Initially, our group met up one day in the library to hash out what would go in our story. And after talking about it the only framework we really ended up needing was two people who fall in love and set out on a journey to find the other one. In a very minimal definition this is really the set up of a lot of romances: a separation between something destined to be together which prompts the search and the journey, and ends in unity with each other. Our story was basically outlined right there and the only thing left was to give it life and create meaning for it, and that's really where all the fun begins. So we just started brainstorming and writing down all the events and fantastic ups and downs we wanted to throw our characters into, drawing our sources from the stories we've read, the essential elements of romance, and basically just trying to put them through as many obstacles and transformations as possible before they happen to coincidentally stumble across each other. With our big list of adventure we set up a Google document and did the "popcorn fiction" thing. Sam wrote the first part, I did the middle, and Jenny tied it all up for us at the end. I had a lot of fun writing it and watching how even between three people, and even with a list of the most arbitrary ideas, a romance appeared to emerge organically from the chaos.
So what exactly was it that made our story the perfect romance? It was a question we unfortunately ran out of time for. As I mentioned before we made sure from the start that we would follow the typical pattern of separation, adventure, and reunion. But we all know this still isn't good enough criteria to be called the perfect romance. Here are just a few of the romantic elements picked out from our story:
Apparent Death: When Alf heard over the radio that a girl of Lorelei's same description had been missing for a while, he assumed the worst and feared that his true love might be gone for good.
Revelation: Alf has a revelation when he's sitting in the ocean and thinking about what the old man said.
Identity: Lorelei has to go incognito as a man in order to escape from the prostitution ring and continue her search for Alf.
Break in consciousness: Alf falls into a deep sleep where images of the temptress at the train station keep his mind preoccupied, causing him to miss his destination.
Descent: Lorelei has to become a prostitute, and re-enter into a submissive role that she had just escaped from. Alf is forced to survive in the wilderness after wrecking his vehicle on a desolated highway.
Ascent: Lorelei eventually becomes leader of the rebellion group. Alf finds money buried in the ground, thus overturning his bad fortune.
And last but not least,
Happy Ending: Alf and Lorelei are reunited at the end of the story, finally able to embrace one another for the first time since they had met.
After our performance I overheard Dr. Sexson saying how our story followed very closely the plot of Shakespeare's Pericles. Not sure about Jenny and Sam, but I've never even read this play before. So I thought it was really interesting how even in a situation where we try, in individually separate efforts, to come up with our own original story, it can still end up closely resembling other stories that came before it. It just reinforces what I've slowly started to realize as this class progressed throughout the semester. We should read and think "Wait a minute. It feels like I've heard this before." I consider this good news because it really reinforces the legitimacy and truth of romance, and makes Frye's book and the other things we've been studying that much more intriguing. I guess the old adage of the infinite monkey theorem holds true, at least in my case anyway: put a monkey in a room with a typewriter and he will eventually produce Shakespeare. It sounds like I was one of those unaware monkeys, a monkey who only knew a little bit what makes a perfect romance.
No comments:
Post a Comment