marycatelli: (Default)
[personal profile] marycatelli
And how long can you make a series? Was pondering this question and hit on a blog post that made me think more on the answer.

Which is: Well, as long as you can have a structure for it. Including "collection of episodic tales." At least, a well-ordered structure, that could be art, as observed from the first days of analysis of plot:

Again, a beautiful object, whether it be a living organism or any whole composed of parts, must not only have an orderly arrangement of parts, but must also be of a certain magnitude; for beauty depends on magnitude and order. Hence a very small animal organism cannot be beautiful; for the view of it is confused, the object being seen in an almost imperceptible moment of time. Nor, again, can one of vast size be beautiful; for as the eye cannot take it all in at once, the unity and sense of the whole is lost for the spectator; as for instance if there were one a thousand miles long. As, therefore, in the case of animate bodies and organisms a certain magnitude is necessary, and a magnitude which may be easily embraced in one view; so in the plot, a certain length is necessary, and a length which can be easily embraced by the memory. The limit of length in relation to dramatic competition and sensuous presentment, is no part of artistic theory. For had it been the rule for a hundred tragedies to compete together, the performance would have been regulated by the water-clock,—as indeed we are told was formerly done. But the limit as fixed by the nature of the drama itself is this: the greater the length, the more beautiful will the piece be by reason of its size, provided that the whole be perspicuous.


The first obstacle to going on forever is that if a story is too long it will simply lose the reader, who can admire the parts but not the whole.

Character development is the second obstacle to going on forever. Actual character development (as opposed to the cheap stuff where someone forgets entirely -- some backsliding is feasible, but not dropping like a hot potato) means you hit the issue of structure in its most basic form.

A whole is that which has a beginning, a middle, and an end. A beginning is that which does not itself follow anything by causal necessity, but after which something naturally is or comes to be. An end, on the contrary, is that which itself naturally follows some other thing, either by necessity, or as a rule, but has nothing following it. A middle is that which follows something as some other thing follows it. A well constructed plot, therefore, must neither begin nor end at haphazard, but conform to these principles.


When you get the end, where nothing logically follows it, the story is over. If the series is to continue, it has to move to a new beginning. In my experience, this works best with a new character, with a new arc, because it's more satisfying to see the success of the development than to see the character need to learn something new.

Other developments work similarly. A story about delving a dungeon ends with the final room.

But, of course, you don't have to have character development. You can keep on ringing variations on the existing characters, in episodic stories with their own beginnings, middles, and endings. And yes,
Of all plots and actions the episodic are the worst. I call a plot 'episodic' in which the episodes or acts succeed one another without probable or necessary sequence.

but that's for a complete story. A string of them is a different thing.

On the other hand, there does have to be enough variation to keep the readers awake, while keeping them similar enough to be recognizable as the same series. Having some of them have character development can be feasible, but it's tricky to pull off. To go back to the unchanging characters, though now a bit different, in the next story may frustrate readers, while the change itself may frustrate others.

The thing is, depending on the set up, there may be a small number of variations, and there may be a large one, but there is certainly not an unbounded number. Sooner or later that's the limit. (Reading through the Robin Hood Child ballads is very tedious after about the fourth "Robin gets into a fight, gets trounced, summons his Merry Men, and invites the victor to join the band.") Character development now and again may manage to work and add to variations, but in a bounded manner.

It's not for nothing that the classic series are often of wanderers, who are always finding new situations and new characters (who can even have their own arcs, since their presence is finite).

Profile

marycatelli: (Default)
marycatelli

July 2025

S M T W T F S
   1 2 3 45
6 7 8 9 10 11 12
13 14 15 16 171819
20212223242526
2728293031  

Most Popular Tags

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags
Page generated Jul. 17th, 2025 10:40 pm
Powered by Dreamwidth Studios