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Comments on How can I pinpoint a story's moral dilemma?

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How can I pinpoint a story's moral dilemma?

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In this answer, Mark Baker makes a statement about story:

All story ideas are basically a variation on one thing. A man (or woman, or child, or small furry animal) has two desires, both of which he (she, it) believes they can achieve, but between which he will eventually be forced to choose... The plot is a device for forcing him into a position in which he must choose between those two desires, for good or ill.

I can immediately think of many cases where this is true:

  • Lord of the Rings: Frodo can keep the ring OR save the world
  • Star Wars: The Last Jedi: Luke can renounce the ways of the Jedi OR use his power to help the resistance
  • The Book of Strange New Things: Peter can fulfill his missionary calling OR save his marriage

But what about stories where this is less obvious? What about ensemble stories where there isn't a main character? What about stories without a climactic moment of choice? What about heist movies?

I'm looking for ways to locate this thread in all of those, so as to better analyze them and understand the thematic undercurrent. Examples would be helpful!

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We gabbed about this today in writers' club. One problem with the exercise is you can fit many suppositions, any manner of supposition, to a piece of expression (a novel). (Rose colored glasses and all that.)

Lord of the Rings: Frodo can keep the ring OR save the world

... But... Frodo wanted a quiet life in the shire. He wanted neither of the above that you stated. He didn't want either.

And what of Boromir, or Sauron, of Gandalf? Why was Frodo the main viewpoint protagonist? Why not Sam? Or Smiegel? They each have agency and an arc. You can sort through what you think, for each.

Star Wars: A New Hope: (I changed the prompt): Luke can renounce the ways of the Jedi OR use his power to help the resistance

...Luke's moment of culmination, in both IV and V, is when he relinquishes control. For Luke, it is all about giving up any illusion of control, submitting to the force, that things will work out. (And this is the tension in VII-IX). When he shuts down the tracking scope in IV, when he stops attacking Vader and throws his light saber aside in V, it's about saying "I submit." Submission to the force is the theme in those stories. Not control.

The Book of Strange New Things: (I don't know this one.)

You will never 'locate this thread' in all stories, because not all stories are the same. That's good.

Fairy tales, just-so stories, and so on serve a different purpose. Psalms (in the bible) serves a different purpose.

Genre fiction might benefit from outer/inner goals and conflicts, and I love (and grow through) MBaker's thoughts on this, but i disagree that it is the only way to share human experience through story.

So how do you find the twinned goal in an ensemble piece? In a heist?

Simple. You look ... and do the work to figure out what you think in that piece, for each character. Who do they love? What do they want?

In writers' club, we spent a good deal of time discussing Luke's 'want' today. Simply, we decided it is to join the rebellion. But one person said his truest want is control, within his life. I said it was to prove himself 'as good as Biggs.'

The case can be made for any of these. Luke's 'need' on the other hand is to manifest, to actualize, realize his one-ness with the force, which is to say... to leave to the side any illusion of control in his life.

The force, that's the power and director. Luke needs to submit to it.

Is that useful to consider? No idea. Play with it. Decide for yourself.

Simplified, the thing they (protagonists) need is internal. Love. A person. Self esteem. (for Luke, he needs to relinquish any illusion of control... = internal.) The thing they want is external. Saving the world. Joining the rebellion. Being better than Biggs. Money. Winning the cup.

How do you sort it for a different style of writing? You jot down ideas and see if they help, knowing that storytelling is more nuanced and complicated than a binary modality like this.

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General comments (5 comments)
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Mark Baker‭ wrote almost 4 years ago

Luke's want is to be a hero. He's a dirt farmer on a dead end world. He's bored. Adventure calls, but he is naive, impatient, and romantic. He wants to rescue a princess. His need is for discipline, which he repeatedly resists -- at considerable cost. He finally submits himself to the discipline of the force and triumphs. In the way of series, though, he had the same problem in the next movie when he flies of to paint the fence with Mr. Miyagi.

Mark Baker‭ wrote almost 4 years ago

This is the reckless young knight story and it occurs over and over again in literature down through the ages. The theme is romance vs discipline. It is a universal theme. Karate Kid. The Sword in the Stone. Star Wars.

Mark Baker‭ wrote almost 4 years ago · edited almost 4 years ago

Lord of the Rings is a meditation on the nature of temptation. Every character of note is tempted in some way, and each responds differently. Tom Bombadil is the prelapsarian figure not tempted by the power of the Ring. (That is why he's important.) Everyone else is either corrupted by it, wise enough to refuse it, or pure enough to resist it (Sam). The moral problem for every character is to resist the glamour of the ring.

DPT‭ wrote almost 4 years ago

@MarkBaker I'm not sure why you left these comments? You've provided an answer above and presumably can expand there if you have more to say about things. Perhaps these comments are not intended as 'schooling' but ... FWIW they do come across that way.

Mark Baker‭ wrote almost 4 years ago

@DPT That was not my intention. The extreme character limits for comment for one to be more abrupt that one would like. My apologies.