Friday, July 19, 2019

Magritte’s Techniques: IllustratedCopy

Copyright 2019 by Gary L. Pullman

Like any other artist, Rene Magritte makes use of a variety of techniques to create his effects. Several of the more common of Magritte’s techniques include


Personal Values

incongruous juxtaposition: disparate objects are placed side by side or together. Example: the comb, bed, mach, rug, glass, shaving brush, wardrobe, cushion, room, and sky in Personal Values.


Memory of a Voyage

diffusion: a quality or condition is allowed, as it were, to spread throughout a scene or a setting. Example: stone permeates Memory of a Voyage.



The Magician

multiplication: a single attribute or feature is multiplied. Example: the arms of the diner in The Magician.


Carte Blanche

fragmentation: a figure or an object is fragmented in some manner. Example: the horsewoman in Carte Blanche.




Dangerous Relations

reversal: the ordinary nature or appearance of a person, place, or thing is reversed or partially reversed. Example: the figure of the nude woman whose back and buttocks appear in the mirror she holds in front of herself in Dangerous Relations.



Philosophy in the Boudoir

personification: human traits are applied to inanimate objects or animals. Example: the nightgown with breasts and the high-heeled shoes with veins and painted toenails in Philosophy in the Boudoir.




The Heart of the World

substitution: one thing is substituted for another. Examples: the substitution of a tower for a unicorn’s horn in The Heart of the World and of a floating balloon for a man’s head in The Art of Living.



The Lost Jockey

synecdoche: a part stands for a whole. Example: the leaf-trees in The Lost Jockey.



The Seducer

environmental influence: an object partakes of the nature of its surroundings. Example: the ship in The Seducer literally becomes one with the sea.




Treasure Island

hybridization: two or more persons, places, or things are combined. Examples: In Treasure Island, The Natural Graces, The Companions of Fear, and The Third Dimension, birds merge with plants, the animal with the vegetable, the aerial with the terrestrial, and the mobile with the stationary.



The Human Condition

overlapping: a “nearer” object partly covers a more “distant” object. Example: The Human Condition.



The Domain of Arnheim

metaphor: this equals that. Example: In The Domain of Arnheim, an eagle is a mountain.



The Collective Imagination



The Alarm Clock

inversion: a familiar object is inverted (turned upside down, inside out, or otherwise reversed. Examples: The Collective Imagination and The Alarm Clock.



The Eternal Evidence

compartmentalization: an object is divided into several sections or boxes. Example: The Eternal Evidence.

subtraction or omission: one or more attributes or features is (are) removed or left out. Example: The Horns of Desire (no picture available).



The Wrath of the Gods

punning: a play on words is used as the basis for the picture. Example: “horsepower” seems to have inspired The Wrath of the Gods.



The Lovers

concealment: one or more attributes or features is (are) hidden. Example: The Lovers.



The Listening Room


The Tomb of the Wrestlers

magnification: an object’s size is increased to gigantic proportions. Examples: the immense apple in The Listening Room and the enormous rose in The Tomb of the Wrestlers.



The Great War

displacement: an object is relocated to a place other than its customary location. Example: the corsage in The Great War appears before the woman‘s face rather than on her gown.




Clairvoyance

clairvoyance: anticipating the future. Example: the artist, studying an egg, paints a bird in flight in Clairvoyance.



Variation of Sadness

irony: the conveyance of an unanticipated meaning or a meaning at odds with or opposite to its literal meaning. Example: Variation of Sadness, in which a hen contemplates a boiled egg.



The Beautiful Relations

borrowed capabilities: by being associated with other ob jects that can do something, one that cannot do the same feat seems to borrow the capability to do so. Example: In The Beautiful Relations, facial features float alongside a hot-air balloon that hovers where the left eye should be.


 The Imaginative Faculty

symbolism: a symbol is used as the basis of the picture. Example: the phallic candle and testicular eggs in The Imaginative Faculty.



The Large Family



High Society

silhouetting: a silhouette shape is cut out of the background or the foreground of the painting. Examples: the bird in The Large Family and the man’s shape in high Society.



