Eccentric Flower:200907/Challenging the Audience
From Eccentric Flower
Challenging the Audience
A Making Light post encapsulates some more of the Lovelace/Babbage cartoons (read "Lovelace - The Origin!" first), and those are great (Lovelace's thought bubbles are always the best part), but I found myself distracted by a post in the ML comments from Mike Leung, which I quote in part:
I have a problem with this. "Showing the audience that the [writer|artist|performer] is thinking" reads to me like "showing off." As much as I love these comics (I am tempted to call Sydney Padua a minor genius), let's face it, a guest appearance from Isambard Kingdom Brunel is not just a joke the average human wouldn't get; it's a joke some of the well-informed people who read these words will have to look up. It's funny as hell, but only to a very few.
[EDIT: I can't decide where this addendum goes since it both refers to the graf above and the one below, but: Unlike Padua I do not consider the set-theory thought bubble or "Sterling Engine" to be failed gags; in fact that was my favorite panel of the cartoon. Sure, the set-theory gag is obscure, but if she'd left it out, the comic would be the poorer for it.]
I'm not saying all jokes should be reduced to the least common denominator, because then we would have nothing but Farrelly Bros. films until the end of time. I'm just saying that I disagree with the prioritization in the quote above: I believe that challenging the audience to think should always be a far higher goal than showing the audience I am thinking. One of the reasons my stories are often painfully oblique is that I want you to figure it out. All my best stories contain riddles to one degree or another; it's the best way I know to engage the reader, to invest them in the story.
I don't say I do a good job of this; in fact, there's a long-standing referendum going on whether my stories are too oblique, one which has essentially severed relations with a friend of mine, among other casualties. But I feel it is far better to risk being too oblique than to risk being too direct; the latter, to my mind, leaves the reader with nothing to do except follow along for the ride. If you do that, then you had better have a lot of confidence in the thrill level of your ride.
If you are, in fact, making me think, then, by definition, you would have to be thinking as well.
This has always been my premise. Although I suppose I could be making someone think about what a bad writer I am!
(Heaven knows that's what I was thinking the last time I went near a Dan Brown book. One of my worries about the universe: What if the audience really IS as dumb as Dan Brown thinks they are?)
-- 20:33, 15 July 2009 (BST)
There's been a running commentary in this household about the dumbing down of America. It began with that new MS app called TuneSmith. Suddenly, anyone, anywhere, who can push a button and utter sounds into a microphone can sing. I was appalled, horrified, numbed at the very idea. Doesn't talent count, anymore?? I ask you!
But Sean said hey, it's just another tool, and those who have talent already will be able to exploit it. And, meanwhile, those who don't will be able to participate on some level.
The thing is, this application blatantly acknowledges that there's a vast population out there who are... non-musical. I suppose you could say that Dan Brown is acknowledging the intelligence level of the general population, and he might not be wrong. But shouldn't he, therefore, be trying to stimulate them to use their heads, rather than pandering to their mediocrity for the filthy lucre? He's made a fortune, so I guess he's the smarter, all right.
-- 21:56, 15 July 2009 (BST)
No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people.
-- 22:49, 15 July 2009 (BST)
Note that Carlin is not showing the audience what he knows, he is showing them what he is thinking about (often obscure thoughts about quite mundane things).
These are very different things.
-- 22:20, 29 July 2009 (BST)
Bunny42:
Okay, here goes...
"I believe that challenging the audience to think should always be a far higher goal than showing the audience I am thinking."
If you are, in fact, making me think, then, by definition, you would have to be thinking as well. It's a given. I think... I much prefer cerebral, esoteric, arcane humor to, say, slapstick. Although there's much to be said for timing. Dick Van Dyke falling over an ottoman, that's funny, no matter how many times he does it. His timing is superb. But I'd rather be challenged to "get it." And if it takes me a moment or two, and then it dawns on me, and I break into a huge grin, well, that's magical.
Sean's been bitching, lately, about Dan Brown's penchant for leading his readers by the nose into the next "thrilling" chapter. The foreshadowing at the end of a chapter, stuff like "Little did he know that, only hours from now, this knowledge would save his life." As if his readers are too numb to pick up this tidbit on their own, so he has to explain it. Obviously, HE'S thinking, but he seems to figure we're not bright enough to "get it" unless he smacks us with a clue-by-four. Brown must know his audience, though, because I'm sure he's crying about such criticism, all the way to the bank.
-- 19:21, 15 July 2009 (BST)