifn take shon cus, keepthe foregroundup thcre in front and the background back. The first and last imponant rule for the creative writer, then, is that though there may be rules (formulas) for ordinary, easilypublisheble ficrion-imitation fiction-therc are no rules for real fiction, any more than there are rules for serious

THEoRY rcnrs oN LTTEMRY-ADsrHsnc

vlsual art or musical composition There rre techniquauicls, can bc studicil hunilredsof thern-that, like carpenter's considentionseveqy and taught; there are moral and aesthetic or writer mustsooner later brood on r littlg whetheror serious wey; thert ere common not he broodsin a highly systematic mistakc-infelicitieq clodpole wayr of doing things-+hrt rhow up repeatedlyin unsuccesful6aion and can be sholnn of how they underminethe 6cfor what they are by *lfis tion's inrcndedefiects;thcrc arg in shorg e greet many things evcry seriors writcr needsto think ebout; but there are no nrles Namc ong and instantlysomeliterary ertlst will offer w rs' somenw work that breals thc nrlc yet pcrsuades Inve and tioq aftcr dl, b rn's mainbusines* oneof thc greatioys of .cceP&$le' e3 evcry artist comeswith making the outrageous or when the painter mrkc sturply clashingcolors harmonious aedition inuoduccs-conrtincr vnitcr in the ingly--a ghosc mis is not m sry thet no one rcally knoun what fiction b or what is limits are; it b simply o recognizethat the valuc or "saying power" of any.piece of literaturc hes to dq findly' with the ctrancter and penonality of the ani* who crcatd ftJtis instincts,his knowledgeof ert and the world, his mar tcry. Mastery holds fast Whrt the beginning writer needq as discouraging it mey bc to hear, b not a set of nrles but otherthings,ma$eq'tof the an of breakingsourastery--emong cdlcd nrles.When m enist of true ruthority sPe}c-+omeonc or Raeine,Dostoevsky, Mellikc Homer, Dante, Shakespeare, ville-we listcn, dl rnentiott, even if what he seysseerr 8t frst r little queer.(At eny nrte we listen if we're old enough inough, so that we know what kinds of things ere cxperienced boitng, iuvenile,ii*pt.-*ind.d, and what thingc erc not. To a needs cenainkind of mastery.) rcadwell, oneelso thar the greatwritcr's ruthoriry consiss On reflectionwe see humar The first we rny call, loosely,his sane of two elemena. ness; that is, his tru$wortfiinessrs a iudge of things' I stability

AestbabLtu ntd Attittc Mynny

rootcd in thc mm of thosc crmplex qualitiesof his charactcr rnd personality (wiedorn,generosiry,compasio4 snength of will) to which we respond, we respond whet fubestin our as to friends, with instant rccogrition rnd admiration" sayin& "Ycs, you're right, thaCs how it is!" The second element, perhaps or I rhould sry fmce, b the writer's ebolute tnrst (not blind flith) in his own restheticiudgmens and instincts,e trrsr grounded panly i" his intelligenccrnd sensitivity-his ebility to penoeivc rnd undentandthe world around hinHnd panly in hb crpcrienceas r cnfsman; that is (by his oum hershstendards), his knowledgg &rwn from long pncticg of whst will worlc rnd what will not. Whrt this means, prectical tcnns for the srudentcrritcr, in b thet in order to achievemasreryhe must reed widely and deeply rnd must write not iust carefully but continudly, thoughdully asesing md reasesing what he writeq because practice,for the writer asfor the concertpianist,is the heartof the matter.Though the literaqydabblermey write r fine story now rnd then, the uue writer is onc for whom techniqueher bccomg asit is for the pianist,secondnenrc. Ordinarily this means univenity education" with counesin the writing of fiction, and poetry aswell. Someimportant writers havesaid thc opposite-for insuncg Ernest Hemingwan who is quoted as h"uing saidthat the way for a writer to learn his cmft is to go rway and write. Hemingway,ic *y help to remcrnber, went ewey for free "tutorials" to rwo of the finestteachcrs then living, Sherwood Anderson GenmdeStein, and It is true that somewriters have kept themselves more or les innocentof education,that some,like Jack Londonnwere more or lessself-madc men; thar is, peoplewho scratched out an education readingbools baween work-shiftsbn boats,in by loggng camps gold camps, farmsor in factoric. It is true or on that univenity education in many ways inimicd to the work is of the eni*: Rarely do paintershrve much good to say of aestheticians hiltoqy-of-ert profesors, rod it's cqually unor

TO

TITEORY NOTES LTTEMRY-AESTHEflC ON

"academiC'writes to loolc commonfor eventhe most scrious, of at n'theprofession English."And it's with fond admiration ncvcrPro' that truermoreover, life in the univenity hasalmost subiectmatter for really good 6ction. Thc lifc has too duced much trivia" too much mcdiocrity, too much soapopra but consider: No ignoramus-no wrfuerwho haskept himselfinnocentof cducadon-has ever producedgreetert. Onc uouble with heving read nothing wonh readingis that one never fully underthat ncverunderstands the stands othersideof one'sergument' is en old one (all great argumeneare), never thc argument undentandsthe digniry and worth of the peopleone has cast failure n The Grqes of Witnes John Steinbeck's rs enemies. Wrah.It shouldhavebeenone of America'sgreat books.But while Steinbeckknew all there wes to know about Okies and to sorrowsof their movc to C.alifornia 6nd work, thc countless &lifornia rancherswho employed hc knew nothing about the rnd exploited them; he had no clue to, or interest in, their as reasonJforbchaving they did; and the resultis that Steinbeck wrote not a great end firm novel but a disappointing melodremain which complex good is pitted againstunmitigatcd, unbelievablc cvil. Obfcctivity, fair-mindednas, the thesc arc someof qistcmatic purzuit of lcgitimatc evaluadon, lifc, and evenif-'+s of thc mosthighly toutcd values university is no doubt truHome profesors arc asguilty of simplification rs John Steinbcck was' the very fact that these velues are Moreover, musthavesome effecton the elertstudent. mouthed no studentcen get far in any university without cncountering the discusion method; and what this means,at le*st in any good universiry,is that the student mu$ learn to lisren carefully and fair-mindedly to opinionsdifferent from his own. In In this my experiencc, is not commonelsewhere. most assemblia, pcople all arguc on rhc samesidc. Look at small-town o-n papcrs.Tmth is not much valued where evcryonc egrecs what thc truth is and no onc is handy to speakup for thc side

Aesthetic lau md Arthtic Mystery

tr

that's becn dismised. However bad universiry profcssors mey bc in gcneral,every greatprofessor a manor womandevotcd is to truth, and every universityhasat leastone or two of them around. But what mako ignoramuscs writen is not iust their bad incxperience fair xrgumcnt. All great writing is in r sensc in imitationof greatwriting. Writing a novel,however innovative that novel may be, thc writcr strugglcsto achicvcone spccific lrrge cffect, what can only be calledthe efrect wc arc usedto gctdng from good novels.However wcird the technique, whateverthe novel's mode, saywhen we havcfinished "Now we it, thm is e noeel!"We sayit of Anna Karminaand of Uniler the Voleano,alsoof the mysteriously constructed Moby-Dick. lf. we say it of Smuel Becketr'sWatt or MaloneDieq of ltalo Calvino'sTbe Bmon in tbe Trees,or Kobo Abc's ?be Rained Map, we say it bccause, for all their surfacc oddiry, thosc novelsproducethe familiar cffect. It rarely happens, it hap if pensat all, that e writer can achieveeffectsmuch larger than the effects achieved bookshe hasrcad and admired. in Human beinp, like chimpanzees, do very linle without models. can One may learn to love Shakespeare readinghim on one's by own-the ignoramusis unlikely ro have done even this-but thereis no substitute beingtakcn by thc hand and guided for linc by line through Othello, Handet, or King Lerr. This is thc work of the universityShakespeare course!and evenif the tcachu is a personof limired intelligenceand sensitivity,onc can find in universitiesthe critical bools and anicles most likely to be helpful,the booksthat haveheld up, and the best of the new boola. Outside the university'sselecriveprocssr onc hardly knowswhich way ro turn. One endsup with some crank book on how Shakapearewas really an erheisr,or a Communht,or a pen-name usedby FrancisBacon.Outsidethc univeniry it scems prectically imposible to cometo an understandingof Homer or Vergil, Chauceror Dantg any of the great masterswho, properly understood,provide the highest

II

NOTES ON LNEBARY-AESNTEMCTHEORT

modcb yet echievedby our civilizatiol Whrtever hb gpnir* b the writer unfamiliar with the highesteffestspossible Yirte out to dly doomed search leser effects himselfh in a bcaer Adminedly the manwho haseducated at positionthan the man not educeted dL But his work b surc io beer the mark of his limitation. If one snrdiesthe work of, the self-educateLand we do not ncan here thc mrn who $ere out with limited but rigorous an<l clasicd educetion' like Herman Melville-whet one noticset once b the spottines and therefore awkwardnes of their knowledge Orc forgives the fgult, but the frct remainsthat fo distraca rnd makesthe worL les than it might have bcen. One finds fos instance,naively ercited and lengthy discusionsof ideesthat or .re commonplece have long been discredite{ or one finds quitky inteqpretrtionsof old nytlrs-interpretetions curious, nrffer by comparison ttnt, though intercting in themselves, e'ith what the myths really say and mean We rea4 let ts san as r story rbout Penelop I gfudgmg, recrlcinznt wife. Thc writing may,be superb,but when we think of Homer'sPottttil of thJtrue prfect wife, as coungeollq cunning and devoted s her husban4Homer'sversionso oushinesthe new one thet we turn dmost in ditg,st from the new writer's worl Truct one cen aseasilyget spotty knowledgefrom univeniry gmdrb rtes, and one cen as easilyget creckpot opinionsfrom univerof snrdy.The sucoess fooh rity profesorc asfrom independent But in the universltyworld b one of C'od'sgreetmysteries. idr point that the man who's been through univenity besidethe man's. rtudy crn have knowledgeas sPotty as the self-nrade offer oppomlutiqThe university can do no more than nowhereebe: r wealth of boolc' oppornrnitiesmadeaveilable profesorg anil fellow $udents' rtieast a few fi$t-rete soutss' also tectures,debategreadingc and gatheringcwhere anyonc rt alt, if he'snot too shy, can trlk with sune of the b'stnovelof b, poets musicianqpainterg politicians'and scientlsts thc it b only sithin ths qge.If foolishnesrboun& in universidleg

Aestbetic otd Artistic Lmut Mlxery

ume university world that the honct understanding litcm. of turc is a conscious discipline.No one can hope to wrire really well if he hasnot learnedhow to endyze fiction-hos to rccognizer symbolwhen it iumpsat him, how to makeout theme in a literary work, how to eccountfor r writer's selectionsnd organization fictional details. of We neednot be much disuesed by the fact thet as r rule painters have very litde good ro sty of rrt hi*orians ssd .estheticien$or that writerq eyen our best-educated rvriterq often qpres impetiencewith English profesors. The critic'r work-that is, the English profesor's-is the endpis of wh* hasalreadybeencrrinen. It b his business qntematizewhat to he readsand to present discoveries the way mostlikely to his in be beneficial his snrdens.If he'sgood at hit ioU, he doesthb to more or les dispasionately, obiectiv.ly. He may be movedby e peniorlar work, and mey let his snrdents tnow ig but though tarsnrn down his cheekqhis purpose to makestmctruemd is meaningcrJntalclear.This czn lead-from rhe artist'spoint of view-+o rwo evils. First, the profesor, and indeedhis whoh profesioq may tend to choose the bestworh of litcrenuc not but thoeeabout which it b most pmible to make nrbde ob scrvations. Since the novelsof Anthony Trollope contain rlm6t no obcure dlusionsand no difficuh rymbotism,they rrc hrrd to teacluOne sundsin front of cles mouthingphtituder, matching cbout for something intersting to sry. On the otha hrn4 one crn dazzleone's studentselmost endlesly, or eor coru"ge one'ssnrdenc to dezzle one another,with talk about dlusion andsymbolin the work of ingenious minor writers. but Subdy and insidiously, standards become perverted."Good" es an resthetic iudgment conresto mean "tricky," ,,acldemic,, ttobscure.t' This perversion sandardslea& to the secondevil: Thc of literature program westesthe young unitert timc. Insteadof dlowing him to concentrare imponrnt books,fiom Homer'g on Iliad to John Fowles' Dmiel Mfitirr, it cluners his reading

r+

THEORY NOTES ON LTTER.ARY-AESTHETIC

houn with trivia, old and new. To the cxtent that I glvcn programfeelsobligedto trclt Englishand Americanliteraturc the in their historicaldevelopment, offenscis likcly to be compounded.Though no onc will deny that writers likc ThomCI bt*ry orssxlr GeorgeGabbe havcboth thcir innateand their for interest, they haveno morc relcvancc the scrious historical D. Watson'slittlc instancc, young writer than has,for James less. of bookon thediscovery DNA. Probably robot in thc program.Suange But thc studentis no helpless to say-+ince writers so often speakhanhly of Englishpro' fcsors-young writcn arc almost always the drrlings of the young writif departmcnt, cspecially they'regood and serious for alwayspossiblc thc writcr to work crs; so that it's almost and gctung the councshe needs arrengement' out somcspecial (Who can hatc r rvoiding thoselikely to bc useles to him. of studeniwho wants'Drntcinstcad Drydcn, Joyccinstcadof Edwards?)And in any event, no law rcquirc that Jonathrn thc student leavecollcgc with a dcgrce-Jiscounting practical All considerations. that's rcquired is that thc student get' he thc somehow, literarybackground needs. One last rcmark and wc can cnd this digrcsion on thc im' youngwriter, of formal education. for portencc, thc serious Thc $gumcnt thet what the writcr rcally needsis cxpcri' cncein thJ world, not training in literaturc--Soth rcading and writing-has been so cndlesslyrepeatcdthat for many it has comc to soundlikc gospcl.We cannottakc timc for e full anfrom Zanzibarto the Yukon" swcr hcre-how widc cxpcrience, is morc likcly to lead to clunered tcxnrc than to dccp and movingfiction, how thc first-handknowlcdgcof r dozentredcs is likcly to bc of lessvduc to thc writer than twcnry good informrnts, thc kind onc gcts talking to in berg on Grcyhound bu*s, et panic, or on eaggingpark benchcs.Thc primary subjcct of-ficcion is end hasalwaysbccn humancmotion, valucs,end belicfs.Thc novelistNicholasDclbrnco hrs rcmarkcd nerly wcrything that by thc agcof four onc hasexpcricnced

Aesthetic IN

arrd Ardstic Myxny

I,

one needs e writer of fiction: Iove, pain, los, boredom,ragg as guilt, fear of death.The writer's busines is to make op "oL vincing humanbeingr and createfor them basicsituationsand ections means which they comcro know themselves by of and rcveal rhemselves thc reader.For that onc needs schoolto no ing..But i-ts by training-by studying great bools end by writing-that onc learnsto presentonc's fictions, giving them thcir due. Tluough the study of technique-not o" "rnoJing logging or slinging hash-one learns thi besr, mosr efficient wap of making characterscome alive, lerrns to know the differencc berwcencmodon and sentimentaliry,lcarm to discern,in the planningstages, differencc the berween bener the dramadcactionand thc worse.It is this kind of knowledge.-to rnrn to our carliersubiect-that leads ma$ery. co However hc may get ir, mastery-not s full mental cataIoguc of thc rules--must be thc writer's goal. He must ger rhe art of fiction, in all its complcxiry-the wholc tradition *a At is technical options-down through the wrinkles and uicky wiring of his brain into his blood. Nor that hc needsto learn literature first rnd writing later: The two erc Frocesses inscparablc. Evcry rcal wrirer hashad Melvillc's experience. Hc works at thc problem of Ahab and thc whale (thc idee of an indiffercnt or malevolent univcrse),hc happcns rcad Shakcto spcarcand somephilosophybooks rr thc sametime, and becauscof his rcading hc hits on hcrecofore unheard-ofsolutions to problcmsof novclisticcxploration.Mastcry is not something thrt strika in an instant, Iike e thundcrboli bur a gathcrini power thar movessteadilythrough time, likc wcather. In other words, an hasno univenal rulcs becausc eachtme anist mcls down and reforgcsall past aesthetic law. To lcarn to writc well, one must begin with e clear undcrstending that for the anist, if nor for thi critic, aesthetic law is thc .i".y. To thc grcar enist, anything whatcver is possiblc.Invcntion, thc spontaneous generadon ncw rulcs, is central to mc And of sinccone docsnot learn to bc r literary anist by sturlying first

TEEOnI IWMS ON IJIBRTRY-AE}TIIEITIC

difierent fronr e litcrery srtist' it follovn how m be something the young writer, as for the great uniter he hopesto &rt for becomg drere can be no firm ruleg no limiq no restrictions. en Whsteverworls is good.He mrst develop eyefor what--by hb oumcrrefully informedstandrrdpworls.

Basic Skills, Genre,

and FictionasDream

ff fterc rrc no ruleq or nonc wonh hb anentioq wherc b thc bcginningwritcr to begin? Often one glroo at the writcr's york tclls thc teachcr6rt x/ht this snrdentunirer needsfirsq bcforc rdfiing rn inch in the directionof 6ction, b r review of fundemcnuls. onc crn No bopeto witc well if he hasnor mastcrcd-+bolutely mestcrcd --thc rudirncnE: grunm.r and qynur prmctrretim, dictioq sentenoc vrdery, peregraphstructurc, rnd so fonlu It is tnrc drat punctrntion (for instance)is o subdcan; but its srbdcry lies in suspcnding rulec rs in 'Toq don'g knorr, e god, dre damned, thing," or "He'd secn bcforc,heuns sureof ie" No her cditcr shouldcver havcto hesitrtefor rn instantover what thc ndc to be kept or suspcnded If hc whhc, the tcachermay ir. dal s'ith the snrdent'sproblemsas the counc goesdong (rs one dealswith qpclling), but this is not et dl the best way. Lcarningto unite fiction is too seriow a business bc mixedin to sith leftoversfrom freshman composition Thc tcacher,if hc tnows what he's doing, is too valuebleto be wa*cd in drb va/; anddre snrdeng oncehe learnsthrt he can gct rid of most ptoblemsquicHy and easily,is ccnain ro want to do so. With dr p-po hclp rnd the proper book, my good srudcnt crn

r7

T8

NOTES ON LTTER^NY-ADSTHEf,IC TTIEORT

oncc and for ell, in two weks. TItc cover thc fundamentals, propr book, in my opinion, is W. W. Wan's An Amaican and the Rhetoric, moeteccurete efficientbook on composition availablc,also chc most interesting and amusing.Usually thc himself,though occesmdentcan do and corrcct the exercises needto takc a problemto his teachcr.If hc sionallyhe mey help frcquentln it's r fairly clcar sign that findsthat hc nceds he'll ncvcrbc a writcr. How the the Let us suppose writer hasmastcred rudiments. shouldhe beginon fiction?What shouldhe write about,and how can he know when he'sdone it well? is enswer t'Write about and A common usuallyunfortunate limiting to the imaginawhat you know." Nothing canbe morc tion, nothing is quicker to turn on the psychc'scensoringdc,vicesanddistortion rhantrying to write truthfully and systcms' interestingly about onc's own home town, one's Episcopalien mothcr, one's crippled youngcr sistcr. For somc writcrs, the it advice may work, but whenit does, usuallyworksby a curiThe writer writeswell aboutwhet hc knowsbeousaccident: cause hasrcad primarily fiction of iust this kind-realistic he Ymkn, thc At' f,ction of thc sort we asociatewith TDc Nc'us Iantic Mmthly, or Hnpn's. Thc writcr, in othcr words, k prcscntingnot so much what hc knova about lifc rs what he knows about a particular literary gcnre. A bcner answer, though still not an ideal one,might havebeen"\ilrite thc kind of stoqyyou know and likc bcstq ghost stoqy,a sciencc-fiction piecc,a realisticstory aboutyour childhood,ol whatevet." Though the fact is not alwaysobviousat a glancewhen we look at works of ert very cloceto us in timc, thc artist'sPrimelr basb unit of thought-his primary consciousor unconscious thc organizing dctailsof his work-is gezrc' rnd for selccting most obviousin thc caseof music.A compccr This is perhaps writcs an opira, a symphony,a conccrto' e tonc Pocm' a suitc or a of country dances, songcycle, a sct of variadons. a strcempiccc (a modcm psychologicalrdaptation of of-consciousnes

BwicSkillt,Geme, FictionssDrcan ml

rg

thc tone pocm). Whrtever genre hc chooscs, to sornG md cxtent depcnding which genrche chooses, writcs within, or on hc slightly varic, uaditional sffucrurrunera form, fugal structurc, ABCBA melodic structure, so forth; or he may creet, and on what hc balievc to bc somefirm basis,I new srnrcture. Hc mry croosgcnres,introducing country/dances into r s)rnr phony or, sty, consrrucing r string quaftct on thc principle of thcme and variations.If hc's looking for novelty (scldom for eny morc noble rcason),hc may trlr to borrow structurc from somcothcr art, using film, theauical movement,or somcthing clsc.When ncw forms rrise, asthcy do from timc to time, they risc out of onc of rwo procsses, genre-crossing the clevation or of popular culrurc. Thus Ravel, Gershwin, Stravinsky, and many others blcnd chsical uadition rnd Amcrican iezt-in this crsc simultancouslycrosing gcnra rnd clevrting thc popular. Occasionallyin music as in the other rrrs, elevating popular culture must bc cxtcnded to mcen rccycling trash. Elccuonic music bcgenin thc obscrvationthat thc bcepsrnd boingpthrt comc out of radiog computcrs,and thc like might sound r littlc likc music if srructure wcrc imposed-rhnh. and something mclody. Anyhing, in fact-as thc Dadaistq likc Spikc Joncs,and John Cagepoinredout-might bc rurned into something music:thc scream e tnrck-tirc, thc noiscof r like of windowshadc, bleatingof a sheep. the Wc seemuch thc samein thc visual ar$. In eny culturc ccrain subiectsbccomeclasicd, repeated ertiscaftcr artist by -for insmncc,in thc CtuistianMiddle Ages,thc rhcmeof the dcad Christ's desccntfrom the crosg thc marryrdom of St. Stcphen,the mother and child. As thc surrounding culrure chengc+thc trcatment of clasical subicca changes, popular culturc incrcasingly impingcs, ncw forms arisc-literary ilIysuadon rcplacing Biblical illustration" seculer figures porodying rcligious fig*.q "real lifc" cdgrng out illustrative painting, ncw vcntrures thought (pychology, mathcrnatics) of treditional sti[ lifcs, rooms' end lan&crpcs to

'O

NOTES ON LITENATY-AESTIIEIIIC TEEORY

dreamimag* or spatialpuzzlecThe proccs of changcin the visualam in other wordg is identicrl to that in music.SomcFtemish timesit risesout of genrecrosing, aswhen Protestant 'prsente secular family ponrait in the uienguler painters it organizationof C,atholicholy-family painten; sometimes rises out of an elevationof the PoPular'or of trashoes on cut{uts' or in the uash collager Gioao's cemprnile,in Matisse's of Roben [auschenberg;and somaimschang comcqrthc uual czse--<utof both at oncc. The sameholds true for literanue. Novehy comc cbiefly from ingeniousgenre-crosing or elevation of familiar rnr' of terials.fu an example genre-crosing think of the bestof ths 'spotted Hotss" (thc one th* threc venions of Faulkner's bcginswith the words "That Flern"), where techniqlesof thc rnd yarn-rnainly diction, comic exaggeration, cruel humorshoa the reclistic-symbolic lc combinedwith techniquesof behindmd of rtory. Genre-crosingof one sort or anotheris the great literaqy an in the Englirshtradition. Chaucel lntn mO ageinplaysone form off aginst another'asin thc Knigbls Taler- vlhue, along with other, less-well-knownforms, he of blen& epic and romanceThe greatest rll medicml alliterr' Knighr, blendselementl tive poems,Sir Gruain mt the Green with romrncl of tlie canhy fabliu (in thc tunpation scenes) most powerful techniquesrre dl ruclements.Shakapeare's his rults of genre-crossing: combinationof proseand ve$e to ihe emotional tange of drama; his combination of rpand Romanhigh-styleconventionwith conventiorsdrawn from the Engtish fott< ptays, rowdy medievalmystery plays (or guil{ pltn), rnd so on; end his crosing of tragic conventionand Milton's fondncs bmi" conoentionfor the "dark comedies." of is for genrecrossing one of the commonplaces scholarship' or As for the elevationof popularmaterials trash+lone or in combinationwith nobler fonns-think of John Hawka' blend novel and the American hanlof the psychological-symbolic boitd rnlnteqf, Italo C.l"ino's blend (in tqao and Cacmi'

Blsic SkillsrGmrerandF*t;n

t Drenn

2l

cottricsl of sci-fi, fantaqf, comic-booktanguegp and imagery, movie mclodrama" nearly werything else,or Donald Berand drelme'r transformationof such culturel trash ss thc research qffioo& the travquestionnaire, horror*how and animated the clogue md psychiauist'r uanscript Like genre-crming, thc elevationof popular or trash materialsb rn old and familiar form of innovation. It was r favorite method of late GrecL poes lite Apollonioe Rtrodic (in the Argonmtice), Romao comic poetq many of the great medievd poee (thinl of ChaucerbRime of Sh Tbopa), and poetsof the Renaisancc. The noblestof modem literary fonrr, equivdent in rengc end cultural importanceto the noblestof musicd fonns, the synr phonn bug"n in the elevation and transformationof trash when Defoe Richrdson, and Fielding begpntransmutingiunk into an. RobinsonCrusoe end Moll Flmler ryring, respectively, from the nsiveshipwrecknarative and the rogue'scorr fession;Ptnrela md Clnissa add character and plot to thc popular collection of epi*olary models for the guidanceof young lndrtsi lonatban Wilile coma from the g"llo* broa& side,or story of the chrracter and horrible crimesof the felon aboutto be hanged. Nonc of thae writerq rnciem or modern,setdoumto unitc "to expreshimself."They satdown to write rhiskind of aory or that, or to mix this form with thrt form, producingsomenqr effecnSelf-expression, whateverits pleasures, comes rbout incidcntally.It alsocomes rbout inevitably.The realisricwriter may setout to conjureup the personality hisaungcreatingfor her, of or copying from lifg some srory through which her chancter b reveded,and rhus he reveals suong feelingr about his aunt; his that rs, he expreseshimself.The fabulist-the writer of nonreelisdcyarns,tales,or febles-mey semtt first glanceto bo doing somethingquite differuu; but he b nor. Dragong tikc bankers candy-store and owners, mustheve6rm andpredictablc characten. ulking treg a trlking refrigerator,e alking clock A mut speak o wey we learnto recognizgmustinfluenceevents in

22

TTIEORY NOTES LTTERARY.AESTHETIC ON

in ways we can identify rs flowing from somcdefinitc motivrcen charactcr comeonly from oneof rwo placc, tion; andsince bools or life, the writer's aunt is aslikcly to show up in a feblc by story. Thus the process which one writes a asin a realistic sto{F on the other,is not much fablg on onehand,or a realistic rnd difierent.Let us look morecloselyat thc similarities diffcrcnces. thc of In anypiece fiction,the writer'sfirst fob is to convincc or readerthat the eventshe recountsreally happened, to pcr(givcn small the suade readerthat they might havehappened thc or changes,in lewsof thc universe), clscto engege readthe writof in the patentabsurdity thc lic. Thc realistic er'sinterest Thc tdc convincingis verisimilitudc. er'sway of makingevents or or writer, telling storia of ghosts, shapc-shifters' somccharBy uses acterwho neversleeps, a differentapproach: the quality of his voice, and by mernsof variou devicesthat disuact thc critical intelligencghe gea what Coleridgccalled-in one of in sentences all litcrature-"the willing the mostclumsyfamous which constitutes for suspension disbelief the moment, of Poetic faith." The yarn writer-likc Mark Twain in "The Glebrated BlueiayYarn" County" or "Baker's Frog of Calaveras Jumping -uses yet another lies, method:He tellsoutrageous or hassome lie' charactertell the poor narrator someoutregeous and he both emphasizes the brillianccand the falsehood simultaneously as of the lie; that is, he tellsthc lie asconvincingly he can but thce obiectionsthc also raisesobiectionsto the lie, either countryreader might raiseor, for comiccffect,literal-minded bumpkin objectionsthat, though bumpkinish,call attention to theyarn'simprobabilities. Ail three kinds of writing, it shouldbe obviouset a glancg dependheavily on precisionof detail. In writing that depends into acthe the on verisimilitude, writer in effectargues reader his stoqyin someactualsetting-Cleveland, He cepmnc. places San Francisco,Joplin, Misouri-and he usescharacterswc He would be likely to meetin the settinghe haschosen. givesrs

Baic SkilbrGeme, Fiction Drerm ml a

2,

such detail about the streets, stores,weather,politicq and concernsof Cleveland(or whateverthe sening is) and such deail about the loolcs,gestures, experience his characters and of that \ve cennorhelp believingthat the story he tells us mustbe rrue. Ig fagt it may be trug as is Truman Capore'snovel In Cold Bloodor NormanMailer'sThe EsecutioneTs Song.The that fact the story is true of coursedoesnot retievc the novelist of thc responsibilityof making the characters and cvcns convincing. by second ask,f'Would a motherreally say thari" we l_._":"9 "Would a child really thinh rhar?"and if the noveiisr donc has ,,yes." If hc his work well we cannothelpanswering, hasdonc hiswork badln on the otherhand,the reader feelsunconvinced the -c-v-elwhen writer presen$evenrshc actually witnesed in Iife. Whar hasgonewrong,in this case, that thi writer mised is or forgot to mendon something importantto the development of the scene. For insrance, a fictional husbandand wife ffc rrif guing binerly and the wife suddenlychanges tactics,spealcher ing gcntln evcn lovinglS the reader c"nnot understand or believe change the unles someclue is providedasto the reason for it. The cluemay be an evenr, perhaps noise another a in part of thc house, reminds thai the ihildren arenearby;ir it that her may be a thought,perhaps wife's reflecrion the that this is how her motherusedto,argue with her father;or the clue may be a gesture, when the wife, after something husband as the says, turns and looksout the window, providinga pause that allows her to collectherself. When the rlafisr'sliork convinces all us, effects,evenrhe most subtlg bave explicit or impticit ceuses. This kind of documentadon, moment moment by authenticating detail,is the mainstaynor only of realisticfiction but of ail fiction. In other words, while verisimilarfiction may be described generally fiction that penuades of its authenticiry as us through real-worlddocumentarion, usingrealor thoroughlytifeme loJations and characters-real citiesor citieswe ierieve to be reat althoughtheir nameshave been changed, real-life characters.

24

NmES ON LTTERARY-AESTHETICTITEORY

and names, so forth-thc line'by-linc with actualor substituted work goesfar beyondthe acctnte namingof bulk of a realist's streetsand storesor eccuratedccription of peopleend neigb borhoods. He must Present'moment by rnomenq ooncrtc of drawn from a cerefulobservation how peoplebehavg images momenB'the cxact berween andhe mustrenderthe connections that' within an,t or facial expresions, turns of speech gesruret, from emotionto emotion,from beings giu"n s".o., mooJhuman one instantin time to the next. the C,ompare techniqueof the writer of talc. Whereasthc the realistarguc the readcrinto ecceptance, tale writer chrnm or lulls him into dropping obiections;that is, penuadc him to disbelief.Isak Dinesenbeginsone of her tales: "After suspend resolved Angelino Santasillia the deathof his masterLeonidas, that he would never egainsleep.Will the narrator be believcd Neverwhen he tells the readerthat Angelinokept this resolve? realist,of coulsc'could tcll this story No it theless, is the case." sinceno amountof argumentwill convincew that a charactcr really might stay rwake for weeks,months, years.The talc grantingthat the evenc writer simplywalkspastour obiections, to recountareincrediblebut winning our suspension he is about and authority of the narrator's of disbeliefby the confidence premise,onc that the voice. Yet aftcr establishing impossible opensthe door to further improbabilities-in the caseof Isak of the Dinesen's asit happens, appearance Juda+at the end tale, of the narrative,countinghis silver in a smdl' dimly lit roonrhis the tale writer documents story momentby mornentby details of exactly the kind realistsuse.The openinglinesslightly alter natural law, but granting the elteration,what follows is and ar leastpoeticallytrue thoroughlyprobable madeto seem by the writer's closeanentionto the naturelflow of moral cause with detailsdrawn from .nd.f."t, a flow minutelydocumented Angelino walks,telks' the life. As the story progresses, sleepless whole dap prs and thinks more and more slowly. Sometimes We'tclieve" and the between beginnings cndsof his sentences.

Basb Skills, Geme, anil Fiction as Dteon

z,

the narrativcnot iust because ulc voicc hascharmedrn but thc dsq and more basicallRbecause chrracter'sgestures, the hb preciselydescribed expresion,md the reactionof othes to hb oddity all seem us exacdywhat they would be in this suange to -c situation.The imagesare as sharp and accuretelyrendered .ny in Tolstoy's Chiklboodot Arna Konhn. The sueetsho wdks, the wcather,the city's soun& md smellsdl euthendcre tfg sleeplesman'sexistence. There is, adminedln one grat diffcrenccbetweenthe useof authenticeting detaii by a rialisr rnd the useof the sameby r tale writer. fhc realistmust tuthe.nucatg continuallS bombarding readerwith proofs; the the criter of dl * sunptifn penuadingus penly byihe b..oty or interest of his language,using authenticatingdetail morc m give vividnes to the tale's key momens. Thus, -qnringly, for example, oncethe writer of'a talehasconvinced panly by us, chernLpaftly by detail,that a cerain king hasr foul tempa, hc can makesuch bald satementsas: ,,The ldng was furious. He sent everyone homg locked rll the doors, rnd had chains wrapped tight around his castle." Nevertheles the differencc b one of degree. Neither the realistnor the writer of talescur gct by without documentation throughspecifc derail. LJj!:_*. rlthe yam. C,onsider following, from Mark the _ Tunin's "Baker'sBlueiayYarn " I fint begunto understand language "Ie.l coriay rectly, there was a litde incident happened Grr. S".o ago, )rears the lastmanin this regionbut me movedrway. There sunds his house-{ecn empry ever since; e log housc, with a plankroofjust oncbig room,andno mori rrc ceiling-nothing betweenthe rafters and the floor. Well, oneSundeymorningI wassiaing out herein front oj with my crg taking the sur\ and looking rt TI Tbjl thc bluehi\ andlisteningto the leeves rustlingsolon'ety in theuees,andthinking of the homeawayyonderin the sets,rhar I hadn't heardfrom in thireen years,when a

26

NOTES ON LTTBMRY-AE$THETIC THEORY

with .n aoornin his mouth,snd blucieylit on thrt housc, 'Hcllo, I rcckon I've stnrck something.' When hc se1n, spoke,the acorn droppd out of his mouth and rolled down thc roof, of counie,but hc didn't carei his mind vmsall on thc thing hc had struck. It was a knot-holein thc roof. He cockedhb hcadto onc sidq shut onc cyc 'possum looking and put thc othcr onc m the holc like r dovn e iug; thenheghncedup with his bright eycq gavc e wink or two with his wings-which signifiesgratificasap, 'It loola like a holc, it's tion, you undcrstand--and it likc located a hole-blamcdif I don'tbelieve il a hole!'" has Baker,wc undersmnd, bccn out in thc wildernes too long and hasgone e little dory--or clse (more likely) he's pulling who reponshisstoqyasgospcl. narretor the leg of thc crcdulous Eithei way, no onebut the nerretorimagina for r momentthat the what Bakeris sayingis rruc. What makes lic delightful b the The cabinwith the knotBakertakes makeit crediblc. to pains holc in thc roof exists:It hasr histoqyand physicalfeaturcs-in fact Bakercan point to it. Detailsconvinccus thet Bakcr really did sit looking at it: It wasa Sundaymorning;his cat waswith him; he wastooking at and listcningto specificthings' thinking specificthoughts.Thc blueiay rcally did speak-thc acorn is thc proof-and further dctails labor valiantly to pcrsuadcus that'blueiaysthink: thc cockedhcad,the onc closedeye, the 'Pos' vivid imageof the opcneyeprcsed to thc knot-holc "likc e sumlookingdown a iug." vivid detailis thc life blood of 6ction. In all thi malor genrcs' of Verisimilitude,suspension disbeliefthrough naradve voicc, or the wink that callsanentionto the yam-teller'slie may be thc outer strztey of a givenwork; but in dl maior genr6' thc inner stretegy is thc samc: The rcader is rcgularly presentedwith proofs-in thc form of cloeely obcervcddetails--that what is Beforewe turn to thc is saidto be happening really happening. look, briefl5 at a fcw of technicalimplicatiorrs thh facg lct us

BwicSkillsrGerre, Ficrton Drecn md a

,7

morc cxamples, sincethe point is onc of grcat importancc. Takc ashortscene from PeterTafor's "The FancyWoman." Georgc has brought Joaephinc, "fancy woman" or prostinrtc hc the lova, hometo meet the family. Josephine been drinking has and Georgeis determined soberher up. to As he plshedJosephinc onto the white, iumpy beast he musthavecaughta whilf of hcr breath.Sheknew that hc musthave!He washoldingthe reinsclose thebit while to sheuied ro arangc herselfin the flat saddle. Then he grasped ankleand asked her her, ,,Did you takea drink upstain?"Shelaughed, leaned forwardin her saddlc, and whispered: "Two.Two iiggen." Shewasn'tafraid of the hone now, but shcwasdizzy. "George, Iet me down," shc said faintly. Shc felt thc honc's flesh quiver under her leg and looked over hcr shoulder whenit stomped rearhoof. one George said,"Confound I'll sober iq you." He handed her the reins, stepped back,andslapped hone on the the flank "Hold on!" hecalled, her horse and cantered across thelawn. - Josiewasclutching the lcatherstrapsdghtln and her ,,f faccwaselmost the horsc's in manc. couldkill him for t!ul'$e said,slicingout the wordswith a sharpbreattu God damnir! The horsewrs gellopingalonge &n road. Shesawnothingbut rheyellow din. The hoofscrumbled over r threc-plank woodenbridge,rnd sheheardGeorge's hone on rhe other sideof her. Sheturned her facet-hat wry andsawGeorge throughthc hairthat hungoverher cyes. wassmiling. He "You dirry basrard," said. she

Who candoubtthc scene? Taylor tclls us that the horse b 'Jo*pI" and provcit by aclooely observcd detail: George hol& thc reins-asonemustto controla iumpy horse whenonc b

28

NoTEs LIIEMRY.ADSTHETTC oN 1gDony

sunding on the ground-"cloce to the bit." That Josicb sitting on a real horse, a iump)'ong is provedby further authentiand cating deuils: The horse'sflesh quivers 'under her leg," and when the writer telk us that Josephine "looked over her shoulder when it stomped retr hoofr" we rre .t onceconvinced one by both the horse's actionandthe woman's response. SinceJcic bdtzzy andpresumably r goodrider, we erefully penuaded not by th. detail telling us "hetr face was almost in the horseb mane,"by the panickywey in which shetdks to henelf, 'slicing out the words with e shaqpbreath," by the fact thag riding down the din road,she"sawnorhingbut the yellow dirg" by the "three-plankwoodenbridge" (in her alarmshelools closely), by the fact that shehean George's horsebeforeshesees and it, by the fact that, turning to look er hin\ she seesGeorge "tluough the hair that hungover her eyes."Examining scene the carefullS we discover tlut something half of it is devotedto like deuils that proveits acnrality. C.ompare short passage a from r comictale in ltalo Calvino'r (translated Cocnricornics from the ltalian by Williem Weaver). The nanabr, old Qfwfq, is recdling the days, in the Carboniferousperiod of the planet,when osseoug pulmonatefislr, including Qfwfq, movedup from the seaonto land. Our family, I mustsay,includinggandparents, wasdl up on the shore, paddingaboutasif we hadneverLnown how to do anything else.If it hednt been for the ob' stinaqy of our great-uncleN'ba N'ga, we would hrrre long sincelost dl contac with the aquaticworld. Yes,we hade great-uncle who wasa fish,on my peternal grandmotherb side,to be precise, the Coclacanthus of family of the Devonianperiod (the frah-wrter branch: who ere, for that metter, cousinsof the others-but I don't want to go into dl thesequctions of kinship,n+. body caneverfollow them anyhow). So asI wassaying, this great-uncle lived in certein muddy shdlowq lmong

BariioShills,Gerre, ml Fictiut a Dteon

29

the rootsofsomeprotoconifers, that inl* of thc lagoon in where dl our ancstors had beenborn. He nwer stirred from there: at any season the yearall we hadrc do was of pushourselves over the softer layersof vegetationuntil we could feel ourselves sinking into the dampnes,and therebelow,a few palms'lengttsfrom the edge, could we seethe column of litde bubbleshe sent up, breathing heavily thc way old folks do, or the little cloud of mud scraped by hissharpsnougalwaysrummaging up around, moreout of habit than out of the needto hunt for anything. Pardy we believe, forget to disbelieve, or what Calvinotells us because the charm of old Qfwfq's voice; and pardy we'rc of convincedby vivid detail. I will not labor the point-the fishanimels "paddingebout" on shore,the vivid picturing of greatuncleN'ba N'ga'shome(the muddyshallows among rootsof the protoconifen), the vivid image of the fish-animelspushing themselves "over the softer layen of vegetation until we could feel ounelvessinking into rhe dampness," specificiry and the 'h eppropriatenas the measure few pdms' lengtls," the colof umn of liale bubblc, the great-uncle's habit of "breathingheavily the way old folks dq" the "little cloud of mud scraped by up his sharpsnout,alwaysrummagingaround,more out of habit thenout of the needto hunt for anything." C,onsider, finally, the piling up of authenticating deails in Ivrn Bunin's"The Gendemrnfrom SanFranciscor" nore cone ventionallynanated,serious tale.The passage presnts ocan .n liner crossing Adantic. the On the second third night therewasagaine bdland this time in mid-ocern, during the furiousstormswecping overtheoceuq whichroared a funeral like masrndrolled up mountainousseas fringed with mourningsilveryfoam. The Devil" who from the rocks of Gibraltar, thc stony

30

NOTES ON LTTEMRY-AESTHETIC THEORY

getcway of rwo worlitls,watched the ship vanish into from behindthc night andstorm,could herdly distinguish ship.Thc Devil 6ery cya of the snowthe innumerable wes as huge as a clifi, but thc ship was cven bigger, a giant. . . . The blizzardbatmany-storied, many-stacked tcrcd the ship's rigging end its broad-ncckcdstacls, firm, majesticwhitenedwith snow, but it remaincd amidstI snowy deck, rnd tcrible. On its uppermost thc up whirlwind thercloomed in loncliness cozy,dimly pondcrthc only half awake, vessel's lightedcabin, where, bearingthe scmous pilot reignedovcr its entire mass, and idol. He heardthe wailing moans blmcc of e pagan by of thc furiousscreeching the siren,choked the storm, of but the nearness that which wasbehindthc wall and to which in the last accountwasincomprehcnsiblc him, by removcd fcars.He wasreassured the thoughtof thc his which now andthenwasfilled with largc,armored cabin, and with thc dry crcaking rumblingsounds mysterious rrounda manwith of blucfircs,flaringup andcxploding was cagcrlycatchingthc inwho a metallicheadpicce, of distinct voicesof thc veselsthat hailcdhim, hundrcds milcsrway.... Onc cansccat r glanccthet thc detailsarc symbolic,identifying by thc ship rs r kind of hell constructed thc pride of modcrn mrn and morc tcrrible than thc powcr of thc Dcvil. But my point at thc momcntis only this: that herc too, as cverywhcre in good fiction, it's physicaldctail that pulls us into thc story' makes bclieveor forget not to bclicvcor (in thc yrrn) acccpt us the lie cvcnrs we laughat it. as If we carcfully inspcct our cxperiencc wc rcad, wc db' for of coverthrt the importance physicaldctail is that it creetes use kind of dream,a rich andvivid play in thc mind. Wc rcedn fcw words at thc bcginningof thc book or thc panicular stoqy, sccingnot wordson a pagcbut a rnd suddcnlywc find ourselvcs

Baic Skilb,Gmre,anilFictiona Dretu

3r

tnin moving through Rusiq an old ltalian qying, or r frrnr housebatteredby rain. Wc read on--dream on-not pasively but actively,worrying aboutthc choiccsthe characters haveto makq listening in panic for somesound behind the fictional door, orulting in charactcrs'succeses, bemoaning their failures. In great fiction, the dreamengagcs hean and soul; wc not us only respondto imaginery things-+ights, sounds,smclls-as though they were real, wc rcspond to fictional problcmsas though they were real: Wc sympathize, rhink, and iudge. Wc act oug vicariously,the uials of thc charactcrs and lcarn from thc feiluresandsuccesses panicular modcsof rctionr panicuof ler attitudes,opinions,aseftions,and beliefscxactly aswc leam from life. Thus thc valueof greatfiction, wc bcgin to suspect, is not justthrt it entcnains or distracsusfrom our troubles, us not our of but iust that it broadens knowledge pcopleand places, rlso that it helpsus to know what wc believc,rcinforcesrhosc qualitiesthrt arc noblestin us,lcadsus to feel uneesy aboutour faultsandlimitations. This is not the placeto pursucthat suspicion-thatis, the placeto work out in detailrheargument thc ultimare that value of fiction is its morality, though the subiectis one we musr rcturn te-but it is r goodplace norea few tcchnical ro implicationsof chcfact that, whateverthe genremay be, ficdon doesin work by crcatinga drcamin the reader's mind.Wc mry obsenre, first, that if thc cffcct of thc dreamis to be powerful, thc dream mustprobrbly bc vivid andcontinuous--uividbecausc wc arc if not quitc clear about what it is that we're dreaming,who and whcrc the characters what it is that they're doing or trying are, to do and whn our emotions judgmen$mustbe confuscd, and disipatcd,or blocked;md continuous because repeatcdly a interruptedflow of action mustnccesserily havclcssforce than rn action direcdy carriedthrough from its beginningto is conclusion.There may be exceptions this general to rule-we will consider that posibility later-but insofar as the generalrule is pcnuasivcit suggesa that oneof the chief mistakes writer can r

,2

TIrEonv NOIESON TJTERARY-,IESTIIETIC

mind mbe distrecte4cveo srekeisto rllow or force thc rcader's from the fictiond dran momentarily, Irt us be sure we hsve the principle clear. Thc rniter e presnts scene-let IE srly . scenein which rwo rattlesnakes are locked in monel combet.He mekesthe scenevivid in thc the rerder'smind; that 11he oncourages reederto "drem" the cvent with cnornons clarity, by pracnting as meny concrete detailsas po"ibL. He shorvqwith as much poaic force es hc hover, iaws wide' slowly swayin& cen muster,how the heads how the teeth sink in; how the tails switch and urd then suike; lasfugropefor a hold,poundup drst clouds;how the two snekes *rike and misq the rwo ratda roaring like hiss,occasionally vividnes; to meke the noto$. By detail the writer achieves scenecontinuous,he ukes painsto avoid enything that might to, disnact the readerfrom the imageof fighting snakes say,the or in which the imageis presented the cheracer of thc trtanner cniter. Thrs is of coursenot to saythat the writer cannotbreak to from the scene someothr-for instencgthe conservationist nuhing toward the snakc in his ieep. Though cheractenmd locale change the dreamis still running like e movie in the teader'smind. The rvriter distractsthe reader-$reals the filnr' inuusion or slip if you will-when by somc of technique egoistic readerto stop thinking aboutthe story he dlows or forcesthe else. (stop"seeingt' stor|) andthink eboutsomething the Somewriters-John Banb for insancoqrake e point of interruptingthe fictionaldreamfrom time to timg or evendenyiog mr readerthe chanceto cnter the fictional dram that his of expcrieacc fiction hasled him to expct.We will briefly cxthe pu{poscand vdue of suchfiaion later.For now, it b rmine cnoughto seythat suchwriten erenot writing fiction at dl" but eomethingelx,maafiaiot Th.y give ttrc readeran erperiencc of thc drat asumes usud experiencc fction asirs point of deprron nug and whatevereffecttheir work mey havcdepends their u8 conscious violationof dreusuelfictionalefrect.Whet interrests

Baic Skills, Gexrer ord Fi6{ton os Drecn

tt

in their novelsb th.t th9'' .rG not novelsbuq instcad $tistic oommcnts rft. 0n WCve comcr longwayfrom ouropningquction, "If therc arc no rules,or nonewonh his anentio& whereis the beginning writer to b"gio?' Amongother things,you mry impatiendyob. of icct, we've raiscdthe specterof e grert moress rulcs: Don't try to write without the basicskills of compositioqdon't tty to write "whrt you know," choose gnre;creater tind of drcem e in thc reader'smin( and rvoid like the plaguedl thrt might briefly distractfrom that drcenr---c notion whereinr multinrdc of rulesareimplied. But nothingin aUthis, I paticntly enswe& anythingto do has with aesthetic or givesruleson how to write. Thrt literanrc law fdls into genresis rirply an observetionfrom naturg com' parableto Adam'sob,servation the animalsneednames. that If one is to write, it helpsto know what writing is. And the fect that all threc of thc maiorgenres haveonecommonelemenq the fiaiond dream,is anotherobservation, nothing more. We ere speaking,temember, only of realistic narretives,ales, and yarns-that is, fiction'sprimary formrso thrt in listing waysin which the reader be distracted can from the fictiond drcam,asI will in Pen Two, I amin fect dealingonly with thingpto wetch out for when suiving for the effeca of raditiond fiction. My premisc course that beforeonecanworlr well with metaficof is tion, one needs somcundentendingof how the primary forms work Let us turn rgrin, theq to that openingquestion:Wherc shouldonebegin? I heve said that e good enswer,but not an ideal one, b "\Mritc the kind of story you know and like best"; in other words, choose gcnrc end tr)r to write in it. Sincewe're living r in an agevery rich in genres.-+ince given snrdentmay havc a encount6red almostanything, from taleslike Isdr Dinesen's to Neu Yo*er redistic fiction, from surred, plotlessfictions-

34

NOTDS ON LITERARY-AESfITEfIC THEOR]

to in-question-rnd-answer-form philosophiczlly cnriched and of dramaticallyintensifiedprce rcndcring;s somethinglikc thc to Maroelcomics-such instructions the writet visionin Captahr in this way, thc writer ic may producealmostanything.Set off stuc to cnioy himself,first ri{fling through genrcs,discovering how manyandhow complexthey rre' then-tonguc bctwccnhis has Thc tccth-knocking off hisbrilliant example. approach thc reminding thc student of what frcedom hc has' advantage of of are, how vrst the poesibilities and thc advantagc cncouraging him to find his own uniquepath. sccms me not idealis thrt, cxto the The reason approach the case, wastes writer's timc. It ir ccpt in the cxtraordine{F inscrucs him to do somethinghc cannot rcalistically bc cxpectcdto do well-end hereI mean"well" in thc alwap urgent way in morc gcntlcmanly not ardstt sensc, thc morc casual, which uredo thingBbadly or well in other univcrsity Programg Let me cxplain.Truc anists,whatcvcr smiling faccsthey may show you, arc obsesive,driven peoplc-whethcr drivcn by somemania or drivcn by somehigh, noblc vision nced not prcsentlyconcernus.Anyone who hasworkedboth asartist and asprofessor rcll you, I think, that he worls very differently can in his two styles.No one is more careful,more scrupulously vision of thc ideal, thrn e honcst,more devotedto his personal trying to write a book aboutthe Gilgttttesh,Hc good professor may writc far into the night, he may evoid parties,hc may fecl of pangs guilt abouthavingspenttoo little timc with his family. his Ncvcrthelcss, work is no more likc an aftist'swork than the is accountant like that of an athleteconten& of e first-class work usesfaculties of the mind more He ing for e championship. easilyrvailableto us; hc has,on all sidesof him, ste1n,checks, rules of procedurethat guide and securehim. Hc's I safeties, on in mansurcof wherehc stands thc world. He belongs sunlit walkways, in ivied halls. With the artist' not so. No critical study,howcverbrilliant, is the fiercepsychologicdbatdce novel qudities that makc. true artist-nearly the same ir. Thc qualities

Basb SkilkrGexrcr Filrtion Drean ord as

,5

thet makc r tnre ethlete-makc it importryrt thrt tbc snrdcnt writer ncverbc prcvcntcdfrom working esscriouslyu hc knows how to. In univenity cotuseswe do exerciscs. Term papers, quizzeqfinal cxaminetions not meantfor publication.Wc are movc through I coursc on Dostocrrykyor Poc iui wc movc through e mildly good cocktail parrf, picking up thc good bits of food or conversation, bcaringwith thc rest,goinghomcwhcn it comesto seemthe reasonablc thing to do. A6 ar thosemo. mens whenit feelsmostlikc art-when we fcel mostalive,most tlcrt, mo6ttriumphrnt-is lcsslike a cocktail parry then a tank full ofshrrls. Everythings for kceps, norhing'sjust for cxercisc. (Roben Froct said, "I ncvcr write cxerciscs, somctimes but I write pocmswhich feil and then I call rhem cxercises.")A courscin crcativc writing shouldbc likc writing itsclf; cverything required should bc, at least potentially, usable,publishable: for kcep. "A mighty uill.'' Hary Jrmcssaid,"that's dl thcre is!" Let no onc discourage undermincthat mighty wilL or I would bcgin, then, with somethingred-smaller than a shon story, tale,yarn, sketclr-and something primary, not secondary (not parody,for exrmple, thc rhing itself). I would bur begin with someone of thoseneccssary parts of larger formq somesinglc clcment thag if brilliantly done, might nrtunlly becomethe uiggcr of r larger work-{omc smdl cxcrciscin tcchniquc,if you likc, as long as it's rcmembered that we do not really meanit asan excrcisc mcanit esa possible but beginning of somemagnificenrwork of arr. A one-page pasagc of dcscriptior\ for example;dacription keyed to someparticular gcnrc-sincc dacription in r short stoqydoesnot work in thc s:rmc wey dacription works in thc ueditiond tale.And I would makethc chief concernof this small cxcrciscthe writer's discovery of the fall meming of 6ction'selements. Having written onc superbdescriptivepessage, writer should know things the nbout descriptionrhat he'll ncvcr nccd to think about again Working clcmenr clcmcntthroughthc neccsarypara of ficby tion, he shouldmakc thc cscntial tcchniques secondnanuc, so

?6

TITE0RY !{orDs oN LITEnAnY-AEsTllErrc

that he c.n use thsn widr incrcesingdexterity md subdety' until at lest,asif effonlesly, he can constructittgtn.ry worlds --huge thoughs made up of concrete deails'--eo rich rnd al simple,that we ere estounded, end so awesomely "orplo, by we're dwap astounded great an This mianq of coursg that he must lerrn to seefiction's great critip: c elemensasonly a writer dos, or en occasional still vdid kind of thc fundamentalunits of an ancient but cdled thought.Homer'skind of thought;what I havesometimes "concretephilosophy"' We're not ready iust yet to tqllr about what that kind of thought entailg but we can mrke r beginning might work. in how an exercise description by describing simply to serves that description To the laymanit may seem giving us Perhatrsomeidee are happening, tell us wherethings of whet the charactenare like by identifying them with their or surroundings, providing uswith propsthat may later tip orer Good dacription doesfar more: lt is or burn down or explode. of of the writer's means reachingdown into his unconscious one his mind, finding clu$to what questions fiction must rsk, and is Good description symbolic with luck, hintsaboutthe answers. by it but because, not becarsethe writer plants symbolsin still workrng in the proper way, he forcessymbols largely mpteriousto him up into his consciorsmind wherg litde by litde he as his fiaion progresses' cen work with them and finally them. To put this anotherway, the organizedand understand intelligent fictional &eam that will eventuallyfill the reader'l mnd begiw asa tugely mystuious ilremr in tbe witef s minil. revising,the writer of Through the process writing rnd endless makes rvailablc the order the reader sees-Discovering the are the and meaning communicating meaning for the writer one e singleact. One doesnot simply describe barn, then. One dein scribesa barn as senby someone somepanicular mood' way can the barn<r the writer's exPeri' becrusconly in that encc of brrns combined with whatever lies deepat is hb feeli4g*-be tricked into mumblingits secrers.

