Quantum Storytelling

How do you react to a lie? Angered? Outraged? Do you seek out justice or the truth? Penultimate Truth by Philip K. Dick examines such a question, much like many of Dick’s other stories.

The basic premise of the story (no spoilers) is that the majority of the world’s population lives in underground bunkers after a nuclear war. The war is conducted on the surface by high level beaureacrats while the average Joe hunkers down in cramped quarters and lives a meek and meager lifestyle underground.

Except here comes the usual Dick twist; The war ended after two years, yet the population has been kept underground for fifteen years. This is of course, a carefully managed conspiracy by faking war-related broadcasts and news. But why would anyone want to pull such a conspiracy on the public living in bunkers? For power of course. To control the resources of land and manufacturing, while keeping the rest of the population in poverty below.

Most of the story revolves around two characters. One character lives below, and must travel to the surface to find a medical supply for his community. The other character lives above, and works in the agency responsible for creating false war news and propaganda.

I’ve told you virtually nothing about the story’s actual plot, in case you want to read it. The reason I bring all this up, is because I found it interesting how a convoluted conspiracy affects the characters–or more importantly, how it doesn’t.

My issue with the storytelling is purely a character problem. Several of the characters who exist on the surface and help to perpetuate the conspiracy do not actually believe in the motives or goals of the conspiracy itself. They have no ‘buy-in’ to the conspiracy. Yet, these very same characters act day-in, day-out, without giving their role in the conspiracy much thought. To me this doesn’t seem very realistic.

The question for me which shatters the illusion, or shatters my suspension of disbelief is this; “Why wouldn’t they just walk away? Or worse, work to undermine the conspiracy?”

Indeed, one of the central characters helps to do this, but he seems to do it in complete paranoia, and without much scruples as to why and how he should care to begin with. In other words, he defies the conspiracy in a less-than intentional way. This makes him less of a hero, and more of a bystander who simply tries not to hurt the tankers as much as his peers do.

The same is true for the character who must travel to the surface. Once he discovers that the war is over, and has been over for a while, he does not seem greatly distressed by this news. Dick’s explanation seems to be, this ‘tanker,’ as the bunker-dwellers are called, has become so accustomed to life in squalor underground, that he doesn’t know what to think when he finds out about the reality of life on the surface.

I don’t buy it. Because Dick later explains that the conspiracy could not be exposed to all the tankers at once, as it would ’shock’ them and cause a revolution. Of course it would! And I believe it would with the main characters as well.

Keep in mind, the characters did not grow up from childhood in these surroundings. The entire framework of the premise takes place over 15 years. Unless the characters are all fifteen years old, there is no way they would go about their routine so mindlessly when it comes to something as important as freedom, and a conspiracy to infringe upon it.

None of the characters seem to take a hard emotional stand, or fight for anything they believe in. This not only makes the story less believable, it denies the reader an identification with a hero. It hurts both the logic of the conspiracy, and the characterizations.

It is an excellent example where the author could have asked himself, “What would I do in this situation?” Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem Dick asked such a question. If you read it, you might agree that a character affected by conspiracy is a penultimate truth.

On the heels of yesterday’s post, we’re in for a bit of fun today. I thought I’d pick apart a nasty review of The DaVinci Code. People have been way, WAY too happy to rag on Dan Brown lately. I’m not sure why people are so insecure, or feel he needs to be taken down 25 notches. My guess is it has something to do with jealousy, or bitterness over the attention that novel has received. It’s like watching a bunch of catty bitches comment on the unpopular girl’s sudden popularity.

Without further ado, I present you a stinky mound of bitterness by Anthony Lane.

“I must say that, though I have recited the Nicene Creed throughout my adult life, I never realized that it was originally formulated in the middle of a Beastie Boys concert.”

How witty! A popular culture reference in regards to a scene which bears no resemblance to the reference.

“He works for Opus Dei, the Catholic organization so intensely secretive that its American headquarters are tucked away in a seventeen-story building on Lexington Avenue.”

Would he prefer Area 51? What exactly constitutes an intensely secretive location? And what might be a better organization given the theme of the novel? Oh, but providing solutions is not the role of the critic. How dare I suggest such a constructive role for any kind of critic, much less this one.

“The task of the Bishop and his hit man is to thwart the unveiling of what Teabing modestly calls “the greatest secret in modern history,” so powerful that, “if revealed, it would devastate the very foundations of Christianity.” Later, realizing that this sounds a little meek and mild, he stretches it to “the greatest coverup in human history.” As a rule, you should beware of any movie in which characters utter lines of dialogue whose proper place is on the advertising poster.”

It’s called good marketing. Try it sometime! Is the critic saying that the idea itself lacks controversy? It should be obvious that a story like The DaVinci code makes use of overstatement. Leave understatement for art-house. And I thought the general complaint about marketing in the big evil world is that it’s too often cheap and tacked-on. So here The DaVinci Code actually uses content FROM the novel/movie for its marketing and advertising. I think that shows a bit of integrity, don’t you? Instead of what we’re used to–a cheap and inauthentic message tacked on after the fact. That sir, is exactly the problem with most marketing and why marketing in general gets a bad name. What The DaVinci Code has done in the marketing department should be applauded, and if anything the bitterness evident through the review and lit world only proves that.

