May 05 2009
Long Narratives: Why Go For It?
Some people like their stories short and sweet, but many don’t. We’ve all seen examples of this, whether it’s a novel series you could build a play-fort out of, a TV show that just won’t end, a webcomic that takes a month to archive-trawl or a game that’s been going strong for the last eight years. It might be intimidating from the outside, but clearly someone’s interested in it.
Photo by hbrinkman
Why do such long stories? People claim a lot of reasons for this. Detractors will often talk about “Cash cows” or “Cottage industries”, and it’s hard not to blame them; there are a lot of series which were obviously stretched for stretching’s own sake and spun off because there was still value. Some people just don’t feel comfortable starting a new world when they have a perfectly good old one, or don’t want to let go of their primary characters.
Of course, there are other benefits to having a long story, ones that don’t carry overtones of selling out. Don’t believe me? Keep reading.
One is world development. In a short, self-contained game or a single novel, there’s only so much detail you can go into; people will complain if there’s too high a detail to story ratio, calling it “just an excuse to show off your pet project”. On the other hand, the more plot you’re going through, the more setting detail you can add without compromising the plot: setting ratio. Similarly, a longer narrative is likely to hit more locations and times over its course, providing even more ready reasons to go into detail.
Similarly, a longer narrative has more room for accommodating individual character plotlines. When you’ve got limited time in which to work, focusing on side characters sticks out more, as their stories take up a greater fraction of the plotline. But in a long-running story, any given individual plotline is a smaller fraction of the overall length, and as a result doesn’t stick out as much.
There’s also attachment. While this can be an author/GM thing, that isn’t always the case. The audience gets attached as well; some people to the characters, some to the world, some to the overall feel that the stories give. Sure, readers can reread, but it isn’t the same, and most gamers just don’t have the rereading option. I’ve found myself to have this problem a lot when playing video games; I’ll get near the end and just stop short, since I don’t want to finish. I doubt I’m alone.
Sometimes a story just can’t be told in a short space. There’s too much to fit in: details that make it make sense, obstacles that need to be overcome, dynamics to express, places to visit…. well, you get the idea. What could be summarized as a simple quest kicks into overdrive, and next thing you know you have a trilogy or a four-year game.
And sometimes it’s clear that there’s still something there. It’s easy to mistake this for the cottage industry phenomenon or the author trying to squeeze water from a stone at a distance, but they aren’t quite the same thing. There’s still a story left in this world, a strong one that leaps up and begs to be told; it would be a shame not to tell it.
But just because a story seems like it should be long doesn’t mean it has to be. Tomorrow: what can go wrong with an extended narrative?
It depends on the story. If you have some kind of point to make about theological environmentalism and you’re purpose-building a world to act as a more effective backdrop, you may write entire tomes before addressing the central theme directly.
On the other hand, if it’s Handsome Detective Roger and the Case of the Very Licky Werewolf, chances are it’ll start getting off-message if it goes over 180 pages…
Brian: Excellent point; a good theme deserves a proper approach.
Zombie: I definitely agree with the first example. Particularly since message fiction needs to be camouflaged or it puts people off; I don’t know very many people who would deliberately read something they know is trying to preach at them.
I love writing long narratives
For me it’s something of a combination of reasons, most of them already stated. When an idea gets into my head it leads to other ideas, and — like Shinali — they won’t leave me in peace until they’re down on paper. Often this is character-driven. My “Athribar” series was going to be a single story until Athribar came down the other side of the mountain looking for breakfast, bumped into Alexandra in a house I hadn’t even known was there a couple of chapters ago, and suddenly I wanted to know all about who she was and where she came from and how Athribar would have to go to the Land of Dreams to rescue her from finding the truth about her father… and anyway, that’s how it became a 13-volume series that I might still write one day, although having discovered how much rewriting still needs doing on the first volume makes me think about getting something smaller done and published before I try to tackle that.
It can also be the themes. Sure, I’d never have started my Sailor Moon fan fiction if I hadn’t gotten interested in some of the characters and wanted to exploit some of their unused potential. But it turned into a discourse on the nature of reality v. fiction, which required a sequel exploring how the knowledge of the truths revealed in the first novel affect the principles of right conduct, and it was all tied together by a third novel (longer than the first two put together) whose purpose was mainly to explore some unrelated themes — themes that weren’t present in SM at all but came up because of the changes my version of the plot made to the characters. In total, the complete sequence runs for 320,000 words.
I just don’t know how to write short fiction
Shinali’s Test. I like that; I’ll have to keep it in mind. (*starts applying it to any series that holds still long enough*)
Michael: I know what you mean about fiction length; while I’ve never gone beyond 225 pages in actual writing, I always had difficulties with writing flash fiction for my writing classes. There’s a reason why I rarely post short fiction here, and not all of it is the network copyright policy.