Naturally, the idea for this post began when I asked myself, “What works of fiction changed how I act?” This is the list I came up with. Which may be true, but is so obvious most audiences probably have heard it already. Lots of stories try to have some overarching theme on the order of “You can do anything if you believe in yourself”. And it has to be something that wasn’t obvious or easy, at least not for you.
What I’m talking about is general knowledge that you can apply to a wide variety of situations. That’s fandom, and can happen with anything. Note that when I say “act differently”, I’m not referring to the people who saw Star Wars or Harry Potter and decided to start attending fan conventions in costume, or to name their children “Anakin” or “Hermione”, or to have themed weddings based on the stories. And even those that do succeed probably only do so for a small percentage of their total audience. There may be many stories trying to achieve it, but only a few succeed. That is the type of story that actually makes the audience look at the world differently, and act differently as a result. It is the most powerful, and also the hardest to achieve. But there is another level on which a story can function. This is as much of an impression as most fiction makes upon its audience. Really spectacular special effects in a movie, or a particularly good line of dialogue, or a moving character death in a novel can do this. There are some works here and there that are so dazzling they make a more lasting impression on you. You watch a movie for two hours, maybe talk about it a little with your friends afterward, and that’s it.
Most fiction is treated as entertainment and nothing more.
0 kommentar(er)