The Rape

transformation: one object turns into (becomes) another object. Example: a torso becomes a face in The Rape.



The Reckless Sleeper

embedding: objects are implanted in a surface of another object. Example: The Reckless Sleeper.



Intermission

truncation: an object is pruned, trimmed, or amputated. Example: the disembodied limbs in Intermission.



Attempting the Impossible



Alice in Wonderland

allusion: a reference to a literary or other cultural predecessor is used as the basis of the picture. Examples: the Pygmalion myth seems to have inspired Attempting the Impossible and Lewis Carroll’s novel appears to be the inspiration for Alice in Wonderland.



Delusions of Grandeur



Megalomania

telescoping: an object is telescoped outward or inward or is depicted with the capability of being so manipulated. Examples: Delusions of Grandeur and Megalomania.


The Six Elements

combination: two or more of the single techniques are used together. Example: The Six Elements employs incongruous juxtaposition, compartmentalization, and truncation.



The Harvest

impressionism: the use of heavy brushstrokes, vivid color, and other techniques to create a sense of mood or atmosphere concerning a painting’s subject. Magritte said he employed the surrealistic technique to create “a feeling of levity, intoxication,” and “happiness” while also creating “a feeling of the mysterious existence of objects (Letter to G. Puel date march 8, 1955, reprinted in Magritte: The True Art of Painting by Harry Torczyner “with the collaboration of Bella Bessard, Abradale Press/Harry N. Abrams, Inc, New York, NY, 1979, 107).

variation: various conceptions of a theme are repeated over a span of time—often several years or decades. Examples: Magritte painted several versions of a number of his paintings or alternative versions of them or of certain motifs in his work. For example, the depiction of a leaf as comprising a tree (see “synecdoche”) is a frequently repeated motif in Magritte’s oeuvre, as is his hybridization of birds and plants.



The Perspective of Love



The Fire


 The Air Plane



The Lost Jockey

 
The Ignorant Fairy (1957)

 
The Ignorant Fairy (1957)



The Companions of Fear




The Natural Graces

 
Treasure Island


The Flavor of Tears



The Enchanted Realm (1953)


Thursday, July 18, 2019

Plots That May Challenge of Change Common Perspectives

Copyright 2019 by Gary L. Pullman

Not all of the examples in today's post are exclusively related to the horror genre, but each of the techniques could be or have been used by writers of horror fiction.

Usurpation: a minor character becomes the main character.


John Garner uses this approach in his novel Grendel (1971), a retelling of the Old English epic poem Beowulf, in which the villain of the poem, portrayed as an anti-hero, becomes the main character.


In Gregory Maguire's 1996 novel Wicked: The Life an Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, a retelling of L. Frank Baum's novel, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.

Altered History: a sub-genre of speculative fiction, alternative history is based on the premise that historical events occur differently than they actually took place. There are many examples of this sub-type, including:


Ward Moore's novel Bring the Jubilee (1953), in which Robert E. Lee wins The Battle of Gettysburg, paving the way for a Confederate Civil War victory.


1945, a 1995 novel by Newt Gingrich and William R. Forstchen, wherein the United States defeats Japan, but enters a Cold war with undefeated Germany, rather than with the Soviet Union.

The-Future-Is-Now: visionary predictions of things to come form the basis of this type of plot.


George Orwell wrote a Future-Is-Now dystopian novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), in which a totalitarian government uses science and technology, propaganda, revisionist history, and other techniques to control its citizenry.

Intersection Stories: explorations of the crossroads between two opposites or extremes.


Gore Vidal's Myra Breckenridge (1968), a novel featuring a transgender protagonist, meets male and female and masculine and feminine binaries as it lampoons and challenges feminism, gender, sexual orientation, and social mores.

In Vice Versa: A Lesson to Fathers an early (1882!) comic novel by Thomas Anstey Guthrie, magic causes a father and a son to switch bodies, the father revisiting adolescence as his son experiences maturity.


Of course, Robert Louis Stevenson's Gothic horror novel, Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886), investigates the intersection of good and evil.

