Category: FICTION IN PHASE SPACE

Tuchman’s Use of Plot Technology

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Tuchman’s work is a prime example of the use of plot technology to create a narrative that is both compelling and entertaining. The idea behind plot technology is that things happen in a story because the plot dictates that they should, rather than due to any logical or realistic reason. This is why, in Tuchman’s work, the good guys always win in the end, even if they face numerous setbacks and challenges along the way.

One of the reasons that Tuchman’s work has been so influential is because of the way she presents the 1300s as a period of extreme cruelty and savagery. The knights that she describes are depicted as little more than armed thugs, who switch sides frequently and care little for the lives of the common people. This portrayal of the medieval period is similar to the way that GRR Martin depicts the world of Game of Thrones, with its backstabbing, treachery and brutal violence.

Despite the lack of attention paid to factors such as climate change, economics, technology, or sex, Tuchman’s work remains vivid and engaging. She brings to life the daily routines of medieval life, from how people bathed and ate to how they behaved in church. These details help to create a sense of immersion in the world she describes, drawing the reader into a vivid and believable world.

Weird Tales and Amazing Stories

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The 20’s in fiction is an elemental soup, open source of tropes made available, redistributed and modified. That means figurative language, words, phrases, images, recurring devices, recurring motifs and clichés shuffled around for artistic effect. Most of the tropes used for world building in sci-if can be traced back to Amazing stories and Weird Tales if not as origin, at least as funnel.

This is how literary and cultural tropes evolve and transform over time, often reappearing in different forms to shape the narratives of various eras. The 1920s were a particularly transformative period for literature and culture, and they continue to influence storytelling today. Here’s an expanded look at how the 1920s contributed to the development and redistribution of tropes in fiction:

  1. Cultural and Technological Shifts: The 1920s were marked by significant cultural and technological changes. The aftermath of World War I, the rise of consumer culture, urbanization, and advancements in communication and transportation all played a role in shaping the narratives of the time. These shifts provided a backdrop for exploring themes of disillusionment, societal change, and the collision of tradition with modernity in fiction.
  2. Pulp Magazines and Genre Fiction: Pulp magazines like “Amazing Stories” and “Weird Tales” gained popularity during the 1920s. These publications featured stories spanning various genres, including science fiction, fantasy, horror, and adventure. The stories often employed imaginative and speculative elements, laying the foundation for many tropes that would become integral to these genres.
  3. Influence on Science Fiction: The speculative and futuristic elements found in pulp magazines influenced the development of science fiction. Tropes like time travel, alien encounters, advanced technology, and dystopian futures gained prominence during this period. Writers like H.G. Wells and Edgar Rice Burroughs contributed to shaping these tropes, which have since become staples in the sci-fi genre.
  4. Weird Fiction and Horror: The 1920s also saw the emergence of “Weird Tales” magazine, which showcased supernatural and horror fiction. This genre contributed to tropes involving eldritch horrors, forbidden knowledge, cosmic dread, and the blending of reality and the supernatural. Writers like H.P. Lovecraft left an indelible mark on horror fiction, introducing themes that continue to resonate in contemporary horror literature.
  5. Flappers and Jazz Age: The cultural changes of the 1920s, including the rise of the “flapper” archetype and the vibrant Jazz Age, gave birth to new character tropes and settings. Characters challenging societal norms, embracing rebellion, and engaging in escapism were often depicted against the backdrop of speakeasies, jazz clubs, and extravagant parties.
  6. Detective Fiction: The 1920s were a golden era for detective fiction, with characters like Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot and Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes gaining popularity. The tropes of brilliant deductive reasoning, intricate mysteries, and enigmatic characters became defining elements of the detective genre.
  7. Artistic Experimentation: The 1920s witnessed artistic experimentation across various mediums, including literature. This era birthed literary movements like Surrealism, which explored the subconscious and the fantastical. Tropes such as dreamlike landscapes, fragmented narratives, and the blurring of reality and fantasy found their origins in these artistic endeavors.
  8. Cross-Pollination of Tropes: The diverse range of genres and themes present in 1920s fiction led to a cross-pollination of tropes. Elements from science fiction blended with horror, fantasy intermingled with mystery, and societal changes influenced character development and world-building across genres.

