rip-off re-inspiration.

[marycatelli]

It's an odd thing about inspiration from other people's work.  Once you hack loose something and run away (with wild "eek!"s of delight) with it flapping behind you, and then you settle down to file off the serial numbers. . . .

The story that ensues may or may not have any resemblance at all to the original.  It grows, it shifts, it puts out new shoots, it may even prune off the original inspiration, it can certainly weave into the growth so thoroughly that you can't detect where it is. . . .

But there's a funny little thing about my muse.  If I re-read the work, or look again at the artwork, or whatever, it frequently sets the muse off and running again on the story if it had gone dry.

Ah, the muse's little -- quirks.

Comments

[baron-waste.livejournal.com]

I've had two such instances of that myself, both stemming from my tendency to improve things over time. The one was a story setting, a concept with which I did far more than the original had bothered, and the other was a character that, as you say, I had to tinker with until the only similarity would be the name, if I kept that!

In both cases mine IS an improvement, simply because I put more thought into it. As such it becomes annoying, that still I needs must acknowledge their origins.

[marycatelli]

yeah, things a writer just cheated us on are the best sources.

[baron-waste.livejournal.com]

There's a discussion over at dochermes of the film Big Trouble in Little China, which was amusing because, as John Carpenter pointed out, the supposed 'hero' of the film wasn't; he was the comedy sidekick who didn't realize it, and thought himself the (clueless) hero!

What I said there was,


…I've never seen that idea actually done elsewhere - the main character may be a reluctant anti-hero, e g Support Your Local Sheriff et al, but it's always plain that he's the hero of the story regardless. This though is closer to what TV Tropes calls “Hero of a Different Story” - Jack Burton is heroic enough in his own way, but he's upstaged here, quite literally!

(Aside from "Miao Yin" roughly translating to 'cat-like,' as IMDb says, we learn nothing of her, because Jack is out of the loop and thus we are also. We learn more about the absurd 'Gracie Law,' who is down on Jack's level - but since he's the sidekick, not the Alpha Male, he doesn't Get the Girl. There's a whole subject could be covered, there; in WWII advertising only officers are shown with attractive females as wives or fiances; enlisted men are shown alone… but I digress.)


… Imagine The Lord of the Rings told entirely from Sam Gamgee's “other ranks” worldview (where literacy is suspect, and apologized for; “It was Mr Bilbo taught Sam 'is letters, meanin' no harm…”), instead of Frodo's vastly higher “officer and landed gentleman” standing. It would be a different story, even if it followed the same overall direction. [We'd see much more of Rivendell's support structure from Sam's point of view; he'd go in the kitchens!]

/======//======/


Wouldn't that be interesting? It's very much what T Stoppard did in Rosenkrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, taking background characters and bringing them to the foreground. It's not something the original author cheated on as such, it's just not the story he chose to tell - but story it is, and could be told!

[marycatelli]

It's amazing what you can do shifting the lighting about like that.

There's a concept I'm playing with. The Lord of the Rings is centered on what is almost an amazing coincidence: that the Ring is found JUST as Sauron is ready to move. Yes, there is some explanation in the book about why they happened at the same time, but --

What if someone found the Ring (or equivalent MacGuffin) and had to destroy it lest a century from now, the Dark Lord would arise? Be a lot harder to get help.

[baron-waste.livejournal.com]

Yes, but “tales are told of the Dark Lord's fall, ages ago!” So that's obviously irrelevant! No, the problem is that some petty bandit chief has found the One Ring and has suddenly become invincible, wielding what is obviously a Great Ring, and is quickly becoming a Dark Lord. Against him the most valiant weapons are useless. The only solution is to make a new Ring that can contest for mastery of all things...

But how the hell we gonna do that? “Um, ahem… I might be able to help,” says a wizened Gandalf-on-crack-and-booze-looking character, obviously a wizard gone badly to seed, but dang he do know he stuff, and under his tutelage a new Ring is made… as once it was. Yes, in a not-coincidence the fall of Numenor robbed him forever of his ability to appear in comely form, but Lucifer Sauron could and did appear physically - Isildur cut the Ring from his finger - and no one makes the connection, nor do they realize that he's been making this new Ring to respond to his command alone… Oops. The plot, as they say, thickens.

[As you pointed out, the Ring and Sauron were interconnected; he couldn't rise until it had been found by someone, and thus his rise (as “the Necromancer”) began with Gollum. If it were being actively used, as Saruman pointed out even the Ringwraiths would obey its wielder, not Sauron. So he'd have to do something more proactive to regain possession of it…]

At this point you change all the names, change the Ring to something else, and hey presto, you've got a fantasy tale of your own!

[marycatelli]

I look forward to reading yours.

[baron-waste.livejournal.com]

Well, y' know, that could be interesting, because although the Silmarillion goes into Morgoth's deal, and Sauron was merely his lieutenant until Morgoth was finally evicted from reality, allowing Sauron to muscle in on his rackets… still, Sauron remains kinda one-dimensional. If he's supposed to be devilish, might he not be devilishly charming? He was in Numenor, and even in his Wizard of Ouzo form he might be witty, gentlemanly, obvious quality now fallen on hard times… It would be difficult to get help, yes, because it would be difficult to convince anyone that this poor old sod of crumbling grandeur, this pitiable palsied gentleman is OMFG THE DARK LORD SAURON himself. “Ri-i-ght. Sure he is. I think you need a little nap-time, you've been working a little too hard on all this…”

[marycatelli]

There's a lot of possibilities.