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| Monday, 29 October 2007 |
| The Chosen One |
I've seen Jane Espenson's article on Selling Sci-Fi referenced in several places in the last few days: it was originally posted on tnr.com, though now seems to survive only in the Google Cache version. It's a very specific type of Hero's Journey, the most potent sub-case. It's told over and over again, and it works, over and over again. Dorothy Gale, Buffy Summers, Harry Potter, Charlie Bucket, Luke Skywalker, even Peter Parker, they all fit a very specific pattern. They're living a life, sometimes a fine one, often a troubled one, but certainly one governed by ordinary rules, when suddenly the curtain is pulled back and a whole new world, or a new set of rules of this world, is revealed. And what's more - and this is the important part - in that new world, they are something special. They are The Chosen One.
I'd make the Buffy-Harry connection before: I read too much fanfiction not to have seen it. But I hadn't quite seen the bigger picture like this.
It's good. This has been bugging me about my NaNo heroine, or FMC [female main character] as any good NaNoer must call her: why her? I know that Ordinary Girl Gets Mixed Up In Something Big is hardly unique, but it seems somehow unsatisfactory. Chosen-One-ness feels right.
Which doesn't stop her bugging me. She woke me up in the middle of the night to say that she wants to be called Harriet. I had planned for her to be Asian. Not that an Asian girl couldn't be called Harriet, and explaining why she's Asian but called Harriet *would* add to my word count. But there is the uncomfortable echo of Ms. Vane, and that, I do not like one little bit.Labels: NaNoWriMo |
| posted @ 11:12 |
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