Alien Archaeologist: an alien or some other type of fish out of water (who may or may no be an archaeologist) studies human society and culture, often interpreting his or her experiences in an altogether unfamiliar manner.


My short story, “One Dilemma After Another” (in One Dilemma After Another, Volume II) (2018) is an example: an extraterrestrial military scout tries to hide among us, but his attempts to mimic human beings confronts him “one dilemma after another.”

Schizophrenic Studies: a subject is examined from a variety of points of view.


William Faulkner's 1929 novel The Sound and the Fury tells the history of the Compton family from the perspectives of Benjamin, Quentin, and Jason, whose stories touch on many of the same incidents, but provide their narrators' own peculiar interpretations of the vents.

Using these techniques often results in a truly “novel” (i. e., fresh) novel, since each technique offers a way to challenge or change readers' perspectives on the subjects of the books that are based on these approaches.

Paranormal vs. Supernatural: What’s the Diff?

Copyright 2009 by Gary L. Pullman

Sometimes, in demonstrating how to brainstorm about an essay topic, selecting horror movies, I ask students to name the titles of as many such movies as spring to mind (seldom a difficult feat for them, as the genre remains quite popular among young adults). Then, I ask them to identify the monster, or threat--the antagonist, to use the proper terminology--that appears in each of the films they have named. Again, this is usually a quick and easy task. Finally, I ask them to group the films’ adversaries into one of three possible categories: natural, paranormal, or supernatural. This is where the fun begins.

It’s a simple enough matter, usually, to identify the threats which fall under the “natural” label, especially after I supply my students with the scientific definition of “nature”: everything that exists as either matter or energy (which are, of course, the same thing, in different forms--in other words, the universe itself. The supernatural is anything which falls outside, or is beyond, the universe: God, angels, demons, and the like, if they exist. Mad scientists, mutant cannibals (and just plain cannibals), serial killers, and such are examples of natural threats. So far, so simple.

What about borderline creatures, though? Are vampires, werewolves, and zombies, for example, natural or supernatural? And what about Freddy Krueger? In fact, what does the word “paranormal” mean, anyway? If the universe is nature and anything outside or beyond the universe is supernatural, where does the paranormal fit into the scheme of things?

According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, the word “paranormal,” formed of the prefix “para,” meaning alongside, and “normal,” meaning “conforming to common standards, usual,” was coined in 1920. The American Heritage Dictionary defines “paranormal” to mean “beyond the range of normal experience or scientific explanation.” In other words, the paranormal is not supernatural--it is not outside or beyond the universe; it is natural, but, at the present, at least, inexplicable, which is to say that science cannot yet explain its nature. The same dictionary offers, as examples of paranormal phenomena, telepathy and “a medium’s paranormal powers.”

Wikipedia offers a few other examples of such phenomena or of paranormal sciences, including the percentages of the American population which, according to a Gallup poll, believes in each phenomenon, shown here in parentheses: psychic or spiritual healing (54), extrasensory perception (ESP) (50), ghosts (42), demons (41), extraterrestrials (33), clairvoyance and prophecy (32), communication with the dead (28), astrology (28), witchcraft (26), reincarnation (25), and channeling (15); 36 percent believe in telepathy.

As can be seen from this list, which includes demons, ghosts, and witches along with psychics and extraterrestrials, there is a confusion as to which phenomena and which individuals belong to the paranormal and which belong to the supernatural categories. This confusion, I believe, results from the scientism of our age, which makes it fashionable for people who fancy themselves intelligent and educated to dismiss whatever cannot be explained scientifically or, if such phenomena cannot be entirely rejected, to classify them as as-yet inexplicable natural phenomena. That way, the existence of a supernatural realm need not be admitted or even entertained. Scientists tend to be materialists, believing that the real consists only of the twofold unity of matter and energy, not dualists who believe that there is both the material (matter and energy) and the spiritual, or supernatural. If so, everything that was once regarded as having been supernatural will be regarded (if it cannot be dismissed) as paranormal and, maybe, if and when it is explained by science, as natural. Indeed, Sigmund Freud sought to explain even God as but a natural--and in Freud’s opinion, an obsolete--phenomenon.

