In chapter one, the character I describe in chapter two becomes a different person, whose story I begin in chapter three.
Right now, I'm a character being described in chapter two. Soon, I will enter chapter one. Then, I will have my story spun, and that will begin chapter three.
When an imaginary person achieves position in my mind as a main character for a novel, I consider the way their life must change for them to take part in the event that begins in chapter three.
Right now, I am considering the way my life must change for me to take part in the event that begins in chapter three. However, I have no way of knowing what that event might be. Somehow, this is wrong.
At the end of chapter three, the main character makes a decision. It is a big decision.
Right now, I would like to make a big decision, but it feels that instead of being in a new position, entering into a new story, I'm being made to wait. So, I cannot make my big decision yet. But, at some point, it will be made.
Chapter four sees the main character in a new world... Chapter four needs to introduce a second main character. The primary main character must interact with the new character. The new character must present a conflict.
Right now, I have dreams about a second main character, who will be my ambassador from the new world, with whom I can interact. It matters not that they might introduce into my life a conflict of sorts -- that is a hill to be climbed -- but without that second main character I feel rudderless. There are no big decisions and there are no presented conflicts.
I like the verb present in this sentence, because of it spikes trace semantic memories of the noun present, and the state of being present. The conflict is a gift. The conflict forces one to be present, to perceive life as it is.
Chapter four ends on a down beat... Our main character has a new life. We experience a walking tour of that new life. We walk a mile in the main character's shoes.
Right now, a new life sounds quite nice. It is not that my life at present is bad, I simply accept that change is a blessing, like growing pains. Right now, I feel no growing pains, so it is likely that I am not growing. A lack of growth is a source of conflict in itself, but not one that is present. Even a down beat, in a new life, sounds better than right now.
Chapter five is the most important chapter in the book... In chapter five, I introduce the reader to a character -- The Other Primary Main Character -- who is as interesting as the main character of the novel.
Right now, I am too self-containing, and therefore -- forgive me -- self-constraining, to receive into my life The Other Primary Main Character. I lack the individual force to meet this Other. That is because I have not yet made my big decision nor have I been presented with conflict by way of The First Main Character. I am confident that my view will shift outwards to such a degree that I can face up to The Other with dignity, with daring, come the time.
We are at the nucleus of the novel. My goal is to manufacture a necessity: the Second Main Character and the First Main Character must need to meet.
That would be nice. Is it my goal now to shape the Second Main Character? Or do I simply have to sharpen my discernment such that I'll know for sure it's them when we meet? Perhaps there isn't any need to do anything at all. I am left swaddled by questions about conflicts and even bigger questions and the absence of The First Main Character in my life.
How do they meet? Why do they meet? Chapter five is not a self-containing chapter because, despite the Second Main Character's deep and interesting uniqueness, they are a slave to the First Main Character's destiny.
I fear my destiny might not be so potent as to overwhelm that of another. But perhaps I am mistaken. There were within me, maybe an hour or so ago, deep swells of attention for the monadic substance of Life itself, on which I failed to capitalise. The next expression of such a thing I'm sure will be momentous and must be seized. Perhaps then my fatefulness might have weight to demand service of others. Is there a plausibly libidinal element siphoning itself into the future here?
Sometimes, you want characters to find plots, or for plots to find characters. This takes time. At the end of this time, you need to look at the plots and characters and extract events. You need to know the beginning and the end of your story.
Most certainly, everyone I know is a character trying to find plots. It is a relief to know that it takes time, but it always did take time, and in fact time is taking from us as 'it' takes from time, so there are no winners here. Only takers. I don't want to think about the end of this time. It's impossible to know its end, and the beginning (and up until now, even) I can barely recall.
Dust on the mantlepiece. My bony arse embedded into this sofa cushion. My body expectant. The end feels very near and very far, like running to the seafront across a long beach.
I want (hypothetical) you to read my novel and think, "Wow, why did that person do that?"
It disconcerts me, the tendency I have to regress to a past self -- in mind -- and through deduction, carry out a post-mortem on their actions. I try to package neatly my forward charge through life into manifestable, thought-out decisions and unconscious, sharpened instincts. Their culmination overlaps but is also concerned and observed by a silent third-party. This third-party toys with all other things as a cat does a string, as it dances from a stick. This third-party is also holding the stick.
There is good fortune. Incoming to me, I am not so sure. But there is good fortune, and all of it is thoughtless. Why it does that, and why it engenders the actions that we then go on to question, is unanswerable. Best to remove the whys and render them as statements. This is a secret trick for profundity. Use it with discernment.
The sixth and final chapter is the product of sometimes months or years of consideration. During these months or years I hold a monolithic final image in my head. I understand who the characters are in the story. I know that they will meet either by fate or purpose. I know the world in which they live. I do not know why they will meet. However, I know that fate has its own ideas of what must happen when two people meet, whyever they meet. Over months or years, I make compact fate.
The monolithic final image is agonisingly simple. Like the first monolith that comes to mind -- Kubrick's deep black block of 2001 -- this image is uniform. It is static and potent and can be rendered too as a standard goal, ready for pursual. I am at the eight-point scale weighing up the options, each of the eight a shifting star, bursting gas; brutally dense one moment, then decaying to the negative next -- light years are sped up to moments. All eight in this dance suggest quantum equilibrium. Undrinking the physics juice, I'm basically unsure. My image as of yet remains unsure, moreover, it lacks the definite, universal clarity for its pursual. It isn't ready. I am not ready. The ending is not now. But it will be.
By way of fate or purpose or the ideas of fate or the shove of purpose or the charging forward of narrative some end will fall upon me from above and finish my story. It will charge the world I live in and hold it accountable for my treatment and this paltry existence will be vindicated, in silence, in a closed room with trenchant bureaucratic regulations pinned on the door, but a party inside, for only the prosecutors to attend. Then, they'll invite the witnesses, and party harder. And the lawyers. And the judges. And the courtroom. And I'll remain outside, unaware of my ending, of its fairness -- was I tragic? Or ugly.
I am a man laid out on a carpet of atoms, and in their caprice, they leave me. There is nothing left to touch.
Eggshells on the side of the road, a chick takes a first few steps, unfearful. The car comes plummeting adjacently. The chick hasn't the time to see the harbin- And it's gone.
Is there much possibility of shaping one's own life like a novelist shapes their characters? Is there any merit in going through the motions in such a manner? Am I merely attempting to streamline the process of living, such that it can be wrapped up at its end and delivered to another as present? What will it be that I think, working through life in such a way? I like that I know nothing at all on the matter of these questions. Accordingly, the next step is to brave the territory beyond the dialectic of question and answer.
notes
- Not really sure what this is but I like the ending sentence.
- I feel quite lost in life and ashamed of my stasis.
- Tomorrow I fly to Morocco - or today I should say. Perhaps that will force a change. In other news, I did a bad thing yesterday.