Baic SkillsrGeme, Fiaionoshectn oil

,7

Consider following re r posible exercirein description: the Dccribe a barn asscenby a manwhosesonhasius beenkilled in r wer. Do not mention the sor\ or nar, or death.Do not mentionthe manwho doesthe ceeing.(The exercise shouldrun to aboutonetyped page.)If the writer worla har4 andif he has the nlent to be e writer, thc result of his wort should be r powerful and disturbing im"ge, r faithful dacription of soms aPPerntl)t barn but onc fronr which the reederge$ e sense real of the father'semotion;though cxactly what thot emotionb hc mr)r not be able to pin down (In an actual piece of fiction, we would of course told what the emotionis-telling irporbe unt ctoric by tly implication b r specic of frigidity. Bw tnowing the emotion, shouldget from the descripdon lest we no powerfuf an effect ) No amountof intellecaul snrdycan d*ermine for the writer whet detailshe should include. ff the de rcription b to be effective,he rnust choosehis boards,$rew, prgeon nnnure, and rope* thc rhythms of his sartenceqhb angleof vision,by feelingand intuition. And one of the things he will discover, inevitably,b that the ir.go of deathand loss thrt cometo him arenot necesarilythosewe rnight expeceThc heck mind leapsinstandy to imagc of, for instance, darknesq heevinesq decay.But thosemay not be at all the kindsof images that drift into the mind that hasemptieditself of ell but the desireto "tell the uuth"; that is, to ger the feeling dom in concretedetails.In everythinghe writa-dacnptioq didogue the recountingof aaions--thi writer doesthe same ttring. inA ro the writer gathers pnrt--+till only pan--of the materiebvith which he does thinking. his At this point the readercanno doubt gues what drc renraintng pertsare.Obviouslyone doesnot think in exacdythe sarre ways,or aboutexacdythe same kindsof thingc in e short storyr r slg andr yern; and reflectionon thrt fact leeds the furhcr to observation thag asWallaceStevens ig "a change stylc b put of I changeof subiect" It was once a fairly common rrnong writers and literary critics thrt whet fiction ought to do

38

THEoRY NorEs oN LTTEnARY-AESTHEf,IC

cxPrss is tell the uuth aboutthings,or, asPoesayssomewhere' is a kind of our intuitions of rerlity. Viewed in this way, fiction But for instrument comingto understanding. we can seethat if to thereareproblems be solved that view is to be defended. of The realistsaysto us: "Show me, by a Process exactimitait's like for a thineen-year-oldgirl when shc falls tion, what painfully, faintingly in love." And he folds his arms,smugin thc dismayus. conviction th* he can do iust that. But questions or Shall we tell the truth in shon, clipped $entcnces long, smooth,gracefulones?Shall we tell it using short vowels and or hard consonans long vowelsand soft consonenB?+causc Doesfiction, in everything. choices makemay change we thc Is it posible that fact, haveanythingwhateverto do with truth? nothing but itselfinstrument,6ction, studies this complicated its own processesl A commonanslperet the presenttime b that that is thc his writer spends whole life trying to work qucstionthe serious by meens the only kind of thinking he trusts;that is, the of out For fictional prmess. the moment,we mustlet that answcrstand -with only this reservation:Great fiction can makeus laugh or cry, in much the way that life can, and it gves us at least thc powerful illusion that when we do so we're doing pretty thingswe do whenwe laughat Unclc Herman's muchthe same fokes,or cry at funerels.Somehowthe cndlesslyrecombining elemensthat makeup worla of fiction havctheir roos hooked, it seemginto the unive$e, or at leastinto thc heartsof human us beings.Somehowthe fictional dream persuades that it's r clear,sharp,edited versionof the dreemall around us. Whator everour doubts,we pick up booksat train stations, withdraw into our studiesand write them; and the world-or so wc imagine.+omeselivc.

3 Interest Tiuth and

Anything we reedfor pleasurc readbecause interas us. we it One would think, since this is so, that the fint questionany young writer would ask himself, when heb rrying to decidc what to write, would be "lVhar canI think of that'sinterestingl" Oddly enough,that is not e very usualfirsr question;in fact, when one points out ro young wrirers that it might be, they often react with suqprise. someexrenr,bad teachingis to To blame,encouraging to rise beyond,and forget, our most imus mediate,most childish pleasures--+olor painting, melody in in musig story in fiction-and learn to take pleasurein things more abstract and complex. Those sophisticated pleasures arc real enough and can be intense, something but mey havegonc wrong whenthey cometo be the first pleasures seek. read we To or write well, we mu$ steer betweentwo cxtremeviews of aesthetic interesr;the overemphasis thingpimmediatelyplerof surable(exciting plot, vivid characterization, fascinatingetmosphere)and exclusive concernwith that which is secondarily but at timesmorelestinglypleasurable, fusing artistic vision. the Though fu cannot be said of all reachers lireraturg it is of cornmonto 6nd teachers indifferent to the kinds of poetqyand fiction thet go most directly for thosevalueswe asociatewith 39

40

TIIEORI NOTES ON LTTEBARY-AESTHETTC

rirptr entertainment-popuhr tyrics, dnrgsole paperbecks' bc ilny in somecases mobbery' but andso forth. The reNson probably i*t * often the ceuseb tlrc sensitivertader's too boring s.mcnss frequent experienccof disappointment--+hc in found at is extreme the scriptsof televisbn Westgrrq cop shows,and sinrationcqnedic. Driven ofi by too mrrchthat b mcrely cwmerciakfrcn shoddyimitrtion of ruthentic origi' o.lity in the realmof the popular-we feil to noticc that popu lar songwriters like StevieWonder and RendyNewmrn' m say crn nothing of the Beades, be dedicatd energttic Poctcm9rc tnre'confcr interating than many of the weery rophimicateg mrs, md nndy rordemicswc ncounterin drc "litdc magr' zineq" rnd thet drugttorc fiaion can often hrvc more to offer Thc rcuh of nrch than fction thought to bc of r higher cless. preiudicr or ignorancr is that litenture coulles ry-gulertyfq ture writcrs les appealing-et leeston ttre immediete serrsrnl level, but cometimc on deeper levels r well-thrn Isaac Asimon &muel R. Deleney, Walter M. Miller' Jr.' Roger writers; a ?*lzmy, or the Suugnsky brotherq science-fiction writers like John lc &n6 rnd Frcderict Forsyth; eventluiller the creatorsof thc arly Spiilerilm comics or Houail tbe ignorethrillers' Duck.lntheory it may be proper that teachers sciencefiaion, and the comic bools. No onc wans C.oleridge from the currhulum by a duck "tnppcd in a world he pushed nevermade!"But whenwe beginto list the contemponry "seriHoqtnil end ots" writers who 6ll highschool literanuc coursq' bad. the Dack canlook not ell that is The snobbery limited rangeof teachers one of the reaor of sonswe forga to think aboutinterestin the sense immediatc appeal;but enothercluse may be more basic.The busines of g{ucationis to give the studentboth usefulinfonnetionend life the cnhancingexperiencgone largely measurable, other not; and sinci thc lifc-enhancingvaluc of . coursein litcrature b ditficult to measuresincq moreover'many peoplcin a position haveno real cxperiencl programs on to put pressure educational

lnterestrndTnttb

4r

in or feeling for the errFir is often tempung to treet lifeenhancement courses courses useful information, putting rs in them on the same"obiective' level ascounis civics,gomF in try, or elementaryphysia. So it comesabout thst bools erc taught (officidly, at least) not because they grve ioy, thc incompareblyrich experience ask and expectof all true arg we but becausg a curriculum commfutee as mighr put it, they "illustratc maior thernesin &nericxn literaturer" or "prescnt r clearly smtedtrint of view and can thus servcasa vehiclefor euchctrriculum obiectivc as (r) demonstrating awerensr en of thc ruthor's purpose, readingcriticalln rnd (l) identily(z) ing organizationdpencrnsin literary selections usedto support r poinr of view." One cannotexactly sry that srrc{rteachingb pernicious,butto treet grcer worla of literarure in drb uny seems linle like arguingfor preservation dolphirq whgleq I of c{rimpt andgorillessolelyon the gmundsof ecological belance. At dl leveh not iust in the highschools the ebovemight (es suggest),novels,short storieq and poenn have for yearsbeen taught not asqperiencrs thet can delight and enliventhe soul but asthingp that te good for u* like viramin C The whole idee of the close critical ,n lfb of literary worln-the idcs emphasized the "New Girics" of the thinies and fonic-hrs by had the eccidental sideeffect of leadingto the notion that the chief virtue of good poetr'' end fiction is insuuctional.If wc look et the famousNew Criticel enthologies designed teach to rn"llois (for in$ance, Undnntndkg Fiction nd tlnilaxouting Poetty, by CleanthBrools and Roben PennWerren), n'e qrnnot help noticing that subdn no doubt unwiningln the rw thors suggest what makes pieceof literature"good" is thc that a writer's thoroughrnd orderly explorationof ideas,hh full de velopmentof the imptcationsof his theme.What theseeuthors suggest in imporant wryn nuc, though ill-considered is boob ""grinst interpretation"(asonc of themis entitled) havedriven close enalpis from many classroorr: Howerrer dazzling and vivid the chare$ers,howcverstarding the action, no piecc of

42

THDORT ON NOTES LTTERARY-AF.STHEflC

fiction canbe of lasdngintcrstif iG thoughtb confined,simplemindcd,or plain wrong. On thc other hand,rcadingfiction or poctry without regardfor thc delight h can givc-its imrnediatc intercst-can mutilatethe crpcricnccof reading.It b not inciplap prcscnt fascinatingch.ractct! dental that Shakcspcare's To cngrgcdin suspnsefulactions. writo fiction without rcgerd for immcdiateiffcrcst, puqposclyctrocing thc nrost colorlcs pocsiblc,e plot cdculatcd to drivc away thc poor cheracters slob intercstcdin sceingsomcthinghappen,and suppresingdl end tcxnrnl richncss varicty-to writg that s, esif fiction wcrc that thc much too scriousto bc cnfoycd-is to raiscsuqpicion ert's truc naturq and is value to writcr b as inscnsitivcto humanity,,s r stoncin r fermcr'sficld. But what givesa work of fiction acsthcticintcrat? For thc momentla us ignorc fiction's flashyyoung cousinmetafiction, sinccmuch of what wc sly hcrc wc must takc back when wc turtr to mcnfiction. Nothing in the world is inhercndy interesting-thtt it' h to mediatelyintcresting,and intcrating in the samedegree, all humanbcingt.And nothing can bc madeto be of increst to thc readerthet was not first of vital concem to thc writr. Each writer's prciudiccs,tasteqbackground,and expriencc tcnd to limit thc kinds of characterqactions,and scttingshc can honcdy carc about,sinceby thc nature of our monality wc calc about what wc know rnd might posrbly lose (or haverlready what we crrc abougand fecl lost), dislikethat which thrcatens indiffercnt toward that which has no visiblc bcuing on our safety or thc safetyof thc pcoplcand things wc lova Thus no two writers gct acsthcticintcrest fronr cxactly thc samcme" sclcctcd tcrials. Mark Twain' saddlcdwith r cast of charactcrs by Hcnry Jamcc would bc quick to maneuvcrthcm ell into tcchnique+echniquc thet wclls. Yct all writcrg givcn rdequete communiafics..+an stir our intercst in thcir sPccialsubicct mllttcr, sinceat hcan dl fiction trcetq dircctly or indirectly' thc samcthing: our lovc for pcoplc and thc worl4 our aspiratiors

IntaenandTrwh

+7

cnd fean. The particular characterqactions,and seaingsarr merelyinstances, on variations theuniversal theme. If this is so-it may be usefulto notice in pasing-then thc writer who denies that humanbeingshavefree will (the writer who rcally denies not jokingly or ironically pretends deny it, to it) is one who can write nothing of interest.Aside from a gro. tsquerythet must soon grow repetirious,he cannot endow characten,places, and eventswith real interest, he because can find no real interestin them in the fint place.Suippedof frec will-robbed of all capaciryto fight for thosethingsthey aqpirc to andavoidthosethingpthey fear-human beings to ccasc be of anything more than scientific and sentimental interest.For thc writer who vicws his characters helpless as biologicalorganisms, mereunits in a mindlas socialstructure,or cogsin a mechanistic universe,whatever valuesthose charecters may hold mrxt necessarily illusions, be sinccnoneof the characteni do anycen thing aboutthem, and thc usualinterplay of valueagainst vdue that makes an interestingcxplorationof themcmustherebc for a cynicalandacademic exercisc. If it is true that no two writers get aesthetic interest from oractly the samcmaterials, true that all writers, given adeyet quate technique,can stir our interest in their specialzubject matter-sincc all humanbeingphave the samcroot cxperience (we'reborn,we suffer,we die,to put it grimly), so that all wc needfor our sympathyto be roused that the writer communiis catewith power and convictionthe similaritic in his characten' cxpcrience our own-then it mustfollow that thc first busi" and nes of the writer must bc to makeus seeand feel vividly what his characters and feel. However odd, howeverwildly unsec familiar the fictional world--odd as hog-farmingto e fourtb generation Parisiandesigner, Wall Srreetto an unemployed or tuba playcr-we musr be drawn into the characten'world es if we were born to it. To saythis is to takc,admittedln an extreme pmition. Thcrc rrc limis to rhc cxrentto which peopleof oneculture can imag-

41

THEORY NgtDs oN LTTERARY-AESTTIETIC

of the inativdy embrece expericnce peoplefrom another,end I statement the argumentI'm offering would bc of more cautious that the writer should make his characten' world sensually that knowing in advance evailable a wide rengeof readers, to for meny readen (Tibetans, perhap), hb characters'xPeriSorrc writen ofrer e still encewill be beyond comprehension. itt suJficient makeone'schrmcten xto nemowerview, thet periurcevivid for only thet smallgroup of readenwhoeehackOnly a wrircr from ground is similer to thrt of the characters. somegrsat culturd center like Parisor New York crn rfford such a position.The man from Wyoming, if hc crilrot corlln to municatehis experience New YorL, is unlikely to get pub writer who limiu his audienccoo narrowly L lished. So the likely to seemparochid, if not {rogent' to tlrac resdcn not to or desperate improvetheir *rtus by eccming born in hir "ity to havelived there.But everywritcr mts makehb own choice. The basicprinciple stendsin rny crse' et lerst so hng rs f,ction containschrractersat dl: The writer must cnablerr to seeand feel vividly whrt his cher.cten sce rnd feel; that is' u enebleus to experience directly and intensely rs posible' How can experience. thoogh vicariorslynwhat hb characters the writer bestdo thb? Somesf the erswer shouldby now be obviots. The writer on must of necesity write in a style that falls somewhere the continuumrunningfrom obiectiveto subieaive;in other words, from the discursive,esayist's style in which everything b to spelledout as scientificdly as possible, the poetic stylc in everything (or practicallynothing) is explained, which nothing or, "rendered."The esap is evoked, to useHenry James'ternr" ist's style is by netue slow-movingand laborious,more wide then deep.It tends toward abstractionand precisionwithout any $vo much power, as we seeinstandy when we comPare style onediscursivqonepoetic.ln the essayist's wc man in the doornay was largc might write, for instance, "The ill rnd apparendy et case-+olrrge thet he had to stooPe littlc

lnterex rndTruth

45

and draw in his elbours." The poetic style sm run harderrt its effecs: "He filled the doorway,awkwerdasa horse." Both styles, needlcs to s:ry,can be of use.One builds is world up slowly and completely, as Tolstoy does in Arns Karenina, where very few metaphors similesappearithe other lights up is or imagrnaryworld by lightning flashes. contemporaryfiction In the essayist's syle is to someexrentout of fashionat the momenqor, rather,is usedalmostexclusively purposes irony for of md humor,sinceits laboredpacecan easilybe madeto reflect pompousness ennui.But literary fashionneverneedbe taken or very seriously.Stylo are born in human anitudes,and since Homer's time the total range of possiblehuman attitudeshas probablynot changed much. Whereverthe writert sryle falls on the continuumrunning from objectiveto subjective, whar countsin conventiondfiction must be the vividnes and continuiry of the fictiond dreamthe wordssetoff in the reader's mind. The writer's characters must standbeforeus with a wonderful clarity, suchcontinuous clarity that nothing they do suikesus as improbablebehaviorfor evenwhen the characterb actionis, assome iust that character, times happens, something that cameasa sulpriseto the writer himself. We must understand, and the writer before us must undentand,morethan we knoat aboutthe character; otherwire neitherthe writer nor the readerafter him could feel confident of the character's behaviorwhen the character acs freely. So it is that Trollope discovers his astonishment, so he tells us, to or that Mrs. Eustace stole her own diamonds. Though her action wasnot in his originalplan, his deep,inruitive knowledgeof the character, developed over dme,tells him instandy,the moment he getshis first clue, thar the act is indeedone that would fow inevitably and surely out of her being. How is this possiblet How cnn e writer-and after him the reader-have this surr &nowledge some of persondirythat literally does exist? not Beginwith the crucial observation herethat, xceptascreetures of the imagination, chrracers in fiaion do not exist It ic

46

THEORY NOTES LITEMRT-AESTHETTC ON

truc thrt Mn. Eustaccmay h basodon, say, Trollop's Aunt Maudc.But exceptin the writing of a biography (and, strialy from not spcaking, eventhere), a writer cannottakc a character in lifc. Every slightestchangethc writer makes the character's must have subde repercusions.I backgroundand experience not the samepersonI would havc beenif my fathcr had lm Trollope's Aunt Maudecan bccnrictr, or had ownedelephants. no longer remain perfectly herself once she'smarried to Mr. in characters'lives waystoo com' change Subtle details Eustace. mind to grasp,though wc nevertheles plcx for the conscious but graspthcm. Thus plot not only changes creatcscharacter: what wc rcally bclicve and, simulBy our actionswe discover both to trneously,revealourselves others.And seninginfluences what onc chmcter and plot: Onc cannotdo in a thunderstorm slips, from homeor, docson r hot day in Jordan.(One'scamel sicknes, refusesto budge; so the asasin gocsuncaught,the into war.) As in the plunged is Prcsident shot,the world is again on minuscule, every hasan effect,however everyatom universe at andSpace any so otheratomo that to pinchthe fabricof Time in 6cdon of thc point is to shakc wholc lcngthandbreadth it, so cvery elcmenthas cffect on cvcry other' so that to changea namefrom Janeto Cynthia is to makc the fictional character's groundshudder underher feet. that Thus it appeers to makcussceand feel vividly what his world as see characters and feel-to draw usinto the characters' more than simply if we were born to it-thc writer must do and authenticate explain and makeup characters thensomchow and thcm (giving them the right kinds of motorcycles bcards, and iargon). He must shapesimulcxactly the right memories creativemoment) his characters' taneously(in an expanding to connected the others;he plot, and setting,eechinextricably must makehis whole world in a shgle, coherentgesture'es a a potter maks pot; or, asColeridgeputs it, he mustcopn with his6nite mind,theproces of the infinite "I AM.' We arenow in a positionto look at the problcmof aesthetic

Interest anilTrutb

+'7

interest in r new light. Firsq rnd least important, wc're in o position to give tentetivc answenito thosei,innovative fictionisq" as who feel impatientwith maditional $ey cdl rhemselveq cxpectationsof character and plot. Character, these writers sometimes claim, is a pan of thc traditional novel'sunnecessery b'aggagc ought to bc discarded. and Thc novel,they.rgo*-.nd they would saythc same shonerkinds of fiction<nce served of purposs c:rn now pcrceivcto bc nonessential its naturc. w to For instance,in an agc when uavel was travail, whur photographsand movieswere nor yet invented,and sociologicai studies were unheardof, it was the novelist who told us what life was like in Venice or New Orleans.He described architecthe turg climatg and vegetation,told us of the history and sociology of the placc;in short, madeus feel asif wc'd beentherc. Noy *^: go booksand picnrrepostT-n therc, or ga spccialized caral thc novelisr told us about character,rclating -Similarll people'sanitudesand actionsto the custorns and climate from which they spring,or delving into the mpteries now demyntified by psychology and neurblogy. rhc old, now oum;ded By theory,they glpleir\ fiction w:rs I means discovcringor reof vealinghow thingshappen rhe world. We reedof a womanin in Chicagowho thrcw hcr father our rhe window of her sixth-floor epertmenr. "How in the world could sucha teriblc thing have comeaboutl" we exclaim, thc novelist's and business to show is oc:t? by step,what happcned. That theory of fiction was e4ploded day Poewrote "Thc Caskof Amontillado,',a stoqy the that hasan end but no beginning middlc;hence *"".s t or is a flrt refutation of Aristotle's th-corythat what is central to ficdgl ir energeio;that is, .,rhc actualizarionof the potential which exiss in characterand situation." poe frees lGfka to write: "One day Gregor Samsa awoke to discoverthat he had bcenchanged_into-a cockroach."Who knowshow or whyl large cares? the selectionand arrangement the materials By of {!9 of his fiction, the writer glvesns not thi truth about rhe wortd and how thingscomeaboutbut an imageof himself,,.a ponrait

48

rollsoN

LnDRART-ADsrItErrcrHEorI

of the anist"--or prhetr nothing morc then m interestingcoc' struction,anobiectfor our snrdyandamusement This view, now cornmo&hasimportant virnrc. It ocourthe rgc the writer to think in new weys, broadening fiaiond to wanderinto r were If erperience. l,ois lane end Supermao sceneby Henry Jarnecwhat would they think of it and how would they afiect itl The answerdoc not manerit snnot properly be calledcorrcct or incorrectit is merelyinteresting. If the stateof Califomir were to sink into the sea,how would in daily life be changed Brooklyn? Agein, if plot is no longer imporant (sinceits iustificationend ctntral interestb its reve lation of the potentid in characterand situation), why should as fiction haveprofluencH)ur sensq, we read,that we're "getting somewhere"lIf the pornait of the arti* b all that really counts,why not an anist who simply chas with us, Pl")tsvith wen insultsus,creatingnot an actionwe cenfollow nsrperhaps its endbut r small,highly flavoredimiation of Eternity? Thc to longer we think alongtheselineq the more interating the eer' If become. the ertilt's revelationof himselfir thetic possibilities ser words and phrases, hb style-not iott hit style in choooing (or tencerhythmsand ways of building paragraphs desuoying the the whole ideaof thc phrue, the sentence, paragraph)'but rlso his style in choosingdetails from redity or dream; ele' anil mcns, that rs,of character seaing-what happn* in tenrs of restheticinteresgif the writer ofrers not his own materials us Thus Borges grves the imageof a brillirnt else's? but someone modernwriter whose$ert opusis, word for word, C*rvantes' Don Quhote, and Dondd Banhelme,in his short story "Pandacription that in gual,' borrort (and fmmotes) e landscape but hasto do not with Paraguay with Tibet. frct Theseare of coursethe argumens raisedagainstconvtF in tional fiction by pcoplemoreinterested metafiction None of fiction will hol4 and lookconventional the argumensagainst ing dosely at conventionelfiction'r defensewill help us soe clcarly whgt thc interat.nd "uuth" in ctnventiond fiction rrc.

IntnenmdTnab

49

Once we havc f,ction's nature clear, we c:m bettcr rpprecietc the specialinterestof metefiction,a subicct to which we will turn in the next chapter. The traditionalistanswer the "innovrtive Ectionfot's" to general line of argumantmight go like this: Innovativc fictions of thc kind iust discusederenot inherendywrong-heeded, mcrcly unserious. Whatcvcr interest or value they hrvc they dcrivc from their contrestwith "traditiond"-thar ic, "conventiond" ot 'normal"-fiction. So long asconventiondfiction remrinsedequate and wonhwhilg innovative fictions are litere{f strmt$ They havea kind of interest,asintellectualtoys, but they engageusonly for the moment.Though traditionalscrious fiction may alsobe plan sinceit deeplyinvolvesuswith the uoublc of chancters who do not in fact cxisq the play in serioustraditionel fiction bearson life, not io.t As we play rt compas. "tt. sion, weepingfor Litdc Nell or Ophelir, wc cxcrciscfacultic wc know to be vitally imponent in rcel life. If the asembly of made-up materials a fiction creets a portrait of the artisg the in imponanceof the portrait is not that it tells us whet the rrtist looks like but that ir providesu with a focuq an aperrure,i medium (as in e s6ance)for secingthings hyond and more imponant than the anist. In the anistb recreationof thc world we are enebled seethe world. Granted,no two aniss revecl to to ts exacdythe samcworl4 iust asno two windows do; md granted,moreover,since aniss are humanand therefore lir ited, some dedicated and seriors artists may bc windocs smudged din, othersmay diston like blisteredand warpcd by pnneq still others may be stainedglas. But ttre world they frameis the world thar is really our rherc (or in hcre Insofers humannatureis everywhere samgit make$ difrerencc). the no A powerful pan of our interestaswe readgrert literrture b our scnse that we're "onto something."And pen of our borcdom when we read bools in which thc vision of life secrmpehrt'mindedis oursense we arenot. that Aristode'sideaof the energeic aaion is not rcally refuted by

5O

NOTES ON LUERARY-AESTHETIC THEORY

PoCs "C,esk of Amontillado" or Kafta's "Metamorphosiq' the though thoocworks may lcad rs to understand theory in e ncw rre)t, a way Aristotlc neverthought of, working ashc did but one to which hc from thc practice of Greck tragedians, might without too great an cffon adapthimself.Poc end Kefka whoocpotentirl is to bc ecnrbcgin not with cxtcrior situations of in thc progress thc work, but with situatiorsthat are' rlizcd interior. litcrally and in thc other expressionistically' in onc casc initial situationn OeilipasRer is r plaguc Wherer Sophocles' in Thcbcs rnd thc king's dark history, as yet unknown to thc king hirnsclf,Poc'sinitial situationis almostcntircly e pychu (whether for hunger revengp logicalshtc,the ccntralchuecter's or not thc hungcr is cven iustified thc readercannot tell), and Kafka's initial situation is a pychological state exPrcssioni*ically uansformed:Where the realist would san "Onc woke up to the realizationthrt he was likc day Gregor Samsa hcightens intensifia reality by or l cockroech,"the expressionist turning the mctaphorto fact. In placeof the clasiczl writcr's clcar distinctionberweenthe outsideworld and thc insidc on world-"situetion," on onc hand,t'character," thc othcr-the and inner realiry asintertwo modcm writers sccoutr rceliry pcnctmtingrThc world is whateverwe feel it to be,so that thc situetion chamctcr must deal with is partly character.Eithcr of way, thc unfolding of the story is the actualization is initial potential. Two ccntrrl tenc$, for the uaditional point of vicw, rrq notion that true literary an is "the rcptif,rst, thc C-oleridgian tion in the finitc mind of the infinite'I AM"'-thc idce'that ie' that, like God openinghis fist, the writer cteatscvcrything at their acdongand their world, eachclcmcnt oncc,his charaffers, dcpcndcnton the others-and, second'the concomitrnt notion rrs that en imponant pan of what interests in good fiction b our gensc, wc read,that the writer's imitation of rcality's Proces3 .s ("the ineluctablemodality of thc visible," as StephenDcddrs puts it) is accuratc;that is, our fceling that thc work, cvenif it

Interest rnilTratb

5r

contrins fabulour elemencn in rcnrc dccp way "truc to lifc.' b Thc obvioucqucstionir: How can the writer pocsibly do so much rt oncc? Thc answeris that hc doesand hc docsn'c Hc can thinh consciously, only a few things ar r time; but thc proccss of by which heworks eventually lcadshim to hisgoel.To rnyonc who thinls aboutit czrcfully, thb must at fint sceme rathcr rtrangc $etemcnt: "The proces by which he worla cventually lca& him to his goal"-es if thc proccss sornc had kind of magicin it, comedacmonicwill of its orvn. Indeed,somcwritcrs-not the lcrst of thcm Homer-havc taken that point of vicw, speaking without epologyof Muscsas,in somescmc,actualbeings,and of "epic song"and "mcmory" (not quitc in our sensc) forcc as grcetcr than and ecparetc from the poct. Wc often hcar cven modcrn writers spcakof thcir work at somchowortsidc thcir control, informcd by e spirit that, whcn they rcad their writing later, thcy clnnot identify c having come from themselves. I imagincevcry good writer heshrd this cxpcrience. testifiesto It thc remarkable subtlcy of fiction ase modeof rhought. The fictionalproccss the writer'r way of thinking, r qpecial b caseof the symbolicproccss mcans which wc do all our by of thinking. Though it's only an analogy,end in someways mb, leading, might saythet sheelemcnts fiction areto a writer we of what numben erc to a mathematician, thc main diffcrcncc bcing that we handlefictional elements more intuitivcly than cvcn the subtlcstmathematicians handlc numbers.As Hobbes said,"We cennotthink aboutthingsbut only aboutthc name of thinp"; in othcr words,to build up a complicated argument we need abstractions. wc wish to think usefully about wildlifc If preservation, must abstractthe dying white rhinocero! at wc our feet to dyrng whitc rhinoceroscs gcncral,wc muil secthc in (another relationship abstnction)bcrwcen dying whitc rhinoceroses dlng tigers,ctc., and risc, finally, to thc abstraction and wcy, e writer consciously urr "dying wildlifc." In the sarne or consciously ab*rectsthe clements fiction. of

t2

NOTES ON LITERARY-AESTHETIC TITEORY

of By thc elements fiction I meanall of thc discrae panicles e story is built, particlesthat might be removed unof which from one story and ptacedin rnother; for example, damaged, particlesof the action,"event ideas"suchrs kidnapping'pursuit lovedone,t murder,los of identiry, andso on; or of the elusive suchasobesityend each paniclesthet go to makeup character, of the things obesitymay imply, or stingines, or lethargy; or In paniclesthat go to makeup setting rnd atmosphere. isolameaning;in iuxtaposition, eachelementhasrelatively limited tion to one enother, the elementsbecomemore significent, of forming abstractions a kind-trigher units of poetic thought which elements, AII the armrre madeup of such fundamental we find repeatedin painting rfter painting, symphony efter are symphony,arrangedrnd built up (as complex molecules built up from atoms)in an infinite variety of wap. From paintof ing we might take the example the mountain (one element) juxtaposition but haver standard and the tree (another)that in against variablefunction: The maiesticmountainis silhouened to th. rky and compared e singlg equally isolatedtrec in thc and foreground,the oneremote,unchanging, divinein connotaWe and humanized. tion, the other accesible,ever-changing, in of find this juxtaposition elemensexpressed is clasical form of in in Titian, Pousin, and othermasterci several the late worlr of paintings 19oz-19o6 of Cezanne-theMont-Sainte-Victoire -we find the traditional fuxtapositioningeniouslyvaried, the uee mlnteriouslydominatingthe mountainand ueated in such at a way (swirling bruslsrokes, vagueoutlinc) that it seems leastasmysticalasthe mountain;or the tree rnd the mountain that so identified,by color and frantic brushstrokes, the eccesor humenemotionand the ideal' seemto sible and the remote. merge; sofonh. and Though no one can srrywhat the numberis, the numberof that fictional elements exisris finite. like the numberof wordsin the English language. Like the ree and the mountainin our example from painting, or like words in the English language

Interex andTnnh

t,

dre elemensof fiction may meanonething in oneplacg another in enother;th.y slip and slide and occasionallyoverlap; bm they havemeaning-or, et eny ratg meeningdomains.+nd ro do their standard,increasinglycomplex iuxtapositions. Good write$ usethem asskillfully andcomfortably,andsometimes ar as unconsciously, plumbersand roofers uselanguage. new No elements likely to be discovered; is what we mean,ot are this whenwe saythat "literatureis exhausted." oughtto mean, What writen do discoveris new combinations. The searchfor new combinationsis both guided by and one with the fictionrl Process. Perhap the logicd fint *ep in the fictional proces b thc writer's conscious intuitive recognitionof the netureof narreor tive, and his acceptance the shackles of imposed his decision by to tell e story (instead say,to write a philosophy.book of, or paint a picture). By definition-and of aestheticnecesity---a story containsprofluence, requirementbestsetisfied e se. a by quence causally of relatedevents, sequence qan end in a that only oneof wo ways: in resolution, when no funher eventcen take place (the murdererhasbeencaught and hrnged,the diemond has been found and restoredto its olvner, the elusive hdy hasbeencapturedand married), or in logical exhaustionn our recognitionthat we've reached stageof infinite repetithe tion; moreevensmight follow, perhap from now till Kingdom but C,ome, they will all expres the samething-for examplg the character's entrapment empry ritual or someconsistently in wrong response the pressures his environment. to of Resolution is of course classical usuallymoresatisfyingconclusion; the and logical exhaustion satisfies intellectually but ofren not emous tionally, since it's more pleasing ro see things definitely achieved thwaned than to be shownwhy they can neverbe or either achieved thwarted.Both achievemenr failure give or and importanceto the thing sought;we csn feel aboutit aswe feel about values. Logical exhaustion usually revealsthat the charrcter'ssupposed exercise freewill wasillusory. of

5+

THEORT NotEs oN LITEMRY-AESTTIETIC

It rmght be objectedhere that no lew requiresan to be then shows why "pleasing."A story that raisesexpectations, can nor they canneitherbe satisfied denied, bc asilluminating, and as interestingmoment by moment,as eny other kind of story, thoughthe endingmay annoyus.The troublg from thc traditionalistpoint of view, is this. First, the revelationthat the of character's exercise free will was illusory raisessuspicions, honaty which may or may not be iustified,aboutthe author's and artisticraponsibility.It may be that the writer wasassurto conclusion his by prised and disappointed the inescapable yet as been; we cennothelpwonderfictional'argument we have in ing how much real interesthe felr from the beginning his conclusion that he hasused suggests characters events: and The uses them rather than caredaboutthem, much as a preacher point. In rousing and old stories strawmento drive homesome is and aboutthe cheracters events*such our suspiour concern cion,right or wrong-he hassetus up, treatingusnot asequals but as poor dumb muleswho must be holleredand whipped we the into wisdom. Second, suspect writer of a kind of frigidrre out ity.By thenatureof our mortality,I pointed earlier, care dislikcthat which aboutwhetwe know andmightposibly lose, what we careabout,and feel indifferenttoward that threatens on bearing our safetyor the safetyof what which hasno visible we do not readfiction primarily in order to we love.Though 6nd ruleson how to live or, indeed,to find anythingthat is in ourselves the engage directly useful,we do sympathetically Readinga pieceof strugglethat produces fictionalevents. the up fiction that ends nowhere-no win, no los; life asa treadmill -is like discovering, after we haverun our heartsout against forgot to switchthe clock,that the timekeeper the timekeeper's suchfictioncanordinarilyproduce clockon.I'he only emotions thoughvalid and and emotions, areweariness despair, those and (finally) by the natureof the universe, cveniustified perhaps arc les usefulto the conductof our livesthan arethe emotions we exercise otherkindsof fiction.Not evenAristotlcwould in

Interest Trutb snd

tt

arguethat fiction ougbt to be cathartic; he saysonly that zuch fiction is most satisfying.But certainly more is involved than simplcpleasure displeasure. leastin comparison or At with thc resolved ending (Aristotle would havesaidif the question had comeup), the endingin logicalexhaustion morallyrepugnant. is Wc have said that by definition and aestheticnecessiryI story containsprofluence, and that the conventional kind of profluence-thoughother kinds are possible-is a crusally rclatedsequence events. of This is the root interestof all conventional narrative.Because is intellectuallyand emotionally he involved-that is, interested-the readeris led by succesivg seemingly inevitable steps, with no falsesteps, no necessary and steps mising, from an unstable initial situationto its relatively stableoutcome. seems pity that it shouldbe necesaryto It a arguea point so obvious, and I will not, ar any length; to instruct the readerthat he shouldquit when he gets bored, or instruct the wrirer that he shouldrry nor to be boring, seems absurd. Nevertheless, curenr fictional theory and the practicc of somefashionable writers makeat leasr somediscussion thc of matterworthwhile. A basiccharacteristic all good art, then-all man-made of works that ere eesthetically interesdngand lasting-is e concordof ends means, form andfunction,Thesinequanon and or of narrative, far asform is concerned, that it takes so is time.We cannotreada whole novel in an instant,so to be coherent,to work as a unified expericnce necesarilyand not iust accidentally temporal,narradvemust show someprofluenceof development.What the logical progress an argumentis to nonof fiction, event-sequence fiction. Pager, evenif it's a pageof is to description, raisesquestions, suspicions, and expectations; thc mind castsforward to later pages, wonderingwhat will come about and how. It is this castingforward that draws us fron paragraph paragraph chapterto chapter. leastin con. to and At ventionalfiction, the momentwe stop caring where the story will go next, the writer has failed, and we stop reading.Thc

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NOTES ON LTTERARY-AESTHETTCTHEORY

shofter the fiction, needlesto sry, the lessthe nced for plc profluence.A story of threc or four pagsmey still interest A.nd of coursenot all though it haspractically no movement. fiction needmove at the samepace.Runnersof the hundredwey runne$ of the marayard dashdo not take off in the same novel would of thon do. If the openingpeges a thousend-page serveequally well es the openingpagesof r shon $oryt thc is likelihoodis that the novel-opening wrong. (This is not quite a firm rule, admittedly. A long novel may begin with greet stride. But urgency,then graduallysettle into its long-distance b the writer's timing in his openingpages a signalto his reader'r expecmtions.) In any case,any narradvemore than e few prges long b doomedto failure if it doesnot st up and satisfyplot exPectrtions. Plotting, then-however childish and elementaryit may or philosophers, with the work of surgeons, seem comparison in nuclear physicists-must be the first and foremostconcern of of the writer. He cannotwork out his sequence eventswithout are at leastsomenotion of who the characters to be or where the actionis to takeplace,andin practicehe will neverdesigna imply. To saythat notion of what is elements plot without some not to sey thxt it b plot must be the writer's first concernis necesarily the first thing that dawns on him, setting off his prolect.The writer'sfirst ideafor thestory-what Henry Jama callsthe "germ"-may not be en eventbut an interestingcharacter,setting,or theme.But whrteverthe origin of the story idea,the writer hasno story until he hasfigured out a plot that it. will effciently and elegentlyexpress Though characer b the andthoughactionwith no meencoreof greatfiction, emotional can ing beyondits own brute existence haveno lastingePPd' plot is-or must sooneror later become-the focts of every goodwriter'splan. Thc writer works out plot in oneof threewap: by borrowing some uaditionalplot or an ectionfrom red life (the method Doetoernky,end many of the Greek tragedianqShakespcare,

IwerenotdTmb

t?

other writerg ancientmd modern); by worting hb way bect from his $ory's climax;or by groping his way forc/xd from an initid situation.Sinceusudly one doesnot work out plot dl at one, but broods over it, mentally trying dtemativeg rting notegcarryingthe ideein the backof one'smind asonercadsor doesone's laundry,workingand reworkingit for daysor monthl or, sometimeq years,one may in pmcticework both backward and forward or even in dl three of the posible wap simultaneously. Whateverh"pp* in lif*a curiors fact one comc across one'sreading (why ir b that pit vipen can sesin thc in derk), s snatch of conversation, somthingfrom thc ncmr. peper$ a fight with one's landlord,--all this becomes possiblc materialfor the shapingof the plcA or for cheracers,sning, md themeas they may influencethe ploe In e later chaper ("Ploaing"), we will examine detailhow by eachof the tlua in methods I've mentioned above-and by other methodsleil likely to produceeft-{he writer builds up his story. For the moment,more generalobservations an abuzct -dyrit of and onekind of ploning will serva iust Tlre wrirer who beginswith e treditionalsrory or sorncection drawl from life haspan of his work donefor him already. He knowswhat happened in genenl, why. The mainwork an4 Ieft to him is that of fig*ing out whar pan of the story (if not the whole) he wans to tell, what the most efficient vay of telling it b, and why it is that it interestshirn Saythe story that hascaughthisattentionb that of Helen of Troy. The mph is largeand complexmd comc down to rs in meny forrns,some themcontradictory,if not mutudly excle, of sivg someversions suictly fabulour-as when Helen's mothr, I*da, is rapedby Zcusin the guiseof I swan,or aswhen Parb vunds before the thneegoddese* auempting to choosebotween thenp-other versions suitablefor modernrealistictreetment.A givenwriter may find his intereststined by almostrny of the story'smaineventsTroy umsa rictr, cosrropolitan ciry; in its ruins, archeologiss found iadc, rulong other thing* ploving

t8

TtlEoRY NOTES LITEMRY-AESTHETTC ON

that Troian traders had contactsas far awey as China. Thc on Achaians, the other hand, whom Helcn lcft when shc fled with her Troian lover, Paris,were cowherds, from her husband raiders-from the Troian point of view crude bargoatherds, to been, saynothingof Helenmusthave How surprised barians. how Parisandhis fathcr thc king felt, when her peopledropped cverything,calledtogcther relativesfrom far and wide, left stonetowns, and cameafter her with r thcir lcan-tosand harsh, thousandships.That moment,her alarm at the news, might pulled their famous maker story. Again, whcn the Achaians of trick, thepeace-offering theTrojan hone,which the Troians that it wasloaded insidethc wallsof the city, unaw,uc dragged Helen is saidto havegoneout at night with Achaiansoldiers, and to havc called to the soldiersin the voicesof their wiveq hopingshecould trick them into revcalingthcmsclvc--but she That cvent, too, saidnothing to rhc Trolans of her suspicions. hasastrangeness might makea goodstory. that Thc writer may decideto treat both of thesccvens, pcrhape othen aswell, in a singlework; but to the extcntthat eachevcnt formsa narrativeclimax,hc thinksout thc two or morecventsas climacFor narrativcunits,or episodes. cachcpisode's seperatc up tic cvent,he borrows from legendor makes on his olvn exin actly asmuchashc nccds order to makethe climacticevent (a) meaningful (b) convincing. instance: wc ere (a) For If and Helen's surpriseat the arrival of her relafully to understand to tives (if thc evcnt is in this primarf sense havemeaning; implications), if we're and nevermind the largerphilosophical (b) to bc convincedthet her relativesreally did comein such astounding numbers,the writer must somehow6nd I wa)r to are peoplcthc Achaians strangc showusclearly ( r ) what these likc that they'd rcactin suchI wey, (r) what the Troiansarc like, and espccially Paris,that he shouldmakcsucha blunder, her rsPonse. and (l) why Helen did not anticipate kinsmen's the All this, if the story is to bc vivid and suspenseful, writc not sccnesr by mustfind twal ro showus dramatically, cnactcd

lntnest tndTrutb

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authorialessa)'s lengthy setspeeches the characters. thc or by If is to be eficient andelegant the sense mathemetistory (in thar cal proofs are elegant), the writer must inuoduce no more background even$or major characters than strictly nece$ary (and,obviously, less),and mustintroduce no these materials in the smallest possible numberof scenes, scenc each rhythmically proportionate thosesurrounding, rhat the paceis regular to so or, if appropriate, regularacceleration. other words,if it in In is posible to show in a singlescene--clearlyand powerfullyboth what the Achaians like andwhy Helenwill not edticiare pate their response her flight with Paris,the efficientand to writer doesnot usetwo or threescenes. scerc we elegant By meanhere all that is includedin an unbrokenflow of action from oneincidentin time to another(the scene the breakfast at table,the scene by the chariottwo hourslater, the scene out between Helenandthe priestin the temple, wharever). or Thc actionwithin a scene "unbroken"in the sense it does is that not includea maiortime lapse a leapfrom onesettingto another or -though the characters walk or ride from one may,of course, placeto anotherwithout breaking scene, camera, to the so the dollyingafter them.The actionwithin e scene speak, need not be "unbroken"in the sense it includes flashbacks brief that no or authorial interruptions background for is explanation. scene The not broken, otherwords,whena character's in mind drifts from surrounding some present to earlier scene, which is thenvividly set beforeus for the time the flashback lasa.The efrcient and writer makes cleganr eachscene bearasmuchasit canwithout clutter or crowding,andmoves the smoothesrr by swiftesttransitions possible from scene scene. to In additionto wuching the rhythm of hissceue-thetempo or pece-the writer pays close attention, in constructingthe to scene, the relationship, eachof its elements, emphasis in of and function.By emphasis meanthe amountof time spent we on a pardculardetail;by functionwe meanthe work doneby that detail within the scene the story asa whole. Let us say and

THEoRT NorDsoN LTTEMRY-AESTHETIc

behinda curtain to look for a loot point Helensteps thet at some she and because is there she happensto overheara brooch, Sincethe function of Helen'ssteppingbehindthe convenadon. the curtain is relatively slight and mechanicd, good writer gets (havingset up the her behindthe curtain asquickly aspossible inevitableand natlost brooch earlier,so that her action seems of unl). If he dwellsat lengthon the appearance the curteirLor emphasis in shesteps behindit, the moment's as Helen'sgesture a dull spotin the to is disproportionate its function andbecomes sincethe tuthor's hoo-rah narrative,or annoyingly misleading larger out' leads aboutHelen'sdisappearance us to expectsome comethanwe get the All these considerations author bears in mind, conof or intuitively, as he constructshis sequence events sciously (Helen'ssurprise).If his story plan is to teadingto the climax he be successful, must rightly analyzewhet is logically neces' $ry to the climax. If he showsus what the Achaiansare like and what the Troians are like, but fails to realizethat he must how her kinsmenwill alsoshow us why Helen doesnot guess behave, climaxwill lack inevitability and,thereforerporrvr. the to Agdn, if the planof the story is to work, the writer's solutions the problemsinvolved in authenticatingthe climax must be her credibleandapt. If Helenloses broochby throwing it at her is Menelaos a drunkard and Menelaos, partly because husband, againsther will, she'sfalling in t lezy o$ and partly because, love with their guestParisand his fine city ways, the curtain but explained, we arelikely to doubt may be conveniently scene with the help of his brother AgamemnorS that Menelaos, even force that goesafter her. could organize huge,stern-minded the Thus in thinking about ploq the writer must alsothink about and character its effecs. He must think, at the sametime, about why it is that the story interestshim. Whether he is using a traditiond plog en he's madeup, no writer action dram from life, or something combinetion his chooses story by pure whim or the mechanical

l*crestcnilTt*b

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than of randomelemenc.For the good writer, nothing is easier makingup poasible stories. pushed, canspinthem out hour If he sequence of rfter hour, eachoneof themtheoreticallysound---a evens leadingto someclima& or, in longer narrativc, an epi" sodic sequence climaxes.(Helen's surpriseand helplesnes of might naorally leadto e second climx, her behaviorhlow the Troian horse.)But of the thirty plotshecanthink up in an hour, only one-if eventhat-will catch and hold his interest,make him want to write. How odd, a different writer might say,that of all the storicsone might tell about Helen, this writer has chosena uivial, psychological climax, Helen's srprisel What the writer's interestmeans that the climactic eventhassruck is some chord in him, onethet seems worth exploration.ICs thc by whole proces of fint planningthe fiction and then urriting itcleboratingchencte$ and detailsof sening, fi"ding the syle that seems appropriate thc feeling,discovering to unanticipated requiremensof the plot-that the writer finds out end corngtunicatesthe story's significance,intuited at the stan. He knows that his firs iob is to authenticate what I earlier celled the story'sFtimary meaning:Helen'ssuqprise. surprise r The i:s feeling, one thet snikes us as conclusive,an implied discoveq1'.But, like all conclusivefeelings,Helen's surprisesuggests somelrrger, secondmymeaning,not iust one person'sf""ling but r univenal humanfeeling,someaffirmationor recognition of a value.It is usually in this larger, secondalysense that we qpeak the "meaning"of worls of an of The lerger "meaning" of e story, we shouldpause herc to note, may or mey nor comefrom our ebstraction or rhought of about what I've calledabovea conclusive emotion.But it does dways come (at leastthis is true in every caseI can think of) from feeling.In the classic ca$e-esin rhe Helen srory we're in the proces of makingupit comes with the resolutionof irony; drat is, it comc at the momentthe characterknows what we lrnow and hevelrnown for somedme.KingLeu. Emna. Miildlennch.In our Helen story, if the writer hasdonc his wort

6z

THEoRY NorEs oN TJTEMRY-AESTHETIc

well, uc know whet the Achaians like and what the Troiars are rrc likc, how the Achaian community, though et first glance crudeandbarbaric, a profoundsense kin responsibiliry, has of a scnse justiceandpropriery that it is willing to extendevento of invited guests(Paris,when he gosto Menelaos' and first house mcetsHelen), and how the Trojan community,though vastly superior in its culture and sophisticadon, superior,too, in its cosmopolitanevolution beyond ethnocentriciT, has becomc morelly lax and has perhap come to expecta similar moral hxity in othcrs (so thar Paris doesnot anticipatethe Achaian raponsc); but thoughtrle know dl this, Helen,because something hasdistractedher attention--+ point we mustreturn todoesnot know until word comes that the Achaianshipshave bcen sightcd.In other kinds of story, the secondaqy larger or mcrning mey bc released other ways.For example, may be in it our fccling rbout the wholemovement the storyr not the final of cmotion of the character,that we abstractto an affirmationof vrlues (secondary meaning).In the naturalistmode-fiction likc Dreiscr's-the charecterfights fcrociously for something but is finrlly beaten forcc and endsin down by overwhelming sorrow or despair, fully awareof what hashappcned him. to not to It is not the despairthat we ab,stract someuniversalvalue, but the struggle.But howeverit may be achieved, all great in fictior\ primary emotion (our emotionaswc rcad,or the charactcrs'cmotions,or somccombinationof both) mrst sooneror later lift off from thc panicular and bc ransformed to en cf,prcsion of what is univenally good in humanlife-whet promotcshappiness the individual rlonc and in sociery;in other for words, somcstetement value.In good fiction, this univenal on stetcmcntb likely to bc too subtle,too loadedwith qualifications,to bc expressed any way but thc story'sway; it may bc in imposiblc, that is, to reduccto any rulc of behavioror generel thcsis.Wc andnstand thc value,undentandit with great prccision, but evcn the shrcwdestlitcrary critic may havc troublc formulatingit in words andthustelling usthe story's"m6sage.'