Overall, the 1920s served as a rich source of inspiration for storytelling, fostering the creation and redistribution of tropes that continue to shape modern fiction. The convergence of technological advancements, cultural shifts, and artistic experimentation during this era laid the groundwork for many enduring literary conventions that writers still draw upon to craft their narratives today.

101 Science Fiction Tropes For Writers

Whodunit: The Jacobean Revenge Play Turned on Its Head

The whodunit, a subgenre of detective fiction, has captivated audiences for over a century with its intricate plots, red herrings, and the ultimate revelation of a murderer. Yet, beneath its polished veneer lies a structure that bears striking resemblance to an older, bloodier tradition: the Jacobean revenge play. While the Jacobean play explores the inexorable descent into violence and moral decay, the whodunit subverts these elements, transforming the chaotic universe of revenge into a puzzle that rewards intellect and order. This post explores how the whodunit can be seen as a Jacobean revenge play turned on its head, where the thirst for vengeance is replaced by a quest for justice, and where the unraveling of truth replaces the inexorable march toward bloodshed.

The Jacobean Revenge Play: Chaos and Retribution

The Jacobean revenge play, epitomized by works like The Spanish Tragedy by Thomas Kyd and John Webster’s The Duchess of Malfi, is a drama steeped in blood, betrayal, and a spiraling descent into chaos. In these plays, revenge is not merely a personal vendetta; it is an elemental force that consumes both the avenger and their target, often leading to a climax where moral and social order is obliterated in a flurry of violence. The protagonist in these plays is typically driven by an overwhelming desire for retribution, often for a grievous wrong that cannot be undone. The path to vengeance is fraught with deception, madness, and ultimately, self-destruction.

In Hamlet, perhaps the most famous example of the genre, the prince’s quest for revenge against his uncle Claudius sets in motion a chain of events that leads to the deaths of nearly every major character. The whodunit takes this narrative framework—the quest for retribution, the uncovering of hidden truths, the pervasive atmosphere of mistrust—and transforms it into something more cerebral, where the emphasis shifts from chaos to order, and from retribution to revelation.

The Whodunit: Order Restored Through Revelation

In contrast to the Jacobean revenge play, the whodunit is a genre obsessed with the restoration of order. Where the Jacobean play revels in the spectacle of moral decay, the whodunit is a narrative puzzle, a game of logic where every piece must eventually fit into place. The detective, often a figure of almost superhuman rationality, serves as the antithesis of the Jacobean avenger. Rather than being consumed by a personal vendetta, the detective’s mission is to restore balance to a world disrupted by murder.

Consider Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot or Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes: these detectives are detached, clinical figures who, like a Jacobean avenger, seek the truth behind a crime. However, their goal is not revenge but justice. The murder in a whodunit is a disruption of the social order, and the detective’s role is to piece together the clues, sift through the lies, and ultimately, reveal the culprit. In doing so, the detective reasserts the primacy of reason over chaos, truth over deception.

The whodunit also subverts the Jacobean emphasis on inevitability. In a revenge play, the protagonist’s path to vengeance is often seen as predestined, a tragic fate that cannot be avoided. The whodunit, however, places the power in the hands of the detective—and by extension, the reader. The ending is not foreordained; it is a mystery to be solved, a challenge to the intellect. The whodunit invites the audience to participate in the narrative, to engage with the clues, and to attempt to outthink the detective. This participatory element stands in stark contrast to the Jacobean revenge play, where the audience is often a passive witness to the unfolding tragedy.

The Subversion of Violence

Violence in a whodunit, though central to the plot, is often relegated to the background. The murder itself is usually a past event, something that has already occurred before the narrative begins. The focus is not on the act of violence but on its aftermath—the investigation, the gathering of evidence, the questioning of suspects. This is a stark inversion of the Jacobean revenge play, where violence is often the climax, the ultimate expression of the protagonist’s inner turmoil.

