blog

commit

98dc52c8badd65d183fc4b8e92fd51c59794a121

parent

2c00ce0b04be67cf1efd35f041b399c19cd97fa7

Author

Tobias Bengfort <tobias.bengfort@posteo.de>

Date

2023-07-19 16:31

add post on crime stories

Diffstat

3 files changed, 69 insertions, 1 deletions

diff --git a/_content/posts/2020-07-30-conservative-stories/index.yml b/_content/posts/2020-07-30-conservative-stories/index.yml

@@ -1,3 +1,3 @@
    1     1 title: The good guys are always conservative
    2     2 date: 2020-07-30
    3    -1 tags: [philosophy]
   -1     3 tags: [philosophy, storytelling]

diff --git a/_content/posts/2023-07-19-crime-storytelling/index.md b/_content/posts/2023-07-19-crime-storytelling/index.md

@@ -0,0 +1,65 @@
   -1     1 As someone who has never published a novel, a short story or even took part in
   -1     2 a creative writing class, I am extremely confident in saying that the current
   -1     3 state of narrative analysis is bad and all the online pop culture critics are
   -1     4 wrong.
   -1     5 
   -1     6 Stories consist of static stuff and changing stuff, and people nowadays seem to
   -1     7 think that the changing stuff like arcs and character development are what
   -1     8 makes a story interesting. They are completely wrong of course.
   -1     9 
   -1    10 This unfortunate misunderstanding is especially destructive in sequels. There
   -1    11 are so many stories today that establish an interesting world and present a fun
   -1    12 and emotional journey with some kind of resolution at the end. But when authors
   -1    13 want to continue their story in a sequel, all they can think of is to undo that
   -1    14 resolution: The villain that was just defeated returns, the treasure that was
   -1    15 just captured is lost, and the ever-so-perfect relationship breaks apart again,
   -1    16 just so that the protagonist has something to do. This is not just lazy, it
   -1    17 also retroactively lessens the impact of the initial resolution. We can't have
   -1    18 nice things in these stories.
   -1    19 
   -1    20 This is also very different from how stories have been told in the past.
   -1    21 Grimm's Fairy Tales, One Thousand and One Nights, Journey to the West, or the
   -1    22 stories that are told at family gatherings are all episodic, very light on
   -1    23 characterization, stuffed to the brim with tropes, and, most importantly, told
   -1    24 again and again.
   -1    25 
   -1    26 Of course there still needs to be a rhythm of suspense and release, but it is
   -1    27 more of a necessity. It doesn't even have to be grounded in the story itself.
   -1    28 Since the readers (or listeners) already know what is coming, either because
   -1    29 your story is so tropy or because they have heard it before, you can create
   -1    30 suspense simply by dragging out the story beats. You already know that Goku
   -1    31 will beat Freezer at some point. But will it be in this episode or the next
   -1    32 one?
   -1    33 
   -1    34 Another great way of artificially injecting suspense into a story is to add a
   -1    35 crime. I will use the [Donna Leon
   -1    36 novels](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guido_Brunetti) as an example: They tell
   -1    37 the story of Guido Brunetti, a police detective in Venice. There are extensive
   -1    38 descriptions of him walking the historic streets, having dinner with his
   -1    39 family, drinking a glass of wine, or meeting with a roaster of recurring
   -1    40 characters. It is nice.
   -1    41 
   -1    42 Each novel also has some crime that needs to be solved. So each novel
   -1    43 introduces new characters that are specific to that case and that might have
   -1    44 some form of arc or development. But the protagonist and recurring characters
   -1    45 typically stay static with very little development.
   -1    46 
   -1    47 With this format, Leon has already created 32 novels. Readers can just spend
   -1    48 some time in this world and with these people. And it never gets boring because
   -1    49 the crime provides the necessary suspense.
   -1    50 
   -1    51 I believe this is the secret why crime stories (and hospital series for similar
   -1    52 reasons) are so popular: They have an external source of suspense so that the
   -1    53 main characters and world in general can remain relatively static, with
   -1    54 positive relationships and sustained success. They can be cozy.
   -1    55 
   -1    56 Of course, your definition of what makes a story "good" can vary. Those are not
   -1    57 necessarily stories that will make you change your view. No one will start a
   -1    58 riot because of a Donna Leon novel. Since these stories need to keep their
   -1    59 worlds static, they are also [inherently
   -1    60 conservative](http://tobib.spline.de/xi/posts/2020-07-30-conservative-stories/).
   -1    61 
   -1    62 If you want to describe social change, you need to focus on the changing stuff.
   -1    63 But sometime you want to describe a positive vision instead, and then it is
   -1    64 completely valid and probably even better to concentrate on the static stuff
   -1    65 and use an external source of suspense.

diff --git a/_content/posts/2023-07-19-crime-storytelling/index.yml b/_content/posts/2023-07-19-crime-storytelling/index.yml

@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
   -1     1 title: Why crime stories are the purest form of story telling
   -1     2 date: 2023-07-19
   -1     3 tags: [storytelling]