© Pierre Maré,
2004 - 2007
Offbeat 09
I have loved stories since I have been able to remember, and my mother will probably tell me that I enjoyed them for a while before that. Aside from Aesop’s Fables, the Brothers Grimm and Beatrix Potter’s somewhat rash rabbits, one of the earliest stories I remember is Spiderman taking on the Scorpion. Cool stuff, and it still is.
I never lost my love of stories, in spite of the cold, emotionless experience of Shakespeare in school. It particularly irked me that I was not allowed to root for Shylock in the ‘Merchant of Venice’. Despite the cold climate, I still found enough interest to pore my way through Sartre, Hess and Patrick White in search of enlightenment and the meaning of life. Like most angry young men and almost all aspiring writers I found the real meaning of life in the bottom of a bottle. I’d tell you what it is, but I forgot it all during the hangovers.
One of my early career aspirations was to be a Hollywood scriptwriter. I gave that one up when I heard about the starlet who was so dumb she slept with the scriptwriter to get a part. Hollywood has virtually no respect for writers. And after that joke, nor do the starlets.
What I learnt from my research on the movie industry is that there are 37 formulaic dramatic situations, set down by one Georges Polti, ranging from mundane loss of loved ones and mistaken identity to more interesting fatal imprudence and conflict with a god. I also have someone else’s step-by-step description of how to write a script and motivate characters. Combine the 37 dramatic situations and the script planner, and all you have to do is insert different names, places, situations and other etceteras. Now you know why good movies are so hard to come by.
Hollywood has not been able to find the one successful story line that will keep us enthralled for the rest of time. Perhaps it is because we recognize that there are better and more interesting stories: our own and the tales of those around us for instance.
Once upon a time each of us is born, and once upon a time everybody meets their loves and once upon a time something happens that makes our lives difficult or interesting, and we set out on quests, well-meaning or ill-advised, that will lead us to a sad or happy ending to the story.
The stories
of our lives are not usually the epic stuff of Hollywood fantasy. The
tellers of our stories are the people who know us and talk about us. Our
stories are told over telephones, in offices, restaurants, bars and backyard
barbecues. They are great stories because they are relevant, amusing,
heroic or sad, here and now.
The stories become even more interesting when they intersect, like chance
meetings between lovers who were never meant to be or accidents at traffic
lights. At these points of intersections, in conflict or agreement, we
exchange the stuff that makes our stories and walk away with one another’s
happiness, anger, madness, sadness or reason. Wherever we meet someone,
we become part of that person’s story.
By exchanging parts of our stories with others we become players in the larger stories of groups, countries and cultures. We also become authors of the tale.
In 1914, a young man shot an emperor and drew the nations of the world into World War 1. In that world war another young man, who may under other circumstances have become a painter, was exposed to the idea that life had no value. A few decades later, he in his turn divided nations into two broad camps and was responsible for millions of death. At the end of his story, two more camps arose but that story appears to have reached its end. New stories are emerging, and beyond them there are other stories waiting to begin.
If there is a moral to the story and enlightenment for authors it must be that where characters intersect, new stories begin to emerge. Your story belongs not only to you, but also to those around you. The questions are, what sort of a story do you want and what should the ending be? Happy or sad, the choice is yours.
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