In the whodunit, the violence is almost sanitized, transformed into a puzzle to be solved. The detective’s role is not to avenge the dead but to speak for them, to uncover the truth that the murder seeks to obscure. The act of detection becomes a moral endeavor, a way of restoring dignity to the victim by bringing the perpetrator to justice. The whodunit, in this sense, can be seen as a response to the moral chaos of the Jacobean revenge play, a narrative that seeks to impose order and meaning on the senselessness of murder.

Conclusion: The Whodunit as a Moral Reversal

Ultimately, the whodunit can be understood as a Jacobean revenge play turned on its head. Where the revenge play is a descent into chaos, the whodunit is an ascent to order. Where the revenge play is driven by personal vendetta, the whodunit is driven by a quest for justice. Where the revenge play ends in bloodshed, the whodunit ends in revelation.

This transformation reflects broader cultural shifts, from a worldview that sees violence as an inevitable response to wrongdoing, to one that sees rationality and justice as the ultimate arbiters of human behavior. The whodunit offers a narrative where the mind triumphs over the sword, where order is restored not through violence but through understanding. In doing so, it provides a counterpoint to the moral and social chaos of the Jacobean revenge play, offering instead a world where truth, ultimately, prevails.

Patricia Highsmith: A Return to Jacobean Revenge Plays by Way of Noir

Patricia Highsmith’s body of work is often categorized within the noir tradition, characterized by morally ambiguous characters, bleak settings, and a pervasive sense of fatalism. However, her novels and stories can also be seen as a modern revival of the Jacobean revenge play, refracted through the lens of 20th-century noir. In Highsmith’s world, the chaotic descent into violence and moral corruption that defined Jacobean drama is resurrected, but it is given a contemporary twist that aligns with the dark, psychological complexities of noir.

The Jacobean Revenge Play: Thematic Parallels

Jacobean revenge plays, such as John Webster’s The Duchess of Malfi or Thomas Middleton’s The Revenger’s Tragedy, are notorious for their exploration of vengeance, corruption, and the disintegration of moral and social order. In these plays, characters often engage in elaborate schemes of retribution, driven by deep personal grievances, leading to spirals of violence that consume both the avenger and the innocent alike. The protagonists in these plays are often anti-heroes, whose pursuit of revenge leads them down a path of moral compromise, self-destruction, and ultimately, death.

Patricia Highsmith’s characters, too, are frequently anti-heroes or even outright villains, driven by obsessions and desires that lead them into moral ambiguity and, often, destruction. Highsmith’s protagonists, like the Jacobean avengers, are often isolated figures, consumed by their fixations. However, where the Jacobean plays often depict revenge as a physical and bloody act, Highsmith explores psychological vengeance, where the mind becomes the battlefield and manipulation, deceit, and emotional torment become the weapons.

Tom Ripley: The Modern Avenger

One of the most compelling examples of Highsmith’s return to the Jacobean tradition is found in her most famous creation, Tom Ripley. The Ripliad—a series of five novels beginning with The Talented Mr. Ripley—chronicles the life of Tom Ripley, a charming yet morally bankrupt conman and murderer. Ripley is a quintessential anti-hero, driven by envy, ambition, and a desire for social ascension. Much like a Jacobean avenger, Ripley is a character whose actions are driven by deeply personal motives, often leading to the deaths of those who stand in his way.

In The Talented Mr. Ripley, Tom’s murder of Dickie Greenleaf is not just an act of survival but a twisted form of vengeance against the world that has denied him the status and wealth he craves. This act of violence sets off a chain of events that mirrors the chaotic unraveling typical of Jacobean revenge plays. However, unlike the tragic ends that befall Jacobean avengers, Ripley’s story takes a more noirish turn: he escapes justice, leaving behind a trail of deception and murder. Yet, despite his outward success, Ripley is haunted by paranoia and the fear of being caught, suggesting a psychological torment that is as destructive as any physical revenge.

