Shockingly Literate

I generally prefer novels to short story collections, but I would read a shopping list if Gaiman penned it.

I received Neil Gaiman’s collection of short stories Fragile Things for Christmas, and I’ve been devouring it rapidly. My favorite so far has been a gem called “Other People.”

The story details a man’s punishment in Hell, where he is physically tortured by a demon. He’s then forced to recount his life aloud again and again, admitting to every bad thing he’s ever done, and then he’s forced to learn the repercussions of his selfishness on other people.

In the end, the torture has left him looking like the demon, a soulless husk, and a new wayward human enters the chamber. The cycle begins anew.

In the forward, Gaiman recounts the doubt he felt upon completion of the story. It felt too circular, too neat to be original. It nagged at the back of his mind. He was sure it must have been a story he’d heard years before and then forgotten. After reading “Other People” to a number of friends, however, no one could name a derivative work.

I think this is a problem all writers face. Whenever I get an idea for a story, if I don’t get it written within a day or two, I usually talk myself out of it. I tell myself it’s too much like this other story or it’s taking too much from this movie.

Art doesn’t exist in a vacuum – everybody draws from their role models and inspirations. What separates us from them, though? How do we differentiate our work, and how do we mark that difference between being inspired by an artist and stealing from them?

I was reading this interview with District 9 director Neill Blomkamp, and he raised a point I found very interesting.

The interviewer made note that District 9 was so surprising because of its originality. It wasn’t based on a comicbook, and it wasn’t a remake. This is increasingly rare in sci-fi and horror films today.

When dealing with aliens, try to be polite, but firm. And always remember that a smile is cheaper than a bullet.

Blomkamp agrees. The director points out that the first question many people ask when they hear about a new movie these days is “Where did it [the idea] come from?” He argues that the most meaningful science fiction didn’t come from watching other films

He goes on to point out that many writers and directors say their stories are influenced by other films. Blomkamp argues that the best sci-fi comes from real life stimulation and experience. Many of the classics were based on the effects of the Cold War, experiences in Vietnam, etc, not just the movies you watched growing up.

This line of thinking really bothers me, as I agree with it, but I fall into the camp whose influences are other authors, not real life experiences. I’ve spent my entire life just going to school and university — that doesn’t make for the most unique or exciting stimuli for story telling.

I know my worries about this can’t be unique. How many other writers are out there whose most influential life experiences came not from life itself, but from their favorite books and movies? Can people like us still tell visceral, important, exciting stories armed only with our own mundane lives and our knowledge of literature and film?

District 9 is an excellent film that does what all good sci-fi should: take a real world issue and reframe it so that people will think about it differently. Just like any intro-level creative writing class will say, it’s a storyteller’s job to hold up a mirror to his or her audience.

Sci-fi writers choose to hold up a fun-house mirror instead, hoping that the distorted image their audience sees will cause them to stop for a second and think about what they’re looking at. Blomkamp holds his mirror up to South African society, but what else is out there that needs a good looking at?