“Should we mind that forty million readers—or, to use the technical term, “lemmings”—have followed one another over the cliff of this long and laughable text? I am aware of the argument that, if a tale has enough grip, one can for a while forget, if not forgive, the crumbling coarseness of the style; otherwise, why would I still read “The Day of the Jackal” once a year? With “The Da Vinci Code,” there can be no such excuse. Even as you clear away the rubble of the prose, what shows through is the folly of the central conceit, and, worse still, the pride that the author seems to take in his theological presumption.”

Ah, so now any mass fans of a novel are ‘lemmings’ and The DaVinci Code, a pop novel, is being evaluated as a theological work. I think a certain writer for the New Yorker woke up one day and got confused about which genre he was reviewing. But let him continue…

“How timid—how undefended in their powers of reason—must people be in order to yield to such preening?”

First, does constructing your sentences like Shakespearean English make you sound smart? Second, somebody please pick up the Clue Phone and hand it to Mr. Lane. THE DAVINCI CODE IS FICTION.

And here we get to the most telling part of his review;

Despite repeated attempts, I have never managed to crawl past page 100. As I sat down to watch “The Da Vinci Code,” therefore, I was in the lonely, if enviable, position of not actually knowing what happens.

So, the critic couldn’t hack 100 pages of a fluffy popcorn novel. That tells me two things:

1. He doesn’t have the patience to read or sit through very much fiction. If he can’t make it through The DaVinci Code, I have my doubts he could make it through anything meatier. Why is he a critic, then?
2. If he couldn’t hack 100 pages of the novel, how far do you think he’s going to get into the movie before Mr. Cranky Pants turns on? He clearly went into it with a cynical attitude. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never enjoyed a film when I approach it with that kind of pretense. And that is exactly what Mr. Lane is being–pretentious.

“Howard’s film is that it is far too dense and talkative to function efficiently as a thriller, while also being too credulous and childish to bear more than a second’s scrutiny as an exploration of religious history or spiritual strife.”

Well, at least we finally got our money’s worth from the critic. Yes, perhaps The DaVinci Code is too dense and talkative to function efficiently as a thriller. However, isn’t this the problem in adapting any novel to the screen?

As for an exploration of religious history or spiritual strife… again, it’s a work of fiction–NOT a theological thesis. I wish critics like Anthony Lane could get that one correct. You don’t see anyone raising the theological inaccuracies towards Raiders of the Lost Ark, do you?

The critic is making claims here that DaVinci Code functions poorly as an exploration of religious history and spiritual strife. Like Mr. Lane’s review on the whole, that kind of nitpick is irrelevant.

What we end up with at the end of his ‘critique’ is a smoldering stew of bitter cynicism, and not many fine points of contention over The DaVinci Code as a work of storytelling. I thought the point of a review was to find out whether a book or film was worth enduring? What I got instead, was a sense that Lane is a cynical person who can’t sit through 100 pages of a pop novel or twenty minutes of a pop film.

Not exactly an enlightened ‘critique’ — do you think?

I thought reviews were meant to provide indication of weakness or strength of the work, rather than a soapbox of hatred towards blockbuster successes!

The art vs. entertainment debate has fired up again over at Melly’s place. I’ve clearly got both feet in the entertainment camp, and I’ll tell you why.

As a storyteller, I only care about the reader’s experience. And this is the fundamental difference between art and entertainment. Art is not necessarily concerned with the audience’s experience. Art is art. It need not justify itself to anyone or anything. It is something that sits on a pedestal, behind a glass case, or a painted line on the exhibit floor that says “Do not cross.”

My problem with the label of art is that it protects the artist. If millions of people hate your work, you can easily write off their opinions with, “But it’s art!” You needn’t change a thing or improve yourself, except to whatever degree suits your fancy or tickles your ego.

I’m more than happy to send my work out into the world without the bulletproof vest label of ‘art.’ I will be happy to let readers shoot my work to pieces. Nothing is sacred, my story least of all. If it is a good story, it will be able to protect itself by its own inherent virtues. It needn’t hide behind a label which calls it sacred.

Entertainment cares about the reader–because the reader ultimately decides whether entertainment is ‘entertaining.’ But who defines art?

The artists.

Art only cares that the artist gets to express themselves. Entertainment only cares whether the reader has a satisfying experience.

The job of an entertainer is to entertain. The job of an artist is to… what? Create something.

There is no prescription for the thing that is created. The end result doesn’t have to meet any particular standard, except those prescribed by the form. And those are not rules, merely guidelines. So really, anything goes.

Entertainment ultimately has to be entertaining. It’s a simple metric. If it’s entertaining, then it succeeds. If it’s not, then it fails.

But how can you judge whether art succeeds or fails? You can’t. It’s entirely subjective. I choose not to hide behind subjectives.

Either my novel will be entertaining, or it won’t. If it’s not, then I failed.

Ultimately what determines whether or not my work is entertaining is how much thought I’ve given to the reader’s experience.

Can the same always be said for art?

In other words, entertainment has the customer or reader at the center of importance. Art has the artist at the center of importance.

Why does the creator have to be the center of importance? Shouldn’t the audience be the center of importance?

Art doesn’t necessarily care for the reader. Entertainment does–because the entire foundation of entertainment is dependent on whether or not the customer had a good time.

I care about the reader and I want them to have a good time. This is more important than all the art or artistry in the universe.