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It ir in this sense that thc "philocophy" in fiction h n'concrete philosophy": Ficdon's meaning(whet I havc called secondary meaning)is assubstantial, groundedin the actual,esere thc or clemensof which it is built. So it is thar fuistotle tells us that a dramaticaction, like life, can imply the metaphysical, that so as thc philosopherabstrectsfrom thc ectual to mcaphysical theory, thc literary critic or scnsitivc readcrcan abstract the out metaphysical implications fictionalcvens;bur fiction'smcar of ing canno morebecome, itself,metaphysical a cow in r by rhan 6eldcanevolve into a Platonic idea. Perhaps analogymay bc of help herc.In orthodoxChrisrn tianiry the believeris told that all formal codes, eventhc shifting cods of situational erhics, supplanted "the penon of are by Christ " "I am the Wzy," Christ sap, meaning, onestandard by interpretation, if the believer giveup hisheartandsoul that will to Chrl*, letting Chrisr'spcrsonaliry"entcr in" like a daemonic force, hc canthen act rightly in cvery situation,becattse fact in he is no longerthe agent;Chrisris-a divinity who can do no wrong. Thc believer's actionsflow nor from any theory of right and wrong but from what an obiectivcobserver-a sympathetic non-believer, say-would call an ingested metrphor: the life andpersonality Christ.Long anddcvoutstudyof Christ's of life and worls has givcn the belicvcr a model of behaviortoo subtlc and complex for vcrbal exprcssionbut ncvenheless truswonhy. In thc same way, fiction provides, its best,trusrwonhy but at inexpressiblc models.We ingesrmetephors good,wordlasly of learningto bchave morc likc Levin than like Anne (n Anna Knanina), morc likc thc transformed Emma (in JaneAusten's novel) than like the Ernmawe first meetin the book.This sub dg for the most pan wordlas knowledgcis thc "uuth" grclt fiction sceks out. We havc seid that Helcn's suqpriscat thc errival of thc Achaiansis to bc, in the fiction wc are making up, an implicd discoveqy from which sprinp, for thc rcader and perhapnfor

6+

HstEsoN LrrEnARy-AEsrHETrcrHEory

Heler! someaffirmationor recognitionof a value.The quction we havenot quite answered How doesthe writer's working is: out of plot leadhim to Helen'sdiscoveryand his own discovery of what he meanslHaving analyzed what he must dramaticdly show to makehis climax (her surpriseand implied recognition) rneaningfuland convincing,the writer introducesfictional elemens eachof which carriesits burden of meaning.LiLe any good liar, the writer makes the mostconvincingexplanatiorr up he can think of for why the things that did not really h"pp.n might havehappened. top with varioustheoriesof why the He Achaians might havebehrvedasthey do-for examplgthe poosibility that, to. man,they are greedyfor the treasures Troy of and glad to we any ercuseto go after thcn\ or the posibiliry that they are movedto their action by the extraordinry cha' risna of Menelaos, the posibility (ab,surd but traditional) or that they arearoused actionby Helen'sb."oty.Taken siogly, to what none of thesepossibleexplanations will wash, because they sayaboutredity (what they "mean") doesnot suike us as true. Our experience humanitymakes hard for us to beliere of it (or membersof any other group) thrn that many Achaians could be so suongly motivatedby greed,though somemight so we ioin in for that reason; cannotbelievein charisma powerful it could movethat menykinp, eachof whom must hevehis own concen$ and troubles;and asfor Helen'sbeauty,we canr not help feelingthat no young woman'sbeautycan to that dGgrce excelthe beautyof all other young wome& including some who aresureto say,"Miklos, don't go! Think of the children!" wheo The Achaiancodeof honor,on the otherhand.--especially (which the combined with such lessermotivations as greed legend gives us in Agamemnon at his weaker momnts)' Menelaos' charisma, and Helen's beauty--+ffers persuasivc causc. the same By process, writer fig*o out why the Trothe what she do what they do aod why Helen doesnot guess ians shouldhaveguesed. SinccHelen,in this story is thc centrd charactcr,her neturc

Interest otdTrwb

65

rnd mcivetion will be of specidimporunce to dre convincingnes of the lie. One posible choice,it might seem fnt glencc, et is to make her an innocent victim. Shelteredand coddle4 brought up emongwomen,manied in her girlhood to mighty she Menelaos, hasno real knowledge her hard-working,hardof fighting Linsmen,their fanatical loyalry to one another, and their puritanical code.Though all thescqualitia might provc usefulto the writer, the decisionto makehcr a victim will bc disastrous. fiction can havercd interestif thc central charNo acter is not an rgent struggling for hh or her own goalsbut e victirq zubiectto the will of others. (Failure to recognize that the centralcharacter mustacq not simply be actedupo+ is thc singlemost conrmonmistakein the fiction of beginnen.) We carehow thingptum out because character czres--ourinterthe coms from empathy---and st thoughwe may know morethan the character knon6, enticipatingdangenthe charactercannot see,rye irn{erstandand to somc degreesympathizewith the character's desirg approving what the character epprovcs (what the charactervdues), evenif wc sense that the charecter's idealis impracticalor insuficient. Thts though we cln see rt e glancethat CaptainAhab is a madman, affrm his fudwe oushungerto know the rrurh, somuchsothat we find ourselves ceughtup, like the crew of thePequod, hislunatic quest. in And thus though we know in our bonesthat the theory of Ras. &olnikovis wrong, we sharehis sense outrageat the iniusticc of of things and becomeaccessories his murder of thc cynical in end cruel old pawnbrokeres.If we're bored by the debauched focal characters the Marquisde Sade, the other hand,thc of on reasonis that we find their veluesand goalsrepugnangtheir world view too supid (threatening? to hold our interest ) Helen, then, must bring her uouble on herself,through the activepunuit of somcgoal we believenot wrong-headed. The nobler the goal, the more interestingthe story. We need not elaboratc detail here the posibilities-her wish, ass child of in Zeugformorc intelligentandsophi*iertedcompen)r, honor hcr

66

THDoRY NorEs oN LITE*,tRy-AEsrIrETrc

rt the ethnocentricityof thc Grcekq her dsirc for gcater digand niry andindcpcndcnce, soon. Whrteverthe writer'schoicc of thc modvation Helen,he mustthink out thc implicatiors for with thc differing communiry of hcr motive,its rclationship We may end of values thc Trojansandthe Achaians, its origins. of fully rcalizcthc implications her motiveonly at thc moment the of recognition, climax*how (for cxamplc)hcr dcsircfor communiry is in indcpendcncecaught thecrosfire of conflicting we value-but long beforethat moment mustbc shownclearly' not iusttold, what her drivingmotiveis.To be shown,we must in bc shownby action;the proof mustappeer plot. Wc mustbe Helcn'sidealandthe functional berwccn shownthe reladonship on bclicfsof Troians,on oneside,Achaiam, the other,and this actionof Helcn'smight elicit onc in too mustappear plot. Some carly in the story' enotherfrom Paris, rcectionfrom Menelaos, or in the natureof Helen'scharacter, somcthing andsomething clucsasto why in the natureof that carly cvent,shouldgivc us end pcrhap Menelaos thc Achaians and Hclen undercsdmates sccurirywith Parb and the Troians. hcr overcstimater potential we Finally,if Hclcn'smotivcis to bc perfcctlyconvincing, must plot. Shc might rebe shownits origins;and that too means mcmbcrfrom her carly childhood,for cxamplc,lnmc event now a slavc-an event nurse, oncee quecn, involvinga beloved character. Helen'sdefiantand indepenCent that hclpcdto shape proofsfor e'e4/ significant thc All thesccvcnts, authenticating elemcntof the story, the writcr must weavcir.to a smoothly plot. flowing,inevitable-seeming Havingdoncall this,the writer is not quiterr:thc endof his' uoubles.Evcry proof the writer thinks up in ,;upportof the will haveits own implicaions and excrt story'$Iargerelements is own subtlepressurc the story.Thc old slavchc invcnted on to charactcr, shc's do thc work required if in supponof Helen's charof hcr (motivateHelen), mustbc r vivid and intercsting why her influenceshould wc acter;otherwisc cannotunderstrnd bc so powerful. But once a vivid and intercstinl:characterhas

Interen andTmb

6l

bccninuoduced,he or shccrnnot rirply be droppcd,forgottcn Oncethe charactcr goncJrrngcd, lct ussayhcnceforward. is we mis the chrracter; to put it anotherweyl we expcctthe or, character's rcturn, at leastin Helcnl memoqf. k will not bc suficicnt, thc writer will find, simply to mentionthc old slavc's namefrom time to time. fiough her work for thc srory is donc, shcmust comc brck, at lcastbricfy, end thc qucstionb: What h sheto do when shecomes back?Shc can't iust standthcrc. Forcedby the neccssiry his srory ro bring hcr back and proof vide her with somcaction, howcver brief, thc writer is forccd to think up somcfurthcr meaning thc chencrcr (it mey help for to ask,in this case, how the slave's defiantindependence diffcn from Helen's).It is panly in this way that the fictionel proccr forcesthe writer to s.y morc thanhc thoughthc could;that ie, to makediscoverics. At somepoint thc wrirer stopsplanningand ssrts writing, flching out the skeleton that is his plan. Hcre too hc b partly in control of andpanly controlled thc fictionalproccs. Again by rnd again,in the process writing, hc will find himsclf forccd of to new discovcrics. must crcatc,sffoke by stroke,powerHe fully convincingchrractcn and sertings; must more and he moreclearlydc6ne himself for what hisoverallthemcor idcais; and hc musrchomcend aesthetically iustify his genreand stylc. Charactcris crcatedpanly by an ascmbly of facts,including actions,panly by symbolic association. Thc first needsno commcnt. Menelaos san rathcr older than Hclen, a famous is, warrior, I poor rhetorician,e srern king but one eesilymovcd to teerc. Thcsearcsimply facts.Thc wrirer makes or borrows up from lcgcnd asmany of them as he necds, supportsthem with appropriatchabitsend gesturc, rnd showsin thc bchavior of othcr charactcrs whcn thcy dcal with Mcnclaoe that thc king b who andwhat he scems. often our deepcst But sensc chrracof rcr com6 from symbolicrsociation. Wc frcquently lcrrn about fictional characters wc identify pcoplc in thc game crllcd rs Smoke.or somctimcscdlcd Fsscnces.

68

NqrEs oN LrrtneRY-Ansrr{EtrcTHEoRY

In this gamethe player who is it thinh of somefamour de living or dead,suchasGandhi,Charles Gaulle,or personag Frank Sinatrq then tells the other players,"I em a deadAsiarq" t'I ame dead or am Europeanrt't'I e living American,tt whatever. by The playen, in order,try to gues the nameof the penonage are kind of smoLe you?" "Whet askingsuchguestions "What $ kind of weather ate you?" "\Mhat kind of animal are you?" enatomy?" And soon.The playerwho "Wbat part of the human b it arswen not in tenns of what the penonagemight have liked to smokgwhat wenher he might haveprefered, etc., but would Deif he were incarnatednot es t what the personage human being but :ls, sI, e certain Lind of smoke-<igareng Virginia Slims,White Owl, or cigar,pipe,or, morespecifically, the hince Alben pipe tobacco.As they ask their questions, a of playen develop powerful sense the penonalitythey're sceking, and when finally, on the basisof the information they'vc the the makes right guess, resultis likely to beengiven,someone of relief. Obviously the gamecannot bc be an orgasrnic sense on played with the intellect; it depends metaphoricintuition. Yet anyonewho playsthe gamewith goodplayen will discover whosenameis the that describe personage that the metaphors a prechion. cumulatively, remarkable have, least et beingsought by In fiction, characterization symbolicrssocirtioncan be infinitely more precisethan it can ever be in the geme,Partly (in are because the final draft) the metaphors cerefully considwe ered, and panly because ere dealing with a consistently goodplayer.The writer may usemeaphor direcdy, aswhen he tells us Parisis like a dapper,slighdy foolish fox, or he may work for symbolicesociationin subtlerwa1n.He may placer his characterin the weatherthat metaphoricallyexprsss naffq so that unwittingly we make e connectionbetweenthe gloomof Menelaos the gloomof the weetherat his back.Or and the writer may subdy incline us to identify Helen's character with the elegandy wroughtknife with which shecarves. the In feshing out his characters, writer doesnot ordinerily

IaterexodTnab

69

think out every implicetionof everyimagehe introduccsat thc time he introducc it. He writes by feel, inruitively, imagining the scene vividly end copying dom its mostsignificantderails, teeping the fictional dream alivg sometimeswriting in r thoughdess white heatof "inspiratioq" dawing on his unconcciouqttusting his instincts,hopingthat when he looksback at it later, in cool obiectivity, the scene will work. So he procee& th"ooghthe story, eventby event,chrracterby cheracter. Each time he sits down for anotherday's work, he may read over what he'sdong makingminor revisions getting a run on thc and pessege wherehe sopped.Different wrirershavedifferent wep of working, but the likelihoodis that the writer's chief concern, at this stage is with achievinga toally convincing, efrcient, rnd elegantaction.With somcexceptions, deails he brings the in hebringsin for thrt purpoee, nonedeeper. But et somepoint, perhaps when he'sfinishedhis ftst draft, the writer beginsto work in enotherway. He beginsto brood over what he'swrinen, readingit over andover, patientlp endlesly, leaing his mind wander, sometimes Picaso or the to Great $ramid, sometimes the posible philosophicel to implicetions of Menelaos'hp (r detail he introduced by impulse bccause seemed it righ$. Readingin this suzngeway lines he hasknown by hean for weels, he discovers tics his unconodd rcioushassentup to him, perheps curiow accidentdrepetitions of imagery: The brooch Helen threw at Menelaoc writer the has dacribed, he discovers, with the samephrasehe usedin describing, muchlater, the sealon the me$ege help sent to for ttreTrojans'dlies.Why? hewonden.Jusrasdreams havemeaning, whether or not w cen penetretethe meaning, uniter the assumes the accidents his writing may havesignifcance. that in He uies vrriow possibilitia; for irstance, the posibility that Helen'swish for independence panly self-delusion. is The ideo grows on hirn He readsthrough the stoqy againand becomes increasingly convinced. He makc tiny alterations.Helen's characterdeepens and flowers. In response, Menelac slighdy

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NOTES ON LTf,EMRY-AESTTIEf,IC THEORY

with the petience changes; doesParis. Slowly, painstakingly, so from men of equalgeniusbut les a that separates Beethoven divine stubbornness, great writer builds thc large, rockfirm the thoughtthat is hisfiction. What heppensin the writcr's developmentof characters and happens in his development atmospherc setting.Thc also of featureof the citiesof megaliths wallsthat form the salient and walkways thc top and antithetical the flowered to the Achaians, more stern, more alarmingin their Icsstowcrs of llium, gro$, as which he uses solidity with eachrevision. Menelaos'scepter, I can, on force. takes daemonic of Since somcwhere the end of his planning the 6ctior\ neer idea or the writer hasknown pretty clearly what the general theme of the work is to be. By theme here we mean not "message"-e word no good writer likes appliedto his workof but thc general subiect,asthe themcof an evening debates may bc World-Wide Inflation.Sinceearly on, it hasbeenclear that in our Helenstorythethemchashadto do with community (Anotherwriter, makingdifferentchoices andindividual values. about plot and character,might wcll haveemerged with a difon fcrent theme, suchasLife venusArt-the Achaians oneside, as theTroianson theother,with Helenin the crossfire both wifc and lover, both keeper of the householdgoods and fanatical artist when she worla et her loom---or the writer might have organizedthe story in terms of Body and Soul.) Givcn his choiceof communityand individualvaluesas his theme,the writer sharpens clarifieshis ideas,or finds out exactly what rnd it is that he must say, testing his beliefs againstrealiry as the story represensit, by examiningevery elementin the story for ia possibleimplicationswith regard to his theme. He thinks eboutMenelaos'scepter, example. occursto him that the for It sceptermight be e legecy from Menelaoe' father, hencea q'mbol of, amongother thinp, tradition or continuity (the detail might not comup if the themewere Life and Art); and once thb hasoccurredto him he may be led to wonder if tradition is

Intnest rndTruth

lr

viewed in the sameway or in different ways by the Achaians and the Trojans,and,if the latter,whetherParismight alsobe given someappropriate symbol,and if so, what? And precisely what does symbolimply? The thought of tradition brought this down from fathersto sons-a thought reinforcedby the inevitable prominencc old King Priam,Paris's father,in the stoqy's of later segments-maylead him to museon Helen's lincagc,half human,half divine.Grantedthat the writer would havc difficulry believing the literal rape of Helen'smotherby Z.uC in what might thc symbolicdoubleheritage What legitmean? imacy can be found for thc metaphor? Finalln the writer must6nd for hisstory whrt seem him to the mostappropriate genreandstyle.Herc too hischoices havc implications.In origin, the story of Helen is of coursccpic-e deadform.What happens throwingczutionto the winds,thc i( writer decides reviveit? As practiced Homer,the epicwas to by e quecrson of serious yarn: The poet tells, often, of impossiblc no thingsandmakes bones aboutthe fact of their imposibility; yct he doesnot, like the yarn-spinner, wink at us, encouraging us to enioy the lie for the cunningand wit of the liar. Neither doeshe,Iike a talenarretor, makea point of distancing stoqy his in timc and spacgor of penuadingus by tone and atmoephcrc that we shouldsuspend disbelief. When humanbeingsarc involvcd (Achilles'talkinghorses warninghim of his death),thc poet spcaks seriously. We must readthe eventascxpresionistic truth, as when Gregor Samsa woke up and discovered himsclf changed a cockroach. to When the godsare involved,the poet mey speak a way morc troublesome our modernmind-sct in to For Homer and his eudience, godsare simpln somehow, the outsideforcesthat can daemonically cnter or otherwiseact on humanbeinp, influencingtheir lives. (Someof Homer's gods have ueditional nameslike Zeus;othershave nameslikc C,onfusion.) Sincethc way in which the godswork can nevcr bc hnown, Homcr makes humanlike up behavior them,somefor timesapologizcs comedyfor thc anifice, yet meens by what he

?2

TIIDOBT NOrEt| Ot{ TJTERART'-ADSTHEM

eys. When divine wisdomgivc wey to someother forug it b ct rf Hera hasput Zers to slap by r sexual seduaion The rcnt b comic, the effect penly t"agic; and to makethingpmore confusing, thce same divine artificescanfeel soraowwc repccg not at dl the comic wailing of clowns.Thoogh on refection wc mty understand Homer'smethodand recorumrct the ancientmindset,I think wc must sey thet we simply qrnnot tbink likc thaa To revive the 9pic, thc modernwriter must commit himself to irony and a deuchd self-consciors obieaivity foreign to thc odgind epic sryle. He cznnot writc an epic but only an cerirst parody that worts chiefly asr snrdy of the anistic minil or asr Gomment an by an. Perhap thb prrodic revival of the genrr on might work for the uniter who haschmen to treat thc Heleo stoqy as a fictional explorationof Life versr Arg but if thc nrriter's themc is privatc and commturity vducs, drc lcvivel of cpic form seems fruidess. What happens he choces to tell thc sto{y as l tele?Thc if inherent dig.ty and solemnityof the form would obviorsly bc srdtableto the content of the story, and at first glancethc mr' tedelssefii easilyadaptablc the tale'sbesicrules The setdng to of e tale b customarilyremotc in eirhr time or spaceor both and is presented with a mixftre of vaguenesand gencraliryon hand and with meticulouslycxact deteil on the other. Thc one vdter's carein supplyingexactdetail encouregs credencqand the remotenesqtogaher with thc vegucnss end genemlity, tendsto preventthe readerfrom consideringthe reality or utrrediry of the setting.The landscape e tde b of a kind likely of to inspire the rEader's wonder-lonely moors,sunny meadouq, wild mountains, dark forests,desolatc seecoests-and both netural and man-madefeaturesof the sening are frcquendy of great eg9 suggesting past chargedwith traditions and vdues a that impose thernselves the will of the cherecters on Tde characters designed be convincingwithout mg. ere to gestingcomparison with real people.They behave recogniz" in ably human wa1n, but they may be superneturalbeingq anrl

IntercstnilTruh

?,

evenwhen they scemto bc in mostrspccts ordinary mco like and women,they tend to be e little larger than life and may possess extraordinarypowers.Uke the settingsin the tale, the charactersusually have a certain remotenss. Thry may bc counts,king:, knighs, rich merchants, peasams, cobblers. Often they are entirely evil or entirely good (the superlative conr is mon in the tale-"the richesg" 'the fairesq' "the oldest" "the wlsst'). Although characters mey be comple4 the derailsof their complexityare often blurred, asif by time Only the significant aspecsareretainedin the narrator'smemory,and often the narrator,it is clear,hasthe stor)rat second hand,perhaps by rncient oral tradition. The characten'actions-the plot of thc ule-may or may not obey the laun of cause efrectoprrr and tive in the actud world, but evenwhen they do nog they sem netural becanse their psychological poetic truth. The re, of or dity of the world of the tale,in other wordq is that of e moral universa What ought to happen, posible or not, doa happeo. For the Helen story wete beenworking oug much in the genrcof the tale seems promising.The supernatural elenrensin the Helen tradition fit naturdly with sle prcsentarion, thorgh the esential gothicismof the genre might incline us to tneet Greek godsandgoddeses rather liLe witches;the uaditionel as effect of the story's main characters, larger than life, ilsap all proprirte for the genre;and tte tele's cllstomary errphasis on oldnes and tradition might nanually qpring intercring ideas and developments guessed advance thc writer. Yet we not in by notice certainproblems that may in the end prove insurmountrble. The principle of eusality in a sle is prychologicd end mordly upresionistig or poetic: It shouldnor b the Achaians who cometo fill Helenwith sqprise--forcesoutsideher-but r necessery doom arising from her own pnycholog:f, somcsup. presed truth that ct last risesto take revenge.If we say that Helen left her peoplefrom vanity, as thc "fairest of rll thc Achaians,"then the claimsof a tale versionof the Helen srory might be somethinglite this: She is told thrt e thoussnd

7+

THE0RY ON NOTES LTTERARY-AESTHSnC

Achaian shipshave beensighted,and when shc flies out' ter' rified, to look, shesces they arc all filled with armedwomcn thet who look cxactly likc herself.The posibilities in this ere Perthe hapsintcrestingand might encoumge writer to work back from the climax to fill in the logical necesitiesof this dilferent but conclusion; herewe encounterthe secondlargeproblemin prcscnting storyof Hclcn asa tale. the Though it's pardy I mattr of the individual writer's intuitoo tion and taste,it may scemthat thc new cnding clashes noticcrbly with the Grcck story as wc know it. Indeed, the rather fierccly with our wholc tonc of thc talc genre clashes fcelingsabout Greeceand Troy. Though thc war hrwcen thc two took placelong agoand in a far-awaycountry, it doesnot fcel to us remotc in timc and space.One might conceivably rrritc e talc in which QueenFlizabethand King Hcnry (any onc King Hcnry) havepartsrs minor characters; might posibly or writc r talc aboutNapolconendJoeephinei onc might writc e ulc including Charlemagno-rs&lvino docsin Thc Nonesistent Knight (not a purc talc but a gencrichybrid). But Grcck uadition secms somehow full of sunlightandsharpimagcry' too too chargcd with Homeric immediacy,to rccommodatcthc would bc to pcrhaps, solutionn moodof e talc. Thc only possiblc changc thc localc and all thc charactcrs'nemes,placing thc anival of thc mysrcriousships off thc coast of, sry' ancient Norway. How thc stoqywould work set asx yern wc neednot clab, orate. Wc sce et once that r yarn-spinnu would havc to be inuoduccd; and someimplied reasonfor his spinning of thc yrrn; rnd iustification would have to be found for tclling so xrc scriousr story comically. Such adaptations not impmsiblg though thc proicct mey seemunpromising.Thc yarn-spinncr in might bc, for once,an old woman,andher purposc tclling thc hcr heroine,a sory might bc subdy fcminist. Making Helen shrcwd woman who at cvery turn comically ouwvitshcr malc t'supcriorc," cscapcto frccdom.Here,if not sooncr'thc yern shc

Intercst otilTrutb

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might go derk, becominga generichybrid (yarn crossed with realisticstory): Helen'sultimatefailure,tonally conflicting with all that went before,might give, howeversubtly, an angry,revolutionarytone to the conclusion. The reader's indignationat the unhappyendingmight be madeto release meaning<r, the in this casc,implied message-thatwomen,howeverthey may strugglcandwhatever are in their brilliance, alweysbeaten the cnd by malechauvinism, conditionthat ought not to prevail. a If all thisweredonein too obvious fashion, story would of a the lightnes of course boring;but for the writer with sufficient be touch and a gift for authentichumor, thc yarn hybrid might havce gooddealof subtletyandinterest, everydetailserving ia feminist the theme, relative powerof menandwomen. Findly, the story might bc told more or lessrealisticalln as Gidc treas Greek legendin his novella"Theseus."The story's supcrnatural elements, not suppresedentireln would in this if case carefully playeddown, treatedasgivensand quickly left be behind for the story's main action, already realistic in namre. Sincethe plot wc've worked out is inhercntly one suitablefor rcalisticprescntation, needsayno more. we Thc last maior element that rnay modify the fictional thought is style. In true yarn and tale presentation, style is a givcn. If the story is presented the form of a realisticnovel, in novella,or short story, or in somehybrid crossof realismand somethingelse,the writer's choice of sryle becomes serious a consideration. neednot spell out all the variouspossibilitia We of stylisticchoice(to do sowould be impossible any case); in it will bc enoughsimply to suggst that eachchoicehasimplications. Thc writer must decidewhat point of view he will tsg what dictionlevel,what "voice,"whatpsychic-distance rangc. If hc hasHelen tell the story in the fim person,he hasthc probIem, at once, of establishing the information Helen herself mises (the natureof the Achaians and the Trojans). In any Iong fiction, Henry James remarked, of the firsr-penonpoint use of view is barbaric.James may go roo far, but his point is worrh

16

NorEsoN LTTERARY-AESTHETICrHEoRI

min4 locts First penon locls ns in one character's considering. us to one kind of diction throughout,locks out posibilities of and going deeplyinto variouscharacters'minds, so fonh. What calledthe 'third-person-limitedpoint of view," or b somaimcs 'third person for drawbacks r has zubiective," someof the same long pieceof 6ction. (This point of view is esentially the same rs first personexcept that each "I" is changedto "she" or point of view, "Helen.") The traditionalthird-penon-omniscient of narrator (a persona in which the story is told by an unnamed the euthor) who can dip into the mind and thoughtsof any primerily on no more than two or characer, though he focuses threc, givc the writer greatestrange and freedom.When he pleases, narrator cen speekin his own voice,filling in necthis yet background offering obiectiveobservations; when or essaqy would be intrusive, he the sceneis intenseand his presence can write in the third-penon-limitedpoint of view, vanishing A for the momentfrom our consciousnes. relatedpoint of view b that of the essayist-narrator, much like the uaditional omniccientnarratorexceptthat he (or she) hasa definite voice and definite opinions,which may or mey not be reliable.This narretor mey be vinually a characterin the story, having e n:rme and somedistant reletionshipto the peopleand eventshe devoice. ecribes, may be simply a particularizedbut unnamed or The choice of point of view will largely determinedl other ehoices with regerdto style-wlger, colloquial,or formal dicand of speed sentences, so on. tion, the lengthand characteristic obviouslnis the extentto which What the writer mustconsider, on point of view, and dl that follows from it, comments the cherrcteq ections,and ideas.Volgo diction in the telling of r the Helenstory would clearlycreate white-hotirony, probably dl but unmanageable. C,olloquialdiction and relatively short onceelewould havethe instanteffect of humanizing sentsnces vrted characters evens. Highly formal diction and all that rnd nerrator might seem goesalongwith the traditional omniscient of ly for dre seriousnes the sory but h ir"di"t

brwestotdTrutb

77

can easily backfre, providing not suitable pomp but mere pompousnss. somechoices point of view, rs well asin And in other sryli*ic elementgmay have more direct bearingon the therneth,rn would others.For instancg the "town" point of view, in $hich the voice in the story is someunnamed ryokesman for dl the community-among the most famou cxamples b Faulkner's"A Rosefor Emily"-+night havethe immediatc c.ffectof foregroundingthe story's conuolling idea,conflictiag communityvalues versus personal vdues.

We hevelookedenoughat the fictional proces to seehow thc conventionaluniter's choiceq from such large choicesas sub i."t, plotr character,setdng, and theme to choicesebout the rrnelles daail of $yle can.ll h"lp him discoverwhat it is he wants to say.We haveseenthat the process at every stage is both intuitive and intellectual The u/riter chooses subiect his beeuse it appeals him--a matter of feeling$ut in develop to hg rq ft* in his pla+ then in his writing, he continudly dependsboth on intellectualfaculties,suchas critical absraction and musing and on intuitionJis geoeralseose of how the world works, his impulses and feelings.Having conrc this far, we cln get better perspective our original quctionr on rbout aesthetic interestandtruth in conventional fiction. Both for the writer and for the careful reader after him, cverythingthat happens r well-constructed in story, from major events the mosttrifling turn of phrase, a ma$erof acthetic to ie interest Sincr the writer haschosenevery elementwith carg and hasrevisedand rqpeetedly re-revised an rttempt to rcadr in something aesthaicperfection,eveqyelement encountr like wc is worth savoring. Evely character sufrciendyvivid aodintcris estingfor hisfunction; eve{yscene iust long enougb itst rich is enough; every metaphor is polished; no symbol sands om crudely from is nntrix of events,yet no resonrnce gocscrrrF plaely unhear4 too dyly mufled by the literal Though we

78

THEORY ON IrroTDs LmRART-AESII|EnC

rtad the work againand againand agin, wc ctn nsvcl sccmto get to the boaom of it. Natunlly suchsubtlery-a story containingsucha trcasury et of pleasures-isachieved somccost.To work so beautifully, asquickly or simply asdoesa comicbook. (Thc it cannotwork grcetcr thc subtlety,the greatcrthe sacrificc.)It is for this reason that the readerwho lovcsgrcat fiction is willing to Put uP as "Deathin Venice,"an with rn opening slowasthat of Mann's tedious thoscwho readnothingbut to opcningthat might seem not Houaril the Duck. This clearlydoes mcanthat the scrious to and writcr shouldmaker point of beingtiresome intcllcctual drive awry dolts.If he respecsthe teader,if he honestlyconwould likc to read,the writer will choosc sidenwhat he himself charecters and the mostimmediately powerfullyintercsting and evcntshe can think of. Hc will go for, asthcy say,dramaturgy. No two writers, as wc've recognizcd,will think of quitc thc to and semccharacrcrs eventswhen thcy look for what appcals writersenjoy stories the cnd of thc world; some them.Some of prcfcr fascinatingtea parties.But if thc writer writes only of what honatly intercstshim, and if he thinks of his work not ti.ply es thoughtful exploration"as it should be, but also as he cntertainment, cannotfail to have,at leastfor somegroup of and serious, dcvotedreaders, both immediate lastingintercst. we If thc writer's work is fully succcssful, arelikely to sayof it, without thinking too carefully what it is that we mean,that the work is "true." We are in a position to seenow that our may wcll bc accuratc.We iudgment, however unconsidered, havc scen that even such r relatively trivial decision as the in choiccof diction level canalter the storyt implications strikto ing ways.Thosewho claim that ficdon hasno rclationship They point out that if we useshort truth makc much of this. wc sentences, short vowels,and hard consonants, get a totally thanwc do if wc uselong sendifferenteffect,on any subiect, No tcnces,long vowels, and nasalor liquid consonents. one

InterestEnilTrcth

79

would deny that this is truc. But what necdsto bc noticcd b that thc good writcr makeseach choicc he makcsbccarsc it seems him appropriate. fictionalclemcntcrn bc approprito A ateor not by only oneof two standards: is appropriatc thc It to work asen .n obiect without refcrenccto realiry, or it is ap propriatc eswe test it egainstour sensc thc actual.It secms of doubtful that art's clements cvu be eppropriatconly to onc cen another.Thc colors in e painting without rccognizablc imagc may be seid to be appropriateonly to one anorher,but it is humanemotionthat iudgcs,tcsting against itsclf. As for fiction, in any casc,it scems fair to erguc thag sincc no narrativc bcyond r cercrin length can hold interest without somc such profluenccas e causalrelation of cvcnts (by either rcal-world logic, comic mockJogc or poctic logic), no namativccxcept. very shortonc cencscap rcd-world relevancc Our comparison of thc work and realiry is rutomatic and instantancous. say To that a srylc feelsappropriate e subicctis to san then, that wc to belicvcit in somcway hclp usto sccthc subjcctuuly. Fiction sceksout truth. Granted, it scela a poctic kind of mrth, univcrsalsnot casily uanslatablcinto moral codc. But pan of our interest as we read is in lcarning how thc world worla; how thc conflictswe sharcwith thc writer rnd all othcr human bcings can bc resolved,if at dl; what valucswc can alfrm and,in gencrel,what thc moral risla erc.Thc writcr who cen't distinguish truth from a pcanut-buttcrsandwichcan ncvcr write goodfiction. What hc afFrms denn throwing awayhis wc book in indignation;or if hc affirmsnorhing,not cvcn orr on. nes in sador comic helplessnes, insistsrhat hc's pcrfectty and right to do so, we confutc him by cloeinghb book. Somcbad men write good bools, adminedly,bur thc reason that when is thcy rc writing they'rc bcner mcn than when they bcat their wiva and childrcn. When hc wrircq the manof impctuous bad character timc to rcconsidcr. has Thc fictional proccss hclpnhim sey what hc might nor havcsaidthat same night in thc tavcrn

8o

rnDoRr NorEItoN LIIERARY-ADSrIIETIc

Good men,on the other hand,neednot necesarily write good bools. Good-heartednesand sincerity rre no substitute for rigorouspursuitof the fictiond process. rhetoric is meantto deny the fact None of this high-minded that fiction is a kind of play. The cniter worls out what he thinls asmuchfor the ioy of it asfor any other reasonYet the remarle{ nc and earnesmes. b sometimes It play hasis uses by enemies fiction but by peoplewho love ig that whereas of and the scientists politicianswork for progres$ writer of fiction rcstatswhat hasd*qo beenknownoftdiog new expresion for familiar truths, edaptingto the age truths that mey seem outmoded.It is true thag in ueating human ernotion, with which wc're all familiar, thc cniter discovers nothin& merely clarifies for the moment,and that in aeating what Faulkner czlled 'the eternalverities," the writer ueats nothing unhearil of, sincepeoplchave beennaming and struggling m organize of their livesaroundeternalveritiesfor thousands yeers.It may even be uue thet many good writers feel indifferent to their work oncethey've finishedit. When they've chechedthtoogh thc galleyproofs,they mey neverlook againat the labor they've that an produccs devotedso muchtime to. But the fact remains the most imponent progrsscivilization knoun. Restatingold truths and adaptingthem to ttre ago eppl)nngthem in ways they were neverbeforeapplied,stirring up emotionby the inherentpower of narrative,visud image or musig artiss crack future. The age-oldidea of the door to the mordly necssar'' human agnity comesto rpply even to the indigeng even to now recendyevento women Thts is sleveq evento immigrants, not to s8y th6t great writing is propaganile. But becaruethe a fictiond procss selects thosefit for it, end because require ment of that proces is strong cmpatheticemotioq it turns out that the true writer's fundamentdconcern-his reasonfor fiodiog r zubiect interestingin the first place-is likely to be in humane.Hc seesinirsdce or misunderstanding the world rrormd hin, rnd he cunnotkeepit out of his story. It nsy bc

Interen otdTrutb

8r

true that he writes prinopally for the love of writing, and that in the heet of creationhe caresas much about the convincing dacription of Helen's face as he doesrbout the verities hcr story bringsto focts, but the mre literary anist is e far cry from who creete"toy fictior5" goodor bed--TV entertrinments those to tekethe perrsioner's mind off hris disrndexistencg self-regar& ing aathetic jokes,po6hsuper-realism, where emotionb ruld out and ideais thought fiction, or pomogr& , or nostalgia "olge phy. The true writer's ioy in the fictional procss his pleasre is in discovering, means can trusg what he bclievcssnd c.n he by effirm for dl time. When the lasttrump plays,he will be list* ing, criticizing, fgudng out the propr psychic distance.h shouldbe added,for honesty's sekg that the true literary rrti* andthemanorwoman whomakc "myfiction" maybethesamc prsonin different moods. Even on the subjectof high scriour. ness, mustbeware reckles high seriorsness. we of

4
Metafiction,Deconstruction,

andJazzing Around
wc'vc becn Not all fiction, old or new,worksby the principles cxaminingso far; in frct, though the thcory wc'vc bcentracing out hasbcenthe dominantthcory of fiction sincethe scvcntcenth ccnmry or so, mostof the lircrature of humanityworks by othersctsof principlcs.Thi lliad hasno "charactcrs," lcast at humanbcings. Tla not in the modernsensc-rounded, complcx Diaine Comedy and Beouulf have,at leastin thc fuistotelian scnsc, "plot"-no causallyrelatedscqucncc cvcns. And no of mmy greatworkg from the Gilgamesh Pmadise to Losr-if not Pound's Ccntor-proceed not by rcndercd rctiors, as Hcnqy would haveevents proceed, by sct speeches. but James in narrative method rcfect changesin thc way Changes humanbeinp see-or think they ought to scc-the world. In a suongly authoritarian an agein which kings and counselage, lors arc revered es innately bener than ordinary men and womeq pcople fiction asa vehicle instruction. By tendto see of rncans fiction, thingsthe authorities of know to bc true arcsugercoatedand passed down to thosefor whom the truth is not so visible. It is hard to speakfairly of authoritrrian age, both becruse spirit rnd thcy're naturally repugnant the democratic to because they arc forever watching from the wings, hoping to 8z

MaafctionrDeconstrwtion, ImkS Arowd enil

83

*ize thc stageagain.But Jomeof thc greatest literaturc in the world comcs of sucheges, we needto understand out and how that litcrerureworksto undcrstand how our own worksandwhy our own, too,is fatedto suffcrconstant changc. Authoritrrian literaturc tcnds to work by thc allcgorical method,or rt leestgcts ia profluencefrom abtract logic (rhc dcvelopment en rrgumentfrom eto b to c), not by nngeia. of Takc thc greatcstwork of thb rypc in English (or, rather, arr cicnt English), Beauulf. The namativeis presentedin threc lergc scctions. thc first, I monstcrcallcd Grendel persecutc In the Danish peoplc until r hcroic fricnd from enother tribe, Bcowulf, kills the monstcr;in thc second secion, the monsrer's motherattacks Danc, hopingto evenge monsrrous the her son's death, rnd Beowulf kills hcr roo; end in the third section, Bcowulf, now an old, old man rnd king of the Geatishnatiorb fights a dmgon rnd dics himself in the rct of killing it. Thc sccond scction-Bcowulf and Grendel's mothcrloceeds crusally from the fint, but only by accident; end thc third scction-Beowulf and the dragon-hes no ceusalroos in the first or sccond sections. is not because It Beowulf killed Grcndct and his damthat he mustnow kill the dragon.Many yearshavc pased,and so far eswc can tell thc dragonnevermet Grendel or his mother. The principle of profluence in BeouruIf is abstract,not dnmatic, Grendelis idcntified in the poemasa symbol of unreson, who wersageinst order end lovcschaos. one ell Grcndel, in otherwords,leprescnts total malfunctionof oneof the three r parts of thc Platonic tripanite soul (cf. Plato's Republic), the intellecnal. Grendel'sdamrcpresensa total malfunctionof the sccondpan of thc tripartitc soul, the irascible (the part thag like a good watchdogor soldier,shouldfight for right against wrong). And the dragonrcpreentsr total malfunctionof the third parg the concapiscatt (th2t is, thc part that dealswith thing: phpical, suchasfood, wcalth, comfon). Thc comingof Grcndcl'sdamin thc sccondscctionof thc pocmsccms causally

84

rItEoRx llcrrEs oN LTTEnrRY-AEsI?EIIc

related m the death of Grendel, but in fact this is nc the principle of selectionthe poet was using; othenpisehe could way of btingng in the dragon.Causalhavefound somecausal a him; he wassheping Porn ity *as ti.ply not what interested the that would illustratg or demonstrate, relationshipbetween the soul'sthreeparts,showingthemat their bestin Beowulf and frmiliar with the poem Readers at their worst in the monsters. but will realizethat the pot wasdoing much morebesides; ths whole ingeniousstrucffe works by the principle lve been pointing ouq not dramatization(in Aristotle's sense)but dlo. The or goricelexpressio+ demonstration. poetwhotruty dramr' chainq cannot tizes a conflicg carefully exploringcausal-event story will be until he getsthere.For be surewhat the end of his hirn, fiaion b a means discovery.For the dlegorisg on ttp of e not other hand,fiction is largeln though perhaps exclusively, knows. means expresingwhat the writer already of to A literary work neednot be allegorical be r dernonstration from scen ratherthan an exploration. Any narrativethat moves to the exigencies not to scene episode episode according to and ir of causeand effect but accordingto someebtract scheme novel which conlikely to be a demonstration. picaresque The ventiondly follows someherofrom onesocid seaingto anotlrer the and another,demonsuating folly of eachsocialcontext, ie & and esentially asabstract instructionalesPilgrinls Ptogress. of s novel in the shape e fictional biographymey proceedacdoign. ln Dntiil cording to the requiremensof someab,stract randomly, seemto progress episodes Coppnfield, for instance, like real life, until onenoticesthe controlling concernwith love in md marriage. Dickenschooses events, other wordq for their At relevance an ebstractcentral quesdon. Dickens'point in to of the development the novel,it is hard to tell whether we att dealingmainly with explorationor mainly with demonstration (Obviorsly both areinvolved.) ln someDickensnove\ swh as A TaIe of Tuo Cities,we sens pretty suongly the prercherly to method,demonsuation opposed exploration;in otherg ces

MaafutionrDeconstruction, and Iming Aroaul

85

pcclatty lrtc novels lfte Grcat Erpectdions, we mey feel thc nro impulsa warring in the writer's mind. as Gtdoguing nerretives one thing or anotherwould servc no usefulpurpose the moment.What countshereis the genat eral observation that fiction hasfor centuries existedoB I continuum mnning berweenauthoritarianand existentid. Gnain books,like the lliail, servedtheir original audience in cffect, as, tru*wonhy hittory, lawbook,evenbible; others, Apollonioc like Rhodioo'lrgonmtica,show only comicor ironic respecfor the traditions and accepted pettems of their culture and seemto offer no answers, only difficult questions. kind of narrativg One the kind I describe euthorirerian, sometimes to look at as is said its sto:y line "spatially," eachof its elemenscxisting for thc sakeof e predetermined "end" or conclusionThis is rlmost inevitably the kind of fiction producedby a writer who composc his narrative by working beckward from the climax, end in practiceany well-madestory may be suspected havingbeen of built this way, sincein the final draft, we canbe sure,the writer will haveintroducedwhateverpreparationhis ending needchoweverexistentially may in fact haverrrived at his ending. he For some contemporaryreadersand critics, e nerrative that seems them spatially conceivedis morally distresing. This to may be no more than r personalquirk of thce reades and critics affected;but the quirk doeshavesomeroor in reality: Metaphpics rnd uniustified notions of human cenainty had more than a litde to do with the holocaust and Americanfirebombinp, not to mention atomic bombinp, napdrq and the rest. It is perhaps largely for this reason that we haveseen since World War II, all overthe world, a riseof non-profuent fiction (actionsleadingnowherg as in the plap of SamuelBeckett) rnd unendedfiction (rs in John Fowles' The fuench LieunenfsWonm). C,riticswho havefocusedtheir ettentionon unconventiond r,ectntfiction haveuseda variety of termsto identify it, mostof tbem apparendyinterchangerble-"fabulatioq" "post-modern-

86

THEoRY Norns oN LITEMRY-AESTHETIc

fictiorq" rnd so fonh. To ism,tt ttmetafictionr"t'deconstructive get e clear sense the kinds of interestend truth avaibble in of fiction asit is presentlypracticed,it will be uscunconventional For ful to bcginby clerring up the critical languagc. our Prsent end discusion,let usscrapthc terms"post-modcrnism" "fabulascts up only r veguc entithesis tionr" since "post-modcrnism" meaning only, in effecgmorelike ltalo Glvino to l'modcrnism," to than like Saul Bcllow, and sincc "fabulation" seems mean u criticsgenerally nothingbut "unconventional." "Mem6ctionr" fiction that, both term. It means usethe word, is r moreprecise convenseen' investigates fiction.fu we have in stylcandthcmc, the for tionalfictioncanbe aninstrumcnt examining world; and, it instrument, can malfunction.Like a like any humanlydcvised us it faulty microscope telescope, can persuadc of thingsthat or the ate not true. For example, conventionallove-story ending as we find it in JaneAustencan subtly penuadcthe careless reader(thoughJancAustenneverintendcdit) that for every womanthereis some perfectman.Needlcs to sey,the morc one powerful a literary conventionbecomes-the more frcqucntly peoplc write books in careful or shabbyimitation of Janc Austen's-the more perversethe convention'simpact. Human beingscan hardly movewithout modelsfor their behavior,and from thc begi*ing of time, in all probabiliry, wc havcknown no greeter purveyor of modelsthan story-telling. hrt it this writer way: Saythat, at e ceftaintime in e certaincountry, some e imitating someone admires--creates hero whose he lerhaps life moao is "Never complain,never explain." The motto has putr cenainring to it; it's the kind of thing onemight consider ting up on the wall in the bathroomof one'schildren. In one lifelike situationafter another, seethis herobcaringup undcr we advenity, scornedfor things he is not gurlry of, laughedat for things he would be praisedfor if the whole truth werc known. thrilling book), wc seeour hero Again and again(in this same, giving orden he secredywisheshe didn't needto glve, making he painful decisions that, for cenainlofty rersons, crnnot xplain

Maafction,Deconstruction, IwkS Aroand 87 tnd

to his friends end loved onc. The effect on the readerof this lonely,lofry herocould be veqf $ear indeed-but nor neccssarily healthy.If suchheroes occur in very manyplap and novcl$ if the appeal of such a characterbecomc widespread, then democracy,even common decency,is undermined.We havc becntaughtto admire, submitto, or behave thc well-meaning like Nazi officer, the business-world tyrant, or rhe moral fanatic. Nothing in the world hasgreaterpower to enslave than docs fiction. Oneway of undermining fiction'sharmfuleffects thc writis ing of metafiction: story that callsattention its methods a to end the shows reader what is happening him ashe reads. rhis to In kind of fiction,needles say,the law of the "vivid andcontinto uousdream"is no longeroperative; the contrary,the breala on in the dream are as imponant as the dream. Thb gencral methodis far from ne% though for reasons suggestcd is I've it cspeciallypopular at the moment.In the Argonauticr" Apolloniosrepeatedly ierks the readerawakewith someseemingly misuse epic tradition, or with someunexpeced, perverse of slighdy frigid joke, or somesceminglyneedless, ponderous But when we've finishedthe poem,we can nevcr comment. againlook with the same innocentadmiration the mechismo at of Homer's cpics, or praisethe warrior's shamcculture abovc the civilizedman's guilt culrure.We find a gentleruseof metafictional techniques Sternc'sTris*cn Shtnfu or Fielding's in Ton lones.In recentfiction, worksthat call insistcnt attention to their anifice are everywhere-loncsco,Beckctt, Barth, BarBorges, thelme, Fowles, Glvino, Gass, soon. and It is usefulto disdnguish between metafiction and fictional deconstruction, thoughtechnically laccr term cncloses the the former.All metafiaions deconstructions; all deconstrucarc not tionsaremetafictions. No commoncontemporery criticzl rerm raises hackles morc quickly than the term "deconstructior\" and rightly so, sincc thosc who usethe term almostalweyssoundwildly confuscd.