Noir’s Fatalism and the Jacobean Worldview

The fatalism inherent in noir is another point of convergence between Highsmith and the Jacobean revenge play. Both genres operate within a world where moral absolutes are either absent or inverted, and where the quest for vengeance is often a symptom of a broader existential malaise. In Jacobean drama, the world is depicted as corrupt and decaying, where the pursuit of revenge leads inevitably to ruin. Similarly, in Highsmith’s novels, the world is morally ambiguous, and the characters’ actions often stem from a sense of existential dread or a nihilistic view of human nature.

Highsmith’s protagonists are often trapped in situations of their own making, much like the avengers of Jacobean drama. They are driven by desires that lead them into dark, inescapable corners, where the line between victim and perpetrator becomes blurred. This ambiguity is a hallmark of both noir and Jacobean revenge plays, where characters are frequently both the cause and the consequence of the violence that surrounds them.

Psychological Complexity: Highsmith’s Noir Lens

While the Jacobean revenge play is overtly theatrical and often grandiose in its depiction of violence, Highsmith’s approach is more subtle, emphasizing psychological over physical violence. This is where the noir influence is most evident. In Highsmith’s novels, the act of revenge is often internalized, manifesting as manipulation, deception, and emotional cruelty. The protagonists’ actions are driven not by external forces but by internal compulsions, making the narrative a psychological exploration as much as a plot-driven thriller.

Highsmith’s characters, like those in Jacobean plays, often engage in a game of cat and mouse, where the stakes are not just life and death but also sanity and identity. In Strangers on a Train, for example, the character Bruno’s suggestion of a “perfect murder” leads to a psychological battle between him and Guy, where the true horror lies not in the act of murder itself but in the psychological entanglement that ensues. This dynamic reflects the Jacobean tradition, where the avenger’s mind becomes consumed by their quest, leading to madness and self-destruction.

Conclusion: Highsmith’s Modern Jacobean World

Patricia Highsmith’s work can be seen as a modern reinvention of the Jacobean revenge play, filtered through the dark, fatalistic lens of noir. Her novels explore the same themes of vengeance, moral decay, and the disintegration of order that characterize Jacobean drama, but they do so in a way that emphasizes psychological over physical violence. Highsmith’s characters are modern-day avengers, driven by obsessions that lead them into a web of deceit, manipulation, and ultimately, self-destruction.

In Highsmith’s world, the chaotic descent into violence and moral ambiguity that defines Jacobean revenge plays is alive and well, but it is presented in a more intimate, internalized form. The result is a body of work that not only pays homage to the themes of Jacobean drama but also expands on them, creating a narrative space where the psychological and the noir intersect, and where the modern avenger continues to haunt the shadows.

Wolfe and Fukuyama

HEGELIAN DETERMINISM: A Savage Journey to the Heart of Fukuyama’s and Wolfe’s

1. The Pitiful Delusions of Fukuyama and Wolfe:

Ah, Fukuyama, the grinning fool who dared to declare the End of History, as if human ambition could be snuffed out like a cheap cigar. In his fever dream of a book, The End of History and the Last Man, Fukuyama pompously decrees that liberal democracy is the final stop on the train ride of human evolution. It’s a grand, bloated claim rooted in Hegelian determinism—a philosophy that promises history has an inevitable end, like some grim, German-engineered march toward a preordained utopia. But history, that old trickster, laughs in the face of Fukuyama’s naive thesis as the world twists, shifts, and careens in directions he couldn’t predict.

Then there’s Tom Wolfe, the silver-maned dandy who peddled the myth of the hyper-masculine hero, strutting through the materialistic morass of the 90s like a Wall Street Gordon Gecko on steroids. Wolfe’s novels—Bonfire of the Vanities and A Man in Full—are soaked in the stench of bravado and blind ambition, casting human desires as nothing more than a sordid pursuit of cash, status, and hollow victories. Both Wolfe and Fukuyama fall into the same intellectual trap, caught in the iron jaws of Hegelian determinism, unable to see beyond the rigid framework that history spoon-fed them.