Meanwhile, among skeptics, there is an ongoing campaign to eliminate the paranormal by explaining them as products of ignorance, misunderstanding, or deceit. Ridicule is also a tactic that skeptics sometimes employ in this campaign. For example, The Skeptics’ Dictionary contends that the perception of some “events” as being of a paranormal nature may be attributed to “ignorance or magical thinking.” The dictionary is equally suspicious of each individual phenomenon or “paranormal science” as well. Concerning psychics’ alleged ability to discern future events, for example, The Skeptic’s Dictionary quotes Jay Leno (“How come you never see a headline like 'Psychic Wins Lottery'?”), following with a number of similar observations:

Psychics don't rely on psychics to warn them of impending disasters. Psychics don't predict their own deaths or diseases. They go to the dentist like the rest of us. They're as surprised and disturbed as the rest of us when they have to call a plumber or an electrician to fix some defect at home. Their planes are delayed without their being able to anticipate the delays. If they want to know something about Abraham Lincoln, they go to the library; they don't try to talk to Abe's spirit. In short, psychics live by the known laws of nature except when they are playing the psychic game with people.
In An Encyclopedia of Claims, Frauds, and Hoaxes of the Occult and Supernatural, James Randi, a magician who exercises a skeptical attitude toward all things alleged to be paranormal or supernatural, takes issue with the notion of such phenomena as well, often employing the same arguments and rhetorical strategies as The Skeptic’s Dictionary.

In short, the difference between the paranormal and the supernatural lies in whether one is a materialist, believing in only the existence of matter and energy, or a dualist, believing in the existence of both matter and energy and spirit. If one maintains a belief in the reality of the spiritual, he or she will classify such entities as angels, demons, ghosts, gods, vampires, and other threats of a spiritual nature as supernatural, rather than paranormal, phenomena. He or she may also include witches (because, although they are human, they are empowered by the devil, who is himself a supernatural entity) and other natural threats that are energized, so to speak, by a power that transcends nature and is, as such, outside or beyond the universe. Otherwise, one is likely to reject the supernatural as a category altogether, identifying every inexplicable phenomenon as paranormal, whether it is dark matter or a teenage werewolf. Indeed, some scientists dedicate at least part of their time to debunking allegedly paranormal phenomena, explaining what natural conditions or processes may explain them, as the author of The Serpent and the Rainbow explains the creation of zombies by voodoo priests.

Based upon my recent reading of Tzvetan Todorov's The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to the Fantastic, I add the following addendum to this essay.

According to Todorov:

The fantastic. . . lasts only as long as a certain hesitation [in deciding] whether or not what they [the reader and the protagonist] perceive derives from "reality" as it exists in the common opinion. . . . If he [the reader] decides that the laws of reality remain intact and permit an explanation of the phenomena described, we can say that the work belongs to the another genre [than the fantastic]: the uncanny. If, on the contrary, he decides that new laws of nature must be entertained to account for the phenomena, we enter the genre of the marvelous (The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre, 41).
Todorov further differentiates these two categories by characterizing the uncanny as “the supernatural explained” and the marvelous as “the supernatural accepted” (41-42).

Interestingly, the prejudice against even the possibility of the supernatural’s existence which is implicit in the designation of natural versus paranormal phenomena, which excludes any consideration of the supernatural, suggests that there are no marvelous phenomena; instead, there can be only the uncanny. Consequently, for those who subscribe to this view, the fantastic itself no longer exists in this scheme, for the fantastic depends, as Todorov points out, upon the tension of indecision concerning to which category an incident belongs, the natural or the supernatural. The paranormal is understood, by those who posit it, in lieu of the supernatural, as the natural as yet unexplained.

And now, back to a fate worse than death: grading students’ papers.