88

NOTES ON LITERARY'AESTHETTCTIIEORY

Probably the uuth is that they .re not so much confusedas hamsuungby wonhip of Heidegger.At any ratg behind the lie dazzlingcloud of language certain more deconsuuctionists' carriesvalueswith ig facts: that language or lessindisputable as valueswe do not recognize we spak and would sometimes in to not subscribe if we noticed their presence what we sayi That and that art (music,painting,literatute, etc.) is language. language carriesvaluesis obvious.Again and againthis book of speaks the writer as"he," though many of the bestwriten I reador havetaught in writing clasesare female.English' have It is Iike mostlanguages, covenly malechauvinist. is also,asthe novelistHarold Brodkey poins oug covertly Christian.Nearly carry r traceof Neoph all our mostresonant wordsandimages tonic Christianity.Evensoinnocenta word as"friend" hasovertones. In feudal times it meant one's lord and protector; in timesit meantthe oppositcof "fiend." We can of Anglo-Saxon incourseread a book about friends without ever consciously of voking the undercurrents the word; but wherethe friendship we surto in growsintense, this storywe'rereading, erealmost imaga of light or warmth,flower or gardenimagery' encounter hunger,sacrifice, blood,and so on. The veqyform of the story, orderly beginning,middle, and end, is likely to hint at r its Christian metaphysic. apert, or Deconstruction the practiceof aking language is taking works of art apart, to discovertheir unacknowledged may or mey not inner workings.Whatevervaluethis approach of haveesliterary criticisrg it is one of the mrin methods corr fictcmporary (and sometimaancient) fiction. Deconstructive is parallelto revisionist history in that it tells the story from tion the other sideor from somequeeranglethat cass doubt on the generally acceptedvdues handeddown by legend.Whereas by metafictiondeconstructs directly celling attentionto fictionb uicks, deconstructive fiction retellsthe story in sucha way that the old versionloses credit. Shakapeue'sHnnla canbe soeneg r work of this kind. In the revengetragediesShakcparc'r

MaafictionrDeoonstntction, cnd lmkg

Aromd

89

sudience familiar wirh, someghostor friend or other ploe was devicelaln on the herothe burdenof avenging somecrime.Thc genre fu by nature righteousand self-confidengauthoritariao: There is no doubt that vengeance the hero'sduty, and our is pleasure we watch is in seeing as irsticc donq howeverpainful the experience. Shakespeare's Hamla deconstructs this. Deell spite Horatio's certainty, we becomeincreasinglydoubdul of the ghost'sauthoriry asthe play progresses, that we become so more and moreconcerned with Hamlet'stestsof peopleand of himself;and evenif we choose believethat the ghost'sstoqy to wastmg we become increaingly unclearaboutwhetherHamlet would be right to kill the king who usurpedhis father'o throne-at any rarer Claudiusbecomes and lessthe stock less villain, and Hamleg as he proceeds through the play, becomes moreandmoreguilty himself. Except for the earliestliterature we know about-the Akkadian Gilgtnesh, cenain parts of the Bible, and the epicsof Homer--all great literature has,to somextent, a deconstnrctive impulse.Thts is of courseonly natural: If the busines of the first man is to crqlte, the business the secondis at least of partly to corec. Throughout the history of Western civilizrtion, we encountera few greatmomensof creation-momentg when the deconstructive impulseseems relatively slight-and r greatmenysuetches time that seem of mainly devotedro taking the machineryapan and putting it togetheragan in somenew wrong way" Though the Beowulf-poetwes deconstructing old paganlegends heroic derring-do,his main impulseseems of to havebeencoastructive:the creationof a myth that would fise dl that wasbestin the old paganand the new Chdstienvision Dante,too, wr$ mainly constructivgfusingthe clasical and the modernby mearsof a new truth-principle what might bc deccribed(not quite fairly) ase form of emotivism:"Truth is thet which one c:m $y without shamebefore Bearrice."And one might mentionothersuchmoments, mostreccntly the advcntof Jama Joyce.

go

firDORt ON NOTES LTTERARY-AESTTIETIC

fic intcrct in metafictionrnd thc interestin dcconstruaivc form) differ in fiction (when the lastis not castin metafictional obviousways.Thc appcalof mctafictionmry be almostentircly intcllcctual.If we laugh,wc do not do so heartily' aswhen wc laugh at or with an intercsting lifelikc character;wc laugh thinly, with e fecling of slight supcriority, aswe hugh at wiso' cracksor "wit.' If we gdeve,we grievc likc philosophen not like peoplc who havc lost loved onc. Mainly, wc think. Wc deviccc his think aboutthe writer'sallusions, useof unexpected his cffrontery in breakingthc rules.Other forms of decongrcetcr achieve that is"--can struction-other than metafictionel, Beowulfstory from retellingthe cmotional power.For example, the point of view of thc monsterGrendel,onc getsnot only tragwhatevcrcmotional cfrcctcen be wrung out of Grendel's readcrmay feel in grief the cxpericnccd cdy, but alsowhatever sceingthc grand old forms of Western civilization rcvealedas and rather shoddy,ccrtainly manipulative tyrannical,and prob' ablypocticlicsin thc 6rst place. fiction is that Nonc of this is mcantto suggcst dcconstructive better than metafction, or vicc versaror that cither of theseis bcttcr or worscthan conventionel fiction. That cachhasits valadherents, ucsis evidentfrom the fact that eachhasis earncst rcady to kill et the faintcst hint that what they somcof thcm lovc is not lovcduniversally. is And onc of thc What wc cnioy wc cnioy; dispute useless Wc thingt human bcings mostcnjoy is discovery. may go along for ycars without cvcr noticing that thc third-person-limited sappy.And then onc dey in metaficpoint of vicw is cssentially laid all tion onesccs thet point of view mocked, its foolishness showsus, barc,and onelaughs with delight.Thc metafictionist point of view forces for instance, that thc third-person-limited the writer into phony suspense. a story bcgins with this Say cvcnt: A man nemedAlex Strugatskyis taking his Saturday morning ballet classwhen his mistres, the wife of thc local in Chief of Policc,comes to standwatching.Alex is distrescd-

Maafction,Deconstruction, lrnkg Around gr and

he doesnot want their afiair known, lest the police chicf shoot him; but alsohe doesnot want to be impolite, because mis. his tres, Gencvieve Rochelle,is a beaury.lf we start off this story in rhc sensible omniscient point of view,asChekhov would,we cen get the imponant facts in right away and get on ro what's really interesting,such as: What will Alex do? Do his fellow dancers noticel And so on. In thc omniscient point of view onc might write: Onc Saturday morningwhen Alex Strugetsky takwas ing his dancingclas, he happencd look over, while. to balancing his toes,and seehis mistress, on Genevieve Rochelle, wife of the local Chief of Police,standing in the doorway.Good grief, thoughtStrugatsky, blushing, lookingaroundin horror at the faces his fellow danof cers-mostly middle-aged womenwho had comethere to work off fat. Notice what happenswhcn the writer limits himself to the thoughtsof thc centralcharacter, mendoning nothing not directly present thc character's in mind. It wesa Saturday morninglike any other,the middlefat aged womenof hisdancing class laboring rround him, the piano punching out uh-azc, uh-nlo, the teacher floating through the motions,sour-pused,when suddenln unsteadily brlancingon his toes,Alex Strugatsky lookedover et the brightly lit doorwayand saw-her! Hc swunghishead studyingcachfat linle facein around, rurn,but sofar no onehadnoticed. Would theyrecognizc hcr if they saw her there?Probablythey would. Hc imagined himselfcrying out, "No, please! please!" and being shotin thehead. Needles to say, there is r place-in comedy-for such silly hpteria. But it's odd to think how serious thosewriters of the all

92

TI{EoRY ON NOTES LTIERARY-AESTHETTC

drinic and forties were who usedthis point of view--+hesamc pcgple whq in movie$ usedsolemnvoice-over.Or agai+ the this may showus,by cunningly misusing point of metefictionist nercisistsof rs all. Alex view, how third penon limited makes has gotten away from his dance clas rnd b sitting with in Genevieve her cer: He did not mind, he thought, her slow wry of drawing the cigarenefrom is packor evenher long hesitation on gropingly for the matches the dasb beforeshereached it but the archedeyebrowthat accompenied all, and the to throughthe windshield see way sheneverevenglanced inexcusrble! felt He was if anyone watching-those were himselfsheping frown andcaughthimself,then covered a his mouthwith one hand,Iestthe frown sneakback. part of All this analyzing everylinle gcture on Genevieve's and Alex's own would be, in real life, the mark of e man deeply the pamnoid.In our fiction it occursbecause writer hasno other way of sayingwhat happens exceptby somehow putting it into Alex'shead. could It might be arguedthat a cleverwriter of metefictions makefun, if he wisheqof any of the standardpoints of view. that any human That is true andnot true. It is probablythe case activir,y can legitimately bc made fun of, and that a clever metafictionl* could make us leugh et the noblest devicc of is Dostoevsky Mann But the smartwriter of metafictions seor leaive aboutwhat he pokc fun at, end pert of our interestas from our recognitionthat the folly hc rre readhis work comes pointsout is significant;that rq it ls not only silly, oncewe look wront at it closeln bm it is in somesense prverse:It pushes vrlues. fiction cnn be described Theoretically all non-conventional rc cither metafiction or deconstruaive fiction or both but know 6et much of what we radn or rcaedyintuitively-we

MaafwtionrDeconstnrction, od IwkS

Arumd

g,

lereon stegeor on the screen,is nefuher. has no theoqy,h It makes grandchiss ht inst iazzingaround. no One of the bestthings nanative can do b iazz rround. The Marx Brothers,W. C. Fiekls,BusterKeaton,old-time Saturday morningcartoons(not the new,cheap ones),certaingreatfakeprofound movia lfte Tbe Magicim and Lr Sttada. There can be no point in makingup an aesthetic theory for iazzng around, but if somefool were to do it, he would find it hard to avoidat leestthe following basicprincipls. When r writer is iazzing aroun4 he may not feel a powerful needto createconsisteng profound,well-roundedcharacters. facg he might stan with In m elderly Jew crynngon a bus and transformhim without notice to r boy of eleverl then to. spsrroq then to the Queenof Poland.All the ordinary, decent-heaned readerwill askis that the transformationbe astonishing interestingand thrt thc end story in some way appear makesense, keepusreeding.Or the to writer may usee castof clown character-eagerly heroic nitwits like the Keptone Cops,or fiendishdaemonic plotten with hails full of suaw, like the Marx Brothersstealinge pianq etc. Where plot is concerned, anythingcan happen that wantsto, so long asit holdsinterest;end seaingmay change whimsicdly as asit did from panelto panelin the Krczy Kot comics.l^?tirng aroundmay cover enything from parody to whimseyto heavy European surrealism. Unfornrnately,it is whet most beginning criters do mostof the time; that is, they snrt with somecharacer for whom they feel someson of afrection-an electricgurtar player,say+nd they dacribe him playing his guiter in his roonr,andthen they askthemselves, "Now what can I male happen?" Something drearyoccursto thenr-the guitar pleyert mommetecomesin-and they write it down. The roonunetes srnokesomepot. They go to e pany. They meet. girl with r large white wolf. And so on. All of which is to say: lu^ng aroundis the hardest kind of fiction in the world. When r writer b g-d at ig the world is his-whatb the cxpresion1---oytefi

gt+

NOTES ON LTTERIIRY-AESTIIETIC THEORY

Y* in the end, alas,thc world's greeterpraiscwill go to thc drudgewho writes eboutmoreor lcs lifclike pcoplc serviceeble who, laboring through cnergeicplos, find thcir destinicsand stir usto affirmation. Metafction, deconstructivc fictiono and iazzlingeround all hevcthis much in commonwith convcntionalfiction: They dl delight us, or, esNabokov uscdto insisg "chrrm." lilhctfier I givcn work is boisterous, a circuq or quietly clcganglikc e like Iikc drcamcomcdivc, or srilboat,or disorienting, en unpleasant frssomcthingelsc, all good fiction has rnomcnt-by-momcnt It cinetion.It hasauthoriry and at lcest4 touch of suangencss. conventiond6ction, drenr usin. In the cascof what I've cslled it's easyto describcthc basisof our rnraction. For unconvcnwhcn tionel fiction, that b not so.Mlntcry is is soul.Somctimcs wc loot closely et rn unconyentionel piccc of fiaion, wc dir of cover thar in fact it's a simpleachievcmcnt gcnrc-crossingfor instrnce, thc folktclc and thc early Hollywood murdcr mystery-but we may bc discoveringmore thrn thc writcr carekncw. As wc'vc seen, fiction takesimmenscly conventional ful plrnning if it's to bc redly good, and maafiction end deconstructivc fiaion take similar ctrc, luz.ng around takes e spccial geniug in which thc ability to plan plap hardly any p.rt It rcquiresincxhaustible imagination(think of thc work of $tanlcy Elkin, for instancc) and thc fiulte to know when thc magic isn't quite good enough.Thc two gftg onc crtreordinarily childlikc, the other highly sophisticatcdand manug rlmost ncvershowup in onc person. thcy showup Occasionally in twq asin Gilben and Sullivarqand the two fight likc devils.

II
NOTES ON THE FICTIONAL PROCESS

Lommon Errors

nr-

Thc mostimponantsinglenotion in the theory of fiction I have outlined--+entially the uzditional theoqyof our civilization's Iiterature-is that of thc vivid and continuors fictional &earn According to this notion, the writer ses up e dramatizcd action in which we aregiven the signals that makeus "see"the secingr characters, evens; that rs,he doesnot tell ts aboutthcm in rnd ebntracttcrmq like m essayist, givcsus images but that rppeal to our serus-preferablydl of therq not iust thc visud senscso that we seem movc emongthe charactcrs, to leanwith drem qgeinst fictional wdh testethe fictional gazpachqsrnellthc thc f,ctionel hyacinttu. In bsd or unsatisfying fictioq this fictiond dreamis interruptedfrom timc to time by somemistake son' or sciousploy on the pan of thc anist Wc ere abrupdy snapd out of thc drearqforcedto think of the writer or the uniting. It b rs if r playwright were to nm our on stege,intenupting hb cheraaers,to remind rs that he haswrinen all this I asr nc sgFg that r novelistc:urnotnoticcably trcet his characters s puppetsin e stage-sct worl4 sinccpuppea and r stagpscr .tt alsothingswe censccrnd to sorn cxtentcrnpathize with. Evar thc mct'obicctivC'6ction, asRobcrt Louis Stcvcnson ca[ed il, isstill 6ction,still dremetizrtion 97

98

PRocEstl oN NotrEs THEFICTIoNAL

If thc principlc of vividnes and continuity i clcar, we can tcchnical implications. tum to somc too will A scenc not bc vivid if the writcr grves fcw daaih to neitherwill it bc vivid if imaginadon; stir endguidcthc rcader's thc Imguagcthc writer uscsis abstractinsteadof concretc.If thc writer says"creaturcs"instcadof "sntkcs," if in en eftemPt Latinatctcrmslikc "hoetilc to imprcss with fancy talk hc uses us instead sharpAngloSaxonwords likc "thrlsh," of maneuvcrs" sand of "coilr" "spitr" "hiss,"and"writher" if instead the desert's abodc,"the of and rocks he speaks thc snakc' "inhospitable up rcadcrwill hardlyknow what pictureto confure on hismendctail and ab,suaction Thesetwo faults,insufficient tal screen. is detail,arc common-in fact wherc what is needed concrete writing. Anothcr is the failurc to dl but uqiversal-in ametcru filtering of thc run straightat the image;that is, thc nccdless Thc amateur image through some observingconsciousnes. the fightingin among writcs: "Tuming, shcnoticedtwo snakes [n rmongthc rocks,two snakes rocl6." C,ompare: "Sheturned. can bc wcrc fighting." (Thc improvement of course further inr' werc 6ghting" is morc rbstract proved.Thc phrase "two snakes striking at erch whipped and lashed, than, say, "two snakes othcr"; andverbswith auxiliaries["wcrc fighting"] arc ncvct ts sharp in focus as verbs without auxiliarics,since the formcr the indicatcindefinite time,whercas lattcr [e.9.,"fought"l sugno gcst e given instant.) Gcnerally speaking-+hough laws are absolutein fiction-vividness urges that elmost cvcry occrrrenccof suchphrases "shenoticcd" and "shesad' be sup as of in prcsscd favorof directpresentation the thingseen. implications the continuity principle-thc of Thc technical from the image idca thrt thc reader shouldneverbc distracted be trcated briefly.In the work of beginning so or scenHannot writcrs, especially thoseweakin the basicskills of Englishcompocition,thc usualmistakcis that the writer disuactsthc readcr can of by clumsyor incorect wdting. Characters, course, speak as clumsily as thcy likc; thc writer's iob is simply to imitatc

CotmtonEnut

99

drem rccurately. But the ctrnderd third-pcnon nerrator c.n nevcr miss.If thc narratorclip into faulty syntax,the reader's mind trcla rway from thc fighting snekes thc problem of to figunng out what thc scntence mcens. Thc distracrionis dmoor cenainto bc emotional wcll as intcllccual,sinccthc rcrder rs hascvcry right to fcel thrt thc writcr'r busincsis to cry whet hc means clcarly. In good fiction, the rerdcr ncver hrs to go back ovcr I scntence iust to find out what ir says.Hc may read r sentencc twicc becausc likcs it, or hcausc, through no frult hc of thc author, his mind briefly wandercd,musing,pcrhaps, on thc largcrimplications the scene; if it's rhc ruthor'gcareof but lesnessthat mekcshim rcad rwicc, hc hasa right to fcel that the authorhasviolatcdthc fundamental contractin dl fiction: that the writcr will derl honcstly and rcsponsiblywith the rcader.(This, it shouldbc mentioncd, docsnot rule out uscof thc so-called unreliablenanator, sincethe unreliablenrrrator is r charactcr insidcthc 6ction.) Clumsy writing is en cvcn morc cornmonmistakein thc work of .mateurs, thoughit showsup cvcnin the work of veqy good writcrs. Some the morc frcquent forms of clumsywritof ing shouldpcrhaps mendoncd bc hcre, sinccfauls of this kind arc r good"dedmorc scrious than thc amateur mry imagina They alicnatcthc expcrienced readcr,or et very leastmakc it hard for him to conccntreteon thc fictional dream,rnd thcy undercut the writer's authoriry. Whcre lumps and infelicitia occur in fiction, the sensitive rcadershrinkseway r little, aswc do whcn anintcresting convcrsationalist pickshisnose. Thc mostobviousforms of clumsincss, rcally failurcsin the basicskills, includc such mistakes inappropriateor cxcesive as use of thc pasivc voice, inappropriatc usc of inroductoqy containinginfinitc vcrbs,shifts in diaion lcvel or the phrascs rcgular uscof disuactingdiaion, lack of ecntcncc varicry, lrck focuq faulry rhythm, accidental of scntencc rhyme, ncedless explanrdorl rnd crrclcssshifts in psychic distance.Let us run through thcseonc by onc,

IOO

NOTES ON ITIE FICTIONAL PROCESS

Except in stock loctrtions,such as "You were paid yesteror weredefeatedr" "The proiect wasabandan" "The Germans doned," the pasive voice is virtually useles in fiction except when usedfor comic effect, as when the writer mimics some instituor way of speaking quotessome fool's slightly pompous more ditional directive.The ectivevoice is almostinvariably to rect andvivid: "Your parrot bit me" esopposed (passive)"I may depend wasbitten by your parrot." (The choicein this case might A on characterization. timid soul'fearfulof giving offense by construction.)In e story presented well chooe the passive narretor-an obfectiveand largely the conventional omniscient formal namative voice like, say,Tolstoy's-the pasimpersonal eive voice is rlmost ceftain to offend and distract.Needles to san the writer must iudge every caseindividuallS and the reelly g*d writer rnay get e\ray with fust about anything.But it must be clear that when the writer makesuseof the pasivc for heknowshe'sdoingit andhasgoodreason what he does. ere $ntences beginningwith infnite-verb phrases so common in badwriting that oneis wiseto treet them asgoilty *ril proven innocent-sentences,that is, that begin with such phrases "Looking up dowly from her sewing,Marthasaid. . ." as or 'Carrying the duck in his left hand,Henry . . ." In really regularlyleadto shifa in badwriting, suchintroductory phrases temporalfocus or to plain illogic. The bad writer tells us, for instance:"Firing the hired man and burning down his shac\ impliesthat the action Eloisedrove into town." (The sentence of 6ring the hired mrn and burning down his shact and the Or ectionof driving into town aresimultrneous.) the badwriter tells rs, "Quickly turning from the bulkhead, Gptain Figg But spokeslowly and carefully." (Illogicel; that is, impoesible.) focusis involve4 the of evenif no illogic or confusion temporal makc use too frequentor inappropriate of infinite-verbphrases the aboutbecause writer snnot bd writing. Generallyit comes The think of r wey to vary the length of his sentences. writer 'She slipped off thc lools at the tenible thing he'r written:

Cownon Enmt
gertr. Shenrned o John Shesmiledat hb cnrbarrosnrcnf and in r dcperete ettempt to gc rid of the dully thudding mbieca md verbs hc revisesto 'She slipped off the ganr. Turning to Johq shesmiledat his embanessment." goal, The vadety, may be admirable, there are better ways sentnoe but One can get rid of the thudding subjeca and verbs by rsing cumpoundpredicates: "Sheslippedoff the ganer and turned to 'She phrases: John"; by inuoducing qualifiersand appooitional rather, yanked--off the ganer, a fraye{ mournful slipped---or, pink onc long pastis prime, gray elasticpeekingout past the (etc.); or by finding someappre ruffes, indifferently obacene" priate subordinate clause, perhaprs: "When she had slippedoff dre gener, sheturned to John"+ solutionthat getsrid of the thudding by lowering (hastening)the stres of the first "sha" (Comparethe rwo rhythms: "She slippedoff the gerter. ShG tumed to John" and "When shehad slippedoff the ganer, she arned to John.") All this is not to deny, of counrc,thet the introductory infinite-verbphrase be an excellent cen thing in its place Properly use4 it momenurily slows dom the action, gives it r considered, weighted quelfty that can heightenthe tensionof an important scene.It works well, for instance,in gimationslike these 'Slowly mising the rifle banel . . ." or "Gazingoff at the woods,giving her no answer.. ." Usedindis. criminateln the introductory infinite-verbphrase chop the action into fits md starts and loseswhst effectivenesit uright have had, properly set. Diaion problemsare usuallysymptomatic defectsin the of c{raracter education the writer. Both diction shiftsand the or of steady use of inappropriatediction suggsteither deepdown bed uste or the awkwardness that comesof inexperience and timidiry. Therc seems litde or no hopefor the adult writer who producessntences like these: "Her cheeh were thick and snroothrnd held a healthy natural red color. The heavy lines under then4 her iowls, extended the inrersection her lips ro of rnd geveherr thick-lippedfrown mostof the time." The phrase

to2

NOTES ON THE FICTIONAL PROCESS

"Her chcekswere thick and smooth" is normal English, but "[Her cheeks]held r healthynamral red color" b clcvate4 pseudo-poetic. word "held" faintly hints at personification The of "cheeks,"and "healthy natural red color" is clunky, stilted similar mistakcs slightly bookish.The sccondsentencc contains Thc dictionlevelof "extendcd thc intcncctionof her lid'b to high and formal, in ferociousconflict with the end of the scntencg which plunga to thc colloquial"mo'stof thc time." There steadilycle' may be slightly more hopefor the writer who uses vated diction--sentenccsthat pomp along likc thcsc: "Thc uniquesmell of urine and saltwatergrcetcd him as hc stcppcd through the hatchway.Hc surveyed arcafor an opcnsink or the showerstall but, finding nong had to wait in linc.' ("Had to writ in line" b of coursca suddendiction drop.) Thc writing herc hasmost of the usualqualiticsof falsely clcvateddiction: ab,stract language ("unique smelf'), clich6 personification ("[the smell] greetedhim"), Latinatelanguage whcre simplc Anglo-Saxonwould bc prcfcrable ("survcyed the area' for "looked around"), and so fonh. If a writer with difficultia likc thcc sticksto thc relatively ."ry kinds of fiction-thc rcrlistic story and thc yarn asopposcd the tale-Jrc cen gct rid of hb to problemssimply. He can learn by diligcrrcc to cradicatedl tracesof fancy talk from his vocabulary, usingdirect, colloquial speechin reall*ic storiesand in yarns imitating the conventional backwater narretive voicc (thc rurel Southerncr,thc crafty old farmer of New England,or whatever).Scrious trleq which by conventionrequirc elevated, almoststatcly tonc, ere likely to prove forever beyondthis writer's msrns,sinccno onc can writc in thc high style if hc cannottell real high stylc from fakc. It's e limitation no writer shouldhappily eccept,asa few phrucsfrom Melvilleshould remindus: Thc moming wes one pcculiar to thrt coast.Everything was mutc and calnr, cverything grey. The seq thooghundulated into long roodsof swclls,seemed fixed,

Comtnon Enms

rot

and umssleeked the surfacelike waved lead that hss at cooledandsetin thc smcltcr's mould.Thc sky seemed r grey mantle.Flights of troubled grcy fowf kith and ldn with flighs of troubled grey vepoursemongwhich they were mixcd, skimmedlow and fitfully over the water, beforc storms.Shadows asswallowsover meadows prcdeepcr shadows come. scnt,foreshadowing to of Or loolcat an example Isak Dinesen's of thc talc's tndiwc tional high stylc: The big house stoodasfirmly rootedin the soil of Denhuts, and wasasfaithfully dlied to muk asthe pcasants' hcr four winds and her changingsersons, her animd to lifq treessnd flowcrs. Only its intercse lay in e higher plane.Within the domain of the limc uees it was no longerco\ils,goats,and pigs on which the mindsand thc talk ran, but honesand dogs.Thc wild fauna,the gamc of theland,that the peasant shookhisfist at whenhesaw it on his young greenrye or in his ripening wheat fiel4 to the residents the country houses of were the mainpursuit andthe ioy of existencc. The writing in thc sky solemnlyproclaimedconti* uence,e worldly immonaliry. The grcat countr)r houscs had hcld their ground through many generetions. Thc familicswho livcd in thcm reveredthe put as they honourcd themselvcs, thc history of Dcnmark wrs for thcir own history. The high stylc, like Bach,is not for everyonq but thc frct thrt amateurs regularly fall into grotesquc so imitation of it suggcsa that it strika someresponsivc chord in us.By readingcarefully and cxtensivelnby writing constantlyand gettingthe bestcriti. cismavailable him, the writer who beginswith no fceling for to dictioncaneventually overcome problems. his &ntence variety is discusedin most frcshmancomposition

to4

PRO@tts ON-IIIE I'ICTIONAL NOTES

boob and necdnot be treated.t lcogdt here;it will h cnough to mention one or rwo of tlrc problearsthrt most frequendy plaguecreativevniters. Whet the young writer ncedsto do, of coursefis study sentencs, consciouslyxperimentwith therq sincehe crn soefor himselfwhat the ditr"*rlty rc and cen soc for himself when he has beatenit: Where vuity b lacking, scntencs dl run to the sameLngtb quqf over ud over the boring structura Subiectsame rhythms,and hevethe same old vcrb, subject-verb, zubfect-verbobiec-t subiect-vcrb. What thc den writer learnsas he beginsto experiment that the crre is can be wone then the direase. mentionedalreadythe tsuI've dly ill-fated introduction of en opening infnite-verb phrase. Another bad cure is the sentence awkwardly stretched by r out 'that'or'which" clause. example, For from the couclr, "Lerping he seized revolverfrom the boolshelf thet stoodbehindthe the armchair,"or, "She turned, shrieking,throwing up her arrr in teror et the sight of the gorilla that had arived that morning from Africq which hadformerly beenits home."What happm in suchsentences, obviously,is that they tend to trail ofr, losc in energy.It may help to look at the metterthis way: Scntences English tend to fdl into meaningunis or s).ntactb slon-for instancgsuchpattemsas
12,

verb,obiect subiect,

subjcct verb'modifier. by In the so-cdledperiodicsentence, highly recommended highor schoolEnglishteacherqthe most interesting imponant thing in the sentence pushcdinto the final sloq as in 'Down the is river, rolling and bellowing, cameMahl's cow." Thc neturll but superioriryof thc periodicsentencrcanbe exaggJeratd it b a fect that an anticlimecticending cen nrin an othcrwisepcrfectly good sntencgend rlmoct invrriebly+lsepi in comic

ComnonEnmt

ro5

writingthe'tlnt" or \'hich" clausc (Il teeds enticlimrx. m NewYorker"supcr-realisr" fictior4thb styll*ic fatnes msybe rvimre.) Often the search vui*y leads another for to problerrn thc overloading sentences the los of focw Looh $ thsc of and sentnc6: Gulf were veqy "The darl watersof thc Persian peaceful the pinkishglow of pre-dawn as light turnedthe gray cloudsto shades orchidend lavendcr. horizon's of The cleer,coolair breezed acrosthe dec}sof the munrnoth whitc shipasit moved almoot silendy ttroogh rhew$er." [n a somc whatfranticattempr gergusro, writcr prcla hissentenoe to the like a Japanese commuter uain. Perhap1 greetwriter migln get awaywith this (in prose fiction DylanThomas [.ewrnd renceDurrell haveuied it), but it seeme too lilely. As r not rule,if a sntence threcqfntaticslor, rs in has
The manwalkeddown the road ---e writer may loadoneortwo of the slos with modifiergbut if the sentence to havefocur-that is, if the readeris to be able is to make out someclerr image,not iust a iumblc-the writer cannot cram dl three synuctic sloa wirh daails. So, for irr sumce,the writer may load doum dot r end lervc the ottrcn moreor lcs dong thru:
I

The old maq stooped, bent almostdoubleunderhis load of tin pans, smilingwith a sort of maniecal yet goodcheer rnd chaneringto himselfin what seemed be Slavonian, to 2t wdked slowly down theroad. Or hemry loadup slot z:

The old manwdked slowln lifting his feet cuefulln rometimcs ticking oncshoe foru'ardin whatlooked like

T06

NOTES ON THE FICTIONAL PROCESII

l dencc,then slammingdown ths foot beforc the solc could flop looscagain grinning whcn it workcd, muttcdown thc road. ing to himself,making no real progrss loadson both slots Or thc writcr may risk piling high precarious for instance: r andr;
I

Thc old man,stooped, bent dmost doublcunder his load of tin pans, smilingwith a son of maniacdgood checr yct to rnd chsttcringto himselfin whar scemed be Slavonian, 2 kickwalkcd slowln lifting his fcet carcfulln sometimcs ing onc shoeforward in what looked like r dance,then slamming down the foot bcfore thc solecould flop loose with himself,but ag;ain, grinningwhenit worked,pleased mrking no rcal progrcss down the road. If what chiefly intercstshim is litcraqy stunts (end such thingp rrc not all bad, though they can deract from fiction's scriousnes), the writer can oonchslot 3 iust e lialc, changingit in thc scntence aboveto somcthinglike "thc b*py, crooked road." is This sort of playing around with scntenccs onc of thc chief no niakewriting e pleasure; ncveftheless, writer can things that is enough. hclp but rccognize that cventuallyenough Rcadcrsscnsitiveto thc virnra of good fiction can bc distracted from the fictional dreamby zubtler kinds of mistakcs Onc of thcsc is faulty rhythm. M*y writers, including somc of femousoncg writc with no consciousnes the poetic effecrs rvailrblc thtoogh proscrhythm. They put thc wine on thc tablg put the cigarctte in thc ashtray,paint in the lovcrs, sta'rt thc clock ticking, ell with no thought of whether the scntences shouldbc fast or slow, light-heartedor solemnwith wedged-in now of thc intentionah I iuxtapccd stresscs, am not spcaking arhythmic writer, thc kind who ncver allows himselfr passegc

CsrmonEnors

rc7

that stands asrhythmically beautiful but on thc other hand out nevermakes stumblcor danccfor our footing likc r calf on us icc. In realisticfiction, suchwriters erueren important part of the writer's businesis to imitatc the way real peoplespeak; and sincc in lifc people do not generally speak in finc poetic rhythms,thc controlling na$ator,who mustthreadthe rhythms in of his speech with the rhythms of the charactcrs, wisc to is keep his rhythms unnoticeable; wise, that is, to steer as far as posiblc from thc rhythms of bardic or incantatorywrfucn likc JrmesJoycc,ThomasWolfc, or Willirm Faulkncr.To choose thc bardicvoicc is automatically takc e slight stepback from to realisrqto movefrom the casuallyspokento the intoned,from the reelistic story toward the tale. Both thc intcntiondly arhythmic writer-John Updikcis an example-and writer, the likc mlnelf, who would sacrificca character's earsfor melodic efrcct, can bc counted on not to distract the readerfrom his dreamby clunky rhythms.The writer who simply nevcrthinlc about rhythm is almostcenain to do so. The readermay suddenly bc stoppcdcold by a line in accidentd doggerel: t , | -, No onc was looking whcn Tarkington's gun went olf, | | - | -| killing James Hamisandmaiming wife.r his The writcr thusunintendonally a produccs form of qprungvcrsc -that is, iammcd strcscs one after enother-whcn what he needs, reflect the moment's to rush, is lighter rhythms,anapsts or dacryls. cxample, may write: For he
tlttl 'Stop, thicf!" Bones Danks crie ,tttl soulstopthat man,please?"

. "Stlp!c"'nt roi,. go'oa

Needles to sey,the writer who doespay attcntion to rhythm can alsofind wap of disuacting thc readerfrom thc fiaiond 'For cxplanetiondrcmeuicd of mukingp, pp.rjr5r. see

IO8

NOTEISOlf fiTE FICTIONAL PROCESII

d$en, mainly by overdoingthinghtht is, by letting hb qo get in the way of his meterials-but this we neednot speat of now, sincewe will necdto look later at Innginus' principle of f"ediqf. -enother initant is rcciilental rhyme as in the scntncc 'When the rig blew,everythingwent flying sky-higtr-me too." both rhymeNotice here that the rhyme is offersive because that wordsrttblew" end t'toor" aresuesedpositions; is, the voict omes down hard on drem.The rhyme ir not offensivgto most cars,if the uniter can get one of the rhymes out of stresed pcrtion: "The rig blew sky-higtr"and ever;'thingwent flyingto me too." In this versionthe word "blew" givesaway stress '*y-high" endthe towardbackground "blew-too" rhymedrops cffect. Now, however,we have r new stresed rhyme-'tkyfor high" and"flying" (well, closeenough rhymein prose)-en<l we noticean odd thing: It sounds OK. If we malp the soundg we aying to undersandthe reasonn perhap comeup with this: rhyme'tky-higtr," with a hoveringstrer First, the rwo-element (seeanalfis below), b resolved a femininerhyme (a word by ending with an unstresedryllable) followed by a phrasa "nn too,'that funaions asa pull-away;the resultis that the rhynrewith the rhyme bese word'flying" his lighdy in comparison 'sky-higb" the voicehurrying on to the pull-away. 'The rig blew sky-higb and everything went flying-me too." Second, phrase the "me too" faindy recdls dre unstrcsed 'bkybase"blern"' and at the sametime rhythmically recdls hbb" *ittt the rcuh that the 'bky-higtr-fying" rhyme b around one last tirr' dighdy muted.[.et us turn the sentence this time suppressing "blew": 'The rig went flying, and everything shot sky-higtr-+nc 'shot" wc seH)r; too.' If we mentally substitute "bled' for rather, hear-at once that it won't do+n extremely heavy, owkwardrhymeof the kind certainto distractthe reader;that rs, for makehim stop thinking of the images a momentto wonder what'sgonewrong vith dto uniterb brain On the othcr han4

Conmon Enmt

tog

with 'shot" dre "fiying-+ky-high" rhymc seenr ecceptabh The sentence's tndtnte openingQoosely iambic) eccelerates to is allegromid-section("flying andeverything"), andtheo su& denly the sentence opnsout like e huga slow firework, witb rpeatd iarnmedstressto bdance the quicknes earlier md the "sky-high" rhlmre rising lite a ctown. This kind of poetic effect in fiction distracs only in .n acceprsble way. Thc rcadcr may peuse rcad the sentence and nricg savoringthe wry sound echoes sensqbut if he hasrurned for r momentfrom the 6ctiond dreamit is only in the way we paulesometimes admirc to the tcchniqueof an animd trainer-the flourish with which he lowen his headinto the faws of the crocodile--after which r'c tlrow ourselves backinto watchingthe act Writers veqysureof their technical mastery-tou-ile-fmca uniters-may meke . tind of gameof seeing how far they cango winking andleering et the reader,before brealdngthe fictional illusiou On th.t, morelater. Needles explanationand explanationwhere drane elonc would be sufficientare other irritants. In amateurficdon these problems may show up in crude forms,but experienced writen can makemistakes the same of basickinds.The amateur writer tells us, for insunce,that Mrs. Wu is a crabby old womanand that one reason Mrs. Wu's trouble with sciatica. explains is All of this information could and should have been conveyed through dialogueand action We shouldhaveseenher kicking the cat out of the wen rubbing her hip, yelling out the window et Mr. Chang,who's parkedhis truck on her curb. We should hearher on the telephone, complaining her sonin SanDiego. to Experienced writers can makethe same mistake-usually,if not invariabln out of a too greet fondnes on the wrirer's pert for the mellifluous tones hisown voice.He maywrite: of Detective Gerald B. Gaine was veIF drunk. Sining that morningin the parted truck, he couldn't tell realiry --or, rt eny rrte, what and 1aou I call rediry-from the

I IO

NO(ES ON THE FICTTONAL PROCESII

producedby his deliriumtremcns. shadows phantoms and His scnse rcspnsibiliry, his courage,his nobility of of hcan, his nativc chivalry, dl thesewcre askeen asevcr; but hiscye for mundane uuth wasnot what it might hevc and thinking bccn.And sq bclievinghe saw something, he thrcw dovm the himsclfcdled upon for heroicection, botde,snatched hisrcvolver,ran into the housc out whcrc th. grl had iust gonc, and once againprovcd himself a fool. it, Voice, oncea writer mesters canbe a delighdul thing, but no smart writer depends voicc alonc to sail him past all cvib. on with thc dnrnken detccCompareanotherversionof the scene tivc, this timc dramatized, explained: not Wherc thesnake A carne from he did not sce. roar 6llcd his mind, the sky fashedwhitg and asif thc doorway to the underworldhad opened, r therelay thc snake, foot across, It maybethirty feet long, grecnish-golden. moved quickln grecefully across streetin front of him and the over the ctrrb towrrd thc porch wherc a momcnt ago Elainc Gla.s had stood. It had largc black cyes; in is raised, rcalcs, glints of violet rnd vermillion.Hatchet-head tongueflicking, it movedwith thc assurencc r familiar of visitorup the sidewalk toward thc step. With a yelp, without thinking, Gainc thrcw dovm thc helfbonlc, pushed opcnthe door of hisside,half-jumpcd, fell from thc tmck, and ran aroundthe front Hc drew his pistol ashe ran. The studens on the porch snatched thcir things from the step end prch-floor and iumpcd beck. The tail of the cnormoussnakcwrs disappcaring throughthc door.Now it wasgonc.Hc ren after it, lvaving the pistol,running so fast he could hardly kccp from frlling. philocophicd novcb whcrc Though we run acrosscxceptions, holdsintercst,the temptationto cxplain b onc thgt cxplanation

Cottnon Enors

ttt

should almct alwrp bc resistcd.A good writer can get snything at all ecros ttuough action and dialogue,rnd if hc czn think of no powerful reason do othcrwisc,hc shouldprobably to lcavccxplanation his rcviewersand critics. The writcr should to cspecially avoid commenton what his characters fccling, or are ct vcq'r lcastshouldbc surc he undcrsnndsthc commonobiection summcd in the old saw'Show, don't tcll." Thc reason, up of course,is that set bcside thc complcx thought achicvcd by drama,explanation thin grucl, henccboring. A woman,say, is dccidesto lcave homc. fu readen,we warch her dl morning, study and think abouthcr gcsturcqher muneringghcr feelingr about thc ncighbon and thc wcethff. After our crpricncg which can bc intcnscif thc writcr h a good one,wc kzott why the charactcrleaves whcn finally shc walks out thc door. Wc know in r way almosttoo subtlefor words,which is the reason that thc writcr's eftcmpt to cxplain,if hc'sso foolish asto makc the attempt,makcs yawn andsctthc book dowrr. us Greles shifs in psychicdistancc alsobc distncting. By can prychic distancc meenthe distance readerfcelsbetwcen wc the himselfand the even$ in the story. C,omparc following exthe amples, frst meantto cstablish thc grcat psychic distance, the next meantto cstablish slighrly les, and so on until in thc last cxample, psychicdisrance, theoreticdly at lcast,is nil. r. It waswinter of the year 1853. largemensteppd A outofr doorway. r. HenryJ. Warburton hadncvcr muchcaredfor snowstoflns. 3. Henry hatedsnountorms. damnsnowstorms. 4 God how hc hatedrhcsc Snow. Undcr your collar, down insidc your shocq 5. freczing and plugging up your miscrablcsoul . . . When psychicdistance greagwc look at the scencasif from is far awry--our usualpoition in thc traditional talg remotc in time and space, formd in prcscntation(cxampler rbovc would

Itt

NOTES OX $TE TICTTONAL PROCESS

.ppcer onty in a taleh asdisancegrowsshortcr-c drc camcrl the nr, aoUies if you wil!,-we approach normd ground of the prn (r md f) and shortsto{f or realisticnovel (r fuugh S). Io g*d f,ction, shifs in pqychic distancerre carefully cm" uolled. At the beginningof the stoqy,in the usualcasqwe find the witer using either long or mediumshots Hc movc in I of liale for scenes high intensity, drrvs back for trensitions' movesin still closer for the story'r climax. (Variations of all kinds are poesible, coursg and the subdecniter is likely m of uscpsychicdistancgashe rnight any other fictional device,to He get odd new effests. man for instancgkeepa wholestor'' rt setting,grving an eerig rather icy efrectif one psychic-distance efrect that dre settingis like that in examplel, en overheated only grat skill can keep from mush or sentimenality if the sating is like thet in example The point is that pychic disf. uncg whether or not it is usedconventionally,must be cotluolled.) A pieceof fiction conaining suddenand inexpliceble shifs in psychicdistrncelooh amateurand tendsto drive the reedereway.For instance:"M."y Borden hatedwoodpcckers. Iord, shethought, they'll drive me crazy! The young wofiran hed never known any personally,but Mary knew what shc liked." Clumsywriting of the kindslve beendi*using crnnot hclp distmcting the reader from the dream and thus ruining or eeriorsly impairing the 6ction. I've limited myself to thc mct commonkinds,or thosethat haveprovedmost commonin my editor of boolc as cxperience a writing teacherand sometime Among very bad vriten evn worse and literary megpzines fauls appear--*wo or three spring immediatelyto mind anil in geningthe events an actionout of mey aswell be mentioned: of detailg and certainperinsenion order, cloddishlyawkunard sistentodditiesof imitadon or spelling ffieuh to eccountfos erc?t by a theoqyof activity by the Devil. The first of these of I rhould needno explenadon. refer ti.ply to the presentetion r scriesof rtions where by somenre{ts the write,r'-pethrp

Comnon Enmt

tt,

bccause mind b focuscdon something his clse-gts ercnr out of sequencg forcing the rcederto go back and straightenthern out; or, to put it anotherwry, wherc the writer momurtarily ruspends meaningin his sentence(almoet.l*)o r bed idea), forcing thc readerto nm on faith for several words,hopingthat out of seeming chaossomesense will emerge. Two cxample* First: "Turning, <lribblinglow ashe went in for his shot,he was ruddenly knockcd flrt by one of the cheerleaders, who hed ruhcd onto the court in hcr exciternent so hrd gonenin hb rnd wry." A scntence this one can be fobbedoff on the reade,r like occasionally-thoughthe sharpreaderwill notice and obiectbut if such things happenoften the authority of dre writcr is scriouslyunderminedand, more to the point, the drcam losc powerandcoherence. wc rre to see. perfectly focused lf dream imegc wc mustbe giventhe signals by one,in order,sothrt one cverythinghappens with smoothlogicdity, perfect inevitability. The only exception(and evenherethe writer shouldbe surehb cxceptionis fustified) is the scene which the character's in disorientation-and the reader's-is meantto be an imponant pert of the effect. Bad writers use this exceptioni$ en excuseto introducevoices of nowhere, when we hevea young man out as walking down the road,whistling happily, no onc in sight, and then we encounter words (new paragraph):"'\Match yourthe sclf, Boon!"'Followed by (ncw pamgraph):"Boon turnedin alarm,looking dl eroundin panic." This kind of thing is conr mon in fictiorL of coursg and my disapproval not do much will to discourage writers from continuingto useit. Nevenhelesg if thc theory of fiction asa dreamin the reader's mind is correcq the surprise breakinto the calmof things ("Watch yourself') is r mi*ake, or enyway a lapsefrom absolute, perfectly foc'used clarity. Compare: from somewhere, voiceshoutc4 "Suddenly, a 'Wetch yourself, Boon!"' But theseare delicatemauers,md eveqywriter will havchisown opinionon iust how far he ought to go in punuit of the idealof clarity. fu far asI'm concerned, if the writer hasat leastseriouslythugbt aboutthe problemrnd

rr4

NOTES ON THE FICTIONAL PROCESS

of the fully understrnds advantagcs keepingcvcnt 4 in front of and cvcnt D and all thc cvent chainsassensible clear as falling hc dominocs, crn-and should-do whatevcrfeelsbestto him. of Who knowswhet'sgoingon in theearlynovels JohnHawkcs? And ya few writers haveevcr creatcdmore powerful and cohcrentdrems. Prrctically nothing nccdbc said,cither, aboutthc cloddishly so awkward inscrtion of dctails.One thinks of thoscmoments, fiction, when the writer findshinr' commonin evenprofcssional sclf struggling (asif for the first time) with the age-oldproblem the of smoothly introducing looksof hiscentralchanctcr. (Shc on her happens a miror, sees facc in a clockface,happens a past friend who gushes about how she usedto look as oppocedto how shelooksnow; or the writer, throwing in the towel, iust writing teecher tells us,rnd the hell with it.) Any experienced can givc tips on how to slip things in with the dexteriry of a from the forcing cardsinto the handof his assistant magician but to audience, really all that needs be said--or ought to be said-is this: What the honestwritcr doc, when he's finished r rough draft, is go over it and over it, time after time, rcfusing to let anythingstayif it looksawkward,phony,or forccd.Clurninto neatly insencd sily inscrtcddetailsmusteitherbe revised out or details they must be revised of the fiction. odditicsof As for the third of the rmateursinsI mentioned, saidthe bencr.I meanthingslilc, the imitadonor spelling, less in dialogue,"um, uh . . ."-*ometimes usedby good writers in waysthat don't standout and distractfrom the fictional drcrm, in but usuallyusedby emateurs waysthat makethc rcadertear one can avoid his hair. fu long asone hasa neretot available, funnyJooking dialogueby simply saying,for example, "Carlos thenfor an slightln '[ don'tknow.'" (No need said, stammcring likc "um" or r "d-d-d-don't.")And thenthereareodd qpellings 'Yca" for wherebyfootballplayers "Yeah" or "Yeh," spellings ("Yeaverily"). like or drugpushcrs sounding Jcsus start clumsykinds of writing belongundcr thc hcadof these All

Cutnon Enon

rr5

ing "Learningthe BasicSkills" end rre mettcrsso obviousto thc rcadcr or wrfuer that they seemat fint glancc to cxpericnced havcno placein a book for serious writers. The reasons they do belongerc, first, that the bcst writen do not alwap (or even often) comc from the wcll-educatedupper middle clas--aft's ceuldronis only on rerc occrsions gold or silver-and, sccond, thrt clumsy crrors of the kind I've been treating help show clearly what we meanwhen we spcakof "things that disract the rcader's mind from thc fictional dreem,"endnothing in whrt I'm sayingis morc fundamental then the conceptof the uninterrupted fictionaldream. Let us turn now to three feults far graverthan mereclumsincs$-not faults of techniquebut faults of soul: scnrimentality, frigrdity, rnd mannerism, Faults of soul, I'vc said; but I don't mean those words as a Calvinist would. Faula of soul, like faula of technique,can bc corrected.In fact the main work a writing teacherdoes,and the meinwork the writer mustdo for himself,is bring about changein thc writer's basiccharacter, hclping to makehim that "rrue Poet," as Milton said,without whom therecanbc no truc Poem. Sentimentality, all its forms, is the attempt to ger some in cffcct without providing due cause.(I take it for grantedthat the rcaderunderstands differenccbetweensentiment ficthe in tion, that is, emotionor feeling, andsmtimentality, emotionor feeling that rings false,usuallybecause achieved someform by of cheating eraggeration. or Without sentimenr, fiction is wonhIess.SentimentalitSon the other hand,can makemushof the finest characte$,acdons, and ideas.)The theory of fiction asr vivid, uninterrupteddreem in the reader'smind logically requircsan asenion that legitimatecause fiction canbe of only in onekind: drama; that is, character rction. Onceit is dramatiin cally atablishedthat r character wonhy of our sympathyand is lovc, the story-teller hascveqyright (eventhe obligation,somc would say) to give shaqp focusto our grief at the misfortunes of that characterby means powerful, appropriaterhetoric. (If of

I 16

PROCESII ON NO|rES TIIE TICTTONAL

plain statcthc emotionalmoment has been well cstablished, Think of Chekhov.)The rault b mentsmaybe iust asefrective. But not ruong sentiment, sentimentality. if the story-tellertries of to makeus bu$t into terrs at the misfornrnes somecharacter to we hardly know; if the story-teller appeals stock resPonsc (our love of C'od or countqf, our prty for the downtrodder\ warm feelingsall decentpeoplehavefor children the presumed end smallanimals);if he tries to makeus cry by cheapmelodrama"telling us the victim that we hardly know is all innoall cuce andgoodnesandthe oppressor vile black-heanednes; or if he uies to win us over not by the detailedrnd authenticated virnres of the unfornrnatebut by rhetorical cliches,by pareone-sentence sentences, by superdramatic breathless or graptu ("Then she saw the gun")-sentences of the kind of frvored by porno andthriller writers, andincreesingly lateby effect is sentimentality, supposedlyseriouswriters--then the the md no readerwho's experienced power of real fiction will by be pleased it. not In great fiction we rre movedby what happens, by the of or brwlhg of the writey's presentation what That is, in great fiction, we are movedby characters happens. to who happens be not urd events, by the emotionof the person fiction of Tolstoy or as telling the story. Sometimes, in the Chekhov-and one might mention many others-+he narrative so voice is deliberatelykept calm and dispasionate, that the through almost emotionarisingfrom the fictional eventscomes but wholly untinged by presentation; restraint of that kind is style like that of Faulknecessiry. flamboyant A not an aesthetic The trick is simply that ner at his bestcanbe equallysuccessful. the style mustwork in the serviceof the material,not in adverand tisementof the writer. When the ideas,characters, actions are firmly grounded,Thomas Wolfe's or William Faulkner's style can give fitting expresionto a story's emotionalcontent. of Like the formal laments a Greek chorus,greatrolling waves of rhetoric can raiseour ioy or grief to e keen intensity that

CumtonEnors

n7

the trrnscends mundane and takeson the richnes and universdity of ritual. What beginsin the real, in other words, can be uplifted by style to something recognize, we evenas wc ree{ es et oncethe red and the real transmuted. the passege on So the derth of Joe Christrnrs,m Light i* Augast, suikes the reederas.t oncereality and anifice, fact and hymn. The proee is poery, in dl its majesticself-consciousness, unabashed leap rbove the language ordinary peoplereally speek,ceuses to us feel the lesonance the deathand all it means. it's because of But the necesrry dramr hasbeenpresented-thelifelike ceuses laid out in the story--'that the rhetoric works When Wolfe c Faulknerworla les carefully, as both sometimes trying to do, make incanation sub'stitute character-in-action, reader for the rguirms, We may squirm in the sameway, it hasoften been remarked, when we encounter other eruemeof manneristic the crtch in Henringwey, , the whine we sometimes wherein understetement becomes kind of self-pity. a The fault Longinusidentifiedas"frigidiry" occursin fiction wheneverthe author revEals someslip or self*egardingir by trusion that he is les concemedabout his chrrectersthan he ought to be-les concerned, that lg then any decent human bcing observingthe situationwould naturally be. Suppose thc uniter is telling of a bloody fisdght between old manand hb en ror\ and suppose earlierin the story he hasshownthat dre thrt old man dearly loves his son, though he can never find rn adequate way to showig so that the son,now middle-age4srill sulfersfrom his beliefthat his father dislikes hinr, and wisheshc could somehownrrn the old man's dislike to love. Supposc, further, that the writer hasestablished story of misunderthis standings with sufrcient power that when the fistfght begrnsthc old man'sblow to the sidcof his son'shead,the son'sa$onishedraising of his arms for protectioq the old man'ssecond bloq this time to the nose, that the sonin pein and fuqy hits so the old manon the ear--our reactionaswe rcad is horror end gief. We bendoward the bookh fescination darn, andthc and

II8

NOTES ON THE FICTIONAL PROCESS

'nTheold manwascrying like a baby now and writer continues: swingingwildly-harmlasly, now that he'd beenhun--*winglikc ing and cryin& red-facedn r baby wfuh hh diapcn full." \ile sey,and throw thc book into the fire. What has "Yuk!" of happened, course,is that thc writer has forgonen that his cheracten'situation b serious;hc's rcspondcdto his own imaginedscenewith insufficientwarmth, has allowed himself by to get carried arwey thc baby imrge, end, momanterilyforraal gening or failing to noticethe sccne's interest-the fact that can a patheticmisunderstanding hrve led to this-the writer at snatches (or sealcsfor) a detail of, at best,uivid interesg diny diapcn.The writcr lacla thc kind of pasionall true artiss a the He possess. lacks nobilityof spiritthetenablesrealwriter to enter deeply into the feelingsof imaginary characters(as he cntersdeeplyinto thc feclingsof real people).In a word, thc writer b frigid. the writcr who Strictly spcaking,rri$diry charactcrizes cerry througlr-fails to seriousmaterial,then fails to presents it treat it with thc anention and seriousnes dcscrvc. I woulil cxtendthe tcrm to mcana funhcr cold-hcertcdncsaswcllothe of the givenwriter'sinabiliryto recognize seriousnes thingsin thc fint place,the writcr who tunut au/ayfrom rcal fccling, or in sec only thc supcrficialitics a conflict of willq or knows no moreaboutlovc,bcauty,or sorrowthanonemight leamfrom r frigidity seems thusextended, Hallmark card.With the mcaning literatureandan. It is faultsin contemporery oneof the salient frigidity that lerds writers to tinker, more and morc sometimes with form; frigidiry that lea& critics to schoolsof obsessively, criticism that take lcss and lessintercstin chara$er,ecdon' and the explicit ideasof the story. It may even be frigidity thc that stees the writer towrrd sentimentaliry, faking of cmonot feel.Frigidity is' in short,one tionsthe writer does honestly of the worst faults posible in literature,and often thc basisof stand other faula. When thc ematcurwriter les a bad sentence in his final draft, though he knows it's bad, the sin is fri$dity:

