How to write fiction

What are the 7 principles of theatre plays? p3

a young couple talking in the balcony
Photo by S Rawos on Pexels.com

Last time I only mentioned them, this one I’ll try explaining a few…Which means nonsense is about to happen and you better free yourself of pure logic.


PLACEMENT RECONVENTION:

The spectator/audience know(s) he/they is/are in a theatre house, their rear on a seat. But if you tell them they’re in Siberia, they will believe themselves in Siberia. In comics if there’s a place’s name inside a white box; voilà, we’re in Gotham city. Same on screen; we’re told we are in a train in the Rumanian border and we won’t protest we are not, just because those trees don’t grow there. In occasion we will see some takes of landmarks but that’s not crucial.

Novels… The same. Though they’re more fastidious in the way there’s descriptions to be made of streets and stores for the reader to really know where the action is happening.


TIME RECONVENTION:

What’s happening on stage is what’s happening in fable time and in history time… And this is what’s a bit different[1]. The whole plot is fable time. There’s not story time that can be brought up as if happening at the moment because we time traveled. No. There can be mention to past but past won’t be re-enacted. It will be mentioned or talked about but never shown as a scene. And by past, I mean the past of the fable time.
Perhaps this is why Robert McKee insists in the dramatization of the flashback. It has to be something happening at the same time we’re watching or reading it for it to be immersive.


CHARACTERIZATION:

I don’t know the name of this character in English. To me, he will always be Benito B. Bodoque and not many people would know him. Top cat wasn’t popular in the States. Tough in Mexico… Better voice actors. And the point dear Merriam is, that you’re talking about Benito talking, feeling and thinking likeTop cat if such is his role. Thus the convention, applicable to every media, is about how the character reacts to stuff. Does they have an accent? Are they cheeky or demure? Will they commit suicide under pressure? Characterization might not be tangible but it is definitely there. It is part of the famous subtext and makes a character something vivid.

TO BE CONTINUED


[1] In the original entry in Spanish I state something different but that was a different me.

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