Motivated by Bitterness

My overly-simple definition of a novel is "a book with at least one four-dimensional character." In English, that means that at least one of a major character's three primary motivations changes over time. Bitterness is a powerful motivator, and it is one that needs to change unless you're writing a tragedy.

Bitterness is a black hole that sucks in all of life--but it makes for fabulous fiction. It's so easy to set up a story where the deepest and most desperate bitterness is justified. Our innate sense of justice makes us side with the wounded hero--we understand their pain and excuse their scars.

Bitterness sometimes looks like humility, from the outside. The bitter hero wins a great battle and then nobody can find him at the victory celebration--he is alone on the battlements, wrestling with unseen enemies that cannot be conquered.

A good example of how all this works in fiction is The Count of Monte Cristo. Edmond Dantes was a poor but honest sailor who was just about to marry the woman he loved and become captain of his own ship when three men conspired to betray and destroy him. He was falsely accused of treason and flung into the Chateau d'If, the notorious island prison in the harbor of Marseilles, doomed to rot his life away. But then, in the lonely darkness, an ancient priest tunneled his way into Emond's cell in his effort to escape. The priest, realizing he could never dig his way out, spent the rest of his days teaching the poor sailor all he knew--including the location of the fabulous fortune of Monte Cristo. When the priest dies and Edmond escapes, the stage is set for one of the greatest thrillers ever.

Alexender Dumas excelled at using bitterness as a motivator, yet he recognized the ultimate emptiness of revenge. Bitterness burns out the soul--it does not satisfy. The Count of Monte Cristo ends with Edmond's triumph, but his justice is tempered with mercy. He turns from wrath to a new and different life.

In my opinion, the end of the The Count is both right and wrong. Edmond's change at the end is too sudden. It is necessary, but inadequate. Bitterness is an addiction--it doesn't let go so suddenly. The only believable outcomes of addiction are tragedy or redemption. The Count got neither.

Dumas had the disadvantage of his times--his audience was not interested in tragedy or Christ. Those are the two appropriate ends of bitterness. We have the same disadvantage. Twenty-first century Americans aren't ready for reality when it comes to the bitter end of bitterness. That makes a book about a bitter hero easy to start and hard to finish.

Battles Between Gods

The ancient epics show humans acting in the foreground, but the gods loom large behind them. The earthly battles are driven by greater wars--Poseidon fights for the Trojans while grey-eyed Athena aids Odysseus. It's mythology, of course, but audiences love it.

Mythology has fallen on hard times, but earthly conflicts are still driven by the wars between the gods. Everybody worships something. Modern lips may not cry out to Zeus or Yahweh, but modern hearts are not that different from Achilles or King David.

C.S. Lewis said:

There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations - these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit - immortal horrors or everlasting splendours.

God has placed eternity in our hearts. He created us to delight in His beauty forever. But our hearts are quick to worship other gods--and that's where human conflicts come from. The smallest spat between friends is a war between the gods.

That's good news for authors who want to write something real in an age of fantasy. We can sketch out these cosmic conflicts in our notes, then show (not tell) what happens when idols clash--or when the Almighty contends with the powers and principalities of this fallen world.

Fiction as Social Science

I love science--the "hard sciences," like physics and chemistry and biology. The so-called "soft sciences" don't impress me. Those are the disciplines that try to apply the methods of science to human beings, with questionable results. Anthropologists and sociologists and psychologists can gather all the data in the world about human behavior--but do they really know anything about any real human beings when they're done?

For my money, fiction authors are the true "social scientists." Do you really understand humanity? Then create a man from scratch. Lay the foundations of his motives and memories, frame his emotions and beliefs, finish him with all the details of his own life story. It takes artistic skill to sketch a human face on a sheet of paper (my best attempts are mere caricatures), but an author sculpts human souls out of a block of paper.

Readers know when the author has succeeded--or failed. We readers know a "cardboard characters" when we see one. They are "flat" because they are too trite, too predictable. The bad guys are all bad; the good guys are all good. It's bad writing--and it's false. Real humans aren't like that!

I have a simplistic rule for creating "three-dimensional characters." Every major character needs to have at least three primary and independent motivations. "Good characters" should have two good motivators and one bad one. "Bad characters" should have two bad motivators and one good one. (That can be a challenge if your plot requires a villain with no redeeming features--which is why I have reserved my own evil twin for any future plots that demand the ultimate evil. )

That's my rule for creating "three-dimensional characters," but novelists have to go a step further. I define a "novel" as a work of fiction where at least one major motivation of the protagonist changes over time. Since time is the fourth dimension, I call these "four-dimensional characters." They aren't just sculptures of static human beings--they have to move!

Successful authors make the reader want to keep on reading. They create characters that move--and move us. Beauty has that quality--it makes us want more. The beautiful novel presents characters that linger in the mind long after the book is over.

A thing of beauty is a joy forever. Let us study beauty!

Introducing Scott

I've been talking to the authors of this blog about art and God and art for over twenty years, so I am both flattered and humbled to be invited to join them here. I can't say I'm an aspiring author--I've written one book and spend a lot of time dodging fans who want the sequel.

I can't say I'm an artist, either (read the book and you'll understand). But I am an obsessive-compulsive philosopher who fell in love with the philosophy and theology of beauty after reading On Beauty and Being Just by Elaine Scarry.

Scarry identifies a defining trait of beauty--beauty makes us want to copy it, sustain it, repeat it. We sketch images, hum melodies, hang pictures on our wall. Beauty asks us to look twice--great beauty wants us to look over and over.

