PROGRESSION LITERATURE: THE LITERATURE OF DENOUEMENT:
INTRODUCING A NEW LITERARY GENRE
What one hears, reads, says, sees, tastes, feels , remembers, and experiences affects our understanding. It is ‘truth’ as we perceive it. Remembering, in particular, evokes attitudes and emotions linked to ‘true’ knowledge of past events. Such experiences affect how we experience and interpret the present – especially if a past event is somehow linked to a present or impending event. For example, if one had been bitten by a white dog in the past, seeing the same white dog again can bring forth an automatic reaction, such as fear or aversion, even if the dog now appears friendly to others, who may then not understand your apprehensive reaction. Your perception of reality is different, though you and the others are both presented with the identical stimulus and information at the present moment.
In fact, much of what we might believe to be a ‘fresh’ experience is likely to be based on many past experiences that may or may not be directly related. A beautiful woman, never before seen by a particular male, may attract, have no effect on him, or repel, depending on past experience/ inexperience. First impressions are often based on past experience, learned prejudice, or instinct: a classic study in Scientific American showed pictures of the same male face, but with different amounts of hair, to respondents. Hairiness ranged from totally bald to long beard and long hair, complete with mustache. Respondents were asked to put the faces they saw in order, according to attractiveness. The shaved face, without mustaches and with neatly trimmed hair, was chosen as the most attractive. Total hairiness and total baldness were lowest on the list. In addition, the presence of a mustache reduced confidence. The faces presented were identical in every other respect. Progression from stage to stage of hairiness versus baldness was judged as a factor of attractiveness, but the test subjects didn’t see the face progress in cumulative stages (progression).
Progression in literature review (cumulative stages of revelation of facts) is what makes reading enjoyable: we aren’t certain of the outcome, and what we think is true can develop in different directions, depending on the information given. In fact, different readers guarantee different reactions. A fine novel captures the attention and interest of most readers.
Real world experiences are not, generally, as complete as a crafted novel. Modern writers, of course, reflect the chaos of our emerging modern world in what, for convenience, I term chaotic literature, white noise literature, with more or less deconstruction or minimalist influences. The result is discomfort for most readers, who must deal with the same stressors in real life. Time, for example, is short, and many of the most popular works, such as Stephen King’s works, are eagerly read because an entirely different world is spread out to relish and enjoy, however macabre. Fantasy and science fiction works have their loyal followings, too. In all writing, ‘truth’ is important -- a guideline in the fog, a face in the mirror, or a beacon in the night. But ‘Truth’ is perceived through a mist of the prejudices we gather in life experiences over time. Truth’ has impact: among other possible repercussions and reactions to its revelation, emotions and thinking can be stimulated or depressed. At any time, what is perceived in the real world as ‘truth’ can suddenly change.
Ian F. A. Bell describes Tony Tanner’s approach to this phenomenon in his introduction to Tanner’s The American Mystery:
“Tanner conceives of the dematerialization of language in American literature, the move beyond the structure of binary opposites, as a continuous process of self-invention. This move involves literary strategies of transformation: the construction of ontological identity, character, and modes of representation. As Tanner observers…if life was in “flux” or constant “metamorphosis,” then writing should be the same. As Emerson says, “In the beginning of America, was not only the word but the contradiction of the word.”
Bell goes on to describe Tanner’s analysis of Hawthorne’s language in The Blithedale Romance:
“…The Blithedale Romance does not ask what constitutes the real, much less the Real, as reality is only “known by the conviction that you have not got it.” As an American Romantic, however, Hawthorne may be suggesting that to know that reality is not real could be the beginning of a Real experience. Tanner tracks the binaries between fact and fiction, forgery and real money as a means of determining the “true” copy; whether “forging” the uncreated conscience of one’s race or forging money, “both ‘forgers’ work by putting falsities/fictions into circulation.”
And finally, in his study of Melville’s The Confidence Man, Bell notes what Tanner says about “reversibility” and “interchangeability”:
“Melville’s novel about trust and confidence in the new world of America, shows how “reversibility” can be re-cast as “interchangeability.” This term, which Tanner borrows from Thomas Mann, registers “the multiplicity and sheer ontological dubiety of the self” in a world where identity, as determined by the constructivist nature of language, is constantly being reinterpreted.”
Whether it is Newspeak, Orwellian style, or Spin City, whether it is a news report or a personal experience, above all, we trust personal experience, and then the Voice of Authority. Anyone with intelligence, plus sufficient interest in the case, can eventually recognize the spins and spirals in the Official Version of the Kennedy assassination. Calling people who discard the Official Version “conspiracy theorists,” while calling supporters of the Official Version “assassination analysts” exemplifies the polarization that can occur in searching for the ‘truth.’
