On nights in workshop, when no one brings pages, we just talk. But instead of talking about book and writing, we tend to talk about movies. This week, someone rented a copy of the documentary movie Trekkies, and I watched it with friends.
It’s still just storytelling. Almost everything is storytelling in some form. So, why not borrow the techniques and forms from other, real-world stories, and use those forms to tell our stories?
Watching Trekkies, you could rattle off a dozen different “textures” of information or types of story telling. We have the main, through-line characters – including the fourteen-year-old, who acts as our guide through all things Star Trek. He appears and disappears during the show, resurfacing usually to introduce a new aspect of the story, or to physically lead the camera through a journey along a convention floor. Otherwise, he forms a broken, or interrupted, but otherwise on-going story that spans the entire film.
It’s interesting, but despite how much time we spend with “the kid,” his name never sticks in my mind. Please note how unimportant names can be to a good character. In the film, we’ll recall the kid’s passion and his language, even his hair and obsession with costumes, but seldom his name. So keep in mind, the actions and language and appearance of a character is what the audience is more likely to retain. Names are over-rated.
Another “texture” of information are the short “anecdotes” told my people who appear just once. Some are famous people, some known by their real names, like Leonard Nemoy. But more are known by their character names. Like Scotty. And still others, we know only by their strange costume or the story they present.
Still another texture is the “tour” sequences, where the audience is lead through a Star Trek convention floor, among tables of items for sale. Or we’re led through a dentist’s office decorated in a Star Trek theme. Or a couple’s home, decorated to look like an episode.
Still, another texture of information is a “collage” of visual images, quick shots set to music or voice over. Another texture is segments of “how-to” information, when someone demonstrates a process or skill – like the man singing “Klingon folks songs.”
My point is that the documentary is a mix of storytelling forms, cut so quickly that no single form has to carry too much weight. If something bores the audience, there’s always a new “act” to replace it. Every few seconds, the texture varies. In that way, the Trekkies documentary mimics vaudeville or variety shows.
My point is – why shouldn’t books do that?
Just consider the different forms of written or oral storytelling:
Recipes. Recipes work great in stories, nothing new there. From the cooking in Heartburn to the explosives in Fight Club, that’s still recipes.
Lists. From the faded guest list in The Great Gatsby, to the name-dropped list of celebrities in Glamourama. Here’s a way to introduce a lot of proper nouns that form a kind-of poetry. It can imply a real-world sense of non-fiction, by using actual people. Or it can imply the sense of time passing, as Fitzgerald does, his list representing a summer of many parties that all melt together in the narrator’s mind.
Definitions. Inventing words and defining them by context and usage.
Consider also epitaphs, graffiti, poetry. Jargon. Slogans. Advertising. All the non-fiction forms of dictionaries and encyclopedias. The call and response of religious ceremonies. Anecdotes. Speeches. The staging or camera directions built into screenplays. Prayers and magic spells. Those little “fabric care” labels sewn into your clothes. The legal warnings printed on a pack of cigarettes. Dance instructions. Street directions. Tour guide speeches. Greeting card messages. Fortune cookie fortunes. T-shirt sayings. Tattoos.
You might not want to write an entire novel in tattoos, but they could make a good device for transitioning from one topic or scene to the next.
Consider name tags – “Patricia Runningbear” -- as very short stories. Photo captions. Headlines. Autopsy reports. School report cards. Even the stuff that people write with their finger, in the dirt on your car, that’s a form of written story telling. Even the language of classified ads in the newspaper. The billboards on a freeway. Junk mail. Chain letters.
You have rules – which worked great in Fight Club. Pledges. Vows. Contracts. All of them, just different forms of non-fiction storytelling.
The point is to be aware of the countless textures available, and to use them to vary your work. Consider this as “sampling,” the way a DJ might record real-world noises or speeches and mix them into music. Instead of just a single running “little voice” or “big voice” narrative, present your information in textures you “borrow” from other less-traditional forms of storytelling.
By using a variety of different textures to tell your story, you don’t just keep the reader’s interest. You also borrow the credibility of the real-world device. You establish authority by borrowing forms that have authority. And you help ground your story in a sense of the real world. Another spooky side-effect, is how you can undermine the authority of the original, real-world device. By using the coded public announcements in Choke, I hoped I could make people question any future announcements they’d hear in airports or hospitals. In that same book, the clocks that use fake bird calls to tell time – those clocks have undermined the credibility of the real birds.
For homework, watch some documentaries, and inventory the different forms of storytelling. I’ve noticed that independent documentary folks are much more creative than Hollywood feature film people, especially when it comes to depicting a story from several angles, in a non-linear way, keeping it interesting despite the “talking head” nature of the information. There’s not much action, so the storytelling forms become even more important.
For another good example of textures, take a look at Stephen King’s Carrie, and how he samples and mixes non-fiction forms to document the disastrous prom.
Then, be aware of all the textures of storytelling you encounter in a day, a week, two weeks. At Starbucks, this week, they’ve set up these small video monitors that pay endless looping infomercials of people making coffee at home. Folks standing in line, waiting to order, they have to face these video testimonials for Starbucks coffee-brewing machines. Occasionally, the overhead music pauses, and a soothing voice says something like, “You’re listening to the Starbucks music channel…” and gives directions for buying the day’s ambient music.
My point is not to bitch about this constant wallpaper of story and message – hell, even the birds singing outside are just storytelling: “I need a mate. This is my nest.” The point is to recognize new textures or devices and borrow them for telling your stories.
Well, pin a medal on me. “Guts” has been nominated for a best short story award by the Horror Writers of America. I’ll be in Los Angeles in late June, to do a reading and – maybe – get an award. Nothing sounds like more fun than a weekend spent with a crowd of horror writers. Actually, the whole event sounds like the set-up for a slasher movie. For more information, check out www.horror.org.
By the time you read this, book tour will be half over. In closing, I hope to see you in person, soon. And thank you for reading my work.
About the author
Chuck Palahniuk is author of the novels Fight Club, Survivor, Invisible Monsters, Choke, Lullaby, Diary, Haunted, Rant, Snuff, Pygmy, Tell-All, Damned, Doomed, and the upcoming Beautiful You. He also has two non-fiction books, the Portland travel memoir Fugitives & Refugees and the collection of true stories, essays, and interviews, Stranger Than Fiction.