Scarry's observation enables us to ask new questions about beauty. With something specific to measure, we can identify beauty's extremes. Scientists do this all the time. For example, physicists define temperature as a measure of molecular motion. "Cold" means slow atoms; "real cold" means real slow; "absolute zero" means the atoms aren't moving at all. If beauty wants to be copied, then greater beauty wants to be copied more. Absolute Beauty would satisfy the viewer forever.

Lovers express this concept all the time. They say, "I could look at you forever!" The divorce rates prove that human beauty isn't really absolute. No earthly beauty is.

Beauty is real but it dazzles us. We look at a flame and think it is the sun. We look at the sun and are blinded. We can't imagine Light in such intensity that the sun is just a minor star lost in an average galaxy. Whenever my heart says, "I want to look at this forever," I make an idol out of something that can't really satisfy.

That is--unless the Beauty that moves my heart is really Absolute. For there is a Beauty that does satisfy forever.

And that's what Art&God&Art is all about...

Sorry for the inactivity

My bad. Here's a free sneak-peek image from my personal project as an apology:

Hoping to be back up and posting soon.

+David

Sequential Art: This is Big.

Sequential art is the single most effective artistic means for communicating a redemptive message to the postmodern world.

How's that for bold? Here's why:

1. Sequential art is...: Sequential art can be visceral, thought-provoking, artistically complex, and powerful in visual and literary symbolism in capable hands. Sequential art has the efficacy of the novel when it first broke on the scene at the outset of modernism - it's a radical new medium with thousands of unexplored techniques. Anyone can be a pioneer in the field of sequential art; and the best pioneers with the best message and the best method have the best chance of making their mark on a new literary terrain.
   
2. ...the most effective...: Sequential art is cost-effective, marketable, and unrestricted. Whereas big cinema movies might reach a wider audience and have more cultural impact as a whole, few Christian artists have the means at their disposal to create a culture-impacting film (although this is not impossible, as Fireproof demonstrated this fall, causing CNN.com to call it "the surprise hit of the fall"). Much more available to the disposal of anyone with a scanner or Wacom tablet and an internet connection is the creation of sequential art, in the form of webcomics or a personally displayed sequential art longform story (aka a "graphic novel," typically released in serial format on the web, often page by page).
3. ...artistic means...: This is my big caveat - there is no replacement in communicating the salvific message for personal evangelism. What we're talking about here is Christian Art, which has a key cultural role, but is completely distinct from the call of the Great Commission, in which Christ clearly directed his followers to go into the world and make disciples of all men. Our art should support our witness, but it cannot neccessarily be our witness.
4. ...for communicating a message...: People are listening to what sequential artists have to say these days. Our culture is getting more and more visually sophisticated. There has been a skyrocketing demand for Graphic Designers in the corporate field, as more and more companies realize that logos and template websites have the potential to instantly kill their appeal to the Apple Market. In this visually sophisticated culture, a visually sophisticated, easily-absorbed message is the message that will get through the noise (nota bene: this does not mean a simple message; graphic novels have dealt with issues as complex as the Holocaust with surprising depth and subtlety).
5. ...a redemptive message...: A quick scan of bookshelves will reveal a strong dychotomy - sequential artist weild a powerful medium, but the message is generally either escapist or pessimistic. Redemptive artists hold the most powerful message of all time, but the medium is frequently stale or easily lost among all of the noise. To break through the market that's saying things powerfully, but not saying powerfully things, with the most life-changing message of all would be something indeed.
6. ...to the postmodern world.: Postmodernism is not a topic that I have any hope of covering in a bullet point, a blog post, or even a single blog. Suffice it to say that postmodernism has to do with (1) a fusion of old and new, familiar and unfamiliar - thus laying the path wide open to an old message using a new medium, (2) narratives as opposed to constructed arguments - creating broad vistas for the stories of the faith to come alive, (3) celebration and light-heartedness - making the joyful Christian message of hope more intruiging than it has been for the past century, and (4) a renewed interest in both spirituality and nonfiction - so the presentation of a spiritual, nonfiction message has that one-two punch effect.

Obviously, this statement is debatable. Feel free to debate! I'm a visual artist, and therefore quite biased. But while you're commenting, I'm gonna start seeing about setting up a webcomic. +David

Sequential Art: Huh?

Hi. David here. There are a few things I think about a LOT. Ranking about fifth on the list (just under Casey and the eternal question of whether my desire for coffee has actually become an addiction at this point) is sequential art. If you know what that is, you probably know where I'm going with this already. But I figure most of you are trying to piece together what I'm talking about.

Here's Scott McCloud's definition:

Juxtaposed pictorial and other images in deliberate sequence, intended to convey information and/or to produce an aesthetic response in the viewer.

Scott McCloud, Understanding Comics

It's really completely unfair of me to introduce you to Scott McCloud through a chunky definition like that. McCloud's Understanding Comics was one of two comic books that were required reading for me in art school. On the right is an example of how McCloud really reads, and I would encourage everyone, their grandmother, and her dog to check out his book.

But I digress. What I wanted to talk about was sequential art - or, if you will - comics.

The word comics is loaded up with connotations like cheesy, fanboy, spandex, WHAM!, POW!, juvenile, and what-are-you-even-talking-about-comics-for-anyway? But artists with their ear to the ground are aware that Comics are a lot bigger than Action Man and the Monster of Doom.

Over the next few days, I want to introduce you to the world of sequential art, and ask/answer a few important questions, like "What?" "Why?" "Who?" and the very important "Who cares?" ... but most of all, I want to talk to you about the relationship between Christianity and sequential art; a relationship that has been chilly on both sides. I want to break the ice.

More on this very soon (tomorrow, unless things blow up). For now, let me link you to the World Magazine cover story about Christians and graphic novels (long form sequential art).

We'll talk soon. See you in the funny papers. +David