(no subject)

[arethinn]

Well, to preach that story is conflict, always to ask, "Where's the conflict in your story?"--this needs some thinking about. If you say that story is about conflict, that plot must be based on conflict, you're limiting your view of the world severely. And in a sense making a political statement: that life is conflict, so in stories conflict is all that really matters. This is simply untrue. To see life as a battle is a narrow, social-Darwinist view, and a very masculine one. ... I do try to avoid saying "the fight" for such and such, "the war" against such and such. I resist putting everything into terms of conflict and immediate violent resolution. ... To limit all human behavior to conflict is to leave out vast, rich areas of human experience.

(Ursula K. Le Guin, Conversations On Writing)

Comments

[chalcedony_starlings]

[αβ] It feels kind of like “where's the cadences in this music”. An awful lot of music has them, and it's an important structural element in widespread styles, but if you try to delimit music that way then you run into problems.

[arethinn]

Funny you say that because nearby was a passage about the rhythm of prose.

[zeeth_kyrah]

I have but one word to say: "kishōtenketsu". :)

[arethinn]

"Missing tree bookstore"?

Neither Google nor Wikipedia is being a lot of help with actual understanding here.

[zeeth_kyrah]

The references I find now and then on story patterns say that this word refers to a story without conflict, considered a uniquely Asian story pattern by most Westerners.

Here's a note I found (with references in the article): Can You Tell A Story Without Conflict?

[sylvanfae]

Gods, I love that woman.

[arethinn]

Unpopular opinion maybe, but I was ... kind of not thrilled by A Wizard of Earthsea? (lol, I typoed "A Wizzard of Earthsea". That would be something else again...) Not the setting or the descriptions of magic or the writing in general, but like, I found Ged hard to like, is my main recollection. Based on the quotes in this On Writing, though, I need to at least give some other Le Guin books a go.

[sylvanfae]

Yes, do! I don't read her for the storytelling, which waxes and wanes a bit from book to book, but the ideas and perspective are of exquisite quality. She had one of the finest minds I've ever witnessed.