Fiction Lessons From Lost or WWJJD?

Not everything applies. Video has the distinct advantage of when people are super hot they can say whatever they want. I could never have a character pontificate to huddled castaways — “If we can't live together, we're gonna die alone.” (insert organ chord here.) This same line, given a glimpse of burly chest and a square jaw, works great.

Despite the fiction writer's different medium, there is much to learn from Lost. During my MFA, when I read for fiction workshops, often having to prod myself along to the end, I wished my colleagues had spent more time watching Lost.

WWJJD?

• Two sides to every story.
  
• When characters interact, the reader should know backstory that impacts the interaction that the characters don’t.
  
• The Run Into the Jungle Screaming Rule OR when in doubt have someone freak out to get the plot moving.
  
• Forge strange alliances.
  
• Break them.
  
• Keep all characters on the verge of mental breakdown.
  
• Have story elements that make no sense. This makes people tense and they will complain vehemently but they love it.
  
• Once in a while toss in a random goodie, like a candy bar or a baby. Or a jumpsuit!
  
• The Hurley “Dudes, this is stupid. Can’t we just…” Rule OR Have a character who speaks for the common man. This gives voice to the impotent reader. But...
  
• ...under no circumstance shall characters listen to reasonable suggestions.
  
• Have a super awesome unique setting that is crucial to the plot.
  
• Enclose people in tight enclosed spaces and force them to interact.
• Fight! Fight! Fight!

The scary part is I could keep going and going. But I’m out of coffee and I’m going to stop here. Please feel free to add your lesson from Lost below.

May is National Short Story Month

Dang. Almost missed it. In a typical K-Ferg move I will celebrate, tardy-style.

Today, while attempting once again to pass my day in a writerly fashion yet not writing, I found this tidbit in my MFA notes, a quote from Padgett Powell on how to evaluate if a story is worth telling.

The deal is you ask these three questions, and you should receive these three answers:

1) Did this really happen? (emphatic no)

2) Could this have happened? (...maybe...)

3) Should it have happened? (YES)

A little internet search yielded these Rules of Fiction from an interview with Padgett Powell in The Believer:

"Rule 1 is The Gosling Rule. The story concerns the first thing the reader sees move. Rule 2 is that the problem, or the apparent and necessarily related problem, must appear soon, in the first paragraph if not the first sentence. Rule 3 is a complex function [wh = f(c1,c2,c3... + e + t)] involving withholding. Rule 4 is the bar test: everything must be said more or less as if you might say it to a stranger in a bar. Rule 5 is the doozie quotient."

The quote then goes on to relate a version of Rule 7, which I typed above.

We Heart Ira Glass

In MFA programs, creative nonfiction is often linked with memoir. I find this irritating. Nothing against memoirs, there are many I love, but I am not writing memoir and memoir is not my primary NF interest. There was also this NYT bestselling phase of the trauma memoir, which seems to have passed, but the lingering stink that memoir = my crappy childhood remains.  Again, not that crappy childhood memoirs can't be fantastic. But all memoirs are not about people's horrible trauma (think: David Sedaris). And again, none of this has anything to do with what I'm writing. 

One of my NF profs, after a few, would bemoan his undergraduate nonfiction class.

"Oh god," he would moan, one hand clutching a glass of wine and the other his head, "I can't read anymore about the bulimia."

I understand this impulse to want to make sense of painful experiences. But what I want to say to young writers and to the fiction profs who equate NF with memoir is "think less My Father Raped Me and more This American Life."

One great quality about Ira Glass is that he is all about sharing information. He doesn't obfuscate what he's looking for in a great story. He's not one of those pontiffs who claims you can't explain "Art." Glass is unafraid to outline what he wants in great, specific detail. And I have learned as much from him as anyone. If you listen to Ira Glass and then go back to your favorite writers you will learn muchly. 

A story is a series of anecdotes building to a point. Along the way questions are raised and answered. These answers should surprise us. 

Easy, right? 

Ha.