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Thread: Originality of a Literary Piece.

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    Registered User Goodfella's Avatar
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    Question Originality of a Literary Piece.

    Hello!
    My people, what do you think has a direct effect on any novel to loss it's originality as a good literary work among the follwing:
    Setting. Plot. Characterization. Conflict. Suspense. etc
    Why did make it so? How?

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    Vincit Qui Se Vincit Virgil's Avatar
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    Good question. It's probably a combination of all. I think a book can get away with one aspect being similar to other books, but when multiple aspects start coming up similar, then its doomed.
    LET THERE BE LIGHT

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    Eats poems like air Mari's Avatar
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    Conflict seems to be the easiest way for a writer to slip into unoriginality. I have read (or started to read) many books that set up fresh settings, combinations of characters, premises, etc., but when it came time to do something with them, they fell back on a cliched complication. If a book is going to lose me early on, that's usually how it does it.

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    If you want to know how to ruin a book with unoriginal devices, take a look at Dan Brown's _Da Vinci Code_. Then look at _Angels and Demons_ and _Invisible Fortress_. Stock characters, stock settings, stock plots... it's almost like he's playing MadLibs:

    "Chapter 1: (Professor/specialist) sleeping with (female love interest) in (place). Chapter 2: (Mysterious secondary character) dies gruesomely in (place). Chapter 3: (Stock policeman) wakes (professor/specialist) with (knock/phone call). Chapter 4: (Peculiar villain) does (something strange and unnatural) in (place)..."

    It's no way to write a book.

    Many authors (including Chuck Palahniuk and John Irving) insist that the crux of the matter is original characters-- if you can create a believeable character, and get inside their head, then their actions/reactions will be original, believable and engaging. But I, for one, am not so sure. I think even stock characters can work, given other points of originality. Heck, Nathanael West makes a point of using shallow, stock characters in _Day of the Locust_. But he does it for the purpose of satire, so it works.

    It's complicated. But as in anything, a truly fresh, original idea will always carry the day. (It's a cop-out, I know. But it's the best I can do at the moment).
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    Registered User muhsin's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Goodfella
    Hello!
    My people, what do you think has a direct effect on any novel to loss it's originality as a good literary work among the follwing:
    Setting. Plot. Characterization. Conflict. Suspense. etc
    Why did make it so? How?
    My friend, you a bit confused me.
    Do you mean when one of these is absent? If this is what you mean I can say all, whenever a literary work lose one; it’ll certainly invites unoriginality. Just like a pillar of a building, when one collapse, the whole of the building will definitely break down.
    The source of any bad writing is the desire to be something more than a person of sense--the straining to be thought a genius. If people would say what they have to say in plain terms, how much eloquent they would be.
    -S.T COLERIDGE

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    Registered User Goodfella's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by muhsin
    My friend, you a bit confused me.
    Do you mean when one of these is absent? If this is what you mean I can say all, whenever a literary work lose one; it’ll certainly invites unoriginality. Just like a pillar of a building, when one collapse, the whole of the building will definitely break down.
    Thank you Muhsin. That is a nice observation.
    So I exatly want to say.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Goodfella
    Hello!
    My people, what do you think has a direct effect on any novel to loss it's originality as a good literary work among the follwing:
    Setting. Plot. Characterization. Conflict. Suspense. etc
    Why did make it so? How?
    Hello, Goodfella, welcome to the forum.
    Of all seemingly unoriginal literary works, I do not necessarily think that always subtracts from it seeming like a 'good' book. TodHackett gave an excellent example of Dan Brown's works; though I have never read them, I have heard very, very similar things of his repetitive plots, yet he remains immensely popular. Well respected literature can also exist with copied characters or stories, such as how Æneid by Virgil continued from The Iliad by Homer (yet both we consider as epics), how Christopher Marlowe wrote Dr. Faustus and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe wrote Faust, and multiple writers have recycled the story of Troilus and Cressida (even William Shakespeare).
    In terms of inspiration, a writer may feel inspired by multiple sorts of plots, settings, characters, etc., yet will not entirely copy them; sometimes a writer can make such aspects of literature similar, but I would like to think that characters and settings have slightly more ease in variability than plot and conflict.

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    X (or) Y=X and Y=-X Jean-Baptiste's Avatar
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    TodHachett, I like your outline! Very funny.

    mono, very good point about well respected classics being reinventions.

    This discussion reminds me of what I was thinking about "Ida," the novel by Gertrude Stein. On the surface the book would seem to be an extended study of the main character. However, I came to the conclussion that the only literary element of the book is Plot. The whole thing is just a series of events with no emotion and no judgement. Ida did this, and then Ida went here, and then Ida did that, and then Ida rested. With the lack of characterization and symbolism and setting and conflict, I have to say that I've never read anything like it; that makes it, as far as I can say, original. But this originality is acquired at the sacrifice of everything that would make me want to read a book. So there must be a line drawn between absolute originality and stock writing. One thing that bothers me (sometimes) is a retelling or continuation of the lives of popular characters. For instance: the sequel to Gone with the Wind, or (yes, they did) the sequel to Le Miserables. This is profanity.
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    Voice of Chaos & Anarchy
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    Originality in literature!! It's a little late to look for that. Pretty much everything that is found in literature can be found in the "Enuma Elish". Character types, plots, settings, and themes have been used before. The only original feature of a novel that is possible is the way that different story elements are assembled.

