[HPforGrownups] Re: a sandwich

[Lee Kaiwen]

No: HPFGUIDX 178842

revaunchanistx:

CJ:
> But as others have pointed out, HP is full of unresolved story
> arcs ... It just strikes me as messy writing.
> 
> I don't understand how it is messy writing. Sure there are many
> unresolved story archs in the HP books but there are many unresolved
> issues in life. 

revaunchanistx:
> The whole thing that makes JKR's writing so good to me is that it is
> ersatz to our own world. 

Umm, sorry, but you consider a story about witchcraft and wizardry an 
ersatz for the RW ?!

Imagine if the HP saga had just ended abruptly after, say, OotP, with 
DEs and good guys still battling for control of the WW with no 
resolution in sight. Or worse, DH ending that way. THAT would be like 
the RW, too. More so, in fact. But nobody would read it. Or they'd read 
it, then complain long and hard about what a stupid book it was. ("What 
the --- ? But who WINS?")

HP is a work of fiction. Works of fiction are intended to be neatly 
wrapped, self-contained packages full of conflict AND resolution. RL 
doesn't have plots and climaxes and denouments or resolved story arcs. 
Fictional works do, and that's exactly why we read them -- to escape the 
messiness of RL.

The second or third thing you learn in Writing Basics -- at least it was 
the second or third thing *I* learned -- is that story arcs resolve. 
Stories move forward. They have clearly defined conflicts, goals and 
directions -- and resolutions. An author must set -- and then meet! -- 
readers' expectations. Unresolved story arcs not only don't contribute 
to the forward motion of your story. Far worse, they confuse the reader 
with chaff. And a confused reader is the kiss of death for an author.

So what was the *first* thing I learned? That a well-crafted story 
doesn't contained more than two or -- for highly experienced authors 
only, three -- story arcs. Because it's the rare author who can juggle 
more than three arcs without fatally muddling the story. Ninety nine 
times out of a hundred, if you have more than two arcs, you're really 
trying to tell more than one story, and it's time to re-evaluate your 
goals as an author. It'd be far better for the author, the reader, and 
the story arcs themselves to save the extra arcs for another time.

In a word: Clarity. It's the most fundamental principle of 
story-telling. Tossing in a half-dozen story arcs, and then not 
resolving them, is the antithesis of clarity.

If I want an ersatz for the RW full of unresolved story arcs and 
un-concluding conclusions, I'll just read the newspaper.

--CJ