Christopher Sharrett reviews Art Simon’s book, Dangerous Knowledge (concerning truth and imagery in the JFK Assassination debate) with some acerbic insights:
“the endless debate…came to constitute an "epistemological crisis," as each official and nonofficial investigation refuted a previous truth claim, and interpretation formed a huge Moebius Strip that traps the body politic and renders truth itself indeterminant but continues to provoke discussion.”
Sharrett notes a lack of moral center in these twisting and turnings of the truth:
“Simon invokes Michel Foucault's remark that "Power has its principle not so much in a person as in a certain concerted distribution of bodies, surfaces, lights, gazes." This simultaneously compelling, obtuse, and arid remark is emblematic of much postmodern discourse... Foucault's linkage of the gaze to power is not the sum and substance of Simon's method, but it does much to turn this work into a studious, eloquent, but labored exercise lacking a real political and moral center.”
Even Official Versions can be abandoned when necessary: enough time has now passed that the Gulf of Tonkin Incident, which provided an excuse to bomb Hanoi, is no longer presented as the ‘actual truth.’ Evidence suggests the incident never occurred, but it’s too late for Hanoi, and for many Americans who haven’t seen the new evidence, American ships were fired upon in the Gulf of Tonkin. ‘Truth’ for those who have come upon or noticed the new evidence differs from those who did not, and both groups will claim they have ‘the truth.’ Progression of knowledge from the former stance to the latter was incomplete. Incomplete transmittal of ‘the truth’ occurs constantly, creating divisions and conflicts. In real life ‘truth’ is almost a commodity.
Literature can be replenished and reach new heights if the principles of progression and perceived ‘truth’ are properly developed by the innovative writer. In the examples presented in the small sample collection of short-short stories provided in this paper, the potential range for progression literature (the genre could also be called the literature of denouement) can be stunning – mind-blowing—and i9t can happen in ‘real life’ as well. Films such as Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction exhibit progression/denouement qualities. A killer known to be dead is shown very much alive after his death, with incredible impact. To the patrons in a restaurant, terrorized by robbers, they’ll never know that one of their ‘saviors’ later died, or that the two men had come into the restaurant to eat after cleaning out a car full of gore and pieces of brain. Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire brought the same approach from stage to film: we slowly realize that the ‘truth’ will never be fully known to Stella, whose passions are manipulated by Stanley, her brutal husband.
Much can be done to fully develop the new genre. The short-short story collection shown here presents controversial religious experiences and interpretations, as felt or reported by persons under widely different conditions. Time can change ‘reality’ and ‘truth’ for the reader or for those in the stories, as more information is obtained., The information might be false, however, leading to false conclusions, which may or may not alter others’ perception of what is ‘true,’ or new information might reveal a ‘new’ or unsuspected truth, or confirm a suspicion. Anything is possible, for ‘truth’ is what is perceived by each individual, or accepted due to the voice of authority. Those impacted by the ‘truth’ can create or live in entirely different universes, depending on the individual, to say nothing of the vicarious experiences felt by the reader or viewer (via literature, film, video games, etc.).
In addition, the writer-as-truth-teller can present the ‘truth’ more vividly and with greater emotional impact, employing the arts as well as the sciences, setting the ‘truth’ in proper proportion to right and wrong, with the potential to sculpt a moral perspective that a simple, arid recounting of events cannot, thus revealing a social aspect and interpretation to ‘truth’ that delivers a personal weight to the individual. Engels, commenting on the impact of Balzac’s Comédie humaine, observed how Balzac delivered “a most wonderfully realistic history of French society ... from which, even in economic details (for instance the re-arrangement of real and personal property after the Revolution) I have learned more than from all the professed historians, economists and statisticians of the period together.”
A simple progression example is to reveal how two people meet after years of absence. They assess the differences now present, compared to the past. These may be psychological as well as physical. What if one person s simply pretending, and isn’t as he seems, or perhaps isn’t the person from the past at all, but is merely masquerading as such? Would/will/can the other person ever find out? Perhaps, perhaps not. Denouement to the reader can be exhilarating, shocking, disappointing, etc., to say nothing of the reactions that can be created by the writer as the story progresses. Truth becomes an object of itself, with its own life, its own history, created within and outside the progression, and may not be ‘true’ after all. Yet the ‘truth’ may be more important than ‘reality’ for political, practical, or social reasons. ‘Truth’ ends up being what we finally believe. If our information remains slight, or even if supporting facts accumulate, the ‘truth’ remains unchanged unless conflicting information enters that is accepted by the recipient. And what about experiencing only conflicting, untrue information at the very onset? We are all familiar with the effects of advertising and propaganda. Hence, ‘truth’ is a hostage of fortune.
