Does one of the characters come up with the way to make it right after all, or does the story end with no one knowing what to do, or does it end with no one realizing the main voice was wrong (other than the audience, of course, since it is in on the reveal from the author).
Is he aware at the end, or is the author reveal just between the author and the audience reader?
Could a trade off of MC or Protagonist be going on?
No, heās the Antagonist.
The author reveals it in a moment of anagnoresis where the character and the readers find out simultaneously.
Itās not an MC trade off. (To my knowledge, weāve never found one of these.)
The Protagonist almost certainly changes, which I think is one of the reasons the MC Throughline fades, because the Protagonist is no longer the Main Character.
Is āthe characterā the antagonist?
Fading from a MC reading focus to an overall story reading focus sounds like a fun read, a good experiment in hooking the reader. The audience might want [expect] something of their [familiar and former pal] MC, a windup zinger at the end. Some scrolling words might do it, a quote of what someone said, etc., if you didnāt want to go through a scene/beat writing route. I mean if it is strictly OS at the end.
Chris at a workshop told us about the film True Lies and how it needed some reference to their daughter at the end, i.e. at the end of the film when they are spies together at a cocktail party, he could have grabbed a trinket or cookie on their way through the room, saying, āIāll take this home to Dana.ā
Yes, the Antagonist (and others) find out at the same time. Itās revealed by people who have only just realized heās screwing up badly.
As for āscrolling wordsā at the end (an image my wife used last night when we were talking about the ending, too!) the book does the book version of this. Itās very emotional.
So, to be clear, the MC doesnāt disappear from the book, but the āweightā of the MC throughline goes way down. In most ways, they are still the POV the book is written from, but the MC Concern is no longer much of a concern.
Who is the Protagonist? MC? IC?
But isnāt power all about someone wanting it? Or wanting to keep it? Maintain infers someone has power and others are trying to help that person keep it.
Are those people a group player? I saw some episodes of Yo Soy Betty, La Fea [original Ugly Betty from the country of Columbia put out by some Argentinan company. It was quite clever, cute and satisfying how some office workers were a player as a group.
Are you reading the thread?
The MC is the Protagonist. The gift he receives makes it so.
The desire for power (OS Issue>Attraction) is destabilizing the government. The Protagonist is concerned with not destabilizing the government. Heās not seeking power, heās seeking to maintain the balance of power between various parties.
No, theyāre just OS players.
Yes, Iāve read the thread from different places and angles. Since what characters see and what they think about it being so primary to their actions and no action, Iād say try putting the storyforming through a Mind overall story. It would be interesting to see the choices you get from that point.
Your line of thinking here is that he is too rigid in his thinking to recognize what heās doing.
Yes, he is single-minded, undoubtably. He also remains that way throughout the story. So, yes, there is an argument to be made that his single-mindedness is the root cause of all the problems. Itās a workable theory down to the Concern level in the OS, but it doesnāt really hold after that.
Still, it goes to show that we can define individual characters pretty well one way, if we look at them in isolation.
The balance I keep referring to is the Universe ā imagine a Calder sculpture with all the parts balancing out the other parts. Itās hard to see the story any other way now that I see it like this.
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It sounds like they all are rigid in thinking. Having read and written Regency period stories, I get empire and thinking. Of course if you like universe, thatās the way to go. But some throughline is in mind. It would be interesting to see which one at the end.
Couple of questions for you.
In Rear Window, the Nurse wants the Man with the Broken Leg to take care of himself, and sheās snarky. Mind?
The Rich Girlfriend wants to get married. Mind?
The Murderer is focused solely on getting away with his crime. Mind?
Actually, no. What I like is irrelevant. The story has a storyform independent of what I like.
Quite naturally, itās the RS.
Interestingly, I donāt think itās with the group IC which is composed of a bunch of Manipulators. Itās with someone else.
The MC has a flirting/frustrating relationship with someone with a fixed set of rules they live by.
The Group IC does contain the Change Character: he stops being a Manipulative Be-er and switches to a Do-er.
Universe, Psychology, Physics, itās the setup, motivation and action driver, in my mindās interpretation.
But canāt we change other things, so the story form fits what we want? Universe sounded like a cool backdrop/canvas to the story. It was nifty, sliding from the MC focus into the overall. Canāt we put what we want into the story engine, then toy with what the characters and plotting could be with what doesnāt fit? If you get my drift.
Are you asking if I can re-imagine the story and transpose it into a different storyform?
I suppose. But my goal is the opposite of this: nail down what the book actually did, so when I alter things, they do so in a way that expands on the original work.[quote=āPrish, post:57, topic:2787ā]
It was nifty, sliding from the MC focus into the overall.
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Iām glad you like that description. That actually remains in tact, even after Iāve seen the proper storyform.
Would it help to figure out the storyform if one tracked what the OS protagonist does in the last half of the book? (or after the MC protagonist fades and another replaces him?)
Iāve pretty much figured it out already