Common Enors

rr9

Hs hasnot yet learned importanccof his art, thc only an or the in science the world that deals precise in detailwith the causeq nature, effects ordinaryandextraordinary and of human feeling. When a skillful writer writesa shallow, cynical,merelyamusing book about extramarital affairs, he has wandered-with far moreharmfuleffcct-into thc same unsavorybog. Mannered writing seemsat times a speciesof frigidiqy (Hemingway hisworst), at othertimesa species sentimen. at of (Faulknerat his worst), but is besttreatedas a separatc tality fault, sincethe mannered writer may bc neither frigid nor sentimental simplymannered. but Mannered writing is writing that continually distracts from rhefictionaldream stylistic us by tics that wc cannothelp associating, we read,with the auas thor's wish to intrudehimself, provehimselfdilferentfrom all otherauthors. The tics of mannered writing erenot to be confusedwith stylisticdevices as that can be explained clearly in thc service subiect of ma$er (character acrion)or designed and to express somenew way of seeing(the specialeffectsof some difficultbut clearlyiustifiable stylewc mustlearnto tunein oq as we do to the stylesof GertrudeStein,Virginia Woolf, or, more recently, Peter Matthiessen Far Tormga\. Neither in shouldthe tics of mannered writing be confusedwith thosc odditieswe associate with inherent stiffnessor nervousnsq comparable that of an amateur to speaker who forms his scntences carefullyand somewhar clumsily,as in the painstaking, clunky stylc of SherwoodAnderson.[,ook, for orsomedmes ample, the first nvo paragraphs his "Deathin the Woods.' at of Shcwasan old womanand lived on a farm nearthe town in whichI lived.All countryandsmall-town people havcseen suchold women,but no oneknov'smuchabout them.Suchanold womancomes town drivinganold into worn-outhorse shecomes or afootcarryinga basket. She mayown a few hens have and to them cggs sell.Shebringp in a baskct takes and themto a grocer.There shetrades

t20

NOTES ON THE FICflONTL PROCESII

Then she beans. salt theurin.Shegetssome pork andsome flour. getsa poundor rwo of sugar some and Afterward shegoesto the butcher'sand asts for somc dog meat.Shemay spendten or fifteen cents,but w{ren In shedoessheasksfor something. my day the butchers gaveliver to anyonewho wanted to c-rrqyit away. In our family we were dwap having it. Once one of my brothersgot a whole cow's liver at the slaughter-housc We hadit until we were sick of it. nearthe fairgrounds. It nevercost e cent. I havehatedthe thought of it ever since, that Anderson thinls count{y peopletalk this It's hardto believe an way, and the ideathat he is imfuating illiterate man'sway of to writing is too discouraging pu$ue. Yet, readingAnderson's thet carefully stifi work, we neverget the sense he writes ashe doesto call acention to himself.Efuherhe csnnot writc more he this) or else wrftesin of smoothly(but some hisfictionbelies his the this farmerishway because style erprsses fiction's purus pose:It discourages from looking for zuperficialbeeuty,the us and of entertainment, encourages to read him soberpolhh that countr)t eamesmess suis the mindedly, with the sort of plain, thoughtful narratorend his stoqy.The style shora rs not the writer's clevernes,much lesshis ego,but the tone and intentionof hiswriting. writing, on the other hend,are drce The tics of mannered from which we gather,by the prickling of our thumbs,some not perhaps fully on ulterior purpose the writer't p.tt, a purpoce nevenheless suspect,puning us on our guerd. corucionsbut or Pasoeat his momself-important, George Think of John.Dos Whereasthe frigid writer BernardShawwhen he pontfficates. lacls suong feeling, and the sentimentdwriter appliesfeeling writer feelsmoresuongly about the indiscriminately, mannered his oum personality and ideas-his ego which he therefore

Enms Conmon

rzr

keepsbefore w by means style-than he feelsabout any of of hischaracters-in effect,dl rherestof humanity. writing, then-like sentimentality Mannered and trigidiryarises of flawed character. critical circlesit is considered out In bad form to makeconnections berweenliterary faults and bad character, for the writing teachersuchconnections imbut are posible to miss,henceimposible to ignore. If r male student writer anacls all wonnnhood,producinga pieceof fiction that the embanases clas, the teacherdoesles than his iob requires if he limits his criticism to comments the writer's excessive on useof "gothic detail," the sentimentalizing tendencyof his sentencerhythmq or the disuactingeffect of his heavilyscatological diction. The best such timorous criticism can achieveis I revisedpieceof fiction that is free of all technicalfauls but no lessembarrassing. help rhe writer, sincethat is his job, the To teachermust enablethe writer to se*-partly by showinghim how the fiction barap his distoned vision (as fiction, closely scrutinized, alwayswill)-that his personal is character wanting. Some writing teachenfeel reluctantto do this kind of thing, and peoplewho arenot anists-people with no burning convictions ebout writing or the value of gecing down to bedrock truth-are inclined to be qympathetic. Nobody's perfecg they generouslyobserve. But the true artist is impatient with such tallr. Circusknife-throwersknow that it is indeedposible to be perfect,and one had better be.Perfectionmeans hitring exacdy what you areaimingat andnot touchingby a hair what you are not. It serves usefulpulposefor the writer to remindhimself no that "even Homer sometimes nods." Homef doesnl exceptin the most uivial wap; for instancg in his many long batde carelessly scenes, killing off the same soldiertwice. Chaucer, in dl his finest p@G, achieves somethingvcry near perfectioo. Racine in Pbsedra,Shakespeare Macbeth. Serious critics n sometimes rrgue that the sandardsin an are always relativc, but all anistic mastcrpieces give them the lie. In the greetesr

-t
r12
NOTES ON THE FICTIONAL PROCESS

or worla of ert-rirink of thc lastworla of C6zanne Beethovcn(not snobbery or thereareno realmistakes. thisvery reason For malice)it is imponantto keeptrack of the faultsof writers not thosewriters closeto our own quitc of the first rank, especially us timc, whose genius half-persuades that their faults must vimres. somehowbe When we look at writers of thc lastgen*ation-to saynothing of the best-knownwriters now emongue-no fault smnds out more visibly than mannered stylc. William Faulkner, thoughoneof thc bestof menand often a brilliant writer, was the One morc "apotheosis," readcrfecls,and highly mannered. he'll be drivento blow up somechurch.In the late works, the rcaderfeelsagainandagainthat Faulkneris trying to recePture to by lostsucceses crankingup thc rhetoric,originallyinvented but rlreadypresent, now meresteam and conveyidees emotions and roar and rattle, a freight train empryof its freight. Hemto proseis antithetical ingwaywasasbad,thoughhis mannered (Shouldanyoncdoubt that the Hemingwaystyle is Faulkner's. as not mannered, iust beautifu\ chiseled, it is in excessively let of "The Snows Kilimanjaro"endall hisbestshortstorics, him in try rcadingthroughten, fifteen storics a row.) James Joycc His as offender, he knew himself. lyrical wasanother ouuageous in especially Ullsses,can of reptitions key symbolicphrases, function; they elways bc cxplainedfully by aesthetic never his carry with thcm a hint of Joyce'sdandyism, middle-pcriod to unwillingness standbackfrom the work of aft-as hc himself told the world it should do-+is unwillingncsses 2n ertist to paringhis nails."Latc indifferent, imitateGod, sitting "outside, in life, Joyce was enormouslypained and frustrated by the his wrong turn he believed careerhad takcn $w Dabliners snd Porttait. The finest shon story cver written' he claimcd, was Tolstoy's late,simplelittlc fable,"How Much Land Doese Man is last Necd?'That opinion,like otherof Joyce's opinions, gcnerally takennot too seriously. Joyccwasill" alcoholic,full of selfhaucd; hc had recently created-and wes still working ovcr-

Enors Common

n3

onc of the towcring works of the humanmind and spiriq FimcgansWake. right to keepJoyce's disadsfecBut while we're obviously Waken perspective, need noticethat we to tion with Finnegans in fact he saidwhat he meant. waspointingout, quite seriHe ously, something that he'd discovered bc going wrong with to thc age-not only in his own work but in everybody'swork. writTurning back,with praisc,to his earln most unmannered ings, and raising for inspectionas a literary touchstone un' an mannered, simplefable,Joycewasreiterating hc principles had recognized from the beginning,though he'd slippedfrom them sometimes practice. in He'd saidlong agothat all fiaion should begin"Once upon a time . . ." and by an ingenious trick had begun Portraitof theArtin on that formula.He'd longsince his offered his inemorable metaphoron the unobuusivcartist imitating God. He waspointing oug in shoft, an imponanttruth,. truth his disciples both early and late,from Faulknerand Dos forward, havetoo often refused hear. Passos to Not all original or strikingly individual writing is mannered. No styleis easier recognize to thanChekhov's, it's difFcult to but think of a writer lessmannered. should be clear, too, that It though a writer may be painfully mannered one place,he in may not be in others.Nowhere in Joyce'sfinest work-"The Dead,"for instance--do find the anist'spenonalityi[egitwc imately intruding on the story. Nowhere in Melvillcb greatest passeges, cenainly not in "Benito Greno" or "Banleby thc doesMelville'svoice rise to (as Lawrencesaid) e Scrivener," In theseworks, and otherslike them, poetic effecn arc "boy." kept subtleandunobtrusive. onecanfail to noticethe poetic No bcauty of Joyce'sclosinglinesin "The Dead," bur the pocr{f (rhythm sosubtlconly comes from the rhphm of the sentences prosccan achieve from the preciselyfocusedimagery (the it), imageof falling snow,which circlesoutwerd dll it fills all thc universc),and thc last lines' echocs-merestwhispcrs-of passeges encountered earlier.Yet it neednot be obvious poeticeffect

l
12+ NO{ES ON TlrE FICTTONAL PROCESS

that makesr story seemilumnered.fu William Gas shoun in hir bestfiaion-'In the Heart of the Heen of the C.ountry,"for instance-even quite spectacular artifice can sit firnrly inside intrusionby the writer. the fiction, not suggesting What doesthe beginningwriter look for, therqassigrs that his writing is slipping toward the mannered? should think He hard about any innovationhe'sintroducedinto his worh mrking surethat the work would not be, for all practicd purposes, the sameif he had done what heb done in more conventional for commas perio& ways. So,for instance, he hassubstituted if in much of the story, trying for somesubdenew rhythmical efrect thet seems him appropriete this particulernerretive, to to punctuatioq he might try reryprngkey passages conventional in over and over, makingsurethat the then readingboth versions new way really doesadd morethan it detracts.(Detractsin the that it distracs the reader'smind until he adiuststo itsense as adiusts we do to the bestinnovativewritinp.) If the writer has inuoduced flamboyant poetic effectsnoticeablerhyme for example-the writer might read and redlowing it to read what he'swritten, then put it away awhilen cool, then againread and reread,carefully analyzinghis emqtion as he reads,tqying to make out whether the new device it worls beceuse givc new interest and life to the materialor whether,on the other hand,it beginsto wear thin, feel slightly in creepy.Needles to sey,no final decision, a maner like thix on Any fool canreviseuntil nothing shouldbe based cowardice. out stands asrisky, everythingfeelssafe-and dead.One way or kind of gusto.The trick all some arrother, greatwriting achieves lies in writing so that the gustois in the work itself, and whetfrom the hrrmony or rneyhavecomes everfire the presentation end indivisibility ofpresentation the thing presented.

Techntqr.

What the young writer needs develop, achieve goal of his to to becoming greete$ist, is not e set of aesthetic . lacn but anisic mastry.He cannothopeto developmesteryall at once;it involvestoo much.But if he pursues god in the proper way, his he canapproach muchmorerapidly than he would if he went it at it hit-or-misg end the more zuccesful he is at each *age elongthe wan the swifter his progress likely to be.Invariably is when the beginningwriter hands a shon sbry to his writing in the teacher, story hasmany thingpaboutit that mark it asamateur. But almostasinvariabln when the beginningwriter deals with someparticular, srndl problen4such as descriptionof r setting, descriptionof a character,or brief didogue that has somedefinite purposc,the quality of the work approachc the profesional This may not happen the writer works blindlyif if he hasnot beenwarnedrbout the problems witl encountcr he rnd given someguidanceon posible wap of dealingwith the mainproblemsetfor him. But it's e commoncxperience unitin ing clasesthat whcn the writer worls with someshrrply de 6nedproblemin techniqugfocusingon that alonq he producc suchgood work that he suqprisc hinrslf.Succes breedssucr25

r26

NOTES ON THD FICTIONAL PROCESS

ctss. tlaving wrincn comesmdl thing veqy wcll, lrc beginso lcarn confidencc. can Two important lessons be learnedfrom thc fect that thc beginningwriter doeshis bat when working with somelimited problem.The first is that thc writcr's relativeindifferenccto his (though this is by no means say to materialcanbe an advantage thet thc writer shoulddways bc indifferent to his material). In bcginning an exerciscasigned him by his teachcr,the writer has no commitmentto the mesageabout to be convcyed,no is to concernaboutwhetheror not the character be created truc to lif+-an eccruate picture, say, of his mother. In an exercisg onc simply makesthings up as thc asignment rcquires'and if by chancc mlkingtrec emerges, getsplayfully involvedin a one figuring out what a trec might think to mcntion.Thc tree, after the othcrwise exercisc all, mustsomchow madeintcrcsting; bc will bc a bore. In fact, the trec cennot help but say things of imponanceto the writer---othcrwisethe writcr wouldn't havc thought of the trec's remarks*and soon thc writer discovers cernest. Conthrt his playful involvementhasturned somcwhat sciouslyor not, heis exprcsingmorc feelingabout,for instance, childhoodfrustradons and maternallovc than he would bc Whether likely to springin a true-to-lifestory abouthismother. r givcn cxcrciscleadsto realisticfiction or non-realisticfictionn throughrecollection simulation, it lcadsto fiction: to a studied rnd imaginativeproicction, of real feeling within the writer. When one writes aboutan rctual pareni,or friends,or oneself, are psychological censors lockedonrsothet frequently, dl one's thoughnot always, produces one eithersafebut not quite true cmotionor clse-from thc writer's desireto tell the truttr, howcvcr it may hun$old but distoned,fake emotion.In the first prombcrse,onc'sold friend Alma Spire,who wasoccasionally cuow, tums out to bc "sensitivcend warmly sensual";in thc do sccond, turns out to be a slut. Resl-lifc characters someshc timcs hold their own in fiction, but only those,loved or hatc{ whom thc writer hasuansformedin his own mind' or through

Teolmirye

n7

beings. Writing sn crcrcise, thc proccs of uniting, to imagrnary thc writer b in ttrc idcd rnistic rtate, both scriousrnd not scrious. wantsthc exercisc bc wonderful,so that his clasHe to mates applaud, hc is not in thedark pychologicalsetof will but the ambitious young noveliststrugglingto writc down hh cxistcnceasit is, with the ghoetof thc young Jamcs Joycc rtanding horribly et his brck. Writing en cxcrcisc,thc beginningwritcr b doing cxacdy what the profasionaldoesmostof the timc. Much of what gocs into r real story or novel gocsin not bccausc writcr dcsperthe ately wantsit thcre but bccause nceds Thc scenc he it: iustifies somelater action,showssomebasisof motivation,or rcveals somcespct charactcr wirhout which thc projccted climaxof of the action would not rcem crcdiblc. Ag.ro and againmc finds onsclf laboriously dcvcloping somcminor character would one neverhevcintroducedwere hc not necdedto sell the clock for thc dmc-bombor to shcarthc shcep. Again and againonc finds onc$elfstruggling with all one'swits to makc I thunderstorm vivid, not bccausc cares one aboutthundcrstorms becausg but if thc storm is not madc real, no one will believeMartha's phonecall the middleof thc night. If hc brilliantly succeeds in with hiscxercisq writer learns, the consciously not, the value or of themind-set produced success. that thc The second importantlesson beginning writer learnsis the that fiction is madeof structural units;it is not onegrcat rush. Every story is built of e numberof suchunits: a pasagcof dacription, e passage dialogue,an action (Leonard drivcs of thc pickupuuck to rcwn), another passege descripdon, of more dialqguc, so forth. The goodwriter ueatscachunit individand uallS devclopingthem one by one.When he'sworking on thc dcscriptionof Uncle Fyodor'sstore,he doesnot think aboutthc hold-up mcn who in a momentwill cnter it, though hc kecp them in thc back of his mind. He describa the $ore, patiently, malcing comcalivg infusingevery smellwith Unclc Fyodorl it cmotionandpnondity (tris feer of hold-up men,perhep); hc

I28

NOTES ON TIIE FICTIONAL PROCESS

writing as worls on the storeasif thb were simply an exercise, if he had dl *emity to finish it, and when the descriptionis not perfect---and Kxl long or too short in relationto its function in the story ase whole-he moveson to his story's next unit. Thinking in this way, working unit by unig alwayskeepingin him to do but refusing mind what the plan of his stoly requires (Aunt Nadia'shysteria to be hurried to more importam things e when the gun goes off), the writer achieves story with no dead of spots,no blurs, a story in which we find no lap,ses aesthetic interest. One way to beginon the road to ertistic me$ery' then' is to By of work et the sptematic development fictional techniques. mean,of coune, ways of manipulatingfictional techniques I that exist or elernens.No book c:rn treat dl the techniques old might exi*---every writer inventsnew onsor nses onesin new ways.-but it will be useful to examinehere in general tnns the role techniqueplap in contanporaqyfictior\ then to look, more or lesset random,at a few technicalmatte$ thet provebasb.

ficdon, techniqueiq on the whole' more selfIn contemporary conscious than everbefore.Given any basicstory situatiorpthe murderer creeping through the bushes,Grandmother'sconwriter is likely versioq the lovers'first kis-the contemporary know morewaysof handlingthe situationthan did the writer to onceit wls commonfor writers to of any former time.Wherees writers may work alwap in some basicstyle, contemporary one change radically from story to sto{f or novel to so on occasion are their productions all by one novelthat we canhardly believe For one thing ere hand.The reesons of coursenot fer to seek. available us.lilhen Sir ThomasMalory to we havemorernodels he wrotc a mas banle scene, had virtually no models.The re mlt is thag brilliant eshe wasasan innovator,his batdessound m modernearstiresomelyalike. The modernwriter hasa vast

Teclmirye

ng

models, supplyof available from Homer'swritingp to Mongolien bandit legends storiesfrom the French Revoludonor Vietto nem. For another thing, thanks panly to certain movements in modernphilosophy,thc art of fiction, like rll the arts, hasbecomc increasinglyself-conscious self-doubting,anists reand peatedlyaskingthemselves what it is they're doing. Chekhov andTolstoy could saywith greatconfidence the businesof that fiction was"to tell the truth." Contemporary thought, aswe've seen,is often skepticalebout whether telling the truth is possible.Thoughwe mey be fairly confident that an does the tell truth, that fiction's elements and techniques form r language that the artist can usewith greatprecision,and that the reeder hasintuitive means checkingon the truth of what the artist of sa1n, will be hclpful to look at this whole mafter in a little it more detail,sinceknowledgeof the ergumenrs help clarify will theroleoftechnique. Telling the truth in fiction can meenone of three things: saying that which is factually correc, a trivial kind of truth, though a kind central to works of verisimilitude;saying that which,by vinue of toneandcoherence, not feellike lying, does a more important kind of truth; and discoveringand affirming monl truth about human existence-the highestrruth of ert This highestkind of truth, we've said,is never something the artist takesas a given. It's nor his point of deparnrrebut his goal.Though the artist hasbeliefs,Iike other people,he realizcs thet a salientcharacteristic an is ia radicalopenness pcrof to suasion. Even thosebeliefshe'ssurestof, the artist pots under prcssurc seeif they will stand.He may hrve a premy clear to idcr wherehis experiment will lead,as Dostoevsky when did he sentReskolnikov his unholymision; but insofarashe'sa on true artist,he doesnot force the results. knowsto the depths He of his soul that when an artist creats the serviceof wrong in beliefs*that ls, out of wrong opinionshe mistakes knowlfor edge--or whenhe creetes the service doctrines in of thet may or

r30

NOTES ON TITE FICTIONAL PROCESS

mry not be true but cannotbe tested-for instancr,doctrinairc resurrection thc dcad-thc of Marxismor beliefin the eventual is not the effectof or cfect of his work, admirable otherwise, or clse:pedagogy, truc art but of something propaganda, rcligon. But thcreremains question, centralconcern all scriin one a namely,thc impliscience; ousmodernart, asin contemporary cationsof the Hcisenbcrg principle:To what exrcntdoesthe instrumcntof discoverychangcthe discovery,whethcr the inof $rumcnt be "the process fiction" or the particlebombardmcntof anatom? amongthc group hc is presence Just asan anthropologisCs of studyingcanaltcr the behavior the group,or asthe bombardto so ing of an atomaltersthe patternit means illuminate, thc which an artist explores rcality may alter the thing exstylc in plored. Anyone can discernthat, in music,emotionexplorcd atonally;and thoughit's tonally diffen from emotionexplored in to emotions the conimpossiblc prove that the generating werc in any way similarin the rwo sciousncs the composer of qNes,composers thc themselves have often cxpressed opinion one's having6rst chosen musical form, onethen bends that the oneself the key of to thoughtto it, exactlyas,havingcommitted of to D minor,oneadapts generative the emotion the resonancc difrerentin thc "hap that kcy; onewould havesaidsomething picr" kcy of G major. A fcw yeers ego, or so I'vc been told, e group of sound tcchniciansconductedan cxperimentto discoverwhether they music multiplying by the of couldheighten "prcsence" recorded but wasquadraphonic sound, on The tracksandspeakers. result the way to that result a s$engething occurred.A group of composcrs, musicalperformers,and critics were asembledto for then Iistcnto musicdcsigned four speakers, eight speakers, somcof to thcn morc.When listening musieon eightspeakers, notedthat what they weregettingwesnot morc the musicians accuratcrcpresentation music as we hear it in e hall but of

Technique

r3r

romahing guitc new and different: One beganto be rble o to locate the soundsin spacc.Thc clrrinet seemed ccupy r panicular point or areain thc room, thc trumpet anotherareq corrspondcnt thc scatingof thc the pianoanother-not ereas to group recordedbut rreasreletedasthe head,rrmg and lep of e rculpture might bc rclated. The music, in shon, had bccomc visud, sornething new under the sun. Writing music for eight composrmight thcoretically shapcmusiclhysirpcakers,. celly shapc it-rs no onc had evcr donebefore.Whether or not my composcr exploredthat posibiliry I do not lmow, but has the story, if it is truc, illustretcs fact well known amongartiss, a that an docsnot imitatercality (hold the mirror up to nature) but crcarcsr ncw rcdity. This rcrlity may bc rppsitc to the rcalirywc walk throughcvcryday+ueets rnd houscs, mailmen, trcc---*nd mry triggcr thoughtsand fcelingsin the same way a ncwly discovcredthing of nature might do-a capturedBig Foot or Loch Nes monstcr--but it is csscntidlyitself, not the mirror reflection of somcthingfamiliar. Thc incrcasingly sharprccognftionthat art works in this way hasgenuatcd thc popularity, in recentycars,of formalist artrn for rn's sake-end metafiction,of which we spokecarlier. Thc generalprinciplc of the former hasbcen familiar for centurics.Thc first modern thinkcr to dc6ncthc modeclcarlymay hrve beenRobcn Louis Srcvcnson his prefaccto thc Chcin terficldcditionof thc tmnslated Worksof Victm Hugo.Therc Stcvcnson pointcd out that all art cxistson s continuum betweenpolcshc calls "objcctivc" rnd "subiectivc." onc cxAt trcme, the subjectivc,we hrve novels like those of Hugo, whcreinwc fccl aswe readthrt we areamongthe Frenchmobs, surroundcdby noiscrnd smoke,uansportedfrom the room in which wc rcad to Hugo'simaginaqy Paris.At the other extremc wc hrve Ficlding'sTotn f ones, whcrcin wc areneverallowcdto imagincfor long that the herois I "rcal" young man.As soonas wc bcgin to incline to thrt pcrsursion,Ficlding introducesa Homericsimile, anintcrchapter, somerhing or from the tmdior

r32

NOTES ON THE FICTIONAL PROCESS

tion of puppeteering, forcing us once more to recognizethe novelasanobject,not "real life." By way of illustrationfrom the visral arts,Stevenson the comparcs effect of early- and middlewere like vivid scenes period Turner, when Turner landscapes other hand, the work of seenthrough a window, and, on the that Stevenson 6omeunnemedFrench painter (one suspects may havemedehim up) who prsted reel sand on his beechscape order that no one shouldmistakewhat he'slooking at in for e red beachon which r family might arrive to spreadia picnic. or creators ob;ective, of ere All literary parodists inescapably momentwe the meaningless formalisgan. The perody becomes foqgetthat the work is a literary obiect iokingly or seriously commentingon anotherliterary object. In ordinary "realistiC' fiction-the writwould call subiective fiaion-what Stevenson er's intent is that the readerfdl through the printed pageinto not so tte scenerepresented, thxt he sees words and fictiond crosing conventions the dreamimageof, say,a tumbleweed but Arizona. [n formalist fiction we are conrious mainly of thc and writer's art, or of both the tumbleweed the art that makc it might be drawn from exemples nrmble.Fxcellentcontemporery going andlooking somethe fiction of William Grs but to seve thing up, I will useonefrom my own work. In my novella"The King's Indian" I parody,amongother writen, EdgarAllan Poe. At onepoint I borrow directty from Poe:"My hair stoodon end, and my blood congealed, I sankagaininto the bilgewater."If my effort is successfulthe readerboth seesthe imagein his mind-les l realist'simagethan one drawn from nineteenthPoe illusuntion-and sees grinning rnd wavcentury magazine wings. ing from the In the nineteenthcentury, most writers, though not ell' fictions unapologetically austed their implemensand presented the mimetic of life. If a writer emphasized cartoon or PuPPet*age quality of his arq asdid Dickens,Thackeray,and Steven-

Tecbnirye

rt3

son, he did so not becarsehe distrustedartt relervanoe life to but either because feh more or les indifrereat to that relehe venceor because enioyedpure enificq as we still do Thc he slme mey bc saidof Homer, Dante,Chaucer, "Monk" Lewis, or Smollea.If pressed, they would probably havesaid that they believedan directly relevant to lifg but they loved anifice Thhl& of.Tristrm Shanily ,The wotkis of course spoof,asen& a up of the novelandof story+ellingin general, no onedoubts but that SterneintendedUncle Toby to seem rs lifelike. Poe q to .mong uniters in Englisb the great nineteenth-century f,cep. tion. The saddisparity beween life and art (ert lrills or transforms life) b both his favorite zubiectand the principle behind his invention of new fictional forms. (He was the inventor of suchforms--aswe know thernnow-as the detective stoqy,thc lrcror story, the piratestory, the doppelginger sto{F,the sto{ys-painting ["Landor's Cottage"], and the fiction that b dl denouement ["The Caskof Amontillado"].) For Pog asfor hb great Frenchtrenslator,art's relation to life uns far from inne crcna "Ligeia" he suggsts In dlegorically that in pursuit of the ilel the "dram munory" of Platonic philoeophy (the narrator's memoryof his lost Ltg.i.), the artist murdersactrnlity. In'The Fdl of the Houseof Usher,"the resurrection dre lost of beauty-blood-stainedand honibly hatteredwhen sheepparr _ls helpeddong by the narrator'sreadingof en old romenoe. Again and againin Poe's psychological dlegories, anist doc the his work muchaswitchesdo theirs,by following ancientformu. Ias,creatingart's effectswith the daemonic help of older worts of are Twentieth-centurywriters, for whom Poeanil his followers opened way, often haveno confidence aft hasrelevancc the that o lifa Like their colleagues scienceand philosophy,they in makemuch of the fact rhar "e changeof style b a changeof subiect" They know that eight speakers not bring us clccr do to thc realiry of the concenhdl, but crere a new actudity, rnil

r3+

NOTES ON THE FICiIIONAL PROCESS

thc tendencyof thc writen is m pursucnot life but thc ncw actudity, the invention.Hencethe fashionof linguisticsculpturc and'bpaquelanguag3." with art'r It is, aswe've seen,this samenervousfascination that hasled to the popularity of mctauntrusnvorthycharacter fiction, thc piccc of fiaion on thc subject of making fiction. of Somcof the moreinterestingrecentcxemples--+omc the less William Gas's Willie Muterr'sLanesmre Wife, boring-ere Ron Sukenick's "lVhet's Your Story?"andJohnBarth's'LifcStory." A cenral concernin all such fiction is the cxtent to One which techniqueor mediummay bc art's solemessege. of is of the mostelegant recentAmericanmetafictions JohnBarth's the "Lost in the Funhouse," story of a boy who goesto a funhousewith his older sister and her lover, a sailor. All that il stanmoving andbeautifully written in thc story by customary from real or imagincd dards,Banh interrupts with comments manuals the an of fiction. We likc and rffirm the story's on lovers, raponding to the beeury of the prose unsophisticated of interruption thet prosc them;but the constant that represents with comments how effectiveproseis written makesus iron of ritably conscious the extent to which moving prooc is not As natural but achieved. a result, wc doubt our naivc rcsPolsc to the lovers,asBarth intendsus to. Wc sharc+s in ordinary fiction wc ere nevermeentto de-the doubtsand problcmsof in the anist, but alsohis pleasurc his work, and in doing so losc and of the innocence our delightin thc funhousc the erperience Like the bright youngerbrother,we get no real of the lovers. we of from the sensetions life's funhouse; slip in to pleasurc arepulledandbecome "loct." wherethelovers Barth is not claimingthat maserful techniqucis a thing to it bc avoided only that, if posiblc, onceonc hasc-rptured but oneshouldkcepit on its chain.On onehand,showytcchniquc is thrilling, as much in a work of Fction as in the work of e brillient trapezcaftist o! animaltrainer. No one would askthet the masterartist hide his abilitia. On the other hand,cleverness

Techniqte

t3t

can become own cnd, subveninghigher cnds,aswhen stylc is overshadowscharacter, action, and idea. Thc question is betweensubiectand. whetherthe artist can ever hold e balance Perhapsit b in the nature of art that acntaliry presentation. mustbe murdered, it is in "Ligeia,"and that what art bringt as thing that, fonh is not somehigher reality but a blood-stained like Madeline life Usher,can flicker with apparent for only an instant before collapsing backto derth. One curiousresult of the current, though not exactly new, fascination with the alteringeffect of technique subiectmeton ter is what L. M. Rosenberg identified as "fictional zuperhas realism."The aim of writers in this mode (Mary Robison, LauraFurman,Ann Beattie, and othen) is identicalto thet of exacicopyistDuanc in photo-realiss paintingor the sculptural Hansen, get down reality without the slightat modification to by the artist. fu e group, they reiect what would ordinarily be called "interestingplot." In one typical story, e characterinheritsa house HoosickFalls,New York, goes in therc to live in it and 6x it up, and hasbrief, seemingly inconsequential conversations with neighbon. Plot profluence limitedto the fact that is time pases,progresingto a momcntof slight emotional rilse (usuallysignaled the transformation dacriptive details by of to a full-fledgedimage the objecdfication an unstated, of trivial cmodon);the conventional divisionof narrative into organized scenes scrupulouslyavoided;if someinsight is awakened is or emotion stirred,the fact is simplyreponed, like any other fact The writer makes effort to choose an images with the disinterest and of a camera, whereverposible he suppresses carefully or wordswith emotive undercuts effect.As Rosenberg pointsout, the writer doesnot allow himselfevensuch dialogue tap as hollered" or "he exclaimed";even questions-suchas "shc "'Wherein hell is the salt?"-are tagged"shesaid."The writen seckto bring to perfectionthe scientificideelof Zolt or William DeanHowells, treatingnothingin natureasunwonhy of notice and nothingasmoreworthy of noticethan anythingelse.H. D.

rt6

NorEs oN rlrE FrcrroNALPRocE$t

Raymond, on supr-redist visuel ertist$ offen r modernversionof the old scientificidrl "In omining ideology, sublimity, and mordity from their vision they erc s\rorn to 8 phenomenologist credo. They stare unblinkingly rt what is 'really'out there,ignoring the mentd constructs through which they arc peering." Oneobiectionto the credois old andobviors: We simply do not believethat reality is what thae writers (and painten) maintainit to be. The realismis not "lifelike" because seems it to us dead.We may evensuspct thc writer's suppresionof in ernotiona certain unwitting dishoncty. Grtainly no one who looks at the paintingpof Philip Pearlstein,with their strong frontal lighting and accurate slighdy cartoonish but of emphasis features-"stupid paintings,"he celts thenr--can deny e faint suqpicion contemptfor feelsan unacknowledged that Pearlstein the humanform, evenwhen the paintingsare of his daughters. Eventhe composer who writes for eight speakers, producing visual music,is likely to do more than simply follow out the posibilities of some new ec$ality. His emocionsclectsonc visual musicasmore interestingthan another.The suppresion of the enist'spcnonalirycanbe virnrally total, esin the fictional super-redism Robison,Furmaq and Beanig writers whose of abnegation individual stle is so completethat, exceptunder of the closest scrutiny, we cannottell one writer's work from another's;yet the very supprasionof sryleis a sryle--+n eesthetic choice,anexpresionof emotion. An oppositeresponse the ctrrent fascinrtion with the to elfect of rcchnique subiectmettermay be found in the work on of r group of contemporary non-realistic movementsKafkaesqueexpresionism,surrealism,and the formalist "irreelism" of uniten like Borges and Banhelme.At is most produccs,for cxample,the Troe4presionisticthis movement pnttnsof Nathalie Saraute. In one of the uopsrtc Srrrautc describes encounter en betweene young womanand en earnest old gendemanis Their conversation awkwardrnd intense:

Tecbairye

q7

But heintenupted her: "England. . . Ah, yes,England . . . Shakespeare, Eh? Shakespeare. eh? Dickens.I remembr, by the way, when I wes youn& I amused myself trrnslating Dickens.Thackeray. Have you read Thackerey?Th. . .Th . . . ls that how they pronounce Eh? it? Thackerayl Is that it? Is that the wey they sayit?" He hedgrabbed andwasholdingher entirely in his her fst. He watchedher assheflung herselfabouta bit, asshe struggledawlnrardly, childishly kicking her litde feet in the ar, while maintaininga pleasant smilc; "Why yes, I ttrinL itb like that . . ." Herg as in someof the worls of Kgfka, panicular alsteilsof psychologicelreelity are directly tr:nslated into phpicel realyet rty. Techniqueis not suppresedbut emphasized, no real divorceof actuality and the expresionof actuality is suggested" Neither is there any real divorce betweenactualiry and exprcsrion in surrealisr fiction (Jerzy Kosinski William Pdmer, sometimes John Hewkes); the difrerenceis that here the rcality imitated iq not in one or nro detailsbut in many, that of our dreams. this fiction (as sometimes the conventionaltde), In in thingshappen if at random;only coherent as givesorden ernotion At other times-here asin Kafka's drerm storic ("A C,ountry Doctor")-a progression evens carriesan emotiond charge of not et first fully explained the evenrs thernselves. prsen: by The trtion tendsto be that of convendonal rEalistic6ction; only the subfectmattbr haschanged. the critic end writer Joe Devid As Bellemyputsit: In the early twentieth-cennry novel of coruciouness or modernistshort fictioq we ere insiilee character(or characters) lookingout. ln the world of thecontemporary superfictionist, ere mostfrequently insidea character we (or characters) looking in-'m theie inner phantasms are proiectedoutward,andin a sometimes frightening,sometimescumicrwenaf the outside"rality" bcginsto lool

r38

NOTES ON THE FICTIONAL PROCEST

morc and morc lilcc e mirror of thc inner lanilscapetherc is so linls difiercnccbcrn'centhe two. Socallcd absurdistfction offcrs another variation. [n Eug]nc Ionesco'splry Rhinocnoq thc peoplcof a town beginchanging, but onc by onc, into rhinoceroses--all thc nart?tor' who at thc wishcshc could changcinto r rhinoccrosbut cnd of thc story as can't, and pocsibly his girlfriend, who pcrhapachanges thc othershavc dong and then againpcrhapsthply pinc awey of Thc characte$'transformalonclincs and guilt rnd disappcars. cannot be cxplainedcxpresionistically' tion into rhinoceroses sincc somcof thosewho changearc rhinoceroolikc(stubbonr' ferocious,incapablcof rcasoning)and othcn are noq and neithc cen thc story bc intcqpretedas r drcam. If anything, the univcrsc to transformationsreflect thc workings of an ab,surd which all humanrcponss("our own moral codc," "our philossystcmof valueq" "humenisrn even ophyr" "our irrcplaceablc " lovc) arc inadcquate.(Thc stoly b commonly intcqprctcd as hevingto do with thc acceptancc Nezi fascism.) of the morc intercstingand variousof the "irrealists,"t Among abandon= group of writers who work out of fictional convention, ing thc attempt to deal dircctly with realiry, is Donald Barthelme. AU his work, from Snou White to The Dead Fathr, might bc read as,amongothcr things, t tow4e-f orce snrdy in litcrery (and visual) techniquc.His worldview, in all his fiction' sruggle with problemsthat is cssentidly absurdist:Characters cannot bc solved and either eccept thcir fatc or stmgglc on. Exccpt for the fact that superficially Banhelme'smethod b comic, and thc fact, also,that the pathoeof Banhelmc'sstorics onc cffect of his work is thc same is alwaysmuted,the emotional wc get from naturalistfictior\ irony and pity. Onc of the things that makehis writing intcrcsting is his sceminglylimitlas abilIt as ity to manipulatctcchniques modesof apprehension. goes nothing:Rcthrt, for Barthelme, apprehend they without saying ality is a place wc cennot get to from here. (Thc shon etory

l
Techniqte r39 fiction.) Yet at his "City Life" is in part a parodyof super-realist bestBarthelme iuggletechniqua in a way that doesexprst can emotionand an attitude toward life. Take, for example, his well-known story from the collection City Lif e, "Views of My FatherWeeping." Thc story combinesliterery perody and surrealism(normelly conficting modes,the first "obiective," in Stevenson's terms,the other "subiective"), togetherwith snippes of other modesand styles,to tell a non-reali*ic story of a son'sattempt to understand avenge father'sdeath. and his Thc story opens: was An aristocrat riding down the streetin his carriage. He ran over my father. After thc ceremonyI walked back to the city. I was trying to think of the reason fathet had died.Then I my rcmernbered: wasrun overby a caniage. hc I tclephoned motherand told her of my father's my death.Shesaidshesupposed was the bcst thing. I too it it supposed wrs the bestthing.His enjoyment diminwas ishing.I wonderedif I shouldanemptto ffacc the aristocrat whosecarriagehrd run him down. There werc said to havcbeenoneor two witnesses. (e.g.,"an aristocrat")are thoseof the converr The materials tional tale;the style,flat-sutement rcalism; surface emotion, the absurdist: he "Then I remembered: wasrun overby a carriage." Abruptln a surrealist image breaks in: The man sitting in the centerof the bed looksvcry muchlike my father.He is weeping, coursing down tears hischeela. that he is upsetaboutsomething. One cansee Lookingat him I see something wrong.He is spewis that like a fire hydrant with its locls knocked off. His ing yenmer dartsin andout of dl therooms. . . .

r10

NOTES ON THE FICTTONAL PRO@SI

The poruait of the imposible deadfather is of course.mbgtr and dutiful, on one han4 and ous.The son is both concerned on rnnoyed by the father's vulgprity and childishness, the ("yammer"), an ambivalence be developed throughout other to the story. Two fuxtaposed images showthe contrestclearly,one showingthe father asmagical,hencevasdysuperiorto the son, the other showing him as embamasinglychildlike, the very rntithesis "an aristocrat.' of My father thronn hb ball of knitting up in the air. Ths orangpwoolhangp thur. My father regards trry of pink cupcakc. Then he the hir thumb into eachcupcake, into the top. Cupcake ir* by cupcake. thick smilespreads over the face of each A orpcaka of The story continuesin alternating pesseges parodic nineteenth-cennry gothic detective fiction (with modifications), surrealistfiction, and other styles.With the help of witneseq the son trecs the driver of the aristocrat'scaniag, I man of naned Lan Bang; we leern that, iust as he is ashamed hb father, the son feels ashamed his own inadequacy the by of aristocraticstandard("When I heard this name [Lars Beng], which in its soundand appearance rude vulgar, not unlike fu my own name, wasseized repugnance.. ."); and6nally, in I by . companywith other listenerqthe son learnsfrom the carriage driver (an elegantman in comparison the son) that the fato ther's deathwas a result of his own foolishnes--he was drunk urd attackedthe horses with e srritch. Insteadof winning iur tice for a murdcred father, the son has learned.-+nd c-aused and increasothersto learn--of his father'sshame guiilf ttrereUy iog hit own. Yet perhaps is wrong Geelity is impenetrable)" this A beautiful young girl, who hassat silent and sullen through Bang'srecitation, abrupdy spedrsup (using language slighdy

Technirye

r4r

bloody liar,' shesaid."The story vulgar): " Bang b an ahcolute As nThe DeodFober, drc burdenof ends,asit mst: "Etc." sonsgoeson and on. What is most strfting aboutthe story is dre rangeof styler orchestrated a singleeffect: gothic detectivefictioq surreeL for (as iur, old-stylemelodrama here): Why! . . . there'smy father . . . sitting in the beddrere! . .. rnd he'sweepingt . . asthoughhisheanwould bunt! . you? ...Frther! ... howisthist... who haswounded ... name man!. .. why I'll. . . fU. . . herg Father, the take this handkerchief!. . . and this handkerchief!. . . endthis handkerchief!. . . ru run for a towel . . . absurdixverbalcomedy: Or again, brshesand somepatr Then we shot up somemesquite of a Ford pickup somebody'd lying around.But no lefr cameto our perty (it wCI noiqy,I admit it). A animels long list of animals failed to arrivg no deer,quail rebbit, sealions, condylanlu.. .. reals, Et cetera"What holds it all togetheris the ncrrative voicg a comic-pathetic troubledmind. All of theseapproachc to fictior--expresionisq srrfreelfttt, rbsurdist, ducc interestingwort if the cniter b rny good, however shaky the philosophicalbase.Whco thc writer creates somethingnew, he can hardly help doing it at leastby endogy to the familiar creativeprocescturning stret sounds elecuonicbleeps or into "musiC'by analogyto the proces by which Bachand thosebeforehim mademrsic of noteq or creatingan oral sculptue by a methodanalogous that of to the taditional sculptoror film-maker.At the "obiective" end of Robea Louis Stevenson's continuunr,the end that rtuects thc ireelist$ the only humanrcaliry thst rernainsis the selecting process the anht. We get from the worh his emotiondsct,the of rfrrmatiom.ven if he doeso'twish to nake it--of bis eye'r

r42

NOTES ON TITE FICTIONAL PRO@SII

goc rclrdonship (and thcrcforc hb hcan's) to thingr. Thc samc for thc rupr-rcalisa. As Robbe-Grillct kcqpepointing out' you cennotg* down thc rcality of thc rcfrigeratorwhcn no onc is in thc room; in othcr words writers camot suppress "the mental construcsthroughwhich thcy rrc pccring."The wholc question of the urrcenainryprinciplc b in l tcnsc r rcd hcning. Wc choorctcchniqucs wc chooccwor& in English,cithcr to say as whet we mcan,esnearly aswc cen,or to find out what heppnr whenwe choose thocctcchniquetr thoscwor&. "I hatcyor1" thc child reyr to hb father, watchingslnewdly for reection."Marriagc is s $rangething," caysthc lover, and glancc at hb love. So I propose a piecc of fiction that r ccnain man had threc in hundrcdrons,all rcd-hcads, I muscon what that makcsmc and 31yncrL Let us turn to spccifics. Out of the horde of tcchnicalmatters that might bc mentioncdI will chocc seventhat seemto me basic learning tcchnique by imitation, devclopmentand control of vocabulary,sntence handling,poetic rhFhr\ point view, dclay, and rtyl.. orr all thcscmacers,my discusion fo of mcentto besuggcstivc, orhausdvc, not Imitation For ccnturieqone of the standardwaln of learningtechniquc hasbccnimitation, aswhen, in thc cightearth century, the stw dcnt took some clasical model-for cxamplg the Plndaric hymn or the Horatian odc---rndwrotc, in Grcclr, Latin, or Eng, Ibh, en original work in imitation of that modcl.The approach is still instructivc. Two kinds of imitation secm cpccially worthwhilc: carefuluscof an old, gencrallyunfamiliarform for and the prescntation analpis of modernsubiectmecer, and thc morc dircct, cvcn linc-by-linc imitation that cnablcsthe writcr to lcarn "from insidc" thc sccrcc of somegrcat unitcr's stylc. Though humancxpcricnccb univenal in many weys, atti-

Technirye

4t

tudc changc from ageto rge rnd onc wey of comingto undcrstand our idcas and emotiom is to rtudy thcm ttuough thc spcctaclcs somccarlier form or sct of aesthctic of prcmise. For a number of reasons, c"nnot quitc sharcthc Romanticcxwe perienccof nrture. For onc thing, naturc itsclf has changed. Whercrs the Romrntic artist might mrkc r painting hc cdls "Trec and Stream" or "Vicw of Montrinte-Victoire, Latc Afternoon," the paintertoday, whetherfrom dlsillusionment or from a curiousbut ruthentic attachment thc world hc knonry, to may makc a painting hc calls "Pontirc with Treetrunk" or way, thc writcr may copy "Chcvy in Grccn Fields."In thc same somc old ide+-thc drcrm visior5 thc imaginary voyege, thc hymn to the state,thc saint'slegcnd,or thc fremed narrativoand may translatcthc form to suit modern cxpcricncc.So in lason tnd Medeia I copicd the Argonntico of Apollonioc Rhodios(with someadditionsfrom Euripidesrnd others), asking myself .t evcry turn what the characters cvcntsmight and meento a modernsensibiliry-asking,thar is, how much of thc original would still hold, how much we arc forced to alter and whn whoeereading of expcrience more eccurate (that of is Apollonios or our own), and how much experience itself has changed. DonaldBanhelme So plap off thc medieval tradition of the allegorical mountain(mainly off Chauccr's The Houseof Fatne) in "The GlassMountain," Srrnley Elkin imitates TDe CanterburyTalesin Tbe Dick GibsonSbaur,John Banh imitatesScheherazede Cbimna, and James in imiJoyce in r sense tatesthe Ofussey,Worlcing closelywith someearlierwork, scrutinizingthe older wrirer's way of doing thinp, the modern writer getsan rngle on his material.He lcemshow the specch of modernheroes must differ from that of old-fashioned heroes (he learns advantages drawbacla decadencc), the and of leens why the innocent Homeric similc has given way to modern, more ironic simile,learnswhy traditional allcgory hasbecomc for us an dl but dead option cxcepr in comic worls.

r#

PROCESS NOTFf ON lNE NCi|TONAL

The imitationsI'vc mentioneLBarthelme end so ondr that is, far removedfrom the bue of dl feirly sophisticated; imitation. Much closcr following of the model can rchieve quelly d new-results. M*y of Poe'sstoric rrc imitationsor parodiccommenr. His'Imp of the Perveng" fof insancg imitatesthe style of WashingtonIrving and aaacls the 'tqgend of phili*inism end anti-intellecnrdismof lrving's asociateparody with SleepyHollow." Though we sometirnes collegehumor magazines suchpopularorgtns x Motl nryaor zine and the Natiwul Ltntpoon, the useof parodic tcchniqug hCI both comicrnd serious, proveda rich vein for contemporaqy writen. (It hasbeen a mainstayof poetsfor centuries.)The parodistmay useonly the generalstyle of his model"asRobert C,ooverin "A PedestrianAccident" (ftom Prichsmgs anil Descantslusesslapstickfilm-comedy and vaudevilleroutins or for a grim new purpose, he may follow his modelalmoa linc for line, merely changingd*ails of action, character,rnd seton ting. Whether or not the resultis art will depend thc uriterb will wit Either wan the exercise producer clearertnowledgc of howthc writer rchievedhiseffects. Yocahtlny Simple lan' A huge vocabularyis not alwap en advantage. guage,for somekinds of fiction at least,can be more effective than complexlanguagewhich can leadto stiltednesor suggest signsof limfued Oneof the surest or dishonesty faulty education. it sometimes gignelt sste or intellectual mediocrity-though polyonly shynes end insecurity-is continualuseof the same words fashionable else qyllabicor foreign words eveqyone uses, like "serendipiry,"or "ubiquitous" "getne|"'milial' ernd "mtt' ; as biancd'when emphasized French; worn-out Germanwords uGestaltr"ot "Sturm und or phrases like "Weltcnschauungr" Drong";or iugon wordslike "fictional strategy."And the writer mt vho ues his own fancy language, iust that which is in style'

Technirye

r45

can be equallyoffensive. we sense lf that, though working asr realisghe writes meinl)r for elegantverbal effect, choosinghb characters the clevernes of their chatter or even violating for characterout of deferenccto his ear, using "calculatC' for "think" or giving all his characters right to say "da*ardly,' the mannerism trigidity and "connneiI f mtlr" or "my maq" we sense end rt onceback off. This rule like dl rules,musr be applied with goodsense. Dostoernkychooses charactenfor thc kinds of things they'll talk abouc And a nodcerbly ornate vocabulery canbe a splendidthing if well rued.For the writer who hrndles dilficult or obscue words well, giving the appEarancc inuo' of ducing them smoothly and effordessly,violating neither the authorialtone nor fidelity to character,omate vocab,tlrry on extendthe writer's rangeof tone and give textural richnes, to sry nothing of increased-precision. For qymboli.ssand dlegoriss lihe Hawthorne and Melvillg ornete vocabularymoy be an absoluterequisitc. In effective writing-normally-ttre writer slip in symbolsand allegoricalemblems with the crnning of e fim-fam mangulling his country victim. The qrsrbol that strnds out too sharply from in matrix may distract the reader's from thc fictiond dream,with thc unpleasing eye effect of making the writer seemfrigid and hb sto47 disingenuong more scrmonthan honestpresentation imaginedvcots.-.a of work, in shon, in which the readerfeels manipulated, prshcd toward someopinion or view of the world not inherentin thc fictionalmaterials imposed but from above. "Normally," I've said.In a cerrrin kind of fiction clunky symbolism,or the eppearance woodco ellegory, can be a of sourccof delighqend a vocabulary cxtremelyodd words like of "furfurlceousr" "venditater"or 'tgnivomousr"words that function like baublesor texmral blisters, calling aneftion to the story's rnificiality, can givc interest.For comic e{fect,one can do anythingthat'sfunny. And to thosewho appreciate pan of it, the appealof Chaucer's Mm of Lns's Tde is its stiffness, its tigdity of ideaand emotion.Cunstance ncverseems us a red to

r46

NOTES ON TT{E FICf,IONAL PROCESS

woman. She has the herd anglesof e primitivc crrving or r figurc in stginedgles; hcr story startsand stopswith the lcrkr and creaksof old machinery,and wc enjoy it preciselybccausc of what nowadayswe would call its irreality-is basein on is The same true of Cleuoutmodcdsct of litcrary conventions. cer'sSccondNun's TaIe and of any numbc of modcrnperdic and comic. By making one'ssymbolism unworks both serious as usuallyobvious, in the bestmornensof Banh's Giles Goatcffectof artificcwithout Boy, onecansometimes a plcasing get in fact sacrificingthe symbolicload.We smileat the clunkincs of thc rllegory but at the sametime follow thc allegory out, much asin puppetshowsor Noh plap wc cnioy both thc cmon and phasis tcchnique its impon. Normally, however,thc symbolistor allcgoristworks morc es subtly. In "Banleby the Scrivener," Mclvillc uses, he often because dlows it docs,r narratorcapable orbicularlrnguage of him to introducedouble meanings-allegorizing puns-without disturbing the surfaceof the stoqy.On its most obviouslevel, lawycr rendered hclples by thc thc srcry is of a compasionate of both kecpingup his work in thc ordinary busines dilcmma world rnd dealinghumrnely with what ftms out to bc the cosof mic dcspair,in fact madness, his copyist Banlcby. On r dcepcrlcvcl, the lawyer is e kind of Jchovahfigure, Berdeby e to patheticandineffective Christwho bindsJehovah r new idea formal,cvcnpondcrous of iustice. Thc lawyer-narrator's diction for story with full respect dlows Mclville to treat the surface thc dignity of his characters their pathctic situationbut at and meaning. Mclvillc thc samc time to work in signals the deeper of writcs: This vierv [the whitc well the nrrator sces throughone of hiswindows]might havcbccnconsidcrcd rathertamc than othcrwise deficientin what landscrpe paintcrscdl "life." But, if so, the view from the other end of my a chembers offered,at leestr contrast,if nothing morc. In

Techniqu

r+7

thrt dircction,my windowscomrnrndcd unob,structed rn view of r lofty brick wdl, blackcncd .g" md evcrlrstby ingshadc.... At first glancg thesescntenccs mcrcly dacriptive of thc arc Rrrntor's suitc of o6ccg with r whitc well rt onc window, e brick wrll at rnothcr. But the n.rmtor'! elcvatcddiction allosr in languagc that hins at thc dccpcrmcaningthrt Bartlcby will call to his attention: Hb cunfonable "uperafus" chambcn erc surounded by dceth. This kind of thing runs dl ttuough the story, atablishrng its full symbolic mcaning. I hrvc spokcnco fer only of ometc vocabulery.A common problem.mong bcginningrvriters fo that eventtrcir vocabulary of ordinary words b limitcd to r dcgrccalnrcetcrippling, Ordinery words, like nrc words, givc tcmrd intcrcst. Thc good writer is likely tq know rnd uso--or find out andrp-thc wor& for commonarchitccturelfcatureq like "linrelr" "newcl poeg' ttcorbellingr" "ebutmcntt' rnd thc concrete or stonc 'hrnst dongsidcthe stcp leadingup into churchcs public buildinp; or thc names carpentcrs' plumbers'tools,anists'mstcriab,or of or whatever furniturg implemcntq or processcs characters hb work with; and thc names clmmon houschold of item* including thCIcwe do not usuallyhearnrmed, often rs wc wc thcm, suchu "pinch-clippcn" (for cuning fingcrnails).Thc witer, if it sris him, should also know and occasiondly nsc brmd nameqsincethcy help to characterizc. Thc pcoplc who &ivc Toyotas arenot thc samc pcoplcwho drivc BMW\ and pcoplc who brushwith Get arc different from thoscwho uscPcpodent or, on thc other hand,one of thc hcalth-foodbrandsmadc of eggplant (In supr-realist fictioq brand namcs more imare portent than thc characters thcy dcscribc.)Abovc all, the writcr shouldstrerch his vocabulaqy ordinary words rnd idiomsof words andidionn hc sces the timc andknowshow to uscbut all ncverus6.I nrcanhcrc not languagc smcllsof the lamp but thrt relativelycommonvcrb6,nouns, adjcctiva-"gdumph" and and

I,$8

PROCESE NOIESON TEE FrcTTO}TAL

ormbler"'quagmire," Acoop' (n), "pustulg" "hippodmnrc'" 'rrni"." The casual way to build "recalcitrant' "disueught" as one reads Thc is vocabulaqy to pay rttention to language way serious-minded is to readthrough a dictionaqf,makinglisa of dl the commonwor& one happarsncver to rse. And of way b to study oounse really serious-minded the Among learn Greek,Latin, and oReor rwo modernlanguages. witers of the first rank onecannamevery few who werenot or rrt not fluent in at least tro. Tolstoy, who spoke Rusian, Frenc[ and English easily, and other langu4gc md didec-o with morc difrculty, studied Greek in his fonies The immediate for the writer who worb hrrd rt develrisk oping vocabularyis that h,it styl. may becometextunlly ovcrricb, disutcting from the fictiond dream.But practiceteaches balance. Limited vocabulary,like short legs on e pole-vaulter, buildsin a naturalbanier to progres bcyonda cenrin poine

TbeSntnce
After the individud wor4 the writer's mostbasicunit of erprecsion is the sentencgthe primary vehich of dl rheorical devices One of the things that should go into the unite.t's is A ootebook a setof experimens with the sentence. convenient rrre md chdlenging place to begin b with tlre long sentence, see that runsto et leasttwo prges.(For ttou4e-fmce example Dondd Berthelme's piece of shon fiction '&ntenct"--in fact one not a long, long sentence a fragment) Long seotenceq, but learns-end I meannot fake long sentenceg whereincom" soon and into periodswith mas,semicolons, colonscould bc changed no los of emotiond power or intellectud cohercncgbut red sentncs-cro be of many Lind* eech with is own rmique The sentence mey be propelledby some &ining hyst reffects. in ical anotion, like William Faulkner's long sentence the oq" siondly includedintrodrrctionto Tbe Soutd a*l tbe Fzryrin .