2. The Hollow Pit of Hegelian Determinism:

Fukuyama and Wolfe are shackled by the same grim, deterministic philosophy—a bleak view that history grinds forward in a series of preordained stages toward some inevitable, final endpoint. Fukuyama dreams that liberal democracy is the crown jewel, the endgame of ideological evolution, while Wolfe’s characters are doomed to chase materialistic ghosts in an endless cycle of greed. This is determinism in its most crude and bastardized form, reducing the chaos and complexity of human experience to a mere footnote in the history books.

They cling to a philosophy that strips humanity of its wild unpredictability, its capacity for invention, rebellion, and change. They see the world as a machine, clicking through its predetermined gears, oblivious to the fact that the human soul is a howling beast, ever hungry, ever restless.

3. The Razor of Continental Philosophy:

But there’s a brighter corner of this intellectual landscape—a place where Continental philosophy takes a rusty knife to the throats of Fukuyama and Wolfe’s half-baked ideas. These philosophers don’t wallow in deterministic despair; they revel in the messy, bloody business of being human.

  • Symbolic: Language and culture shape human ambition, not some grand historical force. Fukuyama’s thesis is blind to this, and Wolfe’s characters stumble through a world without realizing the cultural strings that pull their limbs.
  • Performative: Reality isn’t a predetermined script; it’s something we create with every damn action we take. Fukuyama and Wolfe don’t see that humans are mad creators, constantly reshaping the world through sheer will and chaos.
  • Virtual: The future isn’t written in stone; it’s a realm of unrealized potential, a wild frontier where anything is possible. Fukuyama, in his dim wisdom, declares history dead, while Wolfe’s characters rot in their materialistic graves, oblivious to the infinite possibilities they ignore.
  • Imaginary: Human ambition isn’t just about tangible achievements; it’s driven by illusions, dreams, and myths. Fukuyama and Wolfe cling to simplistic narratives, failing to see that reality is just a smokescreen for the wild dreams that drive us all.
  • Simulacra: In this postmodern circus, the line between reality and representation is blurred, twisted beyond recognition. Fukuyama’s end of history is a mirage, and Wolfe’s heroes are chasing shadows, trapped in a world where nothing is as it seems.
  • Intertextual: Meaning doesn’t come from isolated events; it’s born from the tangled web of references, influences, and connections that span across time and culture. Fukuyama and Wolfe’s narrow views are like horses with blinders, missing the vast intertextual landscape that truly shapes human ambition.
  • Existential: Meaning isn’t handed down from on high; it’s something we carve out of the rock with our own hands. Fukuyama’s deterministic drivel and Wolfe’s materialistic myopia fail to capture the raw, existential truth that human life is a continuous struggle to create meaning from the void.

4. Conclusion:

Fukuyama and Wolfe, those sad devotees of Hegelian determinism, are stuck in a mental swamp, unable to see beyond the narrow confines of their own flawed theories. They reduce the vastness of human ambition to a series of simplistic binaries, missing the rich, chaotic, and unpredictable reality that drives us forward. Continental philosophy, with its nuanced insights into the symbolic, performative, virtual, imaginary, simulacra, intertextual, and existential, cuts through their bullshit, offering a truer, more complex vision of human existence.

This critique isn’t just a takedown of Fukuyama’s and Wolfe’s misguided views; it’s a call to arms—a reminder that human ambition and societal evolution are far too wild, too chaotic, and too damn interesting to be confined to the dreary dictates of Hegelian determinism. If we’re to understand the world, we must embrace its complexities, its contradictions, and its infinite potential for change. Anything less is intellectual cowardice.

This savage dissection aims to tear apart the hollow theories of Fukuyama and Wolfe, exposing the crude determinism at their core and celebrating the chaotic beauty of human ambition.