Bittercon: Levels and Limits of Metafictionality

[kate_nepveu]

Bittercon panel number three. And dual-purpose of getting something off my to-write list!

Levels and Limits of Metafictionality

Stories about stories. When can the teller of a story successfully interact with the story, and when is it a cheat?

Examples that I think work (how they do is spoiler-protected and cut for length): Pamela Dean's Secret Country trilogy, in which kids cross into another world and it looks like their "let's pretend" game is real; the musical The Drowsy Chaperone, where a fan of a musical plays a record, imagines the production, and talks to the audience about the songs, staging, artists, and story; Katherine Blake's (Dorothy Heydt) novel The Interior Life, in which a housewife has detailed daydreams about a secondary fantasy world. What else? And is Dream of the Endless automatically disqualified?

(Don't spoil people, please: ROT13 spoilers or put them between <span style="color: #999999; background-color: #999999"> </span>.)

All spoilers are ROT13'ed, which I prefer because I'm sure no-one's styles will mess it up.

The Secret Country trilogy: hzz, rzoneenffvatyl V qba'g guvax V pna npphengryl qrfpevor gur zrpunavfz orpnhfr vg'f orra n juvyr, ohg pregnvayl gur bgure jbeyq jnf erny; gurer jnf whfg fbzr jnl gung fgbevrf sebz bhe jbeyq pebffrq bire naq unq rssrpg ba gurvef. Evtug?

The Drowsy Chaperone: gur aneengbe trgf nyy fnq ng gur raq naq cnhfrf gur erpbeq, naq gur punenpgref va gur zhfvpny pbzr bhg bs gurve sebmra cbfrf naq vapbecbengr uvz vagb gur qnapr fprar—juvpu ng svefg unq zr ivoengvat jvgu vaqvtangvba, ohg ng gur raq bs gur ahzore ur'f onpx va uvf punve, naq vg frrzrq pyrne gung ur jnf vzntvavat orvat cneg bs vg gb yvsg uvf fcvevgf, be vg jnf n zrgncube sbe gur cbjre bs fgbel gb erzbir barfrys sebz bar'f gebhoyrf; gur zhfvpny jnfa'g ernyyl gnxvat cynpr va uvf ncnegzrag.

The Interior Life: V jnf pbaivaprq gung gur ubhfrjvsr jbhyq pebff vagb gur frpbaqnel snagnfl jbeyq, naq V jnf fb vzcerffrq jura fur qvqa'g.

Comments

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

I can't read the gobbledegook, but then I've forgotten most of the details of the Blake. But wow, a great topic indeed.

[dsgood.livejournal.com]

Story whose title I can't remember; I think by Edmond Hamilton: Starts off with what looks like the standard (in old sf) frame story of men playing cards. In this case, writers. One tells the story: He invented a world to set his stories in -- barbaric, colorful, a lot of fun to read about (and write about), but not really one any civilized man would want to live in.

He got more and more absorbed in this story-world. And then, one day, he found himself trapped in it.

Someone asks how he got out.

"V'z fgvyy urer."

[kgbooklog.livejournal.com]

Dream would be closer to the idea that belief creates supernatural beings.

I get annoyed when stories reveal that the book the protagonist is writing is the one you're reading. It's especially hard to swallow when it then goes on the describe events after its publication and the death of the author.

Do self-fullfilling time travel stories count?

Not quite the same thing, but the webcomic Order of the Stick (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots.html) is set in a D&D universe where (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0001.html) the (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0003.html) characters (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0034.html) know (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0143.html) the (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0297.html) rules (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0340.html).

[nikojen.livejournal.com]

From musicals, another good one is Into the Woods with the narrator being dragged into the action at one point gb or fnpevsvprq gb n tvnag... ohg yrnivat gur punenpgref gb erterg univat bss'q uvz jura gurl ernyvmr gurl qba'g xabj jung gurl'er fhccbfrq gb qb arkg. There's also the implication at the end that the narrator himself is the Baker's son, passing on the stories that his father told him...

Also: I'm still one volume away from the end, but one that has really struck me is the Princess Tutu anime. On its most basic level, the setup deals with a prince and a crow who escaped from the pages of a story and the magical Princess Tutu who is helping them return. But when the story starts to play itself in the "real" world, the lines between reality and story become practically non-existent, with characters aware that they're in a story and bar punenpgre qvfpbirevat gung ur vf qrfpraqrq sebz gur bevtvany nhgube (jub vf nyfb gur aneengbe/pbzzragngbe bs gur frevrf) naq guhf unf gur cbjre gb nssrpg gur pheerag fgbel jvgu uvf bja jevgvat.

[mikeda.livejournal.com]

Another example that I liked is "The Little Country" by Charles De Lint where jung frrz gb or gjb nygreangr havirefrf ner yvaxrq ol n obbx. Naq gur obbx va rnpu havirefr frrzf gb or gryyvat gur fgbel bs riragf gung unccarq va gur bgure.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

I think in The Interior Life the thing that impressed me most about that was when someone was talking to someone else, in the fantasy world, and used the character from the real world as an example of a friend's experience. I loved that. I really admire the way that book makes things work that shouldn't work, and also how amazingly positive it is. Downbeat is so much easier to write than genuinely positive.

