[Writingworkshop] does this sound familiar to anyone?

[Daniel Peters]

shit, that first one was for you Adam.

On Sun, Nov 30, 2008 at 2:13 PM, Adam Holland <adam.holland at gmail.com>wrote:

> This sounds a bit like our earlier discussion of a fiction *renga*
>
> I like what I have heard so far, but want to know more, and perhaps see a
> rudimentary one in action
> I'm not completely sure yet what the  interpreters  *do*.
> do they write pieces of stories?  contribute to an ongoing story?  add
> details, etc?
> What's the authorial analog to improv acting?
>
> also, what's the end product of playing this "game"?  (other than enjoying
> it)
>
> Best,
> Adam
> ____
>
> "I never feel that I am inspired unless my body is also. It too spurns a
> tame and commonplace life.
>
>
>
>   On Sun, Nov 30, 2008 at 2:03 PM, Daniel Peters <danieltpeters at gmail.com>wrote:
>
>>   My little brother does a form of improv where they practice scenes and
>> scene fragments with a series of different game rules that allow them to
>> develop as much as possible out of immediate dialouge and actions.  This
>> is one of his textbooks<http://improvencyclopedia.org/references//Truth_in_Comedy.html>,
>> anybody who has seen a pythons sketch will recognize rules like
>> 'agreement'.  Some of the rules are also geared to keep the games fair so
>> that it stays as much of a group activity as possible and no one player can
>> dominate.  I've been trying to think of ways that similar games could be
>> developed for writing.  Obviously they can't be real time, even if you could
>> do something with a chat the end result is going to lose alot of the luster
>> of spontaniety.  I think I've finally hit on something that would draw
>> inspiration from the idea of a game but not attempt to mime improv to
>> closely.  I would love to know if anybody is doing something like this
>> already or if it sounds at all plausible.  The key to this is that I'm
>> thinking primarily science fiction writing.
>>
>> The game has two kinds of players builders and interpreters.  A builder is
>> given a time frame, say, a week (purely arbitrary), to construct a
>> scenario/world/community.  Now the builder has the hardest job here, they
>> have to describe a set of new idea's or  reconfigure old ones but in such a
>> way as to allow the greatest room for improvisation.  I.E. no one is going
>> to out do Frank Herbert in a week and they shouldn't try because this is a
>> team sport.  So a builder could identify plot arcs or simply a state of
>> affairs for a specific locale or community or set of character types.
>> Leaving room for improvisation also means allowing new characters or
>> scientific constructs *as long as they look recognizably like
>> something from the original model.*  One of the hardest parts is going to
>> be coming up with models that will actually interest possible interpreters.
>> I.E. space opera will get pretty played, pretty quickly.
>> Now for the interpreters one of the cooler parts is going to be the second
>> order of interpretation, meaning the part where it becomes interpreters
>> playing on other interpreters moves.  Now an interesting part of this is
>> going to be the writers analouge of the fourth wall, i.e. it *will have
>> to be a special session for the game to get meta textual.* Refering to
>> another players move or an original model construct as construct would
>> obviously end normal play, it would get pedantic, everyone would be telling
>> rather than showing to use joe's terminology.  An analouge for this exact
>> situation in live improv is the training not to pull out a joke at another
>> players expense, it ruins the scene and is outside of the actual action
>> scene in and of itself.  The maxim of if doesn't move the plot along its a
>> waste of the readers time will be truest fro the interpreters.
>>
>> This also removes the most pressing aspects of integrating info dumps into
>> the structure of the narrative(s).
>>
>> This is a rough sketch and I actually have a few more direct idea's
>> pertaining to this but I would love some feed back.
>>
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>
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