In this video I answer a question from a viewer (PickUpYourPantsPatrol).
Can you make a video on atheist special pleading? More specifically God needing a cause but the universe is allowed to be causeless (Despite the fact that it’s always naturalists who argue this)
Cheah Kai Wai (Benjamin Cheah) and I had a conversation about the pulp revolution, writing, story construction, and other related topics.
It was a fun conversation. Benjamin is Singaporean, so it was also very interesting to get his perspective on stories and genres that are influential on both of our writing, but from a different cultural background.
For a while I’d been running a podcast which was the audio of my YouTube videos, but because of a problem in wordpress’s API for file uploads, it’s just too much of a pain in the neck right now, so for the foreseeable future I’m not going to be uploading the podcast.
(I am planning to make posts which embed the YouTube video, which is far less work for me than extracting the audio and uploading it.)
Of all the kinds of murder mysteries, I think that the murder for revenge is the least fun. The basic problem with them, if it can be called that, is that they necessarily leave justice improperly served. That’s not quite entirely true, as it is possible for the death to be a justified killing, as in Murder on the Orient Express. In that case, though, the killer must not be convicted for murder. If that happens, justice has been served but in figuring out what happened the detective is mostly only satisfying his own curiosity. That can be an interesting story, but it lacks the satisfaction of the detective using reason to put right what was put wrong through a misuse of reason.
The Adventure of the Cardboard Box is very much a tale of revenge. If you haven’t read it, the short version is that Holmes is called in to a case where a respectable woman was sent a box filled with salt and in the salt were two severed human ears. Holmes does some detection and realizes that the ears are those of the youngest sister of the woman and the man with whom she was adulterating her marriage; her (now former) husband was the killer. It turned out that the package was not meant for the oldest sister, however, but for the middle sister. The middle sister, who had been in love with her sister’s husband, tried to seduce him, and failing this, had turned her sister against her husband and then introduced her sister to a captivating man she fell in love with. Holmes directs Lestrade where to find the husband, who is a sailor. Lestrade was, at first, worried because the husband was a large man, but he was haunted by what he had done and had given up living. He went in and gave a full confession, which Lestrade sent a copy of to Holmes, and fills in many of the details.
The story ends with some thoughts on the story by Holmes:
“What is the meaning of it, Watson?” said Holmes solemnly as he laid down the paper. “What object is served by this circle of misery and violence and fear? It must tend to some end, or else our universe is ruled by chance, which is unthinkable. But what end? There is the great standing perennial problem to which human reason is as far from an answer as ever.”
The Adventure of the Cardboard Box was originally published in Strand magazine in 1893, which places it among the first Holmes stories published and among those short stories which made Sherlock Holmes so famous and popular. Its contents were so shocking, however, that for a time it was removed from publication and was not collected in the collection of short stories called The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes. When it was removed, an initial section in which Holmes mind-reads Watson (in imitation of Edgar Allen Poe’s C. Auguste Dupin) was transferred to The Adventure of the Resident Patient.
It is, perhaps, a commentary on the great principles and sensitivity of our forebears that it was later published in the 1917 collection of Holmes stories, His Last Bow, in America, and added to later additions of The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes (first published in late 1893, where the rest of the Holmes short stories published in 1893 were collected). It took twenty one years to conclude that people were now so bad that they would not be corrupted by contemplating the sins described in the story.
It is a rather strange story, all things considered. It is pathetic, in the original sense of the word—creating pathos. It involves a certain amount of detection, but overall not a very great amount. In fact, Holmes says so himself:
Holmes scribbled a few words upon the back of one of his visiting cards and threw it over to Lestrade.
“That is the name,” he said. “You cannot effect an arrest until to-morrow night at the earliest. I should prefer that you do not mention my name at all in connection with the case, as I choose to be only associated with those crimes which present some difficulty in their solution.
Holmes solved it more quickly than the police did, of course, but it is likely they would have eventually found the solution, too. When Mary was reported as missing, they would have gone to look for her husband. He had given up on living, and confessed as soon as he was able. When they went to ask him about his wife, it is doubtful that he would not have confessed then. Alternatively, Sarah would at some time have come out of her “brain fever” and, since she was motivated by hate for her brother in law after he spurned her, she would in all probability have gone to the police and accused him.
