Writer's Block Daily

So today I read a Mary-Sue Hunter story on a whim. The story (not the fic being critiqued, the "hunter" portion of the story that's supposed to be good writing) contained:

• Characters alternating between being unable to stand each other and being close friends
• A giant dinosaur moving silently through a dense jungle
• A veritable wall of profanity for the sake of being "edgy"
• Someone criticizing another person for glorifying senseless violence in the middle of beating them to a pulp
• Vague, unsatisfying explanations for skills pulled out of the characters' asses
• Characters being referred to with descriptors rather than pronouns or their names
• Random, inconsistent application cursing in another language
• A villain letting the characters live for an incredibly flimsy reason
• Someone being told they need a defibrillator for CPR, performing CPR without it, and resuscitating the victim instantaneously

Blaaaaaaaalgh.

I recall it once being said — I can't rightly recall by who originally, but I feel I ought remember — that the sins we find most offensive are those we are ourselves are guilty of. As I'm sure you've considered, that may be relevant here. And perhaps applicable in general to those most furiously offended by "Mary Sues", to the point of writing fics against them, as opposed to those who merely toss the book aside (metaphorically or literally) and find some more productive and unrelated use for the remainder of their day.

edited 15th Oct '16 6:44:08 PM by KillerClowns

Whoo, long time no trope. Got a teaching job for which I am wholly unqualified, and a recent job-related fit of rage made me pick up a pen again... When I have free time, I don't write. When I don't, I do. Make sense of that, if you can.

Offhand question: what do you think of the present tense, and do you use it? I know it's more about how you use it than whether you do so, but it'd be interesting to hear your thoughts. I ask as the story (???) I'm writing came out in present tense and I've begun to wonder if it'll work beyond the first few scenes. A quote I like on the subject:

here

edited 16th Oct '16 11:46:32 AM by LongLiveHumour

Present tense is challenging because of the language and tense isn't always conducive to storytelling, the inability to foreshadow, the limited amount of analysis of events, the inability to jump around in time (just present and backwards)... even narrators that speak in the present tense to a reader tend to recall events from the past.

It's very challenging and very hard to get right, and most of the time you realize that the events should have been told in the past tense. Without specifics past tense is more versatile to the written word, TV and movie scripts are more flexible, but that's mostly due to the differences in the media.

This feels like another good moment to reiterate my point that the entire "Mary Sue police" culture among amateur writers is so, so unhealthy and directly counterproductive to actually helping writers improve.

I've thought that for a while without actually reading anything in the genre, which is actually part of the reason I read this one, since I need to be open-minded. It didn't help much, and reminded me of an idea of mine: a Mary Sue Hunter story from the perspective of the "Sue" they're hunting... only she isn't a Sue.

The idea went something like this: give a character (preferably an OC in fanfic) some common Mary Sue traits (ridiculously good at something, crushing on a main character, everyone likes her, etc.). Twist them a bit to make them more realistic (the skill she's good at is something random like architecture, the main character is completely unaware of the crush, everyone likes her because she's a non-violent nice girl with connections, etc.) Now portray the Hunters as dangerous people, possibly murderers, stalking her for an unknown reason, wielding advanced technology, with no compunction as to who stands in their way, throwing around bizarre terms like "plot" and "canon" and "out-of-character". Honestly, in the right context, Mary Sue Hunters are borderline horror stories.

If their job is to enforce the status quo, they sound more like the secret police.

Then again, being stalked by the KGB during the Great Terror qualifies as a horror story.

The whole thing about "Mary Sues" and Limitus test stuff has never really done anything but stymie young writers from improving their writing skills. To be honest, the stupid rigidness of those test actively prevented making interesting characters.

If a test has something as simple as "plays an instrument" as something that can qualify a character as a Mary Sue, then what's the point of making characters at all? Characters can't have fucking hobbies or they represent some kind of fandom sin? Screw that!

A particular gripe I have with those tests and the whole culture of "Mary Sue witch hunts" is how it turns Self-Indulgence into a punishable offense, especially for young girls who have just started getting into writing.

i might argue that these test can be useful but you can still make character from being Mary sue by simply playing with the characteristics associated with them.

edited 18th Oct '16 2:12:19 AM by ewolf2015

This exactly. People should be worried about making interesting characters, not about if they're a "Mary Sue" or not.

I don't know, I suppose it depends on the sort of writing environment you grow up in. For me it meant a label for something I already recognised as bad writing (I wrote a terrible self-insert when I was thirteen, then reread it two years later and AH GOD THE SHAME) even if I didn't understand exactly why. Learning about Mary Sues helped me understand what makes rounded characters round, and made them easier to write.

