On the nature of mysteries in storytelling
Posted: 2015-12-05 03:46pm
I was thinking of this in the context of a recent comment about Lovecraft in fiction, which left me thinking about the Trail of Cthulhu RPG and mysteries in general. This is also loosely related to my previous post on decaying audience interest in most American TV series. Procedural series seem less troubled by this for a reason that will become apparent.
Author China Miéville used the analogy of quantum superposition to describe this concept. While that gets into the fallacy of using quantum theory at a macro scale, it is a reasonable analogy for this idea. The fundamental appeal of a mystery in fiction is the fact that there are multiple possibilities. At least until the mystery itself is revealed and this property is ruined. A simplistic analogy(loosely taken from the article on Pozni storytelling from Richard Castle's fictional website) comes from the idea of finding a lost key only to realize that it goes to a low rent apartment five blocks away. Before that realization it could be a key to anything from a mansion to a safety deposit box holding some dark secret.
The problem with any mystery in fiction, especially one that drives a work of fiction like Lost or The Sixth Sense, is that once it is resolved the work becomes somewhat pointless or at best less enjoyable. It comes down to the fact that once the driving mystery is known, it makes the work less interesting over time. This is, in a nutshell, why TV series based around a mystery are always problematic. The first option is to draw out the mystery, and have the audience lose interest because there appears to be no solution in sight. The second is to come up with a solution relatively early, in which case the audience loses interest because the thing that kept them interested is now resolved.
More generally, this in a sense related to the idea that many anti-science arguments use, the idea that science ruins the mystery of things. Many creationists seem to largely believe this, that understanding the universe ruins the mystery of God. There was also a story related to this idea told by Richard Feynman in which he recounted a debate with an artist friend in which his friend argued that science detracted from the beauty of a flower by being able to explain the various processes that created it. Feynman of course argued that he could see both the natural sense of beauty that the artist saw as well as the deeper one allowed by his knowledge of science, not understanding how it could subtract. The thing Feynman misses with his argument is that the beauty that the artist refereed to was in fact the mystery that was allowed by ignorance. Discovering those underlying processes ruins that sense of beauty irreversibly. This is not to say that it isn't worth it, scientists in general have a stronger sense of wonder about the universe than average. It is one of the largest motivating factors for them. This is in addition to the different beauty of a solution.
The solution to this problem is found in a mix of the element that drives scientists as well as that which allows procedural TV series to generally outlast those with driving mysteries. It is also why nearly all mystery authors write series. If you cannot enjoy the beauty of the solution in and of itself, after one mystery is resolved, move on to a different one. Though to avoid the problem of Ponzi storytelling it is preferable to not have a direct connection between mysteries.
For a work of fiction, the other key is of course to have interesting elements in your story other than the mystery itself. Good characters are the fundamental key here, if we like the people enough we will continue to consume the stories regardless of which direction they go. How many times do people rewatch The Empire Strikes Back despite the fact that they know the mystery in advance?
Author China Miéville used the analogy of quantum superposition to describe this concept. While that gets into the fallacy of using quantum theory at a macro scale, it is a reasonable analogy for this idea. The fundamental appeal of a mystery in fiction is the fact that there are multiple possibilities. At least until the mystery itself is revealed and this property is ruined. A simplistic analogy(loosely taken from the article on Pozni storytelling from Richard Castle's fictional website) comes from the idea of finding a lost key only to realize that it goes to a low rent apartment five blocks away. Before that realization it could be a key to anything from a mansion to a safety deposit box holding some dark secret.
The problem with any mystery in fiction, especially one that drives a work of fiction like Lost or The Sixth Sense, is that once it is resolved the work becomes somewhat pointless or at best less enjoyable. It comes down to the fact that once the driving mystery is known, it makes the work less interesting over time. This is, in a nutshell, why TV series based around a mystery are always problematic. The first option is to draw out the mystery, and have the audience lose interest because there appears to be no solution in sight. The second is to come up with a solution relatively early, in which case the audience loses interest because the thing that kept them interested is now resolved.
More generally, this in a sense related to the idea that many anti-science arguments use, the idea that science ruins the mystery of things. Many creationists seem to largely believe this, that understanding the universe ruins the mystery of God. There was also a story related to this idea told by Richard Feynman in which he recounted a debate with an artist friend in which his friend argued that science detracted from the beauty of a flower by being able to explain the various processes that created it. Feynman of course argued that he could see both the natural sense of beauty that the artist saw as well as the deeper one allowed by his knowledge of science, not understanding how it could subtract. The thing Feynman misses with his argument is that the beauty that the artist refereed to was in fact the mystery that was allowed by ignorance. Discovering those underlying processes ruins that sense of beauty irreversibly. This is not to say that it isn't worth it, scientists in general have a stronger sense of wonder about the universe than average. It is one of the largest motivating factors for them. This is in addition to the different beauty of a solution.
The solution to this problem is found in a mix of the element that drives scientists as well as that which allows procedural TV series to generally outlast those with driving mysteries. It is also why nearly all mystery authors write series. If you cannot enjoy the beauty of the solution in and of itself, after one mystery is resolved, move on to a different one. Though to avoid the problem of Ponzi storytelling it is preferable to not have a direct connection between mysteries.
For a work of fiction, the other key is of course to have interesting elements in your story other than the mystery itself. Good characters are the fundamental key here, if we like the people enough we will continue to consume the stories regardless of which direction they go. How many times do people rewatch The Empire Strikes Back despite the fact that they know the mystery in advance?