So anyway we all agree that characters and there reasons and actions need to be belieavble, plausible. Some times however I've encountered folks whose particular tastes and logic lead them to feel that a character doing something they know to be unwise, or that they have good reason to believe will have negative consquences for them is not belieavble. This is some times labeled "Too stupid to live."

Now certainly we all get annoyed when say in a movie (especially horror movies) somebody does something totally idiotic that they know is very dangerous and without even really having any motivation for it.

However, putting that sort of thing aside I submit that, in real life many people frequently do stupid things in full knowledge of their stupidity. Example: The paramour of one of my partner's cousins recently wrote checks for a car and a house knowing full well he didn't have money enough in his bank account to cover them. (the situation is still ongoing so i dont know the "end of the story" but the point is they did it.)

People will rationalize to themselves, tell themselves they can handle it, find a way out of it, or just ignore it.

So, I'm not sure I consider "too stupid to live" to necessarily be terribly valid as a story problem unless it has more to do with a disconnect in character nature and motivation.

On the other hand, doing "stupid things" can still work as long as the character has a "rational" reason for performing the action. For example, we may all agree that trying to pay for something when the money does not exist is illogical. However, if a character did this in the hope that maybe, somehow, he or she would get a way with it may work in a story. Since the character has a "logical" reason for this (in his or her own mind perhaps) then this can add a certain amount of suspense for the reader because the reader can see something bad happening. As long as the potential consequences are not completely predictable you may have a chance to intrigue the reader.

This bugs me when I come across it in writing, because it's like the author either doesn't notice (yikes!) or doesn't want to go back and establish the character's motivations (or change it, if what he's asking the character to do is out-of-character for the way he's written the character.)

I think where the confusion comes is that people do out-of-character things all the time in real life. People make mistakes. But the decisions we make tend to reflect the kind of people we are, the difference is that others don't always realize what kind of people we are until the moment that the mistake comes to light. I think that's just people thinking they know someone when all they know is the superficial details of being acquainted with someone (or they know a sociopath, who is very good at conveying to others the image he/she wants to convey. Think of the neighbors interviewed after someone is arrested for some heinous crime. "I would have never guessed he was sheltering a murderous alien horde in his garage. He was the nicest guy. Always happy to loan me his lawn mower...")

Another way of thinking of this is back to that old concept of an unreliable narrator. An unreliable narrator is usually unreliable because we can see events as told through his/her lens that seem to differ from what the narrator thinks about the events. In those cases, the author must work hard to maintain the narrator's unreliability consistently so that it continues to work as a device for the story. Or put it all over the board so the narrator is so unpredictable you never know what's happening - in some surrealist kind of literary way. But most unreliable narrators see the world filtered through their lens in a pretty consistent way - for instance they tend to think of their own behaviors and motivations as good, even when doing awful things (somewhat common in horror.)

The term as I know it with regard to creative writing has a similar context, but there's more to its application than simply examining survival of the fittest or natural selection paradigms.

In the larger frame of a story, a character who's initially weak, mild-mannered, or naively, blissfully ignorant likely hasn't experienced the trials that complel efforts to acquire capability and develop common sense. In the course of a story, when such a character abruptly starts making leaps of ability or intellect, the sudden emergence of those capabilities do not follow logically, a non sequitur fallacy. Lacking an established foundation for the illogical change from too stupid to live (survive) in contentious circumstances to an adept and successful protagonist defies suspension of disbelief and contaminates outcome improbability.

Similarly, the overly incautious or curious or adept character who sticks a nose in whenever and wherever fancy strikes is also prone to jeapordizing suspension of disbelief and outcome improbability.

More than motivation, stakes, purpose, and desire, the emergence of capabilities to win through a contentious circumstance ought to be at least shadowed forth, or even more dramatically artistic, depicted in all their trials and errors of acquisition. Portraying those trials and errors are a substantial feature of some stories' rising action scenes, in that they depict the discoveries and reversals (the turns) that lead inexorably and single-mindedly to maximum efforts to address a problem at that same time leaving an outcome most in doubt well into a story's ending.

*Note: I was responding to extrinsic's comments.