In any event, finding out that a husband killed his wife in a fit of rage for her adultery is… a story without any twists. About the only twist in the entire story is that the box was only addressed by the initial, S, which both the older and middle sister shared, and since the middle sister had quit the premises recently, it was assumed that it was meant for the older sister when it was, in fact, meant for the middle sister.
It’s not a bad story, all told, though I do actually agree with the people who decided not to republish it that it is not really a story that people need to read. There are two types of good stories: the celebration of virtue and the lament of vice. This story does qualify as the second, but not in a useful way. It may, perhaps, be of some use as a warning to women who fall in love with their sisters’ husbands that nothing good will come of turning their sister against their husband then luring her into adultery with another man, but I’m not sure this is a warning many people need.
And the story has some real flaws in it. For example, the husband who committed the murders describes the three sisters, “There were three sisters altogether. The old one was just a good woman, the second was a devil, and the third was an angel.” Angels are not so easily manipulated into being unfaithful to their husbands.
Granted, the characterization is given by a broken man who has not been shown to have great judgment, but at the same time this is towards the beginning of a long explanation and is never challenged. Worse, the pathos of the story depends, to some degree, on the wife being angelic and innocent in spite of her obviously culpable sins. Framed properly, the story really offers no insight into human nature past the observation that if everyone is bad, the results will be bad. It’s not wrong, precisely. It’s just that I don’t see what good wallowing in it does. We already know that the evil man brings evil out of the evil stored in his heart. That the bad tree goes not produce good fruit.
And so we come again to Sherlock Holmes’ question at the end of the story.
“What is the meaning of it, Watson?” said Holmes solemnly as he laid down the paper. “What object is served by this circle of misery and violence and fear? It must tend to some end, or else our universe is ruled by chance, which is unthinkable. But what end? There is the great standing perennial problem to which human reason is as far from an answer as ever.”
There is an element of hope here, but not much of one. This non-answer could really have been improved upon a great deal; if nothing else he could have quoted the parable of the wheat and the tares. Even if the answer was not accepted, merely entertaining it would have been an improvement over this blank mystification.
As a curious side-note, at the time the story would have been set cardboard was a relatively recent invention, though that depends in part on what sort of cardboard it was. The two main candidates are paperboard (the sort of thing cereal boxes are made of) and corrugated fiberboard (probably better known as corrugated cardboard). The first paperboard boxes were readily available in the 1860s. Corrugated fiberboard was developed in the 1870s.
The Holmes stories were often set before their publication, many of them in the 1870s or possibly the 1880s. Cardboard would have been a relatively new thing, though not a complete novelty. Then again, it may possibly be an anachronism; by 1893 it would have been common enough that it would no longer feel new and Conan Doyle might, taking it for granted, not have bothered to remember when it first came into use.
From the comedians Tripp and Tyler, we have Regular People Stunts:
It’s funny, but there’s an interesting point to it, too, which is that with a combination of great camera work, good editing, good acting, and intense music, they make very ordinary things look amazing. It’s a lesson about what one sees on television and in movies, and how much of it is really what you’re seeing versus how it’s presented.
Nearly anything can be a good setting for a murder mystery, but I’ve been thinking of late of how to select fun settings. One of the great archetypal settings for a murder is a mansion. My own survey over golden age detective fiction is that murders in a mansion—especially during dinner parties—are not nearly as common as they are iconic. I think that they’re iconic for two main reasons.
The first reason that a mansion is iconic for a murder mystery is that it’s a closed environment. The ability to exactly identify all of the suspects makes the problem fit in one’s head better, and also promises that a solution is available. The other reason is that a mansion would be a really fun place to visit. One wouldn’t necessarily want to live in a mansion, it certainly has its downsides. But one does not read a book forever. In a book one necessarily only visits, and a mansion would be a ton of fun to visit.
Looked at this way, Murder on the Orient Express, which I think everyone will agree has one of the great settings in murder mysteries, has these properties. A train is a closed environment, at least when between stations. (Yes, a person might slip out of the train, but then someone might slip out of a window in a mansion. It’s even harder in a train than it would be in a mansion.) Equally important, the Orient Express was a piece of high luxury that few of us could ever afford.