My Cup of Blood

Anyone who becomes an aficionado of anything tends, eventually, to develop criteria for elements or features of the person, place, or thing of whom or which he or she has become enamored. Horror fiction--admittedly not everyone’s cuppa blood--is no different (okay, maybe it’s a little different): it, too, appeals to different fans, each for reasons of his or her own. Of course, in general, book reviews, the flyleaves of novels, and movie trailers suggest what many, maybe even most, readers of a particular type of fiction enjoy, but, right here, right now, I’m talking more specifically--one might say, even more eccentrically. In other words, I’m talking what I happen to like, without assuming (assuming makes an “ass” of “u” and “me”) that you also like the same. It’s entirely possible that you will; on the other hand, it’s entirely likely that you won’t.

Anyway, this is what I happen to like in horror fiction:

Small-town settings in which I get to know the townspeople, both the good, the bad, and the ugly. For this reason alone, I’m a sucker for most of Stephen King’s novels. Most of them, from 'Salem's Lot to Under the Dome, are set in small towns that are peopled by the good, the bad, and the ugly. Part of the appeal here, granted, is the sense of community that such settings entail.

Isolated settings, such as caves, desert wastelands, islands, mountaintops, space, swamps, where characters are cut off from civilization and culture and must survive and thrive or die on their own, without assistance, by their wits and other personal resources. Many are the examples of such novels and screenplays, but Alien, The Shining, The Descent, Desperation, and The Island of Dr. Moreau, are some of the ones that come readily to mind.

Total institutions as settings. Camps, hospitals, military installations, nursing homes, prisons, resorts, spaceships, and other worlds unto themselves are examples of such settings, and Sleepaway Camp, Coma, The Green Mile, and Aliens are some of the novels or films that take place in such settings.

Anecdotal scenes--in other words, short scenes that showcase a character--usually, an unusual, even eccentric, character. Both Dean Koontz and the dynamic duo, Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, excel at this, so I keep reading their series (although Koontz’s canine companions frequently--indeed, almost always--annoy, as does his relentless optimism).

Atmosphere, mood, and tone. Here, King is king, but so is Bentley Little. In the use of description to terrorize and horrify, both are masters of the craft.

A bit of erotica (okay, okay, sex--are you satisfied?), often of the unusual variety. Sex sells, and, yes, sex whets my reader’s appetite. Bentley Little is the go-to guy for this spicy ingredient, although Koontz has done a bit of seasoning with this spice, too, in such novels as Lightning and Demon Seed (and, some say, Hung).

Believable characters. Stephen King, Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, and Dan Simmons are great at creating characters that stick to readers’ ribs.

Innovation. Bram Stoker demonstrates it, especially in his short story “Dracula’s Guest,” as does H. P. Lovecraft, Edgar Allan Poe, Shirley Jackson, and a host of other, mostly classical, horror novelists and short story writers. For an example, check out my post on Stoker’s story, which is a real stoker, to be sure. Stephen King shows innovation, too, in ‘Salem’s Lot, The Shining, It, and other novels. One might even argue that Dean Koontz’s something-for-everyone, cross-genre writing is innovative; he seems to have been one of the first, if not the first, to pen such tales.

Technique. Check out Frank Peretti’s use of maps and his allusions to the senses in Monster; my post on this very topic is worth a look, if I do say so myself, which, of course, I do. Opening chapters that accomplish a multitude of narrative purposes (not usually all at once, but successively) are attractive, too, and Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child are as good as anyone, and better than many, at this art.

A connective universe--a mythos, if you will, such as both H. P. Lovecraft and Stephen King, and, to a lesser extent, Dean Koontz, Bentley Little, and even Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child have created through the use of recurring settings, characters, themes, and other elements of fiction.

A lack of pretentiousness. Dean Koontz has it, as do Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, Bentley Little, and (to some extent, although he has become condescending and self-indulgent of late, Stephen King); unfortunately, both Dan Simmons and Robert McCammon have become too self-important in their later works, Simmons almost to the point of becoming unreadable. Come on, people, you’re writing about monsters--you should be humble.

Longevity. Writers who have been around for a while usually get better, Stephen King, Dan Simmons, and Robert McCammon excepted.

Pacing. Neither too fast nor too slow. Dean Koontz is good, maybe the best, here, of contemporary horror writers.


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