As for the Secret Country books, the mechanism -- jnf gung fgbevrf cnffrq guebhtu sebz bhe jbeyq jurer vzntvangvba vf vzntvangvba, gb gurvef, jurer vzntvangvba naq perngvivgl ner zntvp, ohg lbh pna pubbfr jurgure gurl svg lbh be abg. Zrynavr tnir gur puvyqera fgbevrf be fbzrguvat sebz gurve jbeyq jura gur puvyqera jrer va bhe jbeyq (vg'f abg rkcynvarq ubj, abe ubj gur puvyqera fb pybfryl erfrzoyr gur Eblny Puvyqera) ohg gur tnzr gurl cynlrq gura nssrpgrq gur Frperg Pbhagel jbeyq... rkprcg jvgu pubvpr va gurer.

Va gur svefg obbx, orsber gur zheqre naq pbebangvba, V ernyyl yvxr gur jnl vg vagrenpgf, jura gurl'er gelvat gb fgbc jung gurl xabj vf tbvat gb unccra. Va gur frpbaq obbx, guvf nyfb jbexf jryy, naq gura va gur guveq jurer gur crbcyr va gur jbeyq xabj gurl'er vzcbfgref gung tvirf vg serfuarff, ohg V qb svaq vg yrff pbby, rfcrpvnyyl jura vg arrqf gb or rkcynvarq. Ubjrire, V ybir gur npghny raq fb zhpu V'yy sbetvir vg nalguvat.

Great books.

[kgbooklog.livejournal.com]

Another example of characters interacting badly with stories is Fforde's The Fourth Bear. The protagonist is investigating the disappearance of Goldilocks, and he already knew how particular she was, and when he talks to the bears, he knows "she will never been seen again." But then at the end (mild spoilers) ur qrqhprf gur cerfrapr bs n sbhegu orne sebz gur snpg gur cbeevqtrf jrer qvssrerag grzcrengherf naq gung gur guerr orqf zrnaf fnvq sbhegu orne jnf univat na nssnve jvgu znzn orne. Ugh. I'll try the next Thursday Next book, but I won't read any more Nursery Crimes.

[janni.livejournal.com]

Heh. I'm rereading The Secret Country books right now.

Have you read Michael Ende's The Neverending Story? Deeply influential on me as a kid, and deeply metafictional.

It's anime, not fiction, but Princess Tutu is also deeply metafictional. A writer was telling a story, he died before it was through, and his characters escaped the tale--but he's still, even though dead, trying to get the story going again, and trying to control it. He finally resorts into bringing in a new character--and along the way changing a duck into a girl who herself can change into a magical ballerina--but of course, she does things he doesn't expect, too.

Both Neverending Story and Tutu do it well. But both also make very clear that this is metafiction from the start.

In my current book (Secret of the Three Treasures), I have a character who very self-consciously tells the story of her life as it's happening--and uses that story to help turn herself into the adventurer she dreams of being, rather than the ordinary suburban kid everyone else sees. There world of story isn't separate from our world, but it does change how she interacts with our world. In telling her story, she helps make it the story she wants it to be.

I love books where the characters get to interact with the story. I think the tricky (but also fun) thing is, you then have to figure out how the story world and our world relate to, and influence, one another.

[burger-eater.livejournal.com]

The only meta-fictional reading I've done (I think) is Peter Straub's Koko, Mystery and The Throat. All wonderful books, and rnpu obbx vf n abiry va gur jbeyq bs gur arkg obbx va gur frevrf, as I recall. They aren't horror and they aren't really mysteries. I'm not sure what they are. And I must admit that I read them at a time in my life when I wasn't reading very well. I should revisit them.

What does interest me about meta-fiction is the way it resembles some very ordinary genres. I'm thinking specifically about mysteries and ghost stories. Both are (generally speaking) stories about the uncovering of a second, secret story. Who really killed His Lordship? What awful circumstance really created all those ghosts in Wormwood Manor?

For instance: Instruments of Night by Thomas H. Cook. It's about a seriously troubled mystery/thriller writer who is invited to spend a summer at a resort so he can look into a decades-old mystery. No one expects him to actually solve the crime--they just want him to come up with a narrative that will satisfy the victim's mother in a way the official version of the crime never has.

The book is full to the brim of the protagonist's morbid imagination as he pictures the crime over and over again. Every new piece of information prompts another grim mental image of the victims last moments. It's a powerful and difficult book.

Also, I was struck by a story in Dashiell Hammet's collection The Continental Op in which the detective has captured the criminal and cvrprf gbtrgure gur fgbel bs gur pevzr jvgu nyy gur pyhrf ur'f tngurerq fb sne, naq jura fur cebgrfgf gung ur unf vg nyy pbzcyrgryl jebat, ur gryyf ure gung vg qbrfa'g znggre, orpnhfr gur fgbel ur'f pbbxrq hc svgf nyy gur rivqrapr. Vg'yy or tbbq rabhtu sbe gur pbcf Ur qbrfa'g arprffnevyl pner ubj gehr uvf irefvba bs gur frperg fgbel vf, whfg ubj hfrshy vg vf.

That one bit gave me tingles.

And maybe this is a digression from the topic of the thread (okay--no maybes about it) but stories within stories interest me, so I digress.