Most people are probably going to come up with a Mary Sue at some point, and there's nothing wrong with that - we learn as we go. By no means tell a ten-year-old not to write a Mary Sue, or that their story lacks themes, or that they should use a less linear narrative. The rule against Mary Sues is, like any other writing rule, as good or as bad as the people who enforce it. "Don't start a sentence with and" is a stupid rule; "use and sparely and for effect" is not. Likewise it's one thing to say, "Your character seems too perfect / has too many unique characteristics / suffers more than everyone else: perhaps you might consider averaging them out a bit?" and another to go, "Your character is a Mary Sue! This is bad!" with a link to a list of Mary Sue characteristics.

The good thing about Mary Sue is that she's a label, which makes her easy to describe and understand, but that same thing makes her easy to proscribe without nuance. The Universal Litmus Test is pretty good, I think: it asks many questions, emphasising that no single characteristic is "bad" and that even if your character does score as a Mary Sue, they may not be. Though I'm a much better writer than I was, I still run characters through the test as a sort of thinking exercise, and it often gives me new ideas. It's only a tool, after all.

Wow, apologies for the wall of text. It appears I have strong feelings on this.

edited 18th Oct '16 3:36:01 PM by LongLiveHumour

Strong, but not invalid.

It seems that the advice is useful as a "you should avoid this common failure mode" warning until the writer knows what they're doing. At which point a good writer can ignore it at will and still turn out good prose.

The problem is that people tend to be far too absolutist and aggressive about it. Hence my repeated use of the term "police".

Not looking for answers or suggestions, this is something I'd much rather figure out myself the hard way. Just venting:

I wasted a good ten minutes trying to figure out how to make a joke about "literally cutthroat competition" work before realizing that specific line, if it isn't an outright Cliché already, has probably been done enough times to be nearing that level.

So now I need to think of another, not done-to-death way to summarize a particular difference between American and Uelane business culture, the difference being the Uelane have an entire culture of assassination — particular contexts where, despite it being technically illegal, killing a certain kind of competitor^note they have to have grievously slighted you or your ancestors first, though the definition of "grievously slighted" can be dangerously loose in a certain kind of way^note the assassin should use a sword, knife, staff, or ideally their bare hands, though depending on the insult and how many other people the target has pissed off, anything but poisoned food or drink can be accepted and making sure to not quite confess to the murder while knowing just a touch too much is considered entirely acceptable, and possibly even a good PR move.

EDIT: And for now I've decided to accept that I am not, in fact, Terry Pratchett, and should probably just state the observation without a clever quip instead of forcing it. If I think of a good one later, I'll use it, if I don't, that's life.

edited 18th Oct '16 9:15:23 PM by KillerClowns

"The whole thing about "Mary Sues" and Limitus test stuff has never really done anything but stymie young writers from improving their writing skills. To be honest, the stupid rigidness of those test actively prevented making interesting characters. "

Weell first, it's not "limitus" test
Also they are un-rigid as hell. The most they give is "you may be slapping too many special unique traits on your character, slow down, buster".

Okay, so I spelled Litmus test wrong, what does that have to do with it? Seriously, correcting me would have been useful, commenting on it adds nothing.

Also "too many unique traits"

Clearly, Renaissance polymaths are just Mary Sue OCs, because they can do everything and everybody loves them.

See, you are still doing the thing where you attempt to criticise them while having no idea what they actually are

And actually yes, "this guy knows absolutely everything and can solve any problem" is a common sue-trait and anything approaching that needs to be handed carefully by the writing to prevent the plot from going to crapper.

edited 18th Oct '16 11:33:00 PM by Adannor

I'm pretty sure I've been around long enough to know what a Mary Sue is and to have a lot of reasons to criticize it.

Not knowing the name and misrepresenting actual action, function and intent of the tests shows otherwise.

edited 19th Oct '16 9:02:23 AM by Adannor

TBH, I've read lots of those things and it's a pretty fair assessment. As I said, the intent may be more a gentle warning than a rigid set of laws - but that's not how it usually plays out in practice.

It's always a good type of feeling when a character just clicks in your head in response to just a little more input. It's like a minute jostle or drop of catalyst causing precipitants to crystallize out of solution; there isn't much new material there but the existing stuff is arranged with wonderful new clarity.

Agnieszka, now I know exactly what you are: grifter. You became who you are now because you tell others the stories that they want, and you started believing in them yourself.

yo, i have a romani British character but i'm a bit afraid she might come off as a stereotype since she's well...a bit sexual but the thing is, she never gets laid. i don't know its ok or not.

Ask actual Romani people, not randos on TV Tropes.

The tumblr blog Writing With Color is a good resource for learning about race-related writing, but ultimately yeah, actually finding a romani person to speak to is the best course. It's just good to have multiple sources since not everyone finds the same things objectionable. Get a bigger sample size and all that.

well they gotta be a romani in here