Techniqre

r19

which the town librarian fnds Gddy's picture in r magazinc, closes library, and rusheswith the picnre, her wits flying the and her heartwildly pounding,to Jason's store;or the sentence may be kept doft-that is, held back from the relief of a final close,I full stop for breath,in other words,a period-by some neurotic senseof hesitationin the characterwhose aoubled mentalprocsses sentence designed reflect-+ome intelthc b to ligent middle-aged housewifqfor examplgwho hasread about women'sliberation in her magazines feels an increasingly and anxiousinclination, hedgedin by doubts and on-the-otherhands, takee nighschoolcourse-one in fower-arnnging, or to ceramics,or self-awarenesr-perhaps telling her domineering mother and hu$and whar she'sdoing and then againperhap not-though money will be a problem if she taka the course secredy:Shehasonly her household grocery dlowanceand md there are alwaln the children, thoogh Mark (let ru call him) rnight possiblybe talked into stayingafter schoolThunday nighs to play bCIketball, Daniel,on the other hend . . . and but would Danielevenmissher if shewent out, in factt--glueil every night to the TV in his room, smoking(if that'swhat the smell is) pot?-$ut it would be risky, no doubt of it; if thcy found her out-Harold andher mother-there would be scens, tiresome dramas; bener to fnd some morefoolproof plan . . . or the sentenceme). be kqpt going by the complexity of its thought, or by the ometeness its imrgeqy,or by the "sheer of plod' of the drudge it ilhstrateg or by someorher causg or moto& beforeat last it quits. Shon sentences other effects Abo sentence grve fragments They can bc trenchangpunchy. They can suggest weeriness They crn increase drabnes of a dnb scene Used for rn the unworthyreas,o& here,they cenbeboring. as Benveeothesecrtremeq the endles sentenoe thc vcryl and lhort sentence, r world of nrriatbn, a wodd o'ery writer lies mustevcotuallyqplore

r50

NOTES ON THE FICTIONAL PROCESS

PoertcRby*tm

.i-a ,. PrJr., pkil, Fu)l, "i rr{y*'ir, 'nfin'T" [T. --l .venauons.
l--

r. Like poetry, proschasrhythmsrnd rhythmic varietio-ns. es are to 3. Rhythmandvariation asbasic prose to Poet{y. | | | t| | | just mustforccrhythms, like vcrsc.* 4. All prosc the Rcadingat the namralspcedwe usefor Compare above. poctry' wc of prose, fasterthanthe naturalspeed verscor prose find that item z is slower,moreplodding,thanitcm r; anditem
r Metrical analysismarkings rrc dways epproximations, both when wc're dceling with prosc and when wc dcal with versc. Othcr good rcrders-or I myself on anotherdry-might legitimatelyrctd thc lines I'vc mrrkcd in other wayg though somereadings.rc sure to bc les convincing than others. I usc the symbols for mcuicel analysis,here rnd in the rest of this
I u ---lvv | -l--

= $ressedsyllablc; = lightly strcsscd discusion,rs foltows: (or sometimes, meuical vct*, beatin thc rbscnccof sucss); in rylleblc *= O but un$rescdsyllable; = unstrcsscd longor slowsyllablc; = slighdy oonchcd (by rhymc or tomc othcr forcc) unstresscd ryllablc A= 41, hovcring su.s ldso towrrd stres; ll = pause cresure; or whercwc might readtwo iuxteposcd uscdin siturtions rylleblcsrs cithcr trochaicor iambic,but so similar in stres thrt they r.cm to dividc thc crnphasis bcatbctwcen of them,asin RobenFrost'r

,\

or-

wi6*.,, Joa, tr'!r. .Y.r,{r*Yml,.r "f whoAas trrisc .LY*JntTnf *.

Whcn in vcrsc thrce or rrcrc strescs (cithcr in iuxmpositionor with onc or morc interposcdunstrcscd syllebles)iccm to shuc r singlc . (In bcrt, thc phrascmrrt rnd rtressnumbcrmry bc uscful fr) rhythmicellytricky mctricrl vcrsc,think of thc bcrt asthc drum'sbrsic ridc.) Thc fiythttr, rnd the varietionsrs thc frzz soloistl syncopetcd

Tecbnrqn

rjt

of syllablc of 3, because the fairly regular (rccurrence stressed and thc numbcr of unstressed sllabla betweenthem, runs along more lightly than cither r or z and much more lightly than item 4 whercthe iuxtaposed suesses the sentence . slow to trudge.
rcrson for thesc complications,hovcring stress and phrase,is that in metrical English verse a foot can normdly contain no morc than onc strcssed and two unsrressed ryllablcs, though occrsionally<specially in nursery rhymes and somc very old folk poetry--one or morc exue unstresscdsylleblesmey be slipped in-the exua syllables Gcrerd Manley Hopkins called "riders." By the system I am using the only possible patternsfor the-English foot_, discountingriders and other syncopations, arc iambic(- /), uochaic (/-), (--'), anapestic dacrylic (/-), and amphibrachic(-/9. In verse,the number ol leet in the linc gives the Iine'smeter.For instance, Frost line iust quorcd the

wrroscwo/oas l l,ttr, I rr.nl* |,n.r..L

hrs four bcrts (as marked). The basicmcesures monometer!dimeter, lre trimetcr, tetremeter, pntamenter, hexameter, and heptameter. Beyond this length the line tends to break into separate perts, as octameter,for instencc, tends to read es two ioined teuameters. Only on rerc occasionq as in someof the writings of William Gas, and in sorneof my own work, docs prosc rhythm contain meter-uzually hidden, since thc metrically equel lincs ere run together, though they may givc somc such signal of thcir presencers obvious or subderhymc. A knowledgc of versc scansionis no idle talcnt for the prosc writcr. Reelly good prosc differs in only onc wey from good contemporary vcrsc -{y which onc mclns, mainly, frcc versc (unrhymcil end meuicrlly irregular). Vcrse slows thc reader by means of linc brcaks; prosc docs not. Notc that thcsc lines, by poet and fiction writer Joyce Carol Orteq could be sct cither asprosc or asversc: Thc crr plunges wcswrrrd into thc bluing dusk of New York State Thcrc is no cnd to it: the snakes that writhe in thc hcadlights, thc scrrvcs of snow, the veins, vineq tendrilq thc sky r crazy broken bluc likc crockery. Somc conternporary frce versc, likc thar of Gelwry Kinnell, has motp comprcssion than prosc cen bcar; no one denies the power of Kinnclll bcst vcrse, but as Whitmrn proveq comprcsion of tha! sort is not en rbsolute rcquircment

r52

NOTES ON THE FTCTIONAL PROCESS

slipeinto accidental In good prose,rhythm neverstumbles, Condogg.t4 or works againstthe meaningof the sentence. following sentencepermutations. (For my consider the by that the ice hasbeen established context veniencg assume and may be omined when we like.) ^ , rlyr,Jpris r. The pis thr: r@yd ;d squJalea,,iln i6 fi'e

\o

iie,pJntin-griilduembFng.
eshing r. eitE ,tt*ttii'g and squealing, m. rfty
vv | ---

t | - l --

| t* rntingand Penung uembling. f--v | | - . - - \ | - \- | . : / / - | v then panting,uembling, the iashingand squealing, 3. Ttti"striig a;a sq r ' \1 . / . | - -- - - , 1 ,

r,Jpr&,

pi-gl.yi"n -: - / napF" tI'' ii.. 4

helplas. bling,lay

/ | l.,\ T[e pig thrashed and squeded then, panting, uenr t_

not Rhythmicdln item r seems entirely satisfactory.Thc as 6nal phrue, "panting and uembling," comes a tind of afterdon't feel propelledinto it by rll that has gone thought-we 'thrashcd and befor*and ia faint echoof the earlierrhythr& feelsslightly awkward.Item u is worse:The echoof squealed," h "thrashingand squealingp now much too obvious,gt"ing thc symmetry.Itcm 3 is bener. The an sentence ofiensive "looky cchoingphrues havebeenbrought togetherin the samcpart of to dlowing the closeof the sentence suroothout the sentence, word "and" from the phrase and run free; and by droppingthe is "pnnting and uembling," the rhythm of this segment slowed extntsuP down ('!anting, uembling") andthe echois to some presed" And + is beaer yet. Slowed by the PFse "panting, winds down, like thc pig in the word ueinbling,' the sentencc sense. Soundnow echoes "helples." By keepingout e c:reful earfor rhythrq the writer cNnoon' subdety.In with cnnsiderrble trol thc e*oti- of his scntences

Tecbnirye

r53

my novel Gtndel,I cnnted to cstrblishthc emotim rnd c{rarrcter of the cuaal-chancter monster in hb 6rst utter.noe. After some brooding and fiddling, I qrotc;

'fi. ofd *la' dld;se"$"':"E .J* ,oh*ria* ,S--| pidlytriumphane

h,rt of the effect,if the sentence works, is of coursethe choice of words. lt would be different if I'd wrinen, '"The old cow The ris . . ." But pert of it b the handlingof stresses. opening iotupoeed stresseq intensifiedby near rhyme give appropriate hanhnes;the dliteration of an esentially nasrysound("randq" 'rnrpidly") meinteins thir qo"lity; rnd the rhythnic hesitrtion of the long syllableet the cnd of the firs phrase

Jnr:ao
by ino spcrnunrary followed tte nrmble difrorh-to-nrnage oyllebleo unstrcsed
t --t stupidly uiumphant

gro suggestiorl hopc-d de monstcr'rdumsinss of " doqghtud gait (Wc sczn wor&, I thin\ r the empidly triumphant reficr thanrs dacrylic amphibrachic. and Thur'tri'functions -orurould in metricel yGntsarr rider,rnd,given hrbis of our io *ongly rhythmbprose in versgthe syllablc es fdlclurnsily.) The gooduniter worls om hb rhythm by a"; bc usudly ao of here has need dreprnpherndia invoked for purposcc I've it hdpfrrl to scan linc r of disctsion Yc ocrasiondly proves sie mcric.l .nel)rsis merls,asan aid to daermining whcrc tosr ns% *rong beetsbould insqted,(E sonepau of uo' bG
t --, I

r5+

NOIES ON TITE FICTIONI, PROCESS

stresscdsyllabla suppresed or added. Turning sentcnccs aroun4 trying various combinationsof the fundamentaleleit mcna, will prove invaluablcin the end,not iust becausc leads ovcr thc ycan it teaches but to bener sentences elso because ccnain basicwep of fting rhythm that will work again on I other, superficially quitc disimilar sntcncs. don't knoq mootwritcrs would say the same-what mpclf-and I suspect it is that I do, what formulasI usefor switching bad sentences aroundto makcbener ones;but I do it all thc timc, les laboriously cvery ycar, trying to creepup on the bestwap of gening said.One thing thet may be helpful to noticc b the kinds thing;s Take thc that of changes pushunstressed ryllabla up to strss. f,rst phraseof thc nurseqyrhymc "T&y Was a Welshman" Rhythmically thc pocmcanlcgitimatelybe viewedin two wayl, either rs regularmetricalvc$e or 4s"old nativcmcterr' derivativc from thc Old English allhcrative linc. In the former casc thc line hassix bcats,in the latter only four. I will ueat the linc pushingu* herc as old native metcr. Watch the permutations syllablcs strcsqor, asHopkins would say,"tptinging' strcsscd to thc vcrsc. t--| t--| Taffywas a thicf. Taffy wasaWelshman, t - - -.7-T\ r. Taffywasadamnfool, r. Taffyshotidamnfool, .f t-I.4-T 3. Bill Jona shotr damnfool, ^-4TT\ 4-t shot Bill Jones nno drmn foolq 4 Noticc the difrcrenccof cncrgy in thc variousrhythmic Pcrmr trtions, though bhind all thc i*ing thc (imaginrqy) dnurF bcatis thc samc.

fr-,-^

TeclmiEn
Pointof Vieu

rtt

What hasalrcady been saidon the subiect point of view need of not be repeated herc.In contemporary writing onc may do anywith thing onepleases point of view, aslong asit worla. As long asthe flavor of the writing is at oncecontcmporery(as a John sculpture Saltpaintingor a George Segal simplycouldnot come from any other time), onc neednot sendsignalsto the reader that one may do peculiarthings-suddenshifts of any kind. That is part of the built-in expectation and pleesure "conof art. temporary"or at-once-rcognizably-innovative But in cvery includingour own, some literature--+ften best, sinceas age, the a rule onecannotsimultancously invent wildly andthink deeply --somc literatureusesuaditionalmethods, and hcre a ceftain correctncss beyond dismisal. Somediscussion point of is of view is thereforenecessary. It is often said,mainly by non-writers,that the fint-pcrson point of view (the "I" point of view,asin "then I sawthc jug") is the mootnaturd. This is doubtful. Thc third-penon point of view ("Then she thejug") is morecommon bothfolk and in saw nanative. No fairy tdes are told in the first pcrsophisticated son;alsono iokes.First person allowsthe writer to write ashe ulkg and this may be an advantage intelligentpaople for who interesting have speech petternsand comefrom a culture with a highly devcloped oral tradition, suchasAmericanblacks,Jcwg and southernor down-east Yankeeyarn-spinnen;but first person doesnot forcc the writer to recognize that written speech hasto makcup for the lms of facial expression, gsture, thc and like, and the usualresult is not good writing but only writing les noticerbly bad. Once first-person narrative has been mastered-$y some standardof mastery-the writer is cncouraged write in the to third penon sublective, point of view in which all the "f's arc a changed "he"sor "she't and emphasis placed the cherto is on rcterb thoughts, that "Then shesawthe iug" becorneq so "Was

r56

NOTES ON TTIE FICTIONAL PRO@Si

that a lrg shesewl" or "A iug! shethought' This point of vier (style, in a sense) in goesfor deepconsciousnesq the hopethat the thoughs and feelingsof the charecterwill becomethe ir thoughtsand feelingsof the reader.The mediate(unmediated) like: effectis something Was that a fzg shesaw?No, shemust not touch that honeyiug! Old Doc Chinahadchorded,"You loseninety pounds, Lulu Bogg,or you're a goner.Like your ma before you. You'll sit up in bedsome of these mornings one and you'll turn white with the elfon of ig and click." Doc had snapped fingers,brourn, bony fingers that his wouldnt go fat if you fed 'em on goosefat and white bread foramontlu The third-penon+ubiective point of view hasis use*but it also hassevere limits, so that somethingb wrong when it becomes the dominantpoint of view in fiction, asit hasbeenfor years in the United States. addition to defectsmentioneddready In (Chapter 3), it locls the reader inside the characterbmind (even more so than Harry James'"center of consciousnssr" narrator), howeverlimited that where we haveen inteqpreting mry be, so that when the character's mind iudgrnensue mb more conect iudgmens mtrst taken or inadequetgthe reeder's comefrom a cool withdrawal. When the fiction is iudgmentd, and for somereasonmuch third-penon*ubiective fiction b' dre uniter commits himself m nothing except by irony; hs the mercly e:rposes snrpiditiesof mmkind; antl exceptinsofar rs he misesthe point, the readerstan& apan from the rction of dre story, watching it aitically, like e grumpy old man rt r pany. One can of coune get the srme misanthropiceffect by of means other tcchniqua; for instancgby * of the crebby omniscient&urator of Katherine fuine Poner's fiction or tho frvored by Melvile, as in ?De d*Hy ironic voice sometimes Catfulencetlm, lndon the odrer handit b of courseposibh for r writer rsing the third-prso-nrbiective point of visw o

Tecfuiqu

$7

cnioy md admirehis chanctersito writg that b, rbout somconc he considenrt leastin somemeasure hero.But evenwhen thc r fction is hncvolent, the third-person-subjective point of view achievelitde grandeur.It thrives on intimacy rnd somocan thing likc gossip.It peels th"oogh r keyhole never wdb tluough an openfield. An evenlessgrand point of view fu third personobiectioe, identicd to third prsonsubiectiveexceprthat the n:urator not only nevercomments himselfbut alsorefrainsfrom enteringany character's mind. The resultis an ice-coldcamera'seye recording. We seeeventqheardidogue obsen'e setting,end make the guesses about what the characters thinking. This point of are view can work brilliandy in frirly ehon fiction ks limits ore obvious The noblestqniters,Iike Isak Dinesen Leo Tolston rise and above the pettines and unseemlyfamiliarity of third pe$on subjective, and rvoid the savage spersiryof third penon obieo. tive, by means the authorial-omniscient of pint of view. In thc euthoriel omniscieng writer speaks in effecg God. Hc the as, sees into dl his characten'heartsand minds,prsents post dt tions with iustice and detachment, occasiondly dipn into thc third personsubiective give the readeran immediate to sense of why the characterfeelsashe doeg but reserres himselftlrc to right to iudge (a right he usessparingly). Usually he iudges events,touching on moraliry only by implication. When hc intrudes with moral heavy-handedness, Tolstoy does in as Rewnection, the effect is likely to be disasrer. the authorial, [n omniscient point of view the readerccapesthe clauuophobir he may feel when boxed into e limited opinion; he se and ctlebrategshrugsoff, or deplores variety of opinioru; and he a sails dong securelp confident that he will nor be tricked or betrayedby the wisernd thoughdul srretor. The cardsare oD the table. What for e time dernoted authorial-omniscient the point of view--*uler of the field forcennric-vns widesprad doubgt

r58

NOTES Tl|D TrcNONAL PROC,ES{I ON

lerst rmong intellecnrds, of rbout thc existence God, rnd in'What b creasingfascinationwith Pilatc's tiresomequestio,n Stephen Truth?" Charlcs Dickens, Henry James, Conrad, Jooeph to Crane,and many others invented valuablealternatives the omniscicntvoice-among othcrs,the story told through various pointsof view,filteredthroughprhaps unrcliablc narrators like Conrad'rMarlow, or reponedby somcpoeticor rcal voice,cvcn thc imegincd voiceof thc community. Now that nervous theologicaland metaphysical questions havelost thcir widc appeal, writers likc Donald Banhelmc,Joycc &rol Oates,or William they Gas fccl freeto usctheomniscient point of view whenevcr like, unuoubled God'sexistence nonexistencc its furand by or thcrmores. Thc euthorial-omniscient nerretor is, for them, as (or a literary traditionwithout desperatc implimuch a fiction cations)asanything else they may usein their writing, suchas thc old palominohorsewith spavins, the wired-upchair in or somckitchen. Cuning through the mucknthey simply sey-in thc uaditional voice of thc omniscicntnarrator-what is fictionally uuc. They play God asthey mightplay King Claudius, by putting on a cepe. in may encountcr using Onc of the problems beginner thc it thc authorial-omniscient point of vicw ir that of cstablishing inin the first place and,throughout story,movingsmoothly his this point of vicw to the minds of his charecters. establish To when his narrativeopens,the wrircr must dip fairly soon into the variousminds,setting up the rules; that is, cstablishing expectationthat, when hc likes,hc will move from consciousness to consciousnes. shift to third pcrsonsubjectivcreguiresa Thc scc skillful handlingof psychicdistance.(On psychicdistance, p.rrr.) Another availablepoint of view is the so'callcd "essayist Thc casicst way to dacribc it is by contrastwith omniscient." thc authorial omniscicnt. The language of the authorialomniscient voiceis traditionaland neutral:Thc authorspeals sayingwhat any cdm, digniwith digniry andpropergrammer,

Technique

r 59

fied, rnd reasoneblc pc$on would say. "Hrppy familicsarc all alikc." Or: "During thc first quarterof the last century, scaside rcsorts became fashion, evenin thooccountric of Northern the Europc within the mindsof whosepeoplethc seahad hitheno held thc role of the Dcvil, thc cold and voracious hercdita4y foc voicc sounds much of humanity."Evcqy authorial-omniscient like every other. Thc essayist-omniscient though it hes voicc, ncarly the same divinc authoriry, is morc personal. Though wc do not know the nameandoccupation thc spcaker, sensc of we et oncethat the voiccis old or young,malcor female, black (as in Charla Johnson'sFahb nd the Gooil Tbkg) or white. Whereas writer who has chosen the the authorial-omniscient techniqueneeds only to imitatc, say, Tolstoy, thc writer using the essayist-omniscient must first invcnt e charactcrwith voice particularhabitsof thoughtandparticularspeech patterns. Exccpt by their conccrns end subiect metter, onc cennot tell Tolstoy from Dinesen. Neither is free to be sly or bitchy; the voicc simply statesfacts and makesseeminglyimpanial iudgments.JeneAustcn,on the other hand,cen say anythingshe pleases, long as it's interestingand suitableto the pcnonal as voice established. Until recently mosrwriters who usedrhe essayist voicc developedsomeone distinctive voice and used it book after bock (Edger Allan Poc, Mark Twain, Willirm Faulkner).Contemporary writers tcnd to play morc with ventriloquism,so that sometimes book by e given writer sounds one very litdc like anotherby the samewriter. Delay All goodfiaion contains suspense, difierent kinds of suspurse in differcnt kindsof fiction. Take the simplest kind fint. Anyone canwrite "A shotreng out" or "There lay thc body of Mn. Uldridge." Whar is hardcrto writc is the momentlcading up to such a climax. When thc writing is successful, the readersenscs thc climaxis comingand fcels. srrongurgc ro that

Ih

NOTES TIIE FTCTToNAL oN PRocEst'

skip to it dirccdy, but cmnot quitc tcer himselffrom thc pan" graph he's on. Ideally, every elementin the lead-in passagc shouldbe a relevantdistractionthat heightens reader's anticthe ipationandat the same time holds,itself, suchintoest-through richnes of literal or metaphoriclanguege,through starding thematicand accuacy of perception, through the deepening or recalled-that thc cmotionaleffectof significsnteerliermoments reederis reluctantto dash on Even in the work of someof our better pop novelistgtoo esy solutionsto this problemere conmon. One is the author's thoughs of e frst- or third-penon entrrrinto the suqpense-filled character,in the hope that the character'ssuspense will rub off on the reader.Another, more general,is irrelevant disuaction: "As I walkedtoward the Parkerplace,therewasc mockingbird tingtng. Upstain, it soundedlike-.somewhercbehind the shutters-though I knew there couldn't be a mockingbird ioside.I remembered-rnoving without a soundtoward the gate -how Old Bassusedto tell me about mockingbirds.'Samuel,' he'd say . . ." Irrelevantdisuactioruevenif it workg in a feeble wap makes readerfeel manipulated. Trug terftre can help the dirgoit. the fault (the nameOld Bas here,the mockingbird); and true, the line betweenirrelevant distraction and relevant disnrction may be e 6ne one.The distractingdeuil of thought rbout the mockingbird,in the linesabove,is not inelevant if it recallsearlierpassags the fiaiorl asociations in that enrich the srspenseful moment.Old Bas mry havedied mysteriously,or dark may havebelievedthst thc songof a mockingbirdpresages cvents. We are all familiar wirh thoseobligatoqymomentsin suspensefulmovieswhen the lady is ebout to open the dangerous door. Shestopsto listen,cyebrowslifted, end if the movie'sr good one the soundthat hastroubled her is one we've heard before (though she,perhaps,has not), e sound we t<xt lverc uoublcd by at fint, until we learned that it wasonly the tin *p h-g"g on the pump-spout, bengingin the wind. Or thc db

TechniEte

16r

tmcting soundmay recall a scencthet contrastswith this one; for example, scenein which litde Leander,now ominorsly e vrnished,playedhappily with the hired man'scat, offering it a &ink. The lady movesforwrrd agpin, her fear allayed, and reachc cautiouslytoward the door we don't want her to opelu Another sound! She pauses, expression her pertly fear, pardy inimtion-irriution at her own tiridiry, perhap, but the expresion is one into which we're fre to proiect our own irriatiort" (Srspenseful delayis cnioyable, evenwheir distractionr but cnrich the mceningof the climax about to come,we ere not nrch fools asto mis the fect that we're being led, a little like donkep. If the readeris not to wakcn from the fictional dream, it ccn be usefulto anticipatethe reader's feeling and channelit back into the story.) Anothcr kind of delaymay be achieved stylistic io"trp* by sition. F:rly in "Views of My Father Weeping," Donald Barthelmeinuoducc surreali* elemena-in this caseimages from outsidethe flow of tim+-into a narrativcthat hasso far been profuent, or forward-moving.We are puzzledfor a moment, wonderingwhencecamethe srrangeimageof the dead father weepingon the bed then the imageof his throwing the bdl of yrq then thet of his mashingthe cupcakes. Before wc qrn figure out the answer, ffe thrown backinto profluencc, \ye only to be brought up short agein,l page or rwo later, by morc surrealism. The effeq though more subdeand intellectual,b r linle like that in a thriller novel when the author leavesone chrracter rnd sequence evens for rnother not immediately of relevrnt to the first but sureto intersectwith it evenftelly. So, for instancgthc writer may bcginwith a likableAmericanfanr., ily of tourilss*iuing in Hong Kong, then switch to r group of dangerorsinternadonalplotters.Mentally castingforwe,rd,tho rcader cxpec-s trouble for the touriss and feelsthe beginning rwingesof suspcnsc. Herg asin Banhelme, susperse the com6 panly from our nor knowing for zurewherewe rrc or how to mticipate the furure.

t6z

N TES ON THE FICTIONAL PROCESS

involvcsthc In scriousfiction, thc highestkind of suspense concernis of Sanrirn anguish choicc;that is, our suspenscful just with whet will happen with the moralimplicrtioru not but eachbased somcap. on of action.Given two posiblc choices, as provablcgoal, u'e rrvorrJr'r wc read,over which choiccthc will makeand,given thc natureof rcelity, what thc character rcsultswill bc. In some rccentfiction, nomblythat of Samuel Bcckcttand, the ironic use of thc often, Donald Banhelme, writer makes fictional conventionof dclay, encouragingthe reader to cest outcomeand then rcfusingto makc forward to somepossible towardthat end.ln Waitingf or Godotwc aretold my progrcss that thc two ffampshavecometo this barrcnplaccto wait for that may be.Thc namp's talk and go through Godot, whoever motione-routinc lcadingnowhere-and dmc pases, circular The in thc scnse thingshappn (thoughnot scquentielly): that one remaininglcaf falls from its branch on the nearly barrcn reei but Godot doesnot arrive.Our conventional expectrtion In pleyHeppy helpsBcckenmakchis point on stasis. Beckett's Dayswc gct muchthe same thing. Thc pile of refuscin which buried gcs dcepcract by ect-by is one of the two characters this the third it is up to hcr neck;but despitc proof that timc b pasing, the charactcn learn nothing, make no progres. In but, if so, provesto be the Banhelme, end may be achieved idioticioke,esat theendof "The Glass Mountain"or The some Dead Fatber-e ioke that makes nonsense the quest. th6c of ln valug if any, is in thc works dchy bccomc an cnd in itsclf-the ioumcS not the arrival-and the anguishof choice proves r Thc art of fool's dclusion,sinceno chorcebrings satisfaction. suchfiction liesin keeprng readcrgoing,thoughthe writer the knowsfrom the beginningthat there'sno placcto go. The monl valuc of such writing is obviously dubious,though it can be of rrgucd-by cmphasizing moral seriousness thc writer as thc he prcscnts suspect his opinions;by pointing oug if posible, the measurc authenticcompassion cen feel for the characte$ of wc

Tecbtiqtn

$,

(not i,tst pitJror ironic demchmcnt);or by maintainingrheq in laughing,rf,c at oncc ecceptand reiect thc conceit.Wc acccpq, muchaswe do whcn wc hearsick iokcs,in that wc scchow thc thing; wc rciect in thag in . writer might sayzuchen outregeous the ect of laughing,wc deny that humanbcinp arc thc helples clown-creaturcs thc ruthor has represcntc4 rnd wc cuspcct, righdy or wronglp that thc ruthor sccrcdy agrecswidr usothcrwiscwhy makcthe characters clownlikc?The fact that so Samucl Bcckctt is in earncst, se)'she ls, may surpriseus but or docs not changeour rspottsc. thc writcr who wishesto To emulateBcckca or Brnhelme, thc only possible adviceis this: Make sure your routinesare as interestingas your model's, StyIe About style, thc lesssaid thc bcttcr. Nothing lcadsto frauihr lcncr morc swiftly than rhc consciouspunuit of sryll*ic uniqucnes.But on the other hand norhing b more natural to thc young and ambitious writer than that he rry ro find a voicc andtcrritory of hisown, proving himselfdiffcrent from all othcr writers.Sucha youngwriter is likcly to takc adviccfrom no onq end though thet fact may exasperete writing teacher,thc his wisc teachcrknows it's an cxcellcnt sign, and givesthe young writer his head,obiccting to and criricizing srylistic ab,surdities only enough kecpthe studcnthonesr. to A fcw obnervations may bc medcto thc young srylist that mey provc uscful. First, most fictionel styles arc traditiondthink, for cxample, the cusromary of stylc of the tale, thc yrrn, thc third-pcnon-omniscient realisticpieceof fiaion. Meny writen simply masterone such style and make use of it all their livcs, coundngon their ovm uniquecxpricnce and pcnonality to makethc sryle individual. Thcy arc right to do so, though their choiccis not thc only o'ncavailablc. Eachwritcrb intercsts andpcnonaliry mustincvitably modify thc sryle.Someonc who writcs brillianrly, with cloccly observeddemil, about profer-

r6+

NOTES ON THE FICTIONAL PN,OCESS

his or sionaldishwashing clerking in r grocery storg presenting realistic materialin the normal style of third-penon-subiective fiction, must inevitably sound different from another vriter basicstyle, writes of circuswork or who, working in the same life of profesional tornuers.Style often takescareof itself. the not is The same true of the writer who masters oneconventional style but many,eitherwriting eachstory in * style differnt from the style he usedla.sttime or mixing sryleswithin a givenstoqyin r way that seems him intuitively satisfyingand to in termsof the story asa whole. somehow iustifiable But therewill alwaysbe thosewriters, rightly anough,who insiston creatingsomenew style of their own, asJoycedid, or Faulkner,or William Gass. that can be saidto suchwriters All is: Go to it. The rists areobvious:that the style will attrect tq) much attention to iself; that the style may seemmannered; hinrselfit may and that instead freeing the writer to erprss of limit the numberand kinds of things he can say. (We seezuch limitations in Hemingway'searly experimenswfuh the thirdperson-obiective point of view donewith tough-guysimp["ity.) Goodcriticismwill help,if the writer canget iq andwill takeit. Failingthat,timeis likely to softenthe style'serceses

Ploming

e When designing profuent plot, we'vesaid,the writer worb in two oneof threeways,sometimes or moreet once: He borrows somc traditional story or action draum form life; he worls backwardfrom his climax;or he worls forqnrd from an initial situation.Without repetitionof what hasbeensaidalready,this as chaptetwill examine threeof thesemethods they apply to all ploning short 6ction, the novella,and the novelnand dso exrmine wap of ploaing otherkindsof fictioq includingthe kind we cnll "plotless."The discusionqumot hopeto bc exhaustive, but it shouldgive the beginnersomepracticalguidanceon the herdest e writer everdoes. iob Thoogh causal sequence givc the best (most obvious)tind of profuence,it is not the only possible means that necesaqF to cnd. A story or novelmay developargumentetively, leadingthe reederpoint by pornt to someconclusion.In this ctse Eyents occur not to irstify later evens but to dramatize logic'elp6itions; thus eveft 4 doesnot ceuseevent D but stan& in some log".l relation to it. So, for example, writer might impoee the onto the twelve leborsof Hercules-<r someaction from reel Ii[q or somefictiond action-some logicd sequence thag like my other interestingrrgumeff, keep rs reading.By dmmar65

r66

NO|rES ON THE FICTIONAL PROCESS

tizcd concretesituationsthe writer trgueq say, "[f c doesnot work, try bi if b doesnot work, try c"---4nd so on though twelve posible modesof action or value posibilities. Morc specifically,the writer might show his central charactertrying to copeby charitable behavior, then,aftcr failing, trying to cope by selfishbehavior,and, failing again,trying to copeby e mixture of charity and selfishcunning, and so on until all options seem exhausted. even Suche story or novelmight bc interesting, acbrilliant, but it can neverachieve power of an energeic thc it not tion because controlof actionis intellectual, does risc the out of the essence things:It discuses redity the way a lecof (thoughperhaps the ffer does morcvividly), it does reveal not modaliryofthings.It does capture not process. A relatcdkind of profuence, both which can alsoorganizc made-upstoriesand uaditional or real-life stories (found obis picaresgue In plot. iecs, soto speak), the straightor modified uaditional or purc form the picaresquc narrativc follows some characer, oftcn r clcver rascal,from level to level through sociery, showingusthe foiblesand absurdities each. The writer of canmakcany substitutions may pleasc pump new life into to he hero,he thc old formula.Instead the customary of picaresque might uscsomemonstcrfrom thc fens-thc monstcrGrendel, from BeoaruIf, for instance+nd instcad of thc customary movemcntthrough thc strataof socicty,hc might choosce list the of Grcatldeas WesternGvilization (love,heroism, anisof tic ided, picty, andsofonh) to which oneby onche introduces his skepdcalmonster.This structuring of plot is likely to bc more interestingor lessdepending the extent to which thc on raises sequencc questions involvingthc welfareof the character, each value, for instance,putting increasingpressureon the of monster's skepticism. Insofar as the sequence ideasprovides involvementmay be almostasgreat as somethreat,thc reader's it is in the well-built energeicplot, though here too the final proces. energyis mising: the powerof inexorable by Or againa plot may be constructed symbolic iuxtaposi-

Ploning

r67

tion. Thc epicBeoatulf ,discused earlier,worla in this way. All talesof quest, nearly all, havethisstructure. or In the 6nel analysis seems it unlikely that an csentially intellectual strucnre can have thc same power and aesthetic validity, all other things beingegual,ase sructure that appeals simultaneously our intellect and to subtler faculties, our to deepest cmotionsGympathyand empathy) and our intuition of redity's process. However that may be,an intellectualstructure is easier createthan is a powcrful energeic to plot. With intelIcctual strucnrresthe writer always knows exactly where hc stands exacdywherehe'sheading, and thoughthc readermay be baffieduntil he figuresout thc key. If the writer is very clevcr at fleshing the skeleton, out covering with vivid details it drawn from life or lirerature, rcader's the initial baffement, combined with hisintuitivesense the fiction hassome that order,may lerd to the reader's fi$t overvaluingthc work-and his later diset appointment,wheri hc figuresit out Wc sense oncc some at mystcriouslogic in Kafka's "A Country Docror," and our first impulseis to aaribute this mysteriouscoherenccto some ingenious penetration the natureof thingp.But oncewe learn of that the story is tightly allegorical,asnearasmathernatics . or sennonon the sevendeadlysins,wc may begin to find it thin and too obviously contrived. All this may be vain argumcnt; ccrtainly it doesnot deny Dantc his sraruses the greatestof medievrlpoes. But in an agefond of intellectualstructurcs, is it a thought worth consideringthat thosewriten who move us more profoundly than all others-Homer, Shakespeare, and Tolstoy, for cxample-differ not in degree but in kind from thosemasters whosestructuresare intellectual,not energeicwriters like Dance, Spenser, Swift. and The question, poseit one last wan is this: Can an arguto ment manipulated from the start by the writer havc the same emodonaland intellecnralpower es an argumentto which the writer is forced by his intuition of how life works?Comparisons arc odiousbut instructive:C,an Gullfuer'sTraaels, a. however

r68

NOTEII ON TTIB FICTTONAL PROCESS

brilliantly crnstructd evertouch dre hemof the garmcntof r infefur play fike Kirg Leo? Or: Why b ther{ ewid n meu:kdlly to the lli,ld? From all we havesaidaboutploniog in generalit shoulil bo orident that evenin those"modern" plos in which evens hrp the pen by lewsnot immediately visible-as wher\ for instance, taaooedman in the circusreveals the courseof e whimsicel in conversation that he hason his chestI tanq) of the litth girl now looking at hirn, a child he has never beforc secn,or .B wheq in IsakDincen, a decorous nun turns abmpdy into r old monkey-there must be somerationrl or poetically persuasivc bosis. We can enioy e sto{y thet hassomesecrctlqgic we sersc but cannotimmediatelyguess; if we begin to suspect that but the basis profluence nothingbut madwhimsen we beginto of is be di*racted from the fictionel drerm by our questiong doubts, and puzzlement, feeling that the story is getting nowhere. our The "mad" story--+urrealisgexpresionist,or whatever-must bc ascarefully ploaed asthe story with causally relatodrctions. Onc can plot such fiction in r variety of ways The most clmmon is the techniqueof setting up basicphiloeophicdop positionsand then dirguiring thenr, translatingideasinm rp by end propriatecharacters genereting vents the methodof thc old-fashioned allegorist, but cacheventexpresingin mysteriotrs soncretetermsthe activerelationship betweenthc centralidcs& Thus, for example, wishing to tdk about mrterialismand spiritudity, one might chooseas dlegoricd "central characerr" I fat bankerand a pigeon;and wishing to say thrt body crnnot live without soulor soulwithout body, we might sct up r simation in which an elderly pigeonkeep up is strengthby living off the crumbsthat fall from the Oreo cookiesthe brnker eets betweencigars,and the banker is k.pt from dying of cigarby of smokeasphyxiation the necessity from time to time openthe window to let the pigeonin and out. For contrastwe ing might setup in the officenext dobr an identicd fet benter who doesnot havea pigeon,andan identicalpigeonwho hasnothing

Plonkg

169

for sustcnme rain. of thcirneges, but All needles rry (stertto

ing with the bankermd the pigcon), ere choscnboth for theh significance for their inherent interest.(By an cnrblemetic and "emblern" I mcan m image that has one signification.Thc bankermeans materialism only materialism. r "symbo[' By and I meanan imagethat may meansevenlffigt.) And everything in the story-seaing, didogoe enfhing else-must be selected by thc same principles,both immediate emblematic and interesa Oronemight work, asChaucer often does, the obveneof by the dlegorical maho4 choosing ueditiond dlqgoricd emblerm (the roee,the lemb the cron'rqthe grarl) and erploring them in quasi-reali*icterms.Thus, for examplga literd-minded, practicrl philosopher--aninventor of householdapplirnces,or r complains.depertment supervisor-might find himself in thc cmpany of the dying FisherKing. By either of the basicrllegoricalmethods, uriter thinks out fint what he wants ro the say in gened then translatc his ideasinto people,places, ob' jects, rnd evnts,and then, in the proces of writing, followr out suggestions rilsefrom hb story, perhap saying mort that than heet first thoughthe hadto sey. Expresionistic and surreal fiction ie superficiallylike dlsgory but the meaning nuch lessimposed is from without. Thc e4presionist translatessome basic pychologicd redity m actualiry: Gregor &msa becomc not like r cockroachbut r cockroech, rnd the story dwelops,from that point on, redistically. In surreelfiction the writer translates entire seguencc en of psychologicdevents,developing story as the mind spirs his out &eams.Plotting the story, in either of thae modegb e+, rentially lile plotting a realistic piece. The writer shovn us drameticellydl that we need to know (within the modc) to follow the story to is climax.He doesnot simply tell us things but dramatizes that is crucialto ourbelief in the climax. all We sew earlier how the writer works back from a climar (Helen's suqprise) discoverwhrt materialshe must dmme. to tize to makethe climax meaningfuland convincing.In the casc

r70

NOTEIION TIIE rICNONAL PROCCSS

of the Hclcn of Troy story, ccftdn basic facts rrc givcn by wcrc like, cvidcncc(what thc T-i* lqpnd and archcological werc likc), and thc writer is to somesnent what the Achaians things too noticeably,thc snrchwith thoscfacts.If he changes may feel that thc writcr has madethings too easyfor rcader himsclf-playing tcnniswithout thc net, asRobert Frost saidof poet{y without rhyme. Working with a wcll-known traditiond story, or working with materialwe cln find in thc newspaperg that we will gct the the writer automaticallyraises expectation not only an interestingsoqy but an inteqprcmtionof thc faca that must convinccuc if that we too know-en inteqprctation it is to hold our full int*est. Theoretically thc writer may violatc this principle; by tonc and srylc hc may cstablishet oncc that hc is treating the story asa fablc from which hc can withdraw at any timc. Italo &lvino's comic tale of lifc at thc end of of the dinosaur age,"The Dinosaurg"is a specialcase the wellway of telling known cvent reinterprcted. Becausc C,alvino's of thc story-and alsobecause mutationb a pan of the subiectrrc not shocked delightedwhcn the narrator,r dinosaur, we but srqprisingly concludcs:"I traveledthrough vallcp and plaitu. I camcto r station, caught thc fint train, and was lost in thc crowd." But though thc rule is not firm, it is gcncrallytrue that in old storiesrctold ga much of their intcrestfrom our pleasure writer's inteqpretation. the Lct uslook at how the writer works whcn he plos backward from the climax of e story that is cntircly madcup. Any cvent that sccmsto thc givur writcr startling, curious, or interestladen can form the clirnax of a possiblestory: A roadsidc vcndor'spickup is struck by r transcontinental uactor-trailer; r womanpurpoaely runs over a flagmanon the sueet.Depending on the complexity of the writer's way of seeingthe eventdepcnding, that ig on how much backgroundhe fceh our the of understanding the cvent rcquires-the climax becomes high point of r shortstoqy,e novella,or a novel.Sinceplotting is but thc ordinrrily no hastyprocss something writer broodsand

Ploning

ryr

laborsover, trying out oneepproaclr, rhenanother,carrying thc idea aroundwith him, musingon it casuallyas he drifts ofi to sleep,writers often f,nd that an idea for a shon stoqf mey change into an ideafor a novellaor evena novel. But for convcnience here,let ustreer the two climaxes mentioned-the I've wreck of the roadside vendor'spickup and the woman'$attack on drc flagman-asideas remainshon-storyideas. that A roadsidevendor's pickup is hit by a uarucontinental tractor-teiler. Let us saythe vendoris the story's centralcheracter.In any climaxin which the cenual character in confict is with somethingelse (anothcr character,somernimal, or some morc or les impenonalforcc), the climaaic encounter mey comeaboutcither through the knowledgeand volition of both panies or by significant accident. (Accident without significanccis boring.) Thc semidriver may hit the pickup on purpose,accidentally,or for somereason do not know becausc we wc lack eccess his thoughts.If the semidriver his thc pickup ro on purpose, writer working backfrom the climaxis logically the requiredto show dramatically,in carlier scens, what each (r) of the rwo focal characters like; (r) why thc semidrivcr his is the vendor'spickup. (The wrirer might conceivably eround gct both r and r, telling us only whar rhe vendoris like; but thc introductionof a malevolenr semidriver who simply happens into the story, bringing on the climax,hasbecome sucha clichd in modernfiction asto be almost unusable.) story containThe ing r and r is a relatively easykind of story ro think out and write, which is not to saythar it cannotbe an excellent story if well done. Thc valueof the standard feudstory alwalndepends on the writer's abiliry to.create powerfully convincing characten in irrcconcilableconflict, both sida in some measurc sympathetic-thet is, both sidespunuing real, though mutually exclusive, values.For the climax to be penuasive, must bc we shown dramaticallywhy eechcharacrerbelieves what he does and why eachcannotsympathize with the valuesof his antagonist; and wc must be shown dramaticallywhy the conflicting

172

rOTES (nf lHE FTCIIO!{ALPROCES'

qmnot or do not ti"ply rvoid eechodru' s h rcel characters life even tigers ordinarily do. For the climax to bc not only but persuasive intercting, it must come about in I way th* seems both inevitablernd surprising.(trn e form asstandard* to imponant.) Needless the feud story, this last is exceedingly say,no sqprise will be convincingif it restson chaocghowevcr common chance maybein life. If the semidriver hits the pickup by acrident or for some we reason neverlearn,the constructionof an aathetically vdid *ory b more difrculg sincethe vdue conflict that propeb the story must be derivedentirely from the central characterand his situation.In this case sernidriver functionsasan imperthe sonal force and can have only zuch meaningas the roadside vendorFoiects onto him; in other wordg the semimustbg for the vendor,a qrmbol Let w say that for the vendor transcon: tinental trucls represent power and freedonr,r qymboliccor aast with his own life which he vieun as constricted md unsatistying.The wreck of the pickup, then, will be gdmly ironic. Having thought it out this far, we find that the story beginsto fdl into placa The story's principle of profluancc might be e moJementfrom greatct constrictionto least conabmpdy reversed when the semihits suiction'-a development the pickup. vendorb e redneckboaorn-landfarmer, . W th" roadside pole beans,yamg and grower of melons,pumpkins,squash, tometos the red-clay countqf of Kentucky, southernMb in souri or southemlllinois-e mancalledPigto". (Ths venion of are from the writer Leigh Wilson.) Consuictions the plot comes to fnd for sucha man, beuzyedby the len4 the goverr easy ment, thc newly liberalizedBaptist ChurctL perhepsbetrryed by life in other weysrs well, at leastin his own view: His wife sickly-other meq like his neighbor Alice, is worn andhaggard, Plnky Heams,havehealthy,strong wiveq good workers And Pigtoes children Nretoo numerous(or not numerousenougb' chooee one) andrebellious.

