Panoramic Sentimentality

Pity is cheap.

It costs little to evoke and costs little to give.  It has little lasting effect and really does not move the reader.  It does not pull the reader in.  In fact, I think that it is a defensive mechanism to keep your distance.

I’ve seen a battle aftermath using omniscient where the writer tried to evoke sorrow for the destruction by touch a bunch of seemingly random people.  It was a panoramic melodrama – complete with all the typical clichés – the children trying to wake their dead father, a girl weeping over a blood-soaked letter from her dead fiancé and on and on.

This was his opening chapter and the main character only got a paragraph at the end.  With all the wandering images, there was no time to establish or truly show these people and their backgrounds so the writer was stuck with telling, head hopping, narrative downloads and cliché sentimentality.

The victims are tragic and we feel sorry for them (note, this is best case scenario) but don’t want to share their pain.  Besides, especially from several people, it can be overwhelming.  We’re watching it from a distance, but not living it.

Every time you jump to a new head there’s not only the risk of confusion, but we are reminded that it is just a story, that we are whisked around by a narrator – like Scrooge glimpsing scenes in A Christmas Carol.

I think of what the prince in Everafter said – “I thought that if I cared for anything I’d have to care for everything and I’d go stark raving mad.”  So he found a purpose instead – a focused thread that he could live for and experience.

Some people may argue for narrative explanations and at times, it is good because other routes would be tedious.  Particularly for a younger audience, I see lots of it.

However, it is generally regarded as a short cut.  Usually a short cut to that emotional response – which usually results in pity instead of empathy.

Empathy is what I aim for.  To have my reader bond with one or two characters and share their lives for a time – share their emotions and senses.

These days, everyone wants to evoke a response from the reader/viewer – emotional or physical.  Your readers are bombarded with it – everyone trying to manipulate them in one way or another.  As a survival instinct, we close off and are more and more selective about what we react to.

I can see so much of the manipulations coming and I’m so much the resistant skeptic.  Sure, I humor people – marketers, presenters, books etc. etc., but if it feels weak I’m good at keeping my distance. I may not say much to the person, but my Husband is sure to hear the shredding, complete with a heavy dose of sarcasm.

As a writer, I want to move my readers – I want to touch them and provoke them to think about things.  Therefore, I don’t want it to be obvious of what I’m doing lest they block me at every turn.

I want to be more subtle, drawing my readers in, luring them into caring about my characters and then hooking them where they can’t turn away.  Granted, that’s an ideal and I have much to learn – I admit it – but I don’t want my readers to be able to distance themselves from my characters.  So I try to avoid the obvious short-cuts and telling.

Of course, I may have shot myself in the foot by making my star character an empathetic… but that’s why I try to show most everything and in a tense moment, I shy away from internal thoughts and explanations.  Even when I’m in the character’s POV, I try to show the character react without filling in all the gaps.

My Husband is a programmer and particularly in web design one of the rules impressed on him is “just because you can doesn’t mean you should” (note, “less is more” is another one). Just because we explore the heads of all the characters doesn’t mean it will add to the plot or story. More often than not it will clutter and distract.

As a writer, you can’t cover everything – you have to be selective.  It’s the same as with the number of characters you employ. Choose wisely and follow through.

You tell me, what lives longer in one’s memory, handing money to the beggar on the street corner, or serving a meal in a soup kitchen? – or even mowing the lawn of your neighbor who broke their hip?

Take the time to make it specific and memorable and junk the panoramic sentimentality.