Of the two, I think that the second reason is probably more important than the first. A closed group of suspects is interesting, but it is by no means the only interesting possibility. Even if a person is murdered in a crowded train station, one tends to suspect only those people who actually had a connection to the victim. It has a different feel, to be sure, but it makes for perfectly good stories.
And, to be fair, a boring setting can still host a fascinating murder mystery. The Adventure of the Clapham Cook comes to mind as an example—Poirot is called in because of a missing cook and his investigations largely center around a suspicious border in the extra room of this not very interesting house. That said, that even the apparently ordinary can lead to something extraordinary is the theme of the story; its being an exception is not lost on the story itself.
My own two murder mysteries are set in a college campus that’s mostly deserted because of winter break and a large (public) conservatory and botanical garden. The mystery I’m working on at the moment, tentatively titled He Didn’t Drown in the Lake, is set in a camp resort in the Adirondack mountains of upstate New York and promises to be a lot of fun. The one after that will be set at a Renaissance faire next to a Monastery, which takes its name from is neighbor, Saint Anselm’s Fair. None of these settings is opulant, but each is interesting, I think. The university on break has something of the feel of a mansion, though the field of suspects is much wider than the guests at a dinner party. The conservatory also has the mansion feel and, if you discount a stranger jumping the fence, does have the closed list of suspects. There is the difficulty that a conservatory is a very visual place, though, which—even if superbly described—doesn’t carry over as well in a book as it would in a movie. The resort camp should be quite a lot of fun. It may not be the height of luxury, but it is certainly the sort of place I would love to go. The Renaissance fair is a bit different, as after all anyone with fifteen dollars plus gas money can go to one, but it should be a really fascinating and fun place to be.
I think that after that I should probably go to someplace expensive, for a change. It will be a minor difficulty that I’ve never personally been to anyplace very expensive, but then most readers won’t have, either, so at least they won’t be in a position to spot my mistakes. It should also be a fun contrast with the friars who’ve taken vows of poverty, investigating.
In a very interesting blog post, Cheah Kit Sun explains why Chinese is a language uniquely suited for writing epic fantasy. It’s a good post and I recommend reading the whole thing. The short short version is that the Chinese language is packed with tons of meaning in each word, for various reasons but especially because etymology influences meaning.
To give a little bit of his post to show what he means:
Upon hearing the order, he answers, “弟子遵命!”
In English, this is usually translated as “Understood!” or “I will obey!”. But in Chinese, spoken as dizi zunming, it carries huge connotations.
弟子 means ‘disciple’ or ‘follower’. By using this term to refer to himself in the third person, Jiang demonstrates humility, and acknowledges and reinforces his relationship with [those who gave the order]. The word ‘弟’ means ‘younger brother’. More than just a student, he is considered part of the family. In classical Chinese etiquette, laid down by Confucius, everyone has duties to uphold to their social betters and inferiors. As the younger brother, he is expected to immediately and faithfully carry out all orders from his superiors. In turn, his elders are expected to nurture him, as if he were their younger brother.
遵命 is usually translated as ‘obey orders’ or ‘follow orders’. 遵 is to comply, to follow, to obey. It is also a homophone of 尊, to respect, honour and revere. 命 is an abbreviation of 命令, to ‘order’ and ‘command’. 命, by itself, means ‘life’.
These four words are spoken with literary meter and deep conviction. This line is not merely a soldier acknowledging an order. Terse and forceful, it is a warrior sage paying homage to his superiors, demonstrating humility, upholding the Chinese social contract, and speaking his convictions.
This is in keeping with other things that Benjamin (Kit Sun) has said when explaining the connotations which Chinese etymology imbue words. (For example, see my post Benjamin Kit Sun Cheah on Wuxia which quotes a Twitter thread of his.)
He’s also correct that English words frequently change meaning and that their etymology is not often revealing. It’s worse than this, since there is such a broad swatch of English speakers, every English word has been used to mean a wide variety of things. On the plus side, English speakers are fairly used to words being given specific definitions, so one strength of English is that it’s possible to develop specific definitions of a word and then use it that way to convey fine shades of meaning, even within a paragraph.
But what is the English speaker to do when he wants to convey a lot of meaning in a few words? Context is key, but English words don’t come with their own context.
There are two basic solutions, and really only one of them is available in fantasy writing (unless it’s urban fantasy).