Plotting

,7'

Thc urriter might leadup to the climaxwith threerelatively rhon but texturdly ricb at least moderatelysoutherngothic scens. the 6rst, Ptgtoeis at breatfastwith hb wife, talking, In while outside the children load the truck. The writer can quickly rnd easilyestablish Pigtoeb feeling of being squeezed by life-his feelingsrbout the church, the school,blacks,hb chiltlren rnd neighbors, uxeq and the weather.But whereas hb f*ily b pretty much stuck on the farm, as they are grumblingly awarg Pigtoeczn rt leastget eweyr little, seethe larger worl4 met strengers, selling produce from the brck of hb pickup,out by the highway.The scene enrlswith Pigtoewatch' ing ashischildrenfinishtheir carelesloading. A brief transitiond scenemight show Plgtoe driving iloum Lipes Ridge Roed (or whatever) toward the iunction of the state highway and the intentate. We get some of Pigtoeb thoughts,sharpimages how he drivesthe truclg andaboveall of r dramatized movementfrom one world to another.Then the third scenemight show Plgtoe with two or thneesignificant eustome$'--'ir uim suburbanhousewife,for instance;a university couple-"hppi.s," to Pigtoe(they might envy hislife "close to the land"); perhap alsoe well-off family of blacls in a new Chevy wagon.Through all this and,subtly, from the bqginning of the story, we get Pigtoe'sfeelingsabout the peoplearound him: his contemprend bitternes, and his envy, almostworship, of the peoplewho haveescaped imprisonment, menwho his the drive the chromeeighteen-wheelers. the climaxis setup. Now How the wrircr comesout of it (in the denouement), the writer must probably discoverrs he writes and repeatedlyrevises story. Pigtocmay be killed, or he may be left stuing at the the tipped-over pickup, honefeun and pumpkins mmbling down the highway toward Oklahoma.Agein" the sernidriver might *op (not at dl the supremely free beingPigtoehasimagined him); Pigtoe in his rage might seizethe old red gas-can from the pickup andtry-*uccesfully or with pitiful ineptitude -to burn the eighteen-wheeler. any of e dozenother things Or

r71

NOIES ON TllD FICTIONALPROCESC

rnight hrppcn. Thc writer must decidcfor himself,di,scovcring hiscndingfrom within the story. The good Thc risksin thisstory wc've outlinedareepparcnt. writcr will think them out carefully beforc he starts.The main is one, of coun;e, that the stoqy'ssoutherngothicismwill sccm typc is no reeeon old hat. Thc faa that the rtory h of r standard not to write iq however.All fiction is derivativc,r fact that thc making thc most of thc good writcr turns to his advantage, rcldcr's cxpecations,rwisting old convcntions,setisfying expectations in unexpectedwep. Becausehis matcrid is so r obviouslysoutherngothic, thc writer might choose stylc not usual in such fiction, r style as far as posible from that of Flanncry O'C,onngr, Eudore Wclty, or William Faulkner. Mrinln howcver, he must sca the matcrial with a frcsh cyc, using his own experience southernlife, choosingdctails no of othcr writer hasnoticed or, enywxy, emphasizcd, crcating thus a rcality as dillercnt from that of gothic convcntionas gothic convention from realiry itsclf. is story situation,thc womenwho purpoeelyruns Our second ovcr a flagman, thc oppositc our Pigtocstoqy,sinceherethe is of focal chrncter is thc aggrssor, (asat thc cnd of the Pigtoc not story) thc viftim. What the writer mustfigure out, to iustify thc climax,is (r) what kind of womenwould run ovcr a traffic fegmen,and (r) why? Eithcr shecan know thc flagmanand havcsomething personal rgainsthim, or shemay not know him, I but sees asa symbol-e malc chauvinist,for instance. am him ignoring, for my convenience, possibility rhat thc woman thc mainlybccausc that in might run overthe flagman accidcnt, by cascwc arc almostcenainly saddlcdwith a victim story. What the be precedes climax would necessarily e set of harassing At that explainthe woman's carelessness. bcst the story evcnts be,in the abstract, duplicadon our Pigtocstoqy:Thc of would r women believc onc thing-that a cenain attitude and way of are behaving effectivc-andis provedwrong by cvents. Let us say, arbitrarily (though in fact thc givcn writer's

Ploning

17t

choicc would not bc arbitrary but guided by his intuition of what would makce goodstory), that thc womtn docsnot know the flagman.What central charactershall wc choosc-for cxample:a harried,unhappyhousewifqr tough femalecxecutivg e suippert Any choicecould makee good stoqy,but let's tekc the strippcr,an ideethat might appealto r given wrirer at least panly becausc our presentstageof socialconsciousness: of No writer beforeour own momentwould bc likely to seethc striF per in quite thc way we do. What prasurc can wc put on our sripper that will accountfor the climaaic cvenrl Let us say that our stripper, Fanny, is thirty-six, wellpreserved,cven beautiful, but hard put to compete with youngerstrippersof the new breed.Shc'san old-stylc stripper, thc kind who tcases scorns maleaudience, if taunting and her as them, askingto be tamed-a clasic ect (she'sbeenthe star for years),but her acq like her body, is slipping.Her act is of thc highly polishedkind: Sheunclothcsslowly, tormentingly,with rrtistic style. She has,let us sey, urined white doveswho fly away with cacharticlc of clothing shetakesoff. The youngcr dpp.o, who rre bcginning to challcngehcr top billing, arc new-sryle strippers.Nakcdnes meansnothing to them-they takc off their clothcsasindilfcrently astreesdrop lcaves-and thcir acs, bccause their easyand uninhibitcdsexudity, havc of no needof high artifice or polish.WhereasFanny grew up in Texas, stern,southern of Baptist stock,and fed to burlesquc in troubled defiance, guiltily but brazenly,rhe new breedgrew up in citieslike SanFrancisco feelsno suchinner conflict. and Having worked our rhis generalapproachto his story, thc writer is rcady to start figuring out his scenes. thc rulc of By elegancc efficiency,he will choose smallest and the number of scenes posible-perhaps three. Fint, thc wrirer might usc a rcenein which FannR fearfully and engrily, watches rethc hearsal a youngerstripper's Shccan tell asshcwatches of act. that, thoughthe act is technically shoddybeside own, it is her beinggroomed a starringact andmaywell pushher from her as

r?6

NOTEI} rlIE rICIIONAL PR@ESE ON

or billing.In the ncxt scengFenny might crnfront the manager director and learn from him that her suspicionsare wellfounded. Shegoesinto e rage. At the peak of this sceneshc might slap the director, rnd he, to her shock and emazcmurg might slap'her bach even fire her. trn the third sceng Fanny driva toward the flagman, who unluckily smilesr uife lewdly ot her, bring"g on the climax. What happens after this-the soory'sdenouement pull-runy---the writer may know only or when hc writes it (Somewriters claim they know the lest lines of their storiesfrom the beginning.I think this is usrally e bad idee,producingfction thet is subtly forced,or mechanicd.) This brief, rough sketch of e posible story raisesan ertrqnely important point--c point asfundamentalo the most for ceriorskind of uniter, asthe conceptof the uninterruptiblefictional dream.What we haveso far, in the sketchwe've worked out-and whet many quite good writers nevergo beyond-is r proiectedpieceof fiction that, if well-wrinen, will be no more than e penuasive imitation of redity. It showshow things hap pen and may imply certainvalues, it doesnot look hard at but the meaningof thingp.It hasno real theme.This fo e cornmon limitation of second-rate fiction andmey sometimes characterize Welty's novel Losing even quite powerful fiction, like Eudom Brnles. Wc get an eccurateand totally convincingpicnre of whet it feelslike to havca deathin the familn what it is like to leaveoneb husband and children for a new "free' Iife, how it feelsto be suedfor malpractice to losean election;we do not or get closcexamination somedeeprootedidea.The writer, in of fiction-he other words,hasdonethe first iob donein all serious hascreeteda convincingand illuminatingsequence eventsof but he hesnot done the second, which is to "mine deeper!" as Melville says,dig out the fundamentalmeaningof evens by organizingthe imitation of reality around someprimary quesconcern. suggested the character's by tion or theme The themeof our story about Fanny the stripper*bht bc Life (or of cource, melecheuvinism; it might b Aft versus or

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Naturc); or nakednesin sil ia forms. The writer's choicc of themg pudy Fanny'schoicg will dictatehis sclectionand organizationof detai\ h rtyte and so fonlr" For instance if what seems him centrelin Fanny'sstmgglehasto do with thc to Art coftrut between and Naturq he will focuscarefully on rhc differencebctweenFanny'sact end thrt of the younger gul* i.rg.ry, etc., thrt subdy undencores point of his focus.Hc may pry clooeanentionto Fanny'smirror, a beautifully carpentered obiect with a hiutory and, for Fannn specid merning.And th flrgman'suny of doing his iob--+regligendy ed anlesly, or officiouslyand carefully-will havebearingon the climax.If the therncthe writer chooses nekedness, will is hc chooseothcr denils to brood on rnd develop--+he chipping paint on the dresing-roomwalln for instance; paychological the nakednes of somechrracter; the manager's unwillingnes to disguis cover over his lack of int*est in Fanny'swell-being or or, if it clmesto that, his hrtred of dl shcrepresens. Givcn this themc,the uniter may find himselfintroducing a decorous old who clotheshis eveqymood in the moetprinstakingaiianitor quetteend who weas, whateverthe weathcr,two sweaters and r cost Thesebecome "counte$," soto sperk,for the uniter's thc droughc They help him nnd out rnd xprss preciselywhat he rneans Themg it shouldbe noticed,is not imposed the story but on cvokedfrom within it-initially an intuitive but finally an intcllccuel rct on the pan of the writer. The writer muses the on story idea to determinewhat it is in it rhat haseftractedhirn, why it seems him wonh telling. Having determined what to that interesshinFand what chiefly concerns maior characterthe is the ider of nakednes (physicd, psychological, perhapa spiritual), hc top with variouswayc of telling his story, thinls aboutwhat hasbcensaidbeforeabout nalcednes (for instancg in traditional Ctuistianity and paganmlnh), broods on eveqf imagethat occu$ to hint, tuming it over and over, puzzlingon h, hunting for connectionqtrying to figure out-bdorc he

t78

NOTES ON THE FICTTONAL PRO@S8

rcvi.sior of writcq whilc hc writcq and in thc procss repeated -what it is hc rcally thinks. (How nakcil shouldwe bc or crn vulncrability, a virnre or a dcfcct?To what wc bc?Is opennesq crtent, with whet important qualificationst) Hc fin& himself bringng in black stripper$ pcrhapeen Indian nrippr' sup And so on poncd by imagcrythat rccallsprimitivc nakcdncsc Only whcn hc thinks out his stoqyin thb wry docshc echicve not iust an altcrnativercaliry or, looscly,an imitetion of narurc, but nug firm art-fiction as scriousthought I havcsaidthet e writcr mry alsoplot r piccc of fiction by working his way forward from rn initial situation.Sey hc gea thc slightly lunatic idea of e young Ctinesc teacherof high who h kidnappcdby e group of schoolEnglishin 9n Francisco thcy want him to write their stoqy, of Chincscthugs becausc which they'rc inordinatcly proud. If thc fiction b not to bc r victim story (hcncc unusable),somc conflict rmrst be cstab' lished: Thc tcachermust bc givcn e will of his own and a purpocc opposed thet of his captors.In othcr words, he must to want-in some dcspcratelyscrious wey-not to writc their stoqy.What, wc rsk, groprngtoward a stolF, would makc our tcachcrso unwilling to write thc cxplois of thc thugr that hc would crossthcm, understanding danger?Pcrhrp he hes thc his hcedfull of thc lcgcndsof Mongolianbanditq and pcrhap hc's not only a tcachcr but an ambitious,ficrcely dcdicreted )rorrng poct, steepedin thc uadition of Chinescpoctqy and grng that docsnotll' proc. In this casc, story of a miscrablc thc ing morc lofty thrn knock ovcr en occesional Savings& Loan Associationmay bc a story that rc outragc hb scnscof lifc rnd an thrt he refuses have anything to do with it. If thc to gang simply shoos him for his recalcirance,that's thc cnd of that; no story. How can wc kcep him dive and thrs keep the story going?Perhap he docswritc asthcy tcll him to dq but wrircs insultingly, lcgitimatcly conuzstingttrc pctty cscapadc of his kidnappcn with thc cxploitsof great Mongolianbandits Insofarashis captorsarc persuaded thcy really ought to bc that

Ploning

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morc litc Mongolianbandits--and thcy woulil nm hevc kiilnappedhim rnd rskcd him to write if thcy didn't havc somc pride-thc kidnappcn may sparc hinr, grudgingly, Iearning from him a morc dazdingkind of banditry. Evcntudln rhcn, it might occur to thcm thrg given nsbhour uaffc in downtown SanFmncisco, thicvcsmight rob r bank and cscapc thcy werc if mountcdon horscs, Mongolirn bandits.So wc might lcad to likc thc comic-hcroic imrgc of modernMongolianbrndirs chacring acros thc GoldcnGatcBridgcin uzditional regalie, Thc writer's basicproblerm when hc thinls forward from rn initial siturtion rrc ascntielly the sameas whcn hc thinls backwerdfrom r climax. As his plot linc takc shepcend hc graduellymakes whet his climax or scric of climaxcs to out b be,hc mustfigurc out what hc mustdramaticallyprovc to makc thc climaxor scries mcaningfuland convincing.Hc must figurc out his thcme-in this case, clearly,thc rcletionship bctwccnrrt rnd lifg rnd thc moralrcsponsibiliry thc anisr.Hc musrwork of out maior dctailsof chrmcterization think out whet sonrcof rnd his maior images impty (thc cxtcnt, thar is, to which thcy function rs symbols);hc must wort out his story'r nrturd lcngth rnd rhythm tnd dccidcon thc epproprirte*ylc.

So far wcte talkcd mainly about short-stoqyploaing. Lct us look now et longcr forms; thrt s, thc novclle rnd thc novel. I will ueat et lcngth only cncrgeicptos, sincc for long worls thoscerethc kind mostlikcly to succecd. The novclh can bc dcfincdonly as r work shoner than I novcl (mostnovclhsrun somcwhcrc bcrwecn3orooo Sorooo and words) rnd both longcr end moreepisodic thrn r shon story. I use the word "cpisodic" looecly hcrq meaningonly thrt thc novelh usuallyhu r scriesof climaxcqeechmore intcnscthan the last,though it may bc built-qnd perhaps fact ought to in bc built--+f onc condnuous ection.William Gas's 'nThcPcdcrsnKid" is r mofc or lcs pcrfcct exrmplcof thc form. Discount-

I8o

PROCESII FICTTONAL NOTES TTTE, ON

ing brief flashbaclswhich show what Big Hans Ghe hired men), Pa, and Ma were like before the openingof the central actbn and how they cemeto be the peoplethey are now, thc action is a continuous sueam moving through a series of climexes,focused throughout on r single character, young rural landJorge.The story runs asfollows: In somedesolate scape (Wisconsin, perhap North Dakote), in the dead of Lid, winter, a neighbor'schild, the Pedersen arives and is discoveredalmostfrozento deathnearJorgebfather'sbarn; wheo he's brought in and revived, he tells of the murderer at hb Big house, manwith yellow gloves; Hansand Pa decideto go e there,taking youngJorge;when they get there,Jorge,makingr hearsshos; Big Hans and Pa dashfrom the barn to the house, ere killed, epparently-Jorge is not sure-and Jorgeslipsinside the house down cellar,whereet the end of the novellahe is and still waiting. The streamof action is completeand uninterof of rupted, from the initial situation (the cause the sequence events;that is, the arrival of the Pedenenkid with his suange story challengingthe couregeand humanity of Big Hans and Pa) to the closingevent,Jorge'srecognitionthat he hasdonc identity' or what he must,heskept his word andsohasachieved has human $atus. But the continuous$ream nevertheless iu each if we look progresion of increasingly powerful climaxes, on closely,symbolicand ritualisticaswell asintense the level of his pure action.The writer, in other words, hasorganized consegnenq or tinuous action as e grouP of scenes scene-cluster loosely,"episodes." The blockingof C'ast novellamight be laid out asfollows: kid The Pedersen arives andis broughtinto the kitchen end therethawedout or "resurrected"by Jorge'smother. (Here, as of throughoutthe novel, suggestions mystic ritual abound.Mr kid worts on the frozen Pedersen as she worls when baking bread. The boy's whitenes remindsJorge of four, and Mr worla on hir& kneedinghim, on the kitchen tablg where cusNotice, by the way, how tomarily shekneads breaddough. her

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thgroughly rglistic all this is, for all is qfmbolic frrghting. The detailsof the scene havethe sharpedgedvividnes of naward Westonphorographs realisticpainting.yet nearlyevery or detailworkssymbolically well asliterally.) as the thawing of the boy, Ma needs someof pa'swhlskey - lo. (an ironic permutationof the wine that goeswith eucharistic bread,the Pedersen kid's "dead" body), and we learn what a dangerous, meandrunkard Pa is, a man both violent and spirsnakelike, capableof dumpingthe contentsof i*.lly debased, his bedpanon Big Hans' head.The scenJbegenwith intensc (the pressure whole family is slighdy eezyz Mruembles in fear Pal Jorgeresists, almostpsychotically, thawingof the kid the 9f found in the snow) and builds urgenrty to the novella'sfirsr Big Hans'challenge Pa andthe decision go to the of to liTo, Pedersens'house look for themanwith yellow glou.s. and Having, in effect, vowed to do so, Pa Big Hans,and Jorge setout, armedandangnly tormentingoneanother,an4 on their we)r to the Pedenens', find the murderer'sdead horse,nearly buried in snow. (Throughour the novella, snow-burial anh spring rcurrection are seminalideas.)Their discoveryof the horse--end the loes of Pe's on the second climax: Because they'vesaidthey'll go to the pedersens'and are too stubbornto back down, Pa and Big Hans confirm their re. colve.They mekeit to the Pedenens', the JorgerEaches wall of the housg and (in the novella'sthird main climax) pe and Big Ham are shot by someone inside.Ratherthen freezcto deathl thou$ he expects be killed anyway,Jorige to goesinside.The novellabfinal climaxb Jorge'srecognitionol what it is thrt he hrs achieved, whetheror not hewill live to tell of it 'The Pedersen Kid'r$ I've sei4 I more or les prfect crrmplc of the novellafonn-r singlesueamof action?ocused on one cherecterand moving through r seriesof increasinglyinterueclirnaxes. find the same We srructure manyof thJnovdin hs of HenryJames-"The Tum of the Scred' ena "fne;oUy Cornerr"for instanc+-andin the work of vrriousother writcrs:

r8r

NotrEsoN TI{E FtcrIoNAL PRocEss

and "The PasFlaubertin "A SimpleHeart," Gide in "Theseus" William Faulkncrin "The Bear,"andsevcral torel Symphony," of of the novellas ThomasMann. Though this form of thc it and cfficientnovellastructure, is novellais the mostelegant novellawriten Some not thc only structureposiblc, however. babynovels, shiftingfrom onepoint of view (or writc, in effect, with time to focal character) anotherand usingtrue episodcs, stream action.D. H. of breaks between, instead a continuous of this Lawrencc,in his novclla"The Fox," uscs morc complicatcd for makes possible him to it succcss. choice form with some The and in the novella covera longerspanof timc thanis customery alsoa greaterlatitudcof sryle.One paysfor theseadvantages in that thc progras of eventshas lessugency than Gas and whilc the brevity of thc work prohibitshis Feulknerachieve, achievingthe powcrhousc cffcct usualin thc 6nal scction of r goodfull-length novel. Anothcr pcsible structureis fictional pointillism,usedintercstinglyin RobertCoover's "HansclandGretel"andmasterfully by William Gas'in whatis to datcprobablyhisfinat work, "In the Heart of the Heart of the C,ountry." this form the writer In called "crots," moving lets out his story in snippcs, somedmes asif at randomfrom onc point to enother, graduallyamasing action. the elcments, litcral and symbolic, of a quasi-energeic No rule govcrns organization sucha work but that thc the of writer be a prose-poetof genius.Even if hc has someintelfor lecturl system aranging his crots,the basicprinciplcof his his to asemblyis fccling: Hc shuffies reshufles fragments and and 6nd the mostmovingof posible presentations, he achicvc not, hisclimaxes asin linearfiction,by the gellingof kcy vents' so as but by poeticforcc.Dcpending, it does, largelyon texftrc -having abandoned structurein the traditionalsensc(cvents relatedand prcsented morc or lessin sequencc)-thc causally thc modcruns the greatrisk of overrichness, writer's tendency Thc an to pushtoo hard,producing effectof sentimentality. great focuson imagcry advantage, the other hand,is the necessary on

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whereby repeatedimagesaccruegreeter and greater psycho' Iogical symbolic and force. is A good novella, whatever structurg hasan effecranalogousto that of the tone poemin music.A good novel,on thc other hand, has an effect more like that of a Beethoven symphony. metry to make Let analogieslittlc clearer. a these The chief beautyof a novellais its almostorientalpurity, its elegant tracingof an emotional thc line.Wherees shortstoqy movsto an "epiphany,"as Joyce said-in other words to r climacticmomentof recognitionor understanding the part of on the centralcharacter at least,the reader-achievingits effcct or, by fully iustifying, through authenticating background, its climectic cvent or moment,thc novellamovcsthrough a series of smallepiphanies secondary or climaxes e muchmorefirm to conclusion. Through the sparest means posible-not through the amasingof the numerous forcesthat operatein a novel but by following out a singleline of thought-the novellareaches an end whereinthe world iq at leastfor the centralcharacter, radicallychanged. Jorge,if he evergetshomeagain,will be a differentyoungmen: He hassurvived triumphed hisrite and in of pasage, achieved adultidentity.The "fox" at the cnd has his of D. H. Lawrence's novellahaswon his womanand murdered his enemy. The bear,at the end of Faulkner's novellq is gone, and lkc McCaslinis changed forever.Nothing can be moreperfect or complete thana goodnovclla.When e novelachieves thc sameglassyperfection-as doesFlauben's MadmneBoamywe maytendto find it dissatisfying, untrue. The "pcrfecr"novcl lacksthe richness raggednes the besrlong fictions.Wc and of neednot go into the reasons this exceptto noticethat the for novellanormallytreas onecharacter oneimportantaction and in his life, a focusthat lendsitself to neatcut-offs,framing.The novel,on the other hand,at leastmakes some pretense imitatof ing the world in all is complexity; not only look closelyat we various characters, hear rumonr of distant wars and marwe riage* we glimpsecharactenwhom, like peopleon the subway,

t84

NOTES ON TITE FTCTIOXAL PROCES'

we will never seeegein.fu a result, too rnuch neames in r novel kills the novel'sfundamental efrect When all of a novelb suings are too neatly tied together at the end, as sometimes happens Dickensand elmostalwap happens the popular in in m)'sterythriller, we feel the novel to be unlifelike.The novel b by definition,to some extentat least, "loosg baggymonster"a asHenry James iritabln disparrging novelsof Tolstoy. said the but It cannotbe too loose, baggyor monstrous; r novelbuih too asprettily ase tacupis not of muchuse. A novel is like r qymphonyin that is closing movemnt with all that hasgonc before.This b rare cchoes end resounds in the novella; the effect requirestoo much timg too much mas. Toward the cloceof a novel, the writer bringp hackdit or in the form of his characten'recolleaions-image$ "dy characters, earlicr. evens, and intellectual motifs encountered boUnexpectedconnectionsbegrn to surfrce; hidden cnuses however btitfly and unstably, orcome plain; life becomes, the Bpnized; universcrevealsitself, if only for the moment,6 inexomblymoral;the outcomeof the variouschancters'actions b at lastmanifest; wc seethe responsibility free will. It b and of this clCIingorchesuation the novelexiss for. If suchr elosc that we doesnot come,for whatevertheoraically good reason, shut This b of the book with feelingsof disatisfaction,asif cheeted. connee tantamountto saying that the novel" as a genrg has e built-in metaphysic. And so it doc. The writer who doesnot ecceptthe metaphysic neverwrite a novel;he canonly play can off ig asBeck*t and Banhelrnedq achievinghb o*,n cffeca by visibly zubveningthce uaditionalto the novel,working likc tlre sculptor who makc sculpturesthat selfdatruct or thc composr who dynamita pianoo.I em not seying,of course' that the anist ought to lie, only that in the long run the anti. novelistis probebly doomedto at leastrelative failure because we do not believe him. We erc not profoundly moved by wc Homer, Shakapeareor Melvillc beceusc would lite to be lievc the metaphpical theis fictioos embody--ao

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orilerly universe that impces moml responsibility--$rt bccau* we do believethosc asumptions.We c"nnot<xcept in very subtlewayr-believe both Homerand$amuel Beclett Succesful novel-lengthfiaions csn be organized numerin ousweys: energeically, is, by r sequence cansally relatcd ttnt of events;iuxtapositionally, havesymbolic when the novel'S parts or thematic relationshipbut no flowing developmcnt thrcugh cause effect;or lyricalln that is, by someesentially musical and principle-onc thinks, for examplg of the noveb of Malcel koust or Virginir Woolf. The lyrical novel b the moet dificult to talk ebout What canies the reader forward is not ploq basically-though the novel may contain, in disguissd fom\ e squenoe causdly of related cvenc-but somc form of rhythmic repetition: r key inage or clusterof imagc (the oceaa, childhoodmemoqT r e of swingset,a snow-capped mountaiq a forest); e trey event or group of evnts,to which the uniter rcturns repeatedly,theo leavesfor materid that increasinglydeepens redefinc the and meaningof the eventor eyentsior somecentral idec or clustcr of ideas. The form lendsiself to psychological nanativg imitatiog th. play of the wanderingor dreaming mind (eryecidly thc mind aoubled by oneor ntoreuaumeticexpriences);md moet practitionersof this form of thc novel create worls with e marked dream-likequeliry. The clasic exampleb Fimegas Wake. A more manageable example John Hawkes'powerful is rnd mysteriorsearly nove[ Tbe Beetle-Lag, nightmaresto{f a in which thc narrativemoveswith increasing speedand presgurefrom oneto anotherof a few key images-a beetleleg-sized crackin the nmllof a danr, motor,cycle r gang,andsoforth" Thcmostcommon form of the noveliscnergeic.This bbott thc simplat and the hardct kind of novel to write.-the sirn, plest bccause the nost inevitable md self-propelld the it's hardestbecause by far the hardestto faka By hit made-up it's yord, mergeio,asse've said,Aristotlc meent'th actudizatioo of the potentid thrt erisa in chrracterrnd situetioo" (The fact

r86

N TES ON THE FICTIONAL PRO@S3

that fuistotle was talking about Grcclctragedy nccd not dclay us.If hCd known aboutnovcls,hCd hevcsaidmuch the samc.) Iogicalh the energeicnovcl falls into tbrec parq fuistode's "beginning,middle,andend,"which we may think of asroughly equalin length and which fall into thc pattcm cxposition"developmcnt, dcnouement. practicc, sanc and In novclist would no devotcthc first third of his total numbcr of pages cxpoeitiorL to third to development, the lastto denoucmcnt, if thc sccond and only bccausc aftcr five or ten has exposition no profluencc,and pagcsthe readerwould quit. It is for this reesonthet Aristotle rccommends the writcr begin"in thc middle of things" and that 6ll in thc cxpositionashe can.But for pu{poss discusion it of will bc usefulto treatthc threecomponens scparately. all In his cxposition,thc writer prcsents that the rcaderwill needto know about character and situation,thc potential to be without e "actualized."Obviouslyhe cannotplan his exposition clear ideaof what the development sectionb to contain and at since lcastsomeinklins of what will happen the denouement, in in thc novel, rs in the short story or novella"what the readcr necdsto know is cverythingthat is necesaryif he b to believe and understand ensuingaction. If the plot b to bc elegant, thc sloppyandincfficient,then for the ensuing not actionthe reader (essendally) and nothing clsc; must know thc full set of causes that is, no important informetion in thc cxpositionshould be irrelevantto the action that ensuc. And hcre, asin the shorter formg whrt the reader leams in thc cxposition hc must bc shownthrough dramaticevcnts, told. (It is not enoughthat not wc bc authorially informed that r characteris vicious beyond bclief. Wc must sechim slit a baby's throat.) Finally, if anythe thing is to comeof thc initial situationand characterization, in ma$er presented the expositioq rhc situadonmust bc somchow unstable:Thc charactermut for someteasonfeel conr pelled to act, effectingsomechange,end hc must bc shownto capable aaion. bc r character of fiis meangin effecg that in thc relationshiphtween chrr-

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acter and situationthere must be somcconflict:,Cbnain forccg within and outsidcthc character, must prq$ him toward a certain courseof action, whilc other forces,both within and outsidc, must cxcft strong prcsure againstthat courseof action. Both presurcsmustcomenot only from outside character the but also from within him, bccauscothcrwise thc conflicr involvcsno doubt,no moralchoice,and esa resultcan haveno (All mcaning, thc best6ction, comes profoundmeaning. in from -as Faulknersaid-thc hcan in conflicr with itself. All truc suspcnsc, havesaid,is a drematicreprcsenration thc enwe of guishof moralchoice.)The famous curveis in cffecta Fichtean diagram thisconflictsituation: of I

Lct line c represent "normal" coune of action; that is, drc the counethe character would takeif he caredonly for safetyand stability and so did not assenhis independent will, trying thc difficultor imposiblein thc hopeof effecting change. line D Let fepresent couneof actionour characerdoestake,suuggling the againstodds and braving conflict. The descending arrows (l) represent forces (enemies, ctstom, or naturallaw) that work against character's the will, andthe ascending arrows (f) reprcsnt forcesthat support him in his enterprise. The peak of the ascending (&) rpresents novel'sclimacticmoment;and line rhe line c represenrs that follows-that is, thc denouementr all Thc

r88

NOIES ON TIIE I'ICTIONAL PROCESS

eitherbeconfict is nos'resolved, in the proces of resolving, or or has the cause will of the cenualcharacter beenoverwhelmed A he because haswon and his situationis oncemorestabilizing. (our development feelingof suschrn of the novel's emotional curve. fascination, enxiery we read)is,then,Fichte's or as pense, action is in fact not smooth but moves Since the ascending through e seriesof inceasingly intenseclimaxes(the episodic rhythm of the novel), r refined versionof the curve might be
the followinot \

I wastold many yem ego,I forget by whom, the plot of e novel-in-progresthat perfectly illustratesall thls. The central characteris a keen-witted,tough young ApacheIndian-let us call him Jirn-who spenthis early yean on the Indian reservr tion but has now earnede degreein American anthroPolog)t His from the University of Glifornia at Berkeley. motheris old urd in needof his financialhelp, and his youngerbrother needs moneyfor collqe (he wans to bg say,a Methodistminister). to but Jobsin our hero'sfield are scarce, he menagxi land ong without interview, in a small univenity in Ohio-l* us call it At Twjn Oaks-formerly e teachen'college. Twin Oaksa pro' supponedby r is gram in Indian snrdies iust being establishe4 on fdenl grant Jim loads hb few possesions his H*Lythat Devidsonand travelsto Ohiq wberehe discovers e terrible

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mi*ake hasbeenrnde: What Twin Oab University thints it b ge$ing is e spccialist AsianIndian studies. one knoua yet b No that Jim is rn Apache and e specidistin American Indiensurbanonesrt that. Whct to do?The "normal" courseof action would be to ride back to Berkeley end try again.The more daring courseof acdon is to makeen attempt to fake it as an Asien Indiao. He ges himselfr turban. Now thc writer's buines is to put pressure his hero and elsoto line up thosewho on will encourage rbet him, on one hand and thosewho will and oppos hirn, on the other. We havereached whet we may c"ll the development section The writer anengesa set of crisesfor his hero. fuiother Apachemey cometo give a lecture,or a real AsianIndian may anive. A faculty member may develop powerful dislikefor our a hcro and for somereeson mey take to spFng on hirq trying to gt him fued. Cenain studens me)' grow suspicious; his or brother,overzealous piety, mey cometo visit; or a womanhe in goesto bed with may hearhim talking in his sleepand srspect his secret.At the samedmq the writer arrenges forceson the hero's side-friendly snrdens and fellow teachen, increasing from home that force our hero to keep going (his mother breals her hip and hasgreaterneedof mone)')rand so on. Finally the novel'smain climaxcomes, the conflict is in and one way or anotherresolved, moving the novel into is denouement (Here the diagram can be slighdy misleading.The denouement may be a winding down of the action, I reun to r6t, or it may be high-pitched,asin the caseof a triumphant closingsectionor a closingsectionthat b terrible and dark-for example, hero burns down the univeniry and many people the die. Either way, the conflict is resolved; initial concem,thc our teeping of the secret,changes something to else-the result of the secret's havingbeendiscovered.) When he knows what is to happenin his development scetion, and something what it means of philoeophically(thematically), the writer is ready to work out rh demils of his

r90

NOTES ON THE FICTIONAL PROCESS

cxposition. the actionrcquircsJim to havce violent streak,we If must bc shown dramaticellyhow this violent strcak dcvcloped. because both they If hc formsa friendship with oneof thc deans plry thc cornet,we must hearwhereand how Jim learnedto the play. Or, to put it generally, writer mustshowuscverything of imponanccto Jim's characterand everythingof importrnce rbout his situation,which means mainly the character all of thosewho will supportor opposc him at Twin Oala U, their politicrl affiliationsand biases, cverything about them that will hlve somc bearing the action. on This cxposition. wc'vesaid, cannotbc setdown all in a lump the rt the beginning thc book.If the story is to be profluent, of actionmustget goingalmost and immediatelR the writer must slip in cxposition he can,the only limit beingthat by the time as wc rcachthe peak of the Fichteencurve there shouldbe no has moreexposition bc presented. to When a novel's denouement bccnpropcrlyset up, it falls likc an nvalanche, the writer's and chicf job is to describe stoneby sronehow it falls. Heving workcd out what he must present his cxposition and develin opmentscctions, wrirer comcsto the most difficult pan of the rhe his plotting, what medieval rhetoricians called ilispositio, dispositionor organizationof the variousmaterialshe has sclected. In thcorythe writer maydecide starthisactionrnywhere, to but in practicehis optionsare limited.If he starrstoo far back (with Jim in hisfirst yearof college, say),the novclwill bc slow starting end almostcertainly tedious;and if he stxrts too neer last dramatic event-the thc end-for instance. with the novel's rcsult will look gimmickyand self-rcgarding. writer who Thc and wishes avoidsuchfaultsasmannerism frigidiry will figto urc out wherethe actionactuallybegins-probablywith Jims arivrl at Twin Oaks-and stan there.(Thus Homer-to shift not for l momentto thc sublimc--$egins with rhe openingof of seizing Briseus, thc Troirn wer, not evenwith Agamemnon's the but with thc argumentof Achillc and Agamemnon, ergu-

Ploning

r9t

ment that showsthc contrastbcrwccnAgememnon'lcynicism rnd Achillcs' extrcmc idcrlism, thc rrgumcnt that sets off Achilles' withdrawal from the war rnd will ultimately bring down tragedyon hishead.)Hevingdecided wherchc will starg thc writer thcn planshis rhythmicalclimaxes, thcn figuresout in dctail wherc hc will work in the necessary cxposition. cvcry Ar strgeof hiswork, the writcr mey revischis carlicr plan. Hc may for discover, cxample, that hc needs more timc for cxposition in chapterr, and he may thereforeinseft somc ncw minor climax, with a uough on cach side of it, giving himself more room. I will leave to the reader 6gurcout the ploning of the it to cousinof the cnergeicnovel, the so'celledarchitccnormous tonic novel;that is, a novelwith two or moreparallelenergeic plots, cachfocusedon e ccntral characteror group of characten. (This wasa favoriteform of the Victorirns!not to mention Tolstoy,andcrn still be used, William Gaddis as provcs /R.) in All thc plos mustbe philCIophically related. Think, for cxample, of the two main plos of Anne Karenina, onc leadingto Anna's symbolic damnation-her suicidc anong mumbling voicesand sudden" strengclight-the other leadingto Levin's symbolic and actualsalvadon. Basicallythc plotting proces is the samc for the simplecnergeic as novel,only hardcrand also more risky, sincetoo much neatness the parallel plos may in make the novel seemcontrived, and too litdc will make it sprewl,rs if out of control. I alsoleaveto the rcaderthc probIemof workingout the novelthat imitata thc biographical form (e.9.,Daoid Copperfeld). Here the ploaing is cnergeic, least ar for long stretches, the novelbreaks but into largecpisodes from variousperiodsof the hero'slife, and the choice of thcsecpisodes(es opposed other posible episoda) follows theme. to Again thc risks ere self-evident. thc thematicconnectionbcIf twenthc various episodes too neat,thc novelwill seem is conuived rnd unlifelike; and if rhe connections too vegue,rhc erc novelmay lack focus.

tg2

NOTES ONTIIE DICTTONAL PROCE$I

the To a large ftent, whateverkind of plot he chooses, writer is more servantthan mesterof his stoqy.He can almost neveruseimportantdetailsonly once:They are$ue to cdl out if for repetition.For instance, the writer givesthe hero r nightmere,e nightmareso well done (rs it had bener be) that the the distress, writerrerder feelssomethingof the character's rnd the readerafter hfun-will feel a need for anothernightelementcalling to elernent marelrter, or someclerr equivalent, thtoogh the novel, form crying out to form. If he introducesr of love sceng he commitshimself to lrter developments that if he focuses cloeelyon r minor character,he cwrmic $ene; return,if only asr memory. himsclfto that charecter's k is this qudiry of the nov4 is built-in needto renrm and rcpat,that forms th. php..l basisof thc novel'schief glory' is resonant close.(It alsoses up r risk that the novelmay seern et conuived.) What ringsendresounds thc end of e novelis not phy"".l, however.What movests b not iust thrt chareciost terq imagel and evens gt someform of recapituletionor re connectedness thing* of call We rre movedby the increesing uhimately r connectednesof vdues. Coleridge pointed oug by $ined to the obnervation his interestin Hartleim psycholof complexsJrutems asociation can give ogy, thet increasingly e literary work someof is power. When we ncountertwo Hardey notice4 we tend to recdl drings in closeasociationo if one when we encormter other. Thug for example, one ir the standingin e drugstorewhen one first readsShelley,dre ncxt one time onegos a drugstore mey think of the poet, end thc to next time onencountenspoemby Shelleyonemey get e feint l when we The samething happens whiff of Dial and battrsdts. it readfiction. If the first dme our hero mees a given character will next epperance carqy oeurs in a graveyard, character's the sening. with it some residue the graveyard of The effect can bc roughly illustratedthis wry. [.et a repro. rt fim encountered the foot of r rent e pair of bloody shoes, in villow tree &; let c eqnelan orphanhomg first encountered

iloning

rg3

c thundertonn, d; md let e reprcsentr woman'skitC oPoiencedon e uaft\ f. If c (the bloody shoes)b mentioncdlater in the story, it draun with it a memoryof thc willow (& in brackts). In the samewty c produces[d] as en echq and e pre duca [f]. If the top of the line below is the beginningof thc nanrtive and the bonom of the linc b the en4 then e vniter might dwelop somc such pattern of rsociations as the following:
a

b t d l lrl

tl
c

rt, c
a

t
c [ll

ttl t

v l e r [r] (dl tcl I r c pl[Cl

in to Compared what ecnnlly happens fictior\ this diagramb simpleandctudein drc ertremg but perhap it makc the point Even et the cnd of a short stoqy,the power of ao organizcd rcturn of i*g.c event$ and characters can be oonsidemble. clmi4g moments a novd Think of Joyce's of "The Dead."In the the effectcanbeoverwhelming. We are of coursenot tdking abort iust any old return of image*etc. The images that cometogetherat the end of 'oThc Dea4' eachdraggingis trrin of asociationgrre dl imeges of death.The images rnd expcricnces brought togethcr io MoU)t Bloom's soliloquy in Ulyssescreatc en cqudly symbolic but vrsdy morecomplexthought-emotion which the principlc of in coherence loving afirmation rgainst od& rsociationdly rcis cellcd.The 'ycs" thrt begilrsase copulativecry cotargB ou[vnrd to becomea mystical efirnation of dl thc rmiversc, includi4gcvcodeath.To achicvc such.o effecgthc vniar mrst

rg+

NoTES ON TIIE FTCTIONAL PROCESS

of rise abovehis physicalplot to an understanding all bis plot'r including thosc that arc clementsand ell thcir rclationships, in incxprcssiblc. novel'sdenoucment, other words, is not Thc simplythe end of the story but the story'sfulfillment.Here at last, emotionallyif not intcllectually,the readcrunderstands cverything and cverythingis symbolic.This understanding, which thc writer mustreachbeforehe can makeit availablc to in the reader,is imposiblc to anticipate thc planningof the novel. [t is the novclist's reward for thinking carcfully about rcality,brooding cycryimage, on cveryword,both evcryaction, from the beginning thosc thoscthingshe planned and that crept in in thc scrvice convincingness. of Unfonunately,thoughthc can thc cffcct of r truc dcnouement be describcd, writing of e cannot taught.Onc canonly givc hintsand gooddcnouement be warnings. The mostusefulhint is perhaps this: Readthc sto{f overrnd over,at leasta hundred times-literally-watching for subtlc mcanings, conncctions, accidcntalrcpctitiong pychological significance.Leave nothing-no slightcst detailimage end in unexrmined; whenyou discovcr implications some or evcnt,oonchthosc implications towardthe surface. This may bc donc in e veriety of ways: by introducing subtlcrepctitions of the image, that it catches rerdcr'ssubliminal attcntion; so the by slippingthc imagcinto a metaphorthat hclpsto fix and clarify thc meaning you havc found in it; or by placingthe (or event or whatever)in closerproximiry to rclatcd imagc symbols. for thc warnings,two ere of mostimponancc:On fu onc hand,don't overdothe dcnoucment, ferociously so pushing meaningthat thc rcedcr is distractedfrom the fictional dream, giving rhc narrativea too conscious, contrivcd, or "workshop" effcct;anddon't,on the otherhand,write sosubtlyor timidlyfrom fear of scntimentalityor obviousncs-that no onc, not cventhc angcls afluttcr in thc raftcrg canhearthc resonancc.

Exercises

Onc of thc bcstways of lcrrning to write is by doing exerciscs. Thc following group end individual cxcrcises somcI hevc erc found hclpful, but any tcacheror studentcrn think up othcrs in kcepingthc cxercises e notebook iust asgood.I rccommend (a looscJcaf spring-bindcr) rcfcrencc for or later,perhaps along with other thingsuscfulto thc writcr-story ideas, imprcssions, snatchesof dialoguc, ncwspapcrclippings. Somc writers of coursc6nd suchthingsmorc usefulthan do others.Somcwritc each story from scratch,mrking cvcrything up; others build more slowly, depnding morc hcavily-rs Dostocvskydid<n snippcufrom thcir rceding,journal cntries,andthc likc. L Group Exacises Questionsf Discassion m end Many of the individual cxercisc in scction II bclow work cquallywcll asexerciscs bc written, rcadaloud (voluntarily), to and discusscd clas. Onc rdvantage usingthcm in this wey in of is that studcns discoverhow good thcy all uc-no smdl matter. Oncc r clas discovers that it's vcry good (and most students,when thcy work on somclimitcd, clcarly defncd prob-

r9t

196

Ernches

exciting. (In lem, are surprisingty good), the classbecomes my cxperience,fifteen to twenry minutes is enough clas time to spendon the writing, and for writers well beyond the beginnerstage,6ve minutesmey be sufficient.) A secondadis as ventageof doing individual exercises classexercises that the criticism that follows tendsto be of the kind most useful to the writer, especiallywhen the courseis still young. No knockedoff in one is likely to comedown hard on an exercise So A fifteen minutes. few slipsandinfelicitiesareto be expected. is of the hind it ought to be. It points out the discusion on not small mistakes, making too much of them, and focuses of vinues or potential.The third advantage, course,b instant feedbaclt. that ought to be coveredin every cou$ie Someof the thing;s efficientlyonly by e clas on wriring prosefiction canbe covered of working asa group.Exercises this kind follow. No one clasc n get through all of them, and it shoulddways be borne in that the mostimPormind by both the teacherand his students havebeen tent thing that cen be donein clas, oncethe basics is covered, the readingandcriticismof originalfiction. Thinking rbout the exercisc can sometimc be as valuable as siaing down to do them. fu a rulenit is usefulto do certainkhds of ecially thoseinvolving plotting-throughout the cannot by terrn, sincethe skills to be developed thac exercises be acquiredall at once.With practicethe grouPand eachof its gets faster and better at doing the fob. For most of members of theseexercises, either the teacheror somemember the group will needto a$ esblackboardrecorderand referee.The clas decisionasfinal. Group exthe will needto recognize referee's become chaoticandthereforeboringif no oneis accepted ercises the rbout, for instance, nameand age esthe settler of disputes beingmadeup. It shouldalsogo without saying of the character might be usednot for someof theseexercises that occasionally or but group discrusion for esseys meditationsin the wrher'r notebook.

Er,ercises

ryl

suiuble for g r. Clatg in onl two characters frighrcnedor harmed)' ghoststoqy-first the victim (the person the then th9 ghost Wort out for thesecharacters namg 4gg f*tily brckground,psychological physicd description, makeup, connectiongcircle of immediate friends,occupetion,appropri' atc setting, and anything elsethat seenrs important In doing this exercisgand dl thosethat follow, do not be unduly clever Jor instanc, herea dqg and e choosing drc rwo characters as lizard. Undue clevernes defeatsthe puoose of the exercise, nising complcx pnoblems before the simple onc have been rolved. (a r. Writg by onl cooperation, openingparagraph dethe scriptionof sening) for r parodicor serious gothictale' the 3. Write, by orrl cooperetiono openingpuagraph (a de, scriptionof the yarn-spinner in the voiceof the poor,dumb told credulousnarrator) of a comic yarn. Considerusing not thc uaditiond yarn+pinnu (a bachrater Southerner New Engor lander) but someintercting varirnt . canny old womag r black,r fnt-gcnemtion Odnesc-American. li* of elements one or morc 4 Cooperatively the customery of the following: r gothic romence, murdermy$ery, 1)zun, l r TV situationcomedRa lVestern,of $)meother populargenrc with which the wholegroupis familiar.What arethe philosophicrl implicationsof eachof theseelements? example The For uaditional ghoststory includes,amongother thingg someol4 remote building, an emphasis weather (espccidly wind, on cold" and dampnes), x rstless animrl (dog, wolf, orn'|"bat). What do theseelements seemto rneanpsychologically? What eresome posible qfmbolic meaningp the ghost'srerum?The of genreslbted abovc are ell "popular"; that is, their appeatis usudly iu* adventure enteftainment. or Suggct wap in which one or moreof them might be elevated serious fiction How, to

rg8

Ewrcises

for inmancgmight ghost-storyconvurtionsbc usedto cxplore mothc and hcr the rclationship an indqpcndcntdomince.ring of intimidatcddaughtcr? 5. Plot r realixic shon story, b.g*ing wfth the climaxand working baclnpard. What charactcnarc necdcdfor thc climar and what erc they likct (&c cxcrciscr, above.)What must bc &amatizedto authenticatc climax?How many sccncsarc thc necesaryto achievc climaxl thc 6. Using thc stoly worked out in exercise dividc up thc 5, sccn6 emongmembcrs thc group and writc thcn\ then read of doud anddiscus. 7. Plot r rcdistic story working forward from an initial sitw atioru 8.Plot a story bascd some lcgcnd. on of 9. Plot a comic or seriousfable. For cxamples the fonnn Acsopor Jamc Thurbcr. see ro. PIot an allegoricalfiaior\ hgrnning with thc idea or 'message" translating and and to pcrsons, placcs, things r l. PIot a short strrcal fiction; a short expresionisticfiction. r r. Plota tde. 13. PIot a realisticor fabulousshon story, bcginningwith three basicsymbob (for cxamplg an exg thc moon" a sct of goldcn dcmurc). Bcforc working out the plog discus poesiblc By mcanings thc symbols. r "fabulous"stoqyI mcanherc onc of conaining nonexistent beingsor someimaginaqyand fentastic

Erercbes

ryg

placg but . stoqythat, gvcn thcscodditieqoperats rcalisticdly; thatis,by ordinary, notpoetigc'ause effect. and 14.Plot a realistic fabulous story, beginning with thc or (for example, of innocencq themgor philosophical subicct loes poesesivc vcsrrsselfleslovg varicties couragc and cowof ardicc). (forward15. Discus wap of giving fiction profluence movingnes) withoutcarsally related evenb. Plot suche sto{y. 16. r storyby beginning a choice thcsrylcto bc Plot with of used. thestylebe in some Let way oddor unusual-forexsm. of vcry longsentences,thc uscof thc ple,a preponderance or virtuallyunusable second-person of view. point
r7. Plota novella. r8. Plot r novel. 19. PIot an interestingnovel on r hackncycdsubicct; for a cxample, novcl about a circus, r lost vallen a gold minq an unfaithful wife, a doomed plancgfinr love. (or ro. PIot an architectonic multi-plot) novel;plot a novel that imitata thc form of the biography (David Coppnfdd). lI.Indiaidual Eraches the Dnelopmmt of Technique fm It is not necessary a bcginningwriter do all--or any---of that thcsccxcrcises, it would bc imposible, rs well aswastcful, and for a srudent do all of themin one term, sincethc cxercbes to shouldnot be substituted the writing of actualshon storicq for tales,fableqyarns,slcetches, novellas, novels. or One of thc moet

2oo

Erercises

importantthingsa writer canlearnb the fceling frmr within of r completcfictional form; so the snrdentshould work on the only during the early weels of the courscand therc crcrcises after only at odd moments,p$ting most of hb cffort into complae pieces fictioq prcferably shon form$ then longer of forms. is The point of thesetechnicalexercises this: Moet apprentice wriren underestimate dilficulty of becominganiss; the they do not understand believethat greatwriters are rsually or those who, like concen pianists,know many ways of doing for everythingthey do. Knowledgeb no substitute gurius; but supponcd by vast techniqucmakc a literary m$rcr. geniw Eqp*i.[y iust now, whcn compaition for publicationb prob ebly grerter than everbeforg it is helpful for r cniter to know technique. Any apprentice writcr who does0t leestsomeof thesecxerfaithfully and well will secthar when he getsto, say,crcf,cises cisezq he is in a positionto do the eerly exercba with much faithfully more facility than when hc begen;and every exercise usefulin short or long fiction performedwill teacha technique The writer who has worked hard at thesc exercbc will sec whenever writes e story or novel,that he hesvuiors choiccs he available everypoint in his fiaion' and he will be in a betta et new. positionto choooe best<rinvent something the then, with the utmoot The exercises shouldbe approached, writer haq howeverhc mey scriousnes. Every true apprentice try to keep it secretevenfrom himse[ only one malor goal: gloqy. The shoddy wrfuer wans only publication.He fails to twelve recognize that almostenyonewilling to devoteberween end founeenhoursa dry to writing+nd there are many such But people-will eventuallyget published. only the greatwriter hb who fully undentands uade rnd b will survive-the writer willing to take time and the necesaryrisla-alwap asuming' of coursg that the writer is profoundly honestend, rt leastin hiswriting, sane.

Errrcises

zor

&nity in e uriter b merelythis: Howeversnrpidhe rney bc in his private life, hc nevercheets writing. He neverfory.tt in that his audienceis, at least ideally, as noblg generougand that he tolerant ashe is himself (or moreso), and neverfoqgets writing aboutpeoplg sothat to turn characters cart<rcnq, is to to treat hischaracters innatelyinferior to himself,to forga their CI reasons beingasthey are,to tret them asbruteq b bsd eru for Sanityin a writer alsoinvolvesuste. The true uniter hesr great advantage moff otherpeople:He knowsthe greattradition over of literaturg which hasdwep beenthe cuning edgeof moraL ity, religion"and politrcs,to sy nothing of social refomt" He knowswhat the greatest literaqymindsof the pm rre proud to do and what they will not stoopto, and his knowledgeinfonm his practice.He fits hirnselfto the companyhe moat rspcs endeniop: the companyof Homer,V.tSl, Dante,Shakespearc, endsoforth. Their standards his becomqin some masure, own. Patiness, bad tastefall away from him automaticelln end when"olg"rity, bad writers he noticestheir lapsa of tasteet he reads He sees once. that they dwell on things Shakespeare would not hevedwelled on, at his besgnot beczuse Shakespeare failed to notice them but because saw their triviality. (Except to crhe aminc new techniqueqor because personalfriendship, no of serious apprentice shouldeversnrdysecond-rate writen ) To write with mste,in the highestsensgis to write with the asumption that one out of e hundred peoplewho read onc's work may b" dnng or hrve someloved one dying; to write so that no onecommitszuicide, onedespain; write, asShakeno to speerwrote, so that people undersand,qrmpathize,see the univenality of pain, and feel suengthened, not directly errif couraged live on. This is not to say,of course, to that the writer who hasno penond experience pain and terror shoulduy to of write about pain and terror, or that one should never write lightly, humorously;it is only to say that eveq;'writer should be rware that he might be readby thc desperate, peoplewho by might be penuadedtoward lifc or deatlu It does not mean,

zoz

Ernoises

cithcr, thrt writers should writc moralistictlly, lilce prcechen. And rbove all it docsnot meenthat writers shouldlic. It means only that they shouldthink, rlways, of what harm thcy rnight inadvertentlydo and not do it. If therc fu good to be said,the writer shouldremember say it. If therc is bad to bc said,hc to shouldsayit in a way that reflectsthc trwh thaq thoughwc soc thc cvil, wc choosc continucrmong thc living. Thc truc enist to b neverso lost in his imaginaqy world that he forgets thc rcal world, where teen-agers have a chemical propcnsity toward anguish,pcoplc betweentheir thinies and fonies have e tendcncy to gct divorced, and pcople in thcir seventies have r tendencytoward lonelincss, poverty, sclf-pitn and somtims anger.The truc artist chooses never to be r bad physician.He getshis sensc wonh and honor from his convictionthat art b of powerful--cvcn bad art. For all thcseexercises, avoid the cheap,obvioug and corny. For cxample, exercise don't write a sentence in built alnost 3, antirely of adjectives. otherwords,don'r wastetimc. In r. Write the paragraph that would eppeerin a piecc of fictftn iust befmc rhc discoveryr a body. You might perhap of dcscribe charader'sapproach the body he will find, or the the to hcrtio'n, or both. The purposcof the excrcisc to developthc b techniqucof at onceattrectingthe rcadcrtoward the paragraph to follow, mating him want to skip rhead,and holding him on thfo paragraph vinuc of ia intcrct. Without thc ability to by writc suchfmeplry paragraphe, can ncvcr rchicvc rcal guc. onc PGme. r. Trkc a simple evcnt: A rmn gets off r bug uipa looks aroundin cmbarrasmcnt, cccsr worftm smiling. (Comparc and RaymondQucneaq Erereiccs&r Stylc.) Dccribc thh cvenq usingthe samccharacen and elemcnaof sctting, in fue corrr pletely different wap (changcs style, tone, sntcnce strucof

E*ercises

20,

turc, voice, psychic distance,etc.). Make sure the styles erc radicalQdifferent;otherwise, exercise wasted. the is eachat leastone full 3. Write threeefective long sentences: (or :5o words), eachinvolvinga differentemodon typedpage (for cxample, anger,pensiveness, sorro% ioy). Purpose control of toncin a complex sentencc. es a 4a. Describe landscape seenby an old womanwhocc disgustingrnd detatable old husbandhas iust died. Do not mentionthc husband death. or 4b. Describca lake as seenby x young man who has iust committed murder. not mention murder. Do the es 4c. Dacribe a landscape seenby e bird. Do not mention the bird. by 4d. Describea building asseen a man whosesonhasiust beenkilled in a war. Do not mentionthe son,war, death, the or old man doing the seeing; then describe samebuilding,in the thc sameweatherand at the sametime of dry, rr seenby e heppylover.Do not mention loveor thelovedone. 5. Write the opening of r novel using the authorialvoice, making thc authorialomniscicncc omniscicnt clear by going into thc thoughtsof onc or morc characters after establishingthe voice.fu subject, eithcra trip or the arrivalof a use scengcr (somc disruption of ordcr-thc usual novel begin-

trg)'

6. Write e novelopening,on any subfect,in which the point of view is third personobjective.Write a short-storyopeningin thisseme pointof view.