A gymnastics example, illustrating kid with no concept of "I could die":
1) kid is doing well with back handsprings on the floor, so moves up to the low beam (which has mats stacked all around it anyway) and doesn't wait for a spotter, gets chastised (here's the set-up moment)
2) kid decides to try back handspring on high beam, with a spotter, even though is only getting it on low beam 3 times out of 4; needs a lot of help from spotter (here's the narrow escape moment)
3) kid gets in early to practice, has no spotter, says the hell with it and does the back handspring (successfully) on high beam (here's the I-got-away-with-it moment which leads to...)
4) feeling on top of the world, kid decides to finish off routine with another tricky maneuver she hasn't quite mastered - front tuck off the end of the balance beam - doesn't jump high enough and breaks her neck

I changed the oil to a heavier weight, 5W-30. The slapping noises went away, not the overheating. Simple and inexpensive solution but too easy. In the vein of story craft, I discovered something that gave me insight into the problem. The slapping noise was a consequence of overheating. The overheating was not a consequence of the slapping pushrod.

The radiator was hissing. Took out the radiator, located the leak, soldered the punctured flue and put it all back together. The car ran cooler for a while but still overheated.

Replaced kinked radiator hoses and corroded pipes in the cabin heater manifold. The car ran cooler for a while, but still overheated.

Repaired a hole in the coolant reservoir, but the engine still overheated. So far, $30 on necessary replacement parts to patch radiator system leaks, but the problem wasn't fixed.

That left two possibilities, the engine was indeed shot or the thermostat was. Ten bucks and twenty minutes to replace the thermostat. Duh-huh.

Four of my previous cars had the same problem, yet I went through the same routine in the same sequence. At least this time, I fixed the overheating problem before it became an on-the-road emergency.

Meanwhile, I've gotten a couple thousand miles since the mechanics condemned the car and it's now running as good as it was when I bought it with 150,000 miles on it. Never mind that it's been rear-ended twice, total lossed once and paid another settlement on the second collision that helped pay for my current laptop.

Basically, an inciting incident, three trial and error setback scenes--rising action scenes, a discovery of the true situation as a consequence of discoveries in the rising action scenes, a climax when the outcome was most in doubt and efforts to resolve the crisis were at a peak, and a favorable resolution. Temporary though, I still need a newer model car. Soon.

However, the above is merely an anecdote, not a story. There's logical causation, no discernible tension, a smidgeon of antagonism. The biggest lack is the empathy/sympathy quotient--reader resonance's absence from a deficiency of character development. Worse, the anecdote has an autobiographical quality of showcasing my somewhat inept but capable mechanical skills. Nothing particularly empathetic or sympathetic there because I suffered no insuperable struggles. No harm, no ongoing risks, no profound learning experience.

In fiction, a similar story would have an author surrogate as a focal character who experiences no insuperable struggles that compel a profound turn nor ends with a satisfying resolution because reader immersion is unlikely.

Anyway, I'm satisfied for now with my car. I doubt any reader will be as satisfied as I am with the outcome.

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Creative writing imitates real life, it's not about the real thing no matter how close some stories come to reality, even nonfiction ones. A character who takes a foolish risk then goes on to make an astonishing recovery is too farfetched in reality for fiction. The odds are good, even in reality, that such a character will fail in any endeavor without a commensurate period of capability acquisition. Readers expect failure when circumstances foreshadow it. When consequences of foolish actions are out of proportion, suspension of disbelief collapses. When reader expectations aren't met or too easily met, a story's momentum stalls if it ever got moving to begin with.
Readers anymore often love to see goldenboy heroes taken down a notch and inept heroes receive their just comeuppance for their presumptive hubris. A principal feature of many stories evolved from romance literature, poetic justice, where dedicated efforts and pure intents are rewarded, lazinesss and evil punished.

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For the record I'm not refering to characters doing stupid things and getting away with it. My issue is almost the oposite...that some people feel its unrealistic for a character to ever do something they know will have and does in fact have negative consquences.

I'm also not really refering to ability or apititude at all. More circumstances wherein the character chooses to perform (or not perform) an action even though other knowledge or common sense tells them they will suffer negative consquences, generally in pursuit of some specific goal.

If you've analyzed the scenes in question, feel like you've accomplished what you've set out to do, feel like your character's motivations have been established and are clear, feel like the flow of events is logical and right, and have had other critiques that have not raised issues with this section, then it might be appropriate to accept the feedback with thanks, and then ignore it.

