My own contrasts, my own shizophrenia-
- I despise plot. It tries to make everything so streamlined, so simple. It gets rid of the complications, it kills the character by making them cogs in the plot wheel.
- I love plot. It’s structure, and pieces, and parts, and architecture. It’s bones and excitement and plot twists. It’s complex and tricky and yet multi layered and smooth.
- I hate hooks. Boiling a story down to a simple one sentence “gotcha” that’s about as relevant as an internet meme.
- I love hooks. It’s like having a meme, for your story!
- I hate endings. Tying things up, no loose ends, no exploration, no story beyond the story. It’s a door slamming shut.
- I love endings. Satisfactory, denouement afterwards, falling actions, making everything into a perfect geometry of structure. Like cubism with narrative.
- I hate realism. Realism is a farce, is a disguise, is a fiction masquerading as fact.
- I love realism. It explores the psyche, the truth inside of us, the problems of humanity and being human, it speaks to me in a deep, personal way.
- I hate genre. It’s all cliches and rules and boxes and marketing.
- I love genre. It’s got a history, and a narrative that continues backwards and forwards, existing in multiple spaces.
- I hate experimental narratives. Flaccid characters, show off prose, nonsense and gibberish and it just overwhelms as too much.
- I love experimental narratives. It pushes the edge, shoves you against the wall, and gives you something unique, something interesting, something beyond what you knew you were asking for.
I could go on and on and on and on and on…..
