Don't Preach To Me

What do the story of the Tortoise and the Hare and Atlas Shrugged* have in common? They're both stories with messages. And neither is very entertaining. It's relatively common for writers to put in some kind of underlying message in their works, generally to their work's detriment (at least as a story. No one really likes 1984's plot or characterization, but everyone has at least heard of it). I get that writers like to do that in an attempt to create some larger meaning, but I've always found it annoying, especially when things get preachier than one of those old Saturday morning cartoons.

Granted, I'm not one of those people who like talking about philosophy, and it's pretty hard to convince me of anything. I don't go out of my way to find 'political' statements in things, unlike my dad, who was convinced that the Lord of the Rings movies had some kind of liberal agenda. :) But in my experience, people tend to like works that they agree with, and dislike ones that conflict with their existing beliefs.

But the real problem in my mind is that whatever the hell message the author is trying to communicate doesn't really work, especially when the message is on an individual level. I hate to get all after-school special here, but everyone is different. The things that make me happy, the things I want out of life, are going to be different than what other people want out of life, except for a few universal constants. It's pointless to try to tell people what to do when everyone operates under different priorities. 

The absolute worst way for author preaching to enter a story is the voice character. The character who exists for the primary reason to be the author's mouthpiece, to force his opinions on the reader. And because the author controls the world, the world and the plot bends around this character to make sure that he's correct. And, of course, any opposition to this character is strawmanned into idiocy.

To avoid this, I like to make so that I don't agree with my character's viewpoints. To be sure, I try to put a little bit of myself into every major character I write, and I try to make my characters likeable, but that doesn't mean I agree with them, or would do the same actions in their place. In fact, some of my characters are so crazy that I'd be amazed if anyone agreed with them all the time.

However, I break my rule. I created a book with a message, or a theme, or commentary, instead of a focus on just making a great story. It's not an important message, thank goodness, and probably not a very controversial one, but my fantasy novel No More Kings does have such a message. And it's the subject of my next blog post: Classism in Fantasy.



*Lots of people, including some very successful people, like Atlas Shrugged. Maybe you like Objectivism, but come on, it's horrible when it tries to stand on its merits as a novel. It has a fifty page written manifesto in it! Ugh.