I recently had a discussion on the evolution of storytelling – as you do – with a Canadian friend who is an English teacher in an American school. I suggested that storytelling has become more opaque but she rather contested that. She pointed out that the “Iliad” and the “Odyssey” – both, of course, very old works – are examples of complex storytelling. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I’m been thinking more about our discussion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
First, a few introductory points:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
1. I used the word opaque. I could have used other words like less straightforward, less conventional, more complicated, more challenging, more sophisticated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
2. I did not mean this as a criticism, so much as an observation. At its best, this trend makes storytelling richer and more nuanced; at its worst, such storytelling becomes confusing, even indulgent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
3. Our discussion was mainly about storytelling in novels, but my favourite storytelling genre is cinema and I think that hers is theatre. Perhaps later we will look at various arts of storytelling including poetry (which I find particularly hard) and even art itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
4. My friend rightly pointed out that there has always been sophisticated storytelling. I agree. I’m talking about general trends, particularly over the last century or so, and about more literary works rather than common fiction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
OK – now to the substance of my assertion:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I think that we both accept that essentially traditional storytelling has three elements: exposition, complication, resolution. Structurally this usually means a beginning, a middle and an end (but not necessarily in that order).
Beginnings have become more variable these days. Rarely is a story told chronologically; there are usually multiple flash-backs (and sometimes flash-backs within flashbacks). Endings in particular have become more opaque in modern storytelling with frequently uncertain, ambiguous or open endings. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I’ve been rereading an essay titled “Approaches To The Novel” contained in the book “Novels And Novelists: A Guide To The World Of Fiction” edited by Martin Seymour-Smith. This was first published in 1980 and I bought it in 1987.
In support of my basic assertion on the growing opacity of storytelling, I would like to quote some points from this essay:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“In its evolution over the last 250 years, the novel has moved from simplicity to complexity.”<\/em> These comments are predominately about the structure of the modern literary novel but, in our conversation, I also instanced important changes in style:<\/p>\n\n\n\n – instead of one point of view, we often have two or more<\/p>\n\n\n\n – instead of a reliable narrator, we often have a narrator who is unreliable, either intentionally or through trauma, alcohol, drugs, or mental illness <\/p>\n\n\n\n – instead of classic punctuation, speech marks may be omitted or some or all punctuation marks may be omitted or pronouns may be used instead of names.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Any thoughts? Any examples?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I recently had a discussion on the evolution of storytelling – as you do – with a Canadian friend who is an English teacher in an American school. I suggested that storytelling has become more opaque but she rather contested that. She pointed out that the “Iliad” and the “Odyssey” – both, of course, very […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cultural-issues"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27079"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27079\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27089,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27079\/revisions\/27089"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.rogerdarlington.me.uk\/nighthawk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
“One mark of growing complexity has been the defiance or undermining of conventional structures, codes and constraints. Open-ended novels … are common in the twentieth century (in the nineteenth century, they occurred only when the novelist died while writing).”<\/em>
As regards the phases exposition, complication, resolution: “Since fiction in the twentieth century has become increasingly sophisticated, the phases are not always clear cut, or are sometimes deliberately flouted.”<\/em>
“According to one epigrammatic account, ‘the history of fiction is simply the decay of plot’. The writer is alluding to the increasing ‘inconsequentiality’ of modern and post-modern fiction.”<\/em>
“In the modern ‘literary’ novel, the reader has no secure sense that everything will fall into place.”<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n