Progression could highlight how people change through time – perhaps a sinner really can become a saint! Yet another kind of progression involves revelation, where a character is developed before the reader via actions, events, and so on, but then unravels or morphs due to what we next learn. There is always the chance that what we think we know is not real. Dialogue – actual conversations – might reveal ‘the truth’ – and can be persuasive – if ‘the truth’ is being fully revealed. What if it isn’t? I use the example of a person thought to be a scammer turning out to be a saint, but seen by the world in the news, upon learning of his suicide (which isn’t presented here) as a man with a checkered reputation who took “the coward’s way out.” Read the short-short stories yourself, then decide how cruelly you could make the news story reflect the ‘truth’ as the Official Version would have it. There are two ‘saints’ in the short-short story collection: progression literature tells us much more than meets the eye.
In the literature of progression, just as in real life, ‘truth’ is indeed in the eye of the beholder, so I hope I will be forgiven for appropriating the cliché for the short-short story collection. In the examples of progression that I choose to present, brevity is used – but I stress that the objective is not to be gimmicky or to play tricks on the reader, nor necessarily to be brief, for the skilful writer now has a tool of power. I suggest a respectful treatment of the original perspectives in the foundation stories of progression literature, as they can relate marvelously, in talented hands, to the perspective which emerges or is revealed or appreciated later.
- Nevertheless, my thesis material included several foundation stories in the genre which anchored my ideas for progression literature in the domain of short stories
- Think of the ramifications of knowing a ‘truth’ – unless the dog now treats you in a friendly manner. Where, then, is your ‘truth’ to others?
The literature of progression invokes past events, but might now address a different part of a different story altogether, and ‘you’ may be in a different situation: for others, your story of a biting dog may seem utterly senseless, if this dog is known to be friendly to all. And so on. .
- Why?
- Thus untruth, or mistaken perceptions, or misinterpretations, can happen before or after the offering of the ‘truth,’ and we may be unable to discern which version/experience is ‘true’ even though one story, in this case, involves misperceptions and conclusions based on misconceptions and experiences which were ‘untrue’ but seemed ‘true.’
- Denouement cannot bring forth the ‘truth’ because of the sheer volume of conflicting declarations stating the ‘truth.’
There is the element of the voyeur or the rascal involved in writing the non-fiction novel, related to our concerns, where historical characters are fleshed out fictionally to enhance or comply with a stereotype originally created to advance an Official Version that is controversial. Particularly disturbing is when the stereotype is advanced to ‘truth’ by the new fictionalized treatment. If the writer is actually unfamiliar with the historical person, of necessity then relying on what remains of the ‘truth’ in the Official Version [or other extant] records, the ‘new truth’ can become the final and lasting impression. For example, Don DeLillo’s Libra presents a cold-blooded view of Oswald’s treatment of his wife, based on her reports. The brutal glimpses DeLillo gives us of Oswald’s treatment of his wife are seared into the memory: what Oswald told me about his fights with his wife has no place in the version of the ‘truth’ DeLillo created.
Nevertheless, denouement literature, in progression format, can wrest -- even from a DeLillo opus -- a new and relevant perspective. David Foster Wallace summarizes the challenges to the writer of great literature in today’s fast-moving world, where entertainment is cheap, easily accessed, and well-designed:
“(There is)a contempt for the reader, an idea that literature's current marginalization is the reader's fault. The project that's worth trying is to [make]…the reader confront things rather than ignore them, but to do that in such a way that it's also pleasurable to read… Part of it has to do with living in an era when there's so much entertainment available…and figuring out how fiction is going to stake out its territory in that sort of era. You can try to confront what it is that makes fiction magical in a way that other kinds of art and entertainment aren't. And to figure out how fiction can engage a reader, much of whose sensibility has been formed by pop culture, without simply becoming more shit in the pop culture machine. It's unbelievably difficult and confusing and scary, but it's neat. There's so much mass commercial entertainment that's so good and so slick, this is something that I don't think any other generation has confronted. That's what it's like to be a writer now.”
Progression literature can be exciting and relevant. It can do many things: turn the reader’s perspective upside down, enhance understanding of human nature, restore truth to history -- depending on the author’s intentions and abilities. “The literature of denouement”, or, “progression literature,” in more skilled hands than mine might well provide a revitalization to modern literature, with new depth and excitement in its inimitable approach to crafting.
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