2o,4

Esncises

in of 7. Write e monologne at leasttluee pages, which the intemrptions-pauses, gesnueq description, etc.-all clearly rnd penuuively characterize, the shifs from monologue and to and touchesof setting (s when the charactertouchc $sture someobiect or glances the window) all feel rhphmically out right. Puqpose learnwap of letting e character makea long to speech that doesn'tseemboring or artificial. 8. Write a dialogue which eachof the rwo cherectenhas in e sccret.Do not revealthe secretbut makethe readerintuit it. who For example, dialoguemight be betweene husband, the hasiust lost hirs and hasn'tworked up the courage tell hb to iob wife, and his wife, who hrs a lover in the bedroom. hrqpoee:to and to make give two characters individual ways of speaking, cracklewith feelings directly expresed. dialogue not Remember that in dialogue,as a generalrule, every peusemust somehow be shown"eitherby narration(for examplq"shepaused")or by And rememsomegestureor other breakthat showsthe pause. for geslwe is e pan of all real dialogue.Sometimes, ber thrt instance, lookaway instead answering. we of sketchusingob9. Write e trvc.pege(or longer) character sense of landscape, weether,etc., to intensify the reader's iecm, ("Shewrs like . . ."). what the character like. Useno similes is by Pqpose: to creteconvincingcharacter roing morethen inmind. tellect,engaging both the conscious unconscious and ro. Write a two-pege(or longer) dramaticfragment(pan of weather,etc.,to intensify two a story) usingobiects,landscape, characrcrqas well as the relationshipbaween them. Pqpose: scenicbackas the same in exercise but now makingthe same 9 ground, etc., servemore than one pupose. In a diner, for inone may tend to look at certainobiectsinside stence, character the diner,the other may look at a difierent setof obfecs or mry look out the window.

Etncisa rq the r r. From cxercise develop plot of e shon story.

rot

shsrF rr. Dacribc md evoker simpleaction (for example' rat). eninga pencil,crrving a tombstong shooting a voice. 13. Writc rbrief stach in the eseyist-omnlscient 14 Write three acceptable examplcs purple prosHhat of q highly self-consciors arry prosemadeeccepableby suL and iecg parodicintent, voice,etc. 15.Write a brief pasageon some stocksubiect(a iourney,a landscape, sexualencounter)in the rhythm of r long novel" a thenin the rhythm of a tight shortstory. 16.Write an honestandsensitive description(or sketch) of (e) one of your parens, (b) a rnythologicalbeast,rnd (c) r ghost. (one or two 17. Describer characterin a brief passege (a pagc) usingmostly long vowels and soft consonants as in the "moanr" e asin "see";I, tr, h sD,etc.); then describe samc character, usingmmtly shon vowelsand hard consonaffs(i es ft, f, p, gg, etc.). in "siC'; 18.Write e prosepassege makesefrectiveand noticcthat ableuseof rhyme. 19.Write the first threepages a nle. of zo. Plot eachof the following: a short-shortstory, e yar& e fable,a sketch,e tele,e short stoqf, en energeic novel,rn architectonic novel, a novel in which episodes not causallyreare Iated (allegoricd or lyrical strucnre, for example),a radio plaR anopeR a film that couldonly be a fihn.

106

Erercba

zr. In r fully devclopcd monologuc(seccxcrcise prcscnt 7) e philocophicalposition you tcnd to fevor, but prccnt it through e charactcrrnd in I conrcn that modificsor undermines it 'lVrite rz. r pesseg using abrupt end radicrl-4ut droroughly rcceptable-+hifrs from thc authorirl-omniscicnt point of view to thethird penonsubfectivc. z3r. In high parodicform (in thc way Shakcpcarc scriously prrodicd thc revenge tragcdyin Htrilet, for examplc),plot onc of thc following: e gothig I mystery,e sci-fi, r W6rern, e drugstoreromance. r3b. Write the first threepages the novelplottedh r3n of usingthc trashform u the basis a scriorspicceof fiction. of z4. Without an instant'slapse taste,describc person(a) r of goingto the bathroom,(b) vomiting, (c) murderingr child. 15.Writc ashortpieccof fiction in mixedproscandvene. 16. Ifritg without irony, r character's moving defcnr of hinrclf (hcrsclf). 17.UCng ell you know, writc r short storl rbout an animd -for instance, cow. r 28. Write a short story rbout somcwcll-known lcgendary fig*.. r9. Write e tnrc story usinganythingyou necd. story usinganythingyou need. 3o.lVritc a fabulous

Index

Abq Kobo,Tle Rfined MaP,u an, Ab sal Absalom!(Frulkner),4 of cbstrection: conclusive anotion,6r-z; critid 77;of elcmena fiction, jt-2; of in meaphysical, mizuse 63; language, rymbolic 8f* 98; r6G7 rbctrrct logic,83 r38, ebsuriliscfiction, r3g r4r vriterg rq rlr l4-jr rcademic
40 "accidens" of writing, 69 cctioq 7, r 5, 3t, 37, 454, 52,67, 69 97, rz7; continuous strcam, in novelle, ryfit; energeic, 47,495q 83-+, 166 ro5; 167,r85, r9o-r; cxercise, immediate appcd of, 39 4Ir; vs. logical ergumeng 81 165{; metrphpical irr plications possible,63; non-proflueng85, r3i; sentimentrliry no substitute for, r r5-r7; shrpedin tandem with chamctersand setting,

46, 5o16, tfi6.7, rgn-l', qpeeches substitutfor, 8r; as ofale,73; unbrokenflow within sceng 59; writer's limiationq 4r-3 i tee aln ploq ploning rctive voice, roo AateilI (Vergil),18 Aesop, r98 resthetic interest, 1y47, 614 TT 9; basicingredienq 4133 conventional w innovetive fiction, 47-5r ; empethy for centrd chencter, 6y; immcdirte appealvs hsing pleasuren 3g4z; profuence vs boredonr,4&9 55;in urrconventiond fi ctioq 8d 90'9t rcstlretic rules: lbsolutc, futilc search for,3-8, rj-r( 33; suspension of,6j,8 dlegory 83-6 r43, 167,t68, t69; vocebulary o( r45{; ploaing exercrse,r98; psychologicel, r33

209

2IO

Inder
.uthoritarien fiction,8r-6 t5, 89 ilthoriry rnd mrstery, writer\ 8-9, r5,tq,9t auxiliery vcrbq 98

dliteration, r53 dlusion,r3,9o Amer i can M et or i c, An (W ttt), r8 anelyzingfiction, r3t 4r Andersoq Sherwood, 9; "Death in the Woodg" r rg-ro (Tolstoy), rr, r5, AruKnmina 45' 63' I9r q Apof lonios Rhodiosn gonaurtc Ar r rr, Et,87, {3 rppositionalphrases, of, ror use rrchitectonic novel, r9r Ari*otlc, Sl-J,63; cnetgeia, q7, 9-5o,82,83-.1, r85-6 rrrhythmic writing, ro6-7 rrg r5-16,l4-Jr {2, j5,80, rrr-rt ll.flzrloti cornparircns bawcen bnnches of,7+ r&-ro, 5r; contempoffy, tSti crertio{r of ocv redity in, l3r; formrlirt, r3r; fund*,' mcntd clementg5rr 79; genrcl t&-ro; eslenguegc, 8t; "mctning" of works of, fr; rnd metrphyiic, lt4-5; nodcrn relfnue*irning r 19; rclrtion to lifc, l 3r-4 Arimov, Igmc,4o rrocirtion: Hanleian, r9r; in novclf t91, tlhgrmt ry3 rtmocphcre,39,5:; dcvclopmcr* of,7o; tcc tlso ating Aurcn, Jrnc, t6, t5g.Eran*,6t, 69 .uthcnticrtioq rr-6; of climr4 6o,66, rtTi of prirnrry mee* ilng,6r, Q1; scctko detrrli docurncntrtion .uthorid htcrrupionq 59 ruthorirl-onnircLrrt point of v'*w,fi, r57-9; cxercisc, ro3; lcc rlro omniscient-nrrrator point of vicw

backgound cxplanetioru, tg Brcon, Fnncig rr "Brkcr's Bluelry Yrrn" (Tvein), zzrz54 Barth,Johq 32,87,r 34;Chimet6 rq; GilesG oat-B y, r 46i o "Lifc-Story," r 34;"Lom in thc Funhousc,"r34 bardic voicc, ro7; sccalso pedc rhythm Btron in tbe TreesrTbc (Glvino), rr Buthclme,Donald,rr,87, 13( r38-4r,146 r58,r84;"City Life," r39; Tbe Dead Fetbet, t38, r4r, 16r;"Thc Glas Mountriq' r43, 16r;'Pangrny," 4t;'Stntcncq' 148; Slr,w Whitc, r39; rnc of dehn 16r-3;'Vicvr of My Frttrr Wocfrry," r3g4r, 16r 'Benlcby thc Scrivcmr" (Molvillc), rr3, r4G-7 "Bctr, Thc" (Frulkncr), rtr, rtl Bcrnh, An4 r31, r36 Bcckm, Scmucl,ty, tn 16r-3, rtyl; HoppX Dqs, 16z; *Itlox Dks, niWaithgfr Godot, t6z;W.tt, rr Ludwig vm, rrr, rt3 Beethovcn, g, Dcctla-Le TDc (Hewkes), r t5 bcginning.,rc initirl siturtlu oPcnmg bchrvioml nrodcl,fiction rs,8&z Bclhmy,JocDevid,r37 Bcllow, Saul,8d "Benito Greno" (Melvillc), rr3 Beounrlf 8z,83-6 89,9o, t67 ,

Inile*
Bible, thc,89 biogrephSfictionelSqrgr Borgeq Jorgc Luis,48, 87, 136 bmnd nameq usc of, r47 Bread Loaf Writcrs' ConJerencg d Brodkcn Harold,88 Brooks, Clcanth,{r Bunin, Iven, "Thc Gendcmrn from SanFrenciscq" zg3o Bunyan, John, Pilgrim's Prcgrcss, 84

2rr

Gge, John, 19 Italo,86,87; Tbc Bnon C,alvino, inthcTrees, rr;Cosmicotnic!, ztr, z8-9; "The Dinosaurg"rTo;elcvrtionof popular metcrids, zo-r; TDr NonexistcntKnigbt,Tq; t-r,cro,zo Cnttcrbwy Tdcr (Cheuccr), rq rq3rrq54 Cc*ar (Pound),8r CrpotgTrumrr4brCoklBlood, zt C4tain Mantel cornio,3q "Gsk of Amontilladq Thc" (Poe),47,5o,r33 crusality, 2J,16,Jj,79,84, r8t, r 86-7; rbscncc of, 8r, 83-4; rnd dramr,86 rrj, r17;v3 Iogicrl profluence,83,165-6; Wtic,z+7t "Cclcbrrted JumpingFrog of Calrvcms CounV, Thc" (Twain), rr 'ccntcr of consciousnesg'156 C.crvrntcs,Dor Qahote, qB Peul,5r, ru Cdzannc, chrncters, T, 15,rr-r, lr,43ar iJ-1, jz, 5q.6o-r,67-7o1 77, 168-9;rs ccntcr of grcat

litenmre' 4 56; rctivc mtuc rndmotivation"64-6'r86; centrrl, rnd conflicq 187; complcrcnes' 5t t9o; cxcrciscg rg7, ro6 zo5;frec will of,4r,53-+ 186 r87; immcdirtc rppal,39,4r-e, 169;innovrtive fictionirB' dismisal of,47-8; psychologicd consisrencf,6; 45i return to, in novcl, r9:-4; rounded, lrck in llird' 5' 8r; rhaped in trndem with rcning rndploq4( So,S1q, r7r-zt r7g,r8G7; of telc, 7r3; writcrl limitationg 4r-3 Geoffrey,rrr rrr, r33r Chnucer, l6gi Cmtctb*y Talel 43i genre-crossinginrzo;Thc Housc of Ftnc, rq3; Knigbt't Telc,zol Man of Ltttt'sTalc, rq,5;Rimcof SitTbopas,rr; Second Nttn't Tde, 46 ChckhoqAnton,9t, rt6, I!t, rtg;, Thc Scagull,q Cbildhood(Tolstoy),ry Chimcrt (Benh), r43 "City Lifc" (Brnhelmc), r39 Clarkst (Richrrdson), rr clinrax,nrrrativc,53,6o-r,64, rl7,dhgtm 188,lt9; rudrcnticrtion of, 6o,66, rtTi ploaingbrckwud frorn,57, 85, 161,169 rTat' r79; rcconderyclirnrrcl rTgtq r8r, rt3, rt7, r9r; rrrycrrcfd &hy re pcprrtioa fot, 159-6111 dn conclurio; rc dcnoucmcnt C.olcridge,$mucl Trylor, 14 4o, r9r; the "I AM," 4d,5r collegehurmr mrgrzincr, I44 colloguialdictiott,76, rcz comic books,rt, lrh {e 93

zrz

Iniler
Dente, 8, r r, 16 8r, 89 r13, 167 Douitl Copperfield (Dickans),84, r9r 'Dead, The" (Joyce), n\rg, DeadFather,Tbe (Banhelme), r38, r4r, 16z 'Death in the Woods" (Anderson), rrg-uo "Death in Venice" (Mann), 78 fiction, xi,86,87deconstrucdve gz,g4;see alsometefiction Defoe, Daniel, rl Delaney,Samuel R.,4o delay,suspenseful,4z,r5g43 Nicholas,r4 Delbanco, demonstrationvs. exploration, 84 r89, r94; plotting denouemenq for, r73, 176,186.9o description, lit JJ, JJ1rzJ; 7t vs, discursive poetic,44-5; iq exercises 351, 1274, r97. zot, zoj, 2o,6 detail,t77,r7g,r9z;awkward insertion of, r I2, l lr}; emphrslc jfio; functioq 596o; precise,needfor, zz-ro, J2, 98 detective story, rJ3, r4o, r4r section, novel, 186, development t89, r9o; Fichteancurve, r878 didogue, ?, )7, uq n7, 169; exercise, zo4 r3z, I58' Dickens,Charles,84-5, r84;DatidCoppetfield,S4, rgr;Great Erpectations,Sti ATale of Tuo Cities,94, Dich Gibson Show,Tbe (Elkin)' r4t diction" 17,ror-3; choiceof level, 7j, 76,78,Ioz; colloquid, 76, Ioz; elevated,roz-3; fonnrl 7G7; limit in first-person

omic writing, 29 roor ro+-tr r43; vocebulery, 145-6 community point of view, 77, r58 r7-r8 compositionrulesn use compoundpredicates, of, ror conclusion:emotionof, jj-+6ri by logic exhaustionvs. resolution,53-9, 165{; novel vs. closeof novella,184;resonant novel, r9z-4; and spatial treatmentof story line,85; seedlso climex;denouement 'toncrete philosophn" 36,63 Confidence ManrThe(Melville), tt6 conflict situation, 187-9 r58 Connd, Joseph, consomnts,hrrdvs. sofg 38,78, loj continuity principle, 3r-2,97,98 conventionrl fictior\ xf ll, +Z 48..5r,77,p, 94; causalityi& 23r24,46,55; "innovative" {guments against,47-8; profluence in" 48, Jl, Jj4 Coover, Robert: "Hansel and Gretel," r8z; "Noaht Brother," ri; "A Pedestriao Acci&ng" r44 (Cdvino), rer, Cosmicomics rS9 'C,ounay Doctor, A" (KafLr), 37, 167 Georgc, 14 C,rrbbe, Crene,Stepheqr58 CrimeandPsnisbn errt (Dostoevsky),65,rz9 criticisrn, seclitemry criticism *crotq" r8:

Drdaistq rg Dnicl Martin (Fowles), 11

lniler
point of view,76;shifn in of,76; ror-r; types Ievel,99, vulgar,76 Isrk, Dinesen, u+ rr, rot' rrTl t59,t68 'DinosaurqThe" (Crlvino), t7o discoveryfiction rs meensof,67, 86 t3o discunivesrylg44-5 rp dispositio, TDe Dhtke Comedy, (Drnte),8r in documentrtion: redist writing' 2l-i,2j, 16-8;in ule writiqgt in t1.1,26,z&-3o; yarn uriting 254,7o Don Qairote (Grvantes),48 story, r33 doppclganger DosPesog Johr\ t2o,r23 Fedor,& t6 r4t Dosoevsky, hnnt, ry5; Crimernd Punis 65,tz9 dnmatizatiotl r 5, 67,84,97,169 of,834 r7r-r, r79;absence r v:. explrnation, ro-r r, 186; r vr" sentimeneliry, I 5-r7 dreerqfiction as,3o-2, 38,{t, 34 r t 6C, CZ-8, r3, r 15;breaking, cerdindmistekgjr-r, 97i disaactions, t j, t 19,r4tb 98-t r94; r48,168, intentionel of,3u,87,ro9 breaking drermfictiorl r17,r85 Dreiser,Theodorg 6r &ugstorcfictioo,{o DrydeqJohq r+ Dublinqs(Joyce), rn DurrelllcYlrooq ro5 eilucrtim of wrfters,Frt, ror &lwrrds,Jonetheg 14 clenrns of fictio\!J-1, JratTlt of, nf8; rbctractioo 5r-z;

2t, proponionof, 7, alternoting, of' rr8; burden meaning of 64,66; defined, exampleg 5r; of, development 5r; tandem rcst 4, jo,.52,66i of tP 79 ProPflateness, cb, rl4 Eliog George, iddlemm 6r Bkir\ Stanley, 4i T he Dick 9 GibsonShoa443 169 emblem, Entma(Aasten),6r,6t conclusive, emotion, 8o-r, 167; 54, in 53-66r-r; conveyed description,Zi primery,62i 3 of esprimarysubject fictioq t4-r5,42-3iV$Sentimenality, rf, rr5-r7; suppresion I35, in super-realism, 136 empathnwriter's,65,8er; hck of,5qu7-t9 ending reeclimax;co'nclusio'n qy5o,81,1d6,, tQ, energeh,47, r85-6 energeic nove\ r85ar language,88 English rnd profession profmrl Eaglistr r(>rr, r3-rd t4-$t9:{.r epic,7t-2, 8z-68d 89;in genrecros$n8,2() t4; qisodes,nrrrative,5;8,6r, in r87,r9l; innovellg novel, r798o, r8r; panern risc of rnd fall,Z,r87,r9r point of vbq esryist-omniscient 76,r5fi esayis's stylg 44-y game ofr6fE F^senceg t43 Euripides, eyent-sequence, 6o-r, 81 55-6, plon rrz-q; seealso Gr6tS 41,5r, 54,rd8;retornq, innovel ryt4see dm rction

2r4

Inder
17,rr3r r59,16At7g r8r; A bsalom,Ab salom!, qi'nffue Beer," t8:, t81i Light in August, r17; manncrcd writing, rrT, rrgt rr:; tA Ror for Emilyl'1?;Tbc Sowd and thc Fuy,r4fi1 "Spottcd Horscsr" to fceling,T, i7,6r,6177, rrtt t8r; rbstracrionof, 62i sec*bo emotion fcud *ory, plotting, qv4ry{^I Fichteen curvc, 187-8,r9o fction: csscnccof, 6, 3r, 18,4rt, j6; as. modc of thoughg 16,J?{, 5ri rtt 4/to clcmcnt3 of fction; form of fiction; meaningof fction fctional processr 53,6r-8r; 38, plrnning,611,7o,ryi writing,6r,6717, r7of4 Fhlding, Hcnry : I tnathan W ildc, tlt zr;Tom Jones,87, FieldqW. C.,93 Finnegaw lU akc (loyce), tz1, r8t first drafg 69, r 14 first-person point of vicw, 75{t rtt flashbrckq t9 Flrubert, Gustrve: Madattp Boamy, r83; "A Simplc lf3gj." r8r folktalc, r55; in genre-crosing, 2ot94 foreign words, r44 t3r, t32 formalism, formalist ircalism, 136,r3&-4r form of fictiono7, r18, 131;primat/r ro-3Q 33r35i secondary, 19, 87n, r1,z-qi rcc also getuc Forrythn Fredcriclq,4o

Excctttioncfc SongTbc (Mriler), 13 Exetcices du StXlc (Queneau), 10r cxercises,19, tzF7, 195-zo6;in chlractcr, rgT zo$ ro5; chss t discusion and criticism, 1956; in description,,j-7, rz18, to3, ro5, ro6; in didogug ro4; in gcnrc, ry7-9,2o54i Sroup' t9i-8; individud' rgg-zcf; monologue, rol ro6; in plotting, 196,198-9' ro5; in style, ror-3; tcchnicrl zcp.,zoz4 cxistcntial litenture, 85 cxpricncg reada\ and resthetic interest,43-4 writer'sr rs limit on Gxpcrience, his subiect,4r, ror; supposcd needfor, r4-r5 crplanation: background, 59 nccdless, rogrt t, I86 99, cxploretion vs. demonsuatior\ E4 crposition, in novel, 186-7,r9o-r cxprcssionism, 7r, r4r, r6gi 5q t3&7; Kafkaesque,5o, ploningin. 1684

feble, rr-2, r7q t98 fabulation,85,86 frbulism, r I-2, z54i secalso tdci yarn fairy taleg r55 Faitb onl tbe GoodTbing (Johnson), r59 "Fdl of the House of Usher, The" (Poc), t33, r3S "Frncy Womaq Thc" (Trfor)' t74 Fer T ornga (Matthicscn), r r9 Frulkner, Williaq 8o, ron r 16-

lniler
'Fox,Thc" (Iawrencc),r8r, r83 Fowlcs, John,87i Dtniel Martin, 4i T hc Frm cb Lieutmant's Woman,Sg frce will, $, j!-4, r84,r87 frigidiry,17tJ4trrJ-rg, I 20'I 2t' principle r45rr9o;Longinus' rr7 of, to8, Frost, Robcrg3t, r7o Laura,t75,t36 Furmrn, Willirm, /R, r9r Gaddis, r51i Gardner, John:Grendel, lasonandMedcic,r43;"Thc Indirn,"r3r King's 87, William, t3r, r5tz.,r58' Gasq 164, "In thc Hcartof r8r; thc Hcart of the Country," 116l8r;"ThePcderscn Master't Kid," r7g8r; VI/illie Wif Loncsome c, ry4 of,67, I&-3o, choicc gPnrc, 33; ln, 7r-t; exerc$es t97n, t8-I9; in :o5-6;in music, visualers, ryzo; rc also redisticfiction; trlc; yarn rF2r genrc-crosing, | 74-* gq frorn SanFranciscq "Gentleman Thc" (Bunin),z93o r9 George, Gershwin, story,197-8 ghosr Gidc.Andr: 'The Pastoral r8:; Symphony," "Theseuq" l8r 75, Gilbert,Sir William S.,94 oy GilesGoat-B (Barth),r+6 Gilgtnesh,S4Sg Giotto, ro Mountain, Thc" "Glass (Brrthclme), r6t t43, gothicism: deectivefiction, r4o. tg7, r4r; cxerciscs, zo6'. t7t-{ southcrn,

2r5

grammar, 17 Grapctof Wretb,Tbc (*eill. to beck), Gr cat Ergectatiaar (Dickens)' 85 poctry,rI Greek Greektregedy, 56,t86 5o, t53 Gtndel (Gardner), Hnnlet (Shrkesperrc), r r, 5-6, 88-9, zo6 'Hanselrnd Gretcl"(Coovcr)' r8r r35 Durne, Hansen, 16r HappyDays(Beckcn). Hanley,David,r9r Hawkcg John,zo,trq t17iThc Bectle-Lcg fi5 Nathaniel, 145 Hrwthornc, Martin,88 Heidegger, principlc, r4r r3o, Heisenberg Helenof Troyr story treatmcng 9742,61-7,$75, t6yl,o g Ernest, 164; Hcmingvay, writing,rrTrtt9, mannered of rrri "Thc Snows Kiliman' iaror"trr Hobbeg Thomas,5t 6, Homer, 8, r r, 36,5r,7r-r, 87, t84-5; 89,rrr, r33,167-8, lliad,5,r3,8r,85,r68,r9ot; Odyssey, rr. r43;similcl S, r 3 r ,t 4 , GereldMenlcn Hopkins, r'o-rn. horrorstory,r33 Hoaseof Ftnn, TDe((Xreuccr), r4t William Dean, r35i Howells, a "How MuchLandDocs Mrn (Tolstoy),r:z-1 Need?" Hugo,Victor,worksof, r3r alro writing humor,45;lec comic

2t6

Inder
rnd point of view, 75,156, ly8; "TheTurn of thc r8r Screw." iargon,r{4 laon andMedeh (Gerdncr), r4, 931 "iazzingaround," F Ctrarleq citb atd tbc Johnsor5 GoodThingryg r8r Thc" (Jrmes), "Jolly C,orncr, ttt I onath l{ il de (F relding\,zr loneg Spike,19 r+ Jameg 8S rvl, rrr-tr Joyce, 16g r83;'"Thc Dea4' rr3, Fitmcry3;Dublinets,rzzT gans ake,n3, r85iP ottr& W of the Artist asa Yormg Mttt, rzz,rr3; Stephen inelucteble moddity Deddus: of thevisiblg 5o1 lys*s, U r12,t43,tgt rgt lR (Gaddis), r37;'A Ksfl.., FraIrz' 136, +A l37'167' CountryDoctor," "Meamorphc\"{7,tq t6g Keomn,Buster,93 t Khg Lem (Shrkesperre),r, 6r' r68 "King'r Indh+ Thc" (Ciar&cr)'
t]1

l&ad (Homer), i, tJ,8u,85, 168, !9c-r image$zi, 97, 1714, r7g r8z-3; descriptive, 37; directresg 98; emblemadc,r@; in lyrical novgl, r85;repetitionof, r9:4; qYmbolic,6T-988, rr3, t69 r8r imaginadon, leap of, 7, 94 imitation: learning techniqucbn r4r-4; odditiesof, r rz, r 14 "Imp of the Perverse" (Poe), r44 In Cold Blood (Capote), 13 intre inf nite-verb phrases, ducmry,99, rq)-r! ro4 initial situatioq tj; e:cteriorv$ interior, 5o; ploning forwrril from,57, 16$ rlu1^ innovatioq rcr; vs mannerism, r24 innovativc f ctiooists, 47-5o ioside world, 5q rtTi tec clm chgrecter instincq writer\ l,6g instruction, fiction cs vchiclc of, 8r-4,85 inalccq writer'$ 7T 78,g, r& 7, r77, r84 rcc alto thought "In thc Heart of the Heart of tho

t4 Cp*ry" (Gass), r8r iaruitioq vniter'* ?, lT, Jr,6* Tlrr&1,r77 iavcntiott,& U, r33-f 87 aot, Iocscq Eugeoe, ; Rbhmc rt8 irony: disctrsivestyle,45,7r;i! I43 rtslutioq 6r; similcq, imcdisttl' 13( r38-4t Lving, Washingtoaq*gand of Holloq" r44 Sleepy Hcnry, 95,42,44,56'8l, Jrgrcs, r8a;"Ttrc Jo[y Coroer,' r8r;

Kinnell,GdwrS r5Ira T Kaieh* TaIG, bc (Chlw)' to ofsrbiecq rq tr, rl knowledge Kosinski,Jennt37 Krcl Kcrcomks,93 "Lrnilot's CottegC(Poc), r33 r48; laoguege, rs crrrier of vduq, 88;concrtte'for vividncs' 3r,$;(opnqug'r3adnpb

hdet
vs.complcr,98,r44;rocrbu" lery, rg-t Irwrence, D. H" rr3;'Thc Forrt'r8r, r83 le Cerr6,Johtt,<p Hollon/ "Legendof Sleepy (Irving), rf+ Lcwig MaahewGregory "Mon\" r33 use ties,absurd, in yarq ut; by accepteoce reeder,z( 3o "Life-Story"(Barth),r34 "Ligei." (Poe),r33,r35 Ligbt in Augast(Faulkoer), rr7 linguisticsculpture't34, t4l r18,tzt; literarycriticism, 88; deconstructive, New C'riticg4r of, literature:analysis rt, {r; 'exhausted" teachiqg of, 53;
I(>II' l3-lth Jg-tll

2r7
Mrnn,Thoms, r8r;'Dce6 b Venicg" ?8 trt! meonerisnr, tr7, ttgF l, tgo ,22a, r4j, 164, Tele,Tbc Mn of Laa;'s (Chaucer), r45 Marx Brotherg93 ree mestery, authority aod mesteDt Matthieseq Pecr, fcr Torug4
t19

logrc,typesof, in fiction, 79 logicalexhaustioq 531, 165-6 logicd profluencq83, 165 London, Jack,9 ro8, Longinus, rr7 Lotkg Batiles(Wdty), 176 (Brrdr), "Lost in theFunhouse" r14 lawry MdcolnuUulerfre Yolcano,u lyricd novel,rE5 Macbetb(Shrkeqpeere), rrr Lldtme Bauary(Flrubcrt), r83 Mod wgazine, rq4 "mrd" story, 168 Magician,Tbc (movie),91 Mailer, Normao,The E*ct tioaer't Soag z1 MaloneDier (Beckctt), rr Mdory, Sir Thomrq rrE

Mrtlsg Hcnri, ro of meaning 6ctioo, 6t-1, t76-7, r87; authentication 6r, of, 64-7;primary,58,6r; secondary, larger,6r-a or 63;seealsotheme poetry, zq rr medieval Melville, Hermarl g rr, 15,tol, t4j, 176 r84; "Brrdeby tb tz1, Scrivener,tt r@i 'Benito Cerenor' t4; Tbe Confdence Mo4 r56iMobyDick, n, ryr Gg 'rnessage" fiction, of 7t, 6tr 7o mcufction,rr, tr-3, qz,48n, 86-7,88,9G2r9$ r3r, r:Ki 86 defined, sMetamorphosis" (Krfka), 17, jo, 169 mctaphorq 7r,7?,r%i in 45, 68; chancterization" of good, by rbsorbed reader,63; tneated facg 5o as 63, netaphysic, 85,88;of novel rgf-t mcricel analysiqr5o-n Middlmncb (Eliot),6r Miller,Wdter llL, Jr,4o Milton, Johr\ r r5; gcnr-crossinE, zo;Patadise Lost,Sz l[oby-Dick (Melville),rr, 15,63 modernisrq 86;plotq r6&j 4r, Moll Flcndm (Defoc), rr

rr8

Inder
lyricel, r85; vs. memfiction! 3r-3; rnd metephysic,184-5; vs novclla,r8r, rE3-4; opcning of, 5d 186;opning exercisc,zo3; origins of, rr;, philosophicrl, r ro; picarcsque,84, 166;ploning, 165, r7o, t7g, r85-94; ploaing cxercises, r9g zot; psy-

moratconsiderations,3r, rg5; & 16r, enguish rnoralchoicc, of

t87

morally exprcsionistic causclity, 7t moraltruth,73, rr9 movies,2rt 92,g\ t4+ Mozert, Wolfgang Amrdeus, 6 multi-plot novel, r9r music,8q 88, r3o-r; visual,t3r, 136;writing comparedto, 7-8, r&-rg 5t, r83, 184 mystery, tq 96 r84, rgv t6

Nrbokov, Vhdimh ef narredve, y1-6; climax, 58, 6o-rt 66 6d; lengt!, 79; pacc, 59; end proflucncc, J3, jJ,79 nertetivc cpisodes,scc cpisodc nerratiYc surnmary, 7 ntttatolr tz, t4 26176, toz, t$ r r4; intcrprcting, 156; omniscieot,7f..7,gr, roo, rtq 157-9;unrclirblc, 99 r58; tcc alto point of vicw; voicc National Lnnpoon,4q nrturalist fictioq 6r, r3E Ncw Critics,4r Newman, Rrndn p Naut Yorkcr, The, t8, 3g, to5 'Norh'g Brothcr" (C.oovcr),xi N oncdstent Knight, T bc (@lvino)' 74 r oon-ledisdc movcmcnnq, 3G 1t oovcl, tr, 183-5;rrchitcctonic' r9r; choice of sylc, 75; clocing of, 186 r9r-4; 'conncctednesq" tgz4i r85-9I; cpisodic encrg;eic, rhythm, r87, r9r; fictiood biogrrphn 84, r9r; innovrtive fictionists rn4 +7;

chological-symbolic, r85; rq terching r3-r4 4r of, novella, r7T83;choiccof 7J, crylc,75;continuous strerm of action,r7g8r; dcfincd, r79;episodic $rucilrg r798q r8r; lcngthof, r79, rEr; vs.novcl,t8r, 1831; ploning, 169, r7o,r7y83, pointillism r8r-3; vr in, 186; *ron srory,r7g rtl r5rz., r58 Orteg JoyccC,erol, obicctivc fiction,97,r3r, r3r, rt9,
t,lt

obicctivc-nrbicctivc continuum, {4J, tJt-t, tJg objectivity, nerdfor, rrrl, tt O'Connor,Flenncrn 174 (Homcr),$ rz, r4t Odyssey OediptttRer (Sophocles), 5o point of omniscient-narntor vicwr7r.'-7,9r, 156, too, 1579; ercrcise, ro3 a On Bccoming Noeclix (Grrdner),xii opquc lenguagc, rp r9n opcning:exerciscq ro3; novd w. shon $ory, t6i tec alm initid situatioq trposition order,ncedfo4 7,16 Otbcllo (Shakcspuc),rr Onmy, Thomeq r4 ortsidc wodd 5o

Inder
pacc of narntivc, 59 painting, raa visual arts Pelmer,William' li7 Panela (Richtrdson), z I Lort (Milton)' 8r Psradise paragraph$ruc$re' t7 "Pamgury" (Barthelme), 48 I3lr r3r'4o' perody, 35,72t,93, r44; exerciseqrg7' zo5, zo6 passive voice,99,too i'PastoratSymphony, The" (Gide), r8r Philip, t36 Pearlstein, "PedersenKid, The" (Gas)' r798r "Pedestrian Accident, A" (Coover)' t44 pcriodic sentence,to+ Pbaedra(Racine),r:r philosophicalnovelq tto *philosophy" in fiction, 3d 63 photo-realism'r35 picarequc novel, 84, 166 Pilgrim's Progres (Bunyrn)' E4 pirate story, r33 Plato, Repablic, 83 plog 4&7, 55-7, 165-8;causel vs. squencc logicel argumcntr 83' 165{; energeiq 166, t67. r79; immediatc rppeal of, 39,4t-ri innovativc fctionists' dismisd of, 47-8; in logic of,6, r6E;shaped tanilem with characters an<l sctting, 44 5o, 57,66, r8G7| as story "gerr&" j6; symbolic, 81-4, r6G7i of, talg Zl; as writer's first concern, j6i tee 4lto rcdoni crusality; profluencc plodes fictioq 33-6 82, 83-n t35, t65-6, t85 ploaing, 5G7, 6o-t, 6q 66, r65n4; brsed on traditiond

219

plot or real lif.e, 56, 57n, ir1 165,t7o; cxerciscs rS' rg8-9,ro5; novel, r7q l7g r85j4; novella, ryo, r7Y81, 186;short sory, r7o9, 1861 working backward, 57, 85, 165,169' r7e8, r79; working forward, 57, 165,r78'g Poe,Edgar Allan, l& rStt tJ3' r59; "The Cask of Amontilhdo," 47, Io, tJJi "Thc Fell of the House of Usher," 133' r35; "Imp of the Perverscrt' r44; "Lendor's Conager" rlli "Ligeiar" r3j, r3J poetic causaliry,16 73 poetic rhythm, in prosc' roG7, r13, r+1, r'(F{ poetic style,44-5,rz3-4' IEr Potryr rr; tn genretros$ng, 2q r44; teachingofr 4t pointillism, fictionel, r8:-3 point of view, 75-7, r42' t5t-9; ruthorial-omniscieng76' r j 716 cseyist-omniscicnq zorr zott 76, 158-9;exercisesr ro6; frst-person, 7 54' t 55i shifts in, 76, t57, r58, zo6i third-personJimited (subfective), 76, gez, 155-7, r 98, 164;third-personobiective, r57, 164;thirdperson-omniscient, 9rt 99 7d roo, 156,r57n, t63 popular materialq elevrtion of, ryzr, 197-8,zo6 Poner, Katherine Anne, 156 portrait of the enist in convco' tiond fiction,49 in innov.tive fictioq 47-8 Portrait of the Artist as a Yotmg Man (loyce), n\ rz, post-modernism, 85-6 Pound, Ezra, Conto\8t

220 Poussir\ Nicolaq 5r preiudice, writerl 4r profluence, j54,79, r6t4, J!, r9o; abstract logicalvr dramatic, 165-6; 83, defind modern 48; lack in some fictioq 85,r35,16r prosepoeuy, ro6-7,rr7, rgo-4. Proust,Marcel,r85 pychic distance, 8r,99r, rrr75, rr, r58;defined, rrr peychological rt3 allegory, pychologicalceuseliry, 73 psychologicd consistency, 4t 4 pqychological $lte, rs inid.l situation,5o novel pqychological-rymbolic 185;in genre-crosing, ro puactuatioq 17,rr4

Inile*
diction in, rgr.; plor-tilS, 169r t7oj4; precisionof deail needed,22-q z&8 realisric-symbolic short srory, zo Renaisancepoetry, rr Republic (Plato), 83 resolutioq conclusionby, flf Resartection (Tolstoy), r57 revisions,69-7o, rr4, 12$ 77, t9t rhetoric, ttFt1, tzz Rhinocerot (Ionesco),r 38 rhyme, ru4 r53; accidentel 99, ro&9, rr4 rhythm, poetic, 9p, r&T rzt, r4z, r5c-4 Richardson,Samuel zr Rime of Sir Thopas (Chaucer),

qualifierquseofr ror Reymon Erercic t &t d, e Queneau, Style,zoz f,ctino, question-end-rnsnrer-form 31 raised, que$ions mustbe aaswere4 ?1, i4, SS SiPhaefuq Recine, JeanBaptiste, Robergro Reuschenbery Maurice, r9 Ravel, H. Re)trnond' D., 135{ io, reading, b, rJ, 78;boredom of' 49 55;Pleazures lg-+; in universityeducatioqro-r4; r48 for vocabulary, Hlistic fctioq rg 2r-g r1,,7t, of roTtr3zichoice style,75-7, 1631; control of prychic on di*ancg rrr; dependent verisimiliode,n4 ry, z6;

Robbe-Grillet, Alain, r4r (Defcp-), Robinson Crusoe zr Mary, r35,136 Robison, romance, genre-crosing, in zo poetry,rr Roman 143 Romanticism, 'Rose for Emily, A' (Frulkner), 77 L. Rosenberg, M., r35 Ruined Map,TEe (Abe), rr futile seerch rules:eesthetic, for, 33; 3-8,15-16, composition, t7; suspe$ion of,61, 8, 17 Mrquis de,63 Sade, SalgJohn,r55 Nathalie, Ttopiwtt, Sarraute, rt6 of Sartriananguish choice,16r fcenes, 59{o, 77,84;defined,59; rhythm of, 59;wriring, 3r, 98,r73,1754 r43 Scheherazadg rr, eciance-ficdor1 4o

hdes
Seagttll,?be (Ctrethov)' 4 &cond Nrrlt't Tale (Cheucer)' t46 Segal,Gorgp, !55 self-educatedwriterg 9' la 'Sentence" (Barthelme)' l4E sentenceq ro4; rccidental rhYnrc in, g9, ro&9; bearing of Point of view on, 76; fqcuq 99 ro5; inaoducory infnite verb phnseq 99, too-r' ro4; learning to hendle, r4r, r4&9, ro3; length of,76, roq r4&j; periodic, ro4; rhYthnl 7199 ro/h roG7, rr3, r5o-4; sPeed,74 106;structure, ro/$; cyle, 38, 78; variety, 17,99, ror, ro3{ rntimentelity, r5, rr5-r7, rt8, rrq r8r, I94; monnered,rI7, rt9 rcning, zr-3, 4G7, 52,6r,67; rtmospherc, !9, J2t loi development of, 7o, r69i rtreped in tsndem widr ch.rgcters rnd Plot,46 50, t7i rr Itory "germ," 56; of tale, 7r, 73; writer's limitations, 4z-3; we alto description; detail William,6, & rI, r5, Shakespeare, 42' 56,1674 r84' ror; "darlt comedieg" 20; genre-cro$ hg, zo; Httnlet, i4, ,rl 8&9, zo6; King Len, t4 6r, ft8; Macb*b, rzr; Othello, t r; revenge tragedies,88, Shaw, George Bernard, rzo of Son story 37, r8r; choic,e sgle, 7t; closing of, r93; description iq 35; opening, 56; plotting, 165,r7c9, 186; ro5; ploning exercises,rff, rcalistic-symbolic, ro; erchiog of,4t

22t

similesr45; Homerig use of, r3r, r43; modern ironic, r43 'Simple Hearq A" (Flrubert)' tBr Sb Gaanin ttd tbe Gren Knight, zo Smollett, Tobias George, t33 "Snows of Kilimanjaro, The' (Hemingway), trz Snou Wbite (Buthelme), t38 Sophocles,OediPus Re4 5o soul, tripanite (Plamnic), 811 Somd md the Fwy,Tbe (Faulkner), r4&9 southern gothicism, r?3-+ space/time remotenesgin tale, 7r, 72r7lr 7+ rrr-r2 ryatial treetment of story 85 spelling,rr2r rt4 Spenser,Edmund, 167 Spider-Mm comics, 4o

"SponedHorses"(Faullocr)' zo g Geruude, rr9 Stein, Steinbeck, lohn,Tbe GnPesof , l{roth, to e, Laurenc Tt isttcnt Sterne, r73 Shtntly,6,87, Wallace,37 Steveng RobertLou\ 97, Srevenson, t3r-3trtg, rlr *ory-rs-painting,r33 etory idea,origin of, 56 La Srada, (movie),93 Igor, 19 Suavinsky, Suuganky,Arkadi endBoris,4'o rtyle, 44-j, r rg, r4z',appropriatc to feeling, 6r,79, rr6-t7; of change means of, change subiecg!7, r3j-fi choiceof, q7, 67,7t,jt-7, r63-a6 qg esayist'sdiscursive, 44-5; iq exercises r99,:oz-3; r24i 116-17, flrmboyanq individudisnin, ra3,161;

222

*yle (canthrued) rmnnerisrq r17,rrFzrr ,rtt rzz-q, r6q1, poetic,44-5, re31, tEr; sentence/vowel/ consonlntcombinations, 38, of, 78;supprcssion in supr135-6 rcalism, rubjectivc fiction,r3r, r39 rubicctive-obj ecdve continuum, 14-5,r1r-2, r39 Sukenick, Ron,"Whrt's Your Storyl," r34 Sullivrn,Anhur,94 ruperfctionisrs, r37 rrrpcrn.nu.lclcmcntq ,73, 7F 7t srpcr-rcdbmr 8r, ro5,135{, 8, r39,I+!, r{7 rurredisrn r3?, 33,91,,r!6, llF ploaiagk\ {rr r6t, 169; t68a nr?cnrc; in mguishof monl 16r.r87;dclayfor, choice, 159{3; cxcrcise, ror anpcnsion disbclicf,zz,t4 26, of 29 Swifg Jonrthrq ft7- Gullivct's Ttwcb,1674 oymbolicrbstractionand iuxtrposition, 83-.6r6G7, r8y symbolicasociation,cheracterizadonbn 67-8 vocrbularyof, r45{ rymbolists, symbolq 169; recognizh&t3; 3o, uscof, 36,7c-lr 77,t4g4, r@, 17% r8rr, r83,r93-rh r9b synBcticslots,ro6 ro5{ Eyntrx,t7, ggiteealsoscntcnccs ttlc, rr-2, z1rg3,, 7r1; rction !7r rnd plot of, 73;chrractcrs, oo 7r-3; dcpcndcnt susFn-

sionof disbclief, z6 26, zt, u9;dcscripdon lf; hgh b dictionuscd,lor-3; lrndscape 7:; precision of, of detailnceded, zq-5,26, zz, r8-3q 7r; rcmoteness of timc rndr/orsp.cc,7r, 7tr 7\ Jg rrr-tz; scningof, 7t, usc 73;style, ror, 163; of 75, superlatives, 73 Talc of Ttn Citics, (Dickcns), A 84 tastc, wrircr\ T g4ttori rs limit on hissubjecg 4r Teylor, Peter,"The Frncy Womrn," r7-E trching:of litemmre,tctr, 13r+, ,9-+r; of writing, rrl,
1254, t9g4

tcchnique, rJ,3J,4r, rt5-t, E, r34; cffect on subjcct mrtter, .nd uncertrinqr principlg t3o-4r; emphasis in on, contcmponry non-rcrlistic movcmen$, r3G7; cxcrcisct in, r9g-:oo, rou-6; mcthodr of lcarning, 14r-64; supprcssion of, in rupr-rcdisnr, t35-6 televisionshowq 4q 8r tempo of namtive, 59 Thackerrn Williem Mrkcpetcg r3: "thrt" cleuscg ro41 lheme, 56, 57, 8er, 1767, t7g; beering of point of vicw onn 77; choicc of,67,7o-4 defined, 7o; exploretion of, 43i recoSnEngrrli.s story "gaaar" 56, 168,r99; sceelso meening of fiction "Thcseus" (Gide), 75, rEr third-personJimited (subicctive) point of view, 7d 9o-u,

lniler
155-7,16$ chift to' from omniscicnt point of vicq 76, r57, r58, ro'6 third-pcrron-obicctivc point of point of 76-7,gtr99, roo,156,

22' "The Cclebratcd JumPing Frog of Cdrvcns C.ounryr"

22

r-rcro (Cdvino), ro rrt, r43,r93 Ullrar (Joycc), r3o' r+r principle, uncertainry &awing on' 69 urrcon*ioug fiction, xi, 47-5q unconvcntional 85; t514; non-profluencc, 85 unended, tcealsodeco* rtrucrivc fiction; mctrfiction Undcrstmdhgfictror (Brools & Werrcn),trr Paary (Broob t Urderstaading Wrrten),4r Urder tbc Yolcano(lowry)' tt 6ction, 85 unended unrclirblc nrrntor, 99, r5t Updikc, Jolq toZ vdueq u nbicct of fctioq l4' 3r, 43,6r, 6,1 vcrbe:rctivc vr. prsivc voicg roo; ruxilirry, gt; infinite
tqFl

163; ruthorirl, 76' t57'9^zo31' syrsq 7d r5t-9, ro5 ThomaqDyhn, roy (writcrlr), 16,374,5r-z' drought 7o,77,78 tfuillcrs,4o Thurbcr, Jrmcs,lg8 in rcmotcnceq tdc, 7r, time,/space ?r,7r 7$ rrr-r7 of, timing, scnsc 7, i6 Titien, 5r Tolstoy,flo, rrg r4t, ry7' t67' 186 r9r; ArilKttair,n, ttr {J, 63r r9r; Cbiklbood" 15;"Hov Much Lrnd Docr r ManNced?,'rrr-1; nrrrativcvoicc,roortt6' t57t t57 rSgiRcnencotim, Tot* loncs(Ficlding),87,t3t tovrr" point of vicq 77,t5t 'toy fictiott,' 8r clerration rgrr of, trashmetcrids, Tdstrtn SDeadr($crnc)' 4 87, r33 triviality, 6 ror Trollope,Anthonn t3, 4i{ Tropisms(Sarrrurc), r 36-7 tntth, ro-t t, 38,,18, 774' zoti 73, kindsof, rr9; re$rrcmentofr rr9; for,63,79, ia 8o;serrch fictioq 84 unconvcntionel 889 Turncr, loscphM. W., r3r "Turn of thc Scrcw,Th" (Jamcs), r8r Twain, Mark,4r, r59;"Bdrcr'r Bluejry Yun " u, r5{;

Vcrgil, rr; Acnciti,$t vcrisimilirude, :r-q r5, 16rtr9 victim story, r74 r7t Victorirn novd r9r 'Vicws of My FathcrWccping" (Banhclme), r394r, 16r visudrrts,8o,E8; r36; I 3t; to, writing comparcd ?-4 rgFx), t31' t3t{, rEt tr, vividness, rchicviog, 974 !r, 3r; rnd development vocabulary: conuolo( r4r' r44-t; vs lrtinatc polysyllabic colloquialwords,9E,ror, r+4-t; ormterr4t-7

22q

Inder
c&o frigidiry); cmpathyq 65,8er, rr8; experieDcg r4-rt, 2or;inqpiration, 5r, 69; instincg7, 69;intellecq 77,78,9, rdG7,r77,rBz (seealsothought); intuitioo, r77i 7, ?7,jr,69 77,167, Iimitationsor! 42;rcsponsibiliry of, ror-r; ssne humannesg zor-r; &-9' scholarvs enist 3gy; tae of, 7,94,2or; m$t in hisorrn judgmeng 9 sitios, process &,677q of, r7e94; choice genre,67, of of 67, 7r-5; choice sryle, 7r, 67, 75-7;choiceof theme, 7o-r; faultsof dumsy writing,98-rr5;seealso 6tsn draft; revisioru )nrn, !r-r, zj4 $, !?,7\ 7#i co,ntrolof psychicdisrunce, rrz; dependent sccepurrg3 on of lie, z6 3o;diction iq ror; cxerciseq in genrer97; croasing, 74-$ p,reci$oNl lq of deail needed, t5{, zt, foi style, 75,rot, 161 ?,laury, Rogerr,lp Zdr, Eoilc, r35

voicg choicc of, Zj, rt89; bordic, ro7, rrGrT; catn obiective, rcn, 116,r57at overuse, rto; in telg zr, r4, t6i seealto D:urrcor; point of new vowels, short rc. hog, 38, ?8, zot

W citingf or Gotlor (Becten), t6z Warreq Roben Penn,4r Watsor\ James 14 D., Watg W. W., Art Ameticm Rhetoric, 18 TZcr (Becken),rr Vleaver,Willianr" 18 Welty, Eudora,q6 Losing q6 Battles, Westor\ Edward,r8r "Whet's Your Story?' (Sukenick), r34 ro41 "which" cleuseg Whitman,Wdg r5rr. Willie Mendt LorcEo;r Wifc (Ges), r34 Wilsott Leigtr,r7r Wolfe, Thome$ ro7, rrGrT Wonder,Stevig4o Woolf, Virginia, rrg r85 of, writer: character g 79 rry l; &awing on unconsciour, 69;educedoq Fr5, 2ori ego.ro$ tr?, rrg, ntt (*e

About theAuthor
was accordedwide praisefor his JoHx GenoxER of rvorksof imagination, criticism,and of scholarNew York. ship.He was born in 1933in Batavia, Among the universities at rvhich he taught are Oberlin. San Francisco State, Northrvestern, Southern Illinois, Bennington,and the State University of New York-Binghamton. The Art of Fiction was completedbeforehis deathin 1982.