The better, but less universally available approach, is reference, typically by quoting snippets. The most common sorts of references used to be from the bible because one could rely on people being familiar with it. For example, if you were to have the commander of an army be told that the village he’s about to attack is, in truth, not in the fight, and he replies, “Truth? What is truth?” That would convey a great deal about that commander.
Shakespeare is also common, even if he’s not always quoted correctly, as anyone who’s seen the phrase “the lady doth protest too much, methinks”. (In The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, the queen meant that the character in the play made too many vows, since at the time to “protest” was to assert something to be true, and the character was vowing that she would never remarry if her husband died. It did not mean that she objected to something too often.)
Interestingly, the common misquotation of Shakespeare with regard to protesting itself offers layers of meaning. It can be quoted correctly, which would also convey aspects of having actually read Shakespeare, or in the common way, which adds ambiguity. In either case, you can get a lot of meaning out of a few words not only because of the original referent, but also because of the intermediate referents.
The field for quotation is quite wide, of course. Consider the opening to Alexander Pope’s famous poem:
A little learning is a dangerous thing ;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring :
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
And drinking largely sobers us again.
It would be possible to convey quite a lot of meaning with just the words “a little learning”.
One cannot make use of quotations in high fantasy, though. In period fantasy (set in a historical timeplace) one would be quite restricted to giving characters words that might possibly have gotten to them; it would be a bit egregious to have a medieval knight quote a man who won’t be born for centuries (whether you’re talking about Shakespeare or Pope). So what is an English author to do in this case?
The solution here is to develop one’s own references. This can be part of world building—working into the narrative the stories that all children are told as they are growing up—or it can be part of the narrative itself, giving people noteworthy phrasings at critical moments that can be referred to later.
The phrasing must be noteworthy in order to be referenceable. Imagine how hard it would be to reference the annunciation if Gabriel had only said, “hello” and Mary had only said, “OK”, rather than “Hail, full of grace” and “Behold the handmaid of the Lord. Be it done unto me according to thy word.” But, to be clear, the noteworthy aspect in this is not the archaic language that is commonly quoted. Even if one went with a more contemporary translation, such as from the New Jerusalem Bible, “Rejoice, you who enjoy God’s favour!” and “You see before you the Lord’s servant, let it happen to me as you have said.” If one is referencing something, using the actual words of the quote is important; my point here is that if the words of this momentous occasion were commonly translated into contemporary English like that of the New Jerusalem Bible’s translation, they would be just as possible to reference. The key is that the way the thing is said must not be the most common way, and it can’t (with rare exception) be single words.
A good example of this comes from the movie The Princess Bride. The beginning fairy tale backstory builds up the meaning of “as you wish”, such that the phrase can convey tremendous meaning later on in the story, and can even be the grandfather’s way of telling his grandson how much he loves him at the end. That ending bears some examination to make my present meaning clear, btw. The phrase “as you wish” is not merely code for “I love you”, as if the original words don’t mean anything and are just an index into a code book, like one might have found during World War II. Instead, the grandfather is conveying the one level of meaning, “I love you” but also another layer of meaning, that the two now share the bond of shared knowledge. Another layer is that bond of friendship of both loving the same thing, together. There is even the layer of meaning that the two have gone through something together—the grandfather reading a story to an at-first unwilling grandson, and persevering through the grandson’s initial resistance, snarky comments, etc. The literal meaning of the phrase is also a layer of meaning, that the Grandfather is respecting the child’s will now, though he mostly wasn’t at the beginning, when his grandson would rather have been watching video games. Having gone through the story, the grandson has now matured enough that he can make his own decision about whether he would like it read a second time. Yet another layer of meaning is reflected in the structure of the containing story, where the child is growing up with modern things, like the video game he was playing when he was told his grandfather had arrived to read him a story; there is a gap between the generations. The grandfather gives him the book wrapped up, and when the kid opens it he is disappointed. “A book?” he says, incredulous. He had expected something he would recognize as giving pleasure. The grandfather replies, “That’s right. When I was your age, television was called ‘books,’ and this is a special book. It was the book my father used to read to me when I was sick and I used to read it to your father, and today I’m going to read it to you.” In the end, that words from the book convey meaning from grandfather to grandchild means that this gap has been bridged. Not a shabby amount of meaning for three words to convey.
Chris Lansdown 