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    Voice of Chaos & Anarchy
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    Quote Originally Posted by Jamesian
    I believe "lol"s are in order.
    We would do well, I suppose, to notify the publishing industry of the death of the novel.
    I am afraid I am ignorant as to this "Enuma Elish". Could someone perhaps enlighten me?
    Enuma Elish is better known as the Gilgamesh Epic. It is the oldest piece of literature that still exists. The oldest versions of it dates from about 2000 to 2100 BCE. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epic_of_Gilgamesh

    Just because everything has been written before is no reason to stop trying to write it in a new way.

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    X (or) Y=X and Y=-X Jean-Baptiste's Avatar
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    T.S. Eliot said, in his essay (wonderful essay) "Tradition and the Individual Talent" that the objective of the poet (though his thoughts need not be restricted to poetry) is not to discover NEW human emotions to depict, but to depict the old ones in a new way. I don't have the essay in front of me at the moment, so I can't quote, but I recall his idea that searching for new things always leads to decadence. This seems relevant.
    These fragments I have shored against my ruins

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    Registered User muhsin's Avatar
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    I now re-think and discover that; What abscent most invalidate a literary work to loose it's originality is SUSPENSE. Sincerely reading a novel without suspense to me is just like obeying command when there is a mouth of a gun pointed at my head -boring simply it is.
    The source of any bad writing is the desire to be something more than a person of sense--the straining to be thought a genius. If people would say what they have to say in plain terms, how much eloquent they would be.
    -S.T COLERIDGE

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    The lack of variety in literature may have reasons beyond the pen and page, in my opinion, as in concerning the creation of characters, plot, conflicts, etc., the subject aims more towards the author rather than the literary piece.
    Despite any experience, a finite number (sometimes a very small, finite number) of resolutions can come, and it matters not the number of characters involved. Take, for example, the common 'falling head over heals in love with someone' in an average novel; this very basic structure has few resolutions built into it, ranging from success in love, failure in love, initial failure followed by success, or initial success followed by failure. All occurrences in literature seem restricted to common experiences in life and the author's imagination; in realistic literature, not including science fiction and fantasy, these seem all earth-based, slightly more attainable events that a reader could possibly experience himself/herself.
    Taking the limited plot choices into consideration, the only originality in literature found, I think, relies more upon expression - what combined events happened, how they happened, how the character(s) felt, and how the characters conform (or lack thereof).

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    X (or) Y=X and Y=-X Jean-Baptiste's Avatar
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    Very good point, muhsin, and I agree to a degree. Suspense within the body of a work is necessary. However, I personally cannot care whether the ending of a book has been divulged to me before hand or not. I generally don't read Mystery novels, for the reason that the outcome is often the focus. One book that I've read recently that displayed a mastery of suspence was The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton. It wasn't so much a "what's going to happen next" hysteria that I found intriguing, but rather the awareness of all of the options available to the character and dreading the inevitable. If a book is well written, with all necessary elements in place, the outcome is a minor consideration.


    Edit: Sorry, mono, I didn't see your excellent comment when I posted this. I concur.
    Last edited by Jean-Baptiste; 08-13-2006 at 11:26 PM.
    These fragments I have shored against my ruins

    James Joyce, the pirate. Why don't you write books people can read? -Nora Barnacle

    Insupportable claim: Reading my stories will make you a better person. Do your best to prove me right. http://www.online-literature.com/for...ad.php?t=20367

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    love to read... Bookworm Cris's Avatar
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    This discussion is really good; my mother used to say that "Nothing is created, everyting is copied". All (or nearly all) possible themes, plots, emotions, dramas, tragedies, all of it was already used more than once in literature. If all has been said, what can be done? Say it your way, and it will be said differently. Thatīs the originality, I think. Every human being is different, is original, and if you tell a tale your way, it will be different than if I told it.

    Jean-Baptiste said:
    "However, I personally cannot care whether the ending of a book has been divulged to me before hand or not. I generally don't read Mystery novels, for the reason that the outcome is often the focus."
    I agree, Jean-Baptiste. I donīt care either if I know how a book ends, I may read it for the pleasure of reading a good story. If not, why should we re-read books? Itīs not the ending that gets me, but how the author got there. The theme and the plot may be stock, but if the author tells it in a way that captivates me, with good writing, then the book got me. Itīs like Mono said:

    "Taking the limited plot choices into consideration, the only originality in literature found, I think, relies more upon expression - what combined events happened, how they happened, how the character(s) felt, and how the characters conform (or lack thereof)."
    "Itīs our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities"
    Albus Dumbledore, in HP and the Chamber of Secrets - J K Rowling


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