If, on the other hand, every reviewer is pointing out the same place in the MS, every reviewer has the same critique...well, that may indicate a blind spot for you. A place where you think things are just fine but readers think otherwise. Some writers continue on writing through their blind spots. Not every problem must be addressed. Others seek a wider set of reviewers, seeking someone who "gets" what the writer is trying to do. Others go back to the drawing board/basics/take a class/whatever to try to address a blind spot (particularly when a blind spot is around some writing mechanics issue like point of view, or grammar, or shallow characterization, things that can be addressed in a class or read about in books on writing.)

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"Too stupid to live" is to me an offensive statement when made by a screening reader or a critiquer about anyone else's characters. Worse, it doesn't say anything meaningful and more likely insults a writer than offers any meaningful insight. I believe it's a catchall phrase used by lazy critiquers to ineffectually address a range of plot and character deficiencies.

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I agree with you totaly, extrinsy, but I got exactly that from a pro-level slush reader (actually they didn't say it they spelt it-TSTL)

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You know, Merlion, maybe you've found yourself in a position many of us have had before where you've got the wrong people reviewing your work. If this kind of critique is coming from one person or a small group of people, they may just not care for the style of storytelling you do

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Yeah I get that a lot. In all honesty (not wanting to start a war here or anything but...) I find the tendency to perform critiques based mostly on personal taste (or in some cases on a person's ideas of "what editors want"), rather than within the context of the work is a very common problem, here on Hatrack and elsewhere. It's something I've posted about and discussed with people a good deal, and also links with my saw about subjectivity...that a lot of things some people see as rules or absolutes are just a matter of opinion.

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(putting people with real flaws down on paper - some readers really prefer not to see this kind of thing)

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This is really what I'm kind of addressing here mostly...to me the idea that its somehow unrealistic for people...even sensible people...to do things they know are foolish out of desire or denial is a bit strange, because it happens constantly in real life.

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I'm not saying you have a blind spot, in reality I suspect you have the first - a reviewer or group of reviewers who don't get what you're trying to do or don't read enough in your genre and don't understand the conventions.

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Honestly? I think a lot of people just can't divorce their own personal tastes and/or experiences (or a statement they saw from an established writer or editor or whatever) from their critiques...and some also have the (in my opinion misguided) belief that some things are objectively "right" or "wrong" or "good" or "bad" ways to write, types of stories, whatever.

On a related note, it seems in my experience that people who read/write a lot of hardcore sci fi have issues with my stuff since a lot of my work is driven by philosophy, mysticism and emotion rather than logical, "rational" thinking. People don't always choose the wisest course even when they know what they are doing is a bad idea.

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I agree with you totaly, extrinsy, but I got exactly that from a pro-level slush reader (actually they didn't say it they spelt it-TSTL

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I know, I saw that there and have seen it used many times in less than practical applications, there and elsewhere. I don't take anyone, especially emerging writers and screening readers, seriously who can't even be bothered to spell out words and use Standard Written English style conventions, let alone say what they mean and mean what they say.

Not a few of those "pro-level" screening readers also misuse conventional writing terms or invent terminology out of whole cloth or borrow terms from another discipline that serves more to confuse rather than inform and that contributes little, if any, pertinent meaning to a writing discussion. Myself, when a commenter is responding from aesthetic hunches and missing making a solid point, I have to work too hard to understand what's being said.

When I diagnose a story's deficiencies, I begin with an aesthetic hunch and then determine what's causing my discomfort. Often, it's a lack of empathic reader resonance from overlooking reader immersion methods.

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When I diagnose a story's deficiencies, I begin with an aesthetic hunch and then determine what's causing my discomfort. Often, it's a lack of empathic reader resonance from overlooking reader immersion methods.

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Yeah thats probably why you wind up not really liking most of my stuff...we immerse very differently, you and I. But I think you, unlike some, are able to understand that fact...that everyone looks for different things in a story and experiences them in different ways.

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I know, I saw that there

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On a side note (as you may have already seen) I've more or less quite that place due to about 90-95% of the feedback I was getting being, to me, more like a movie critics review in a newspaper rather than a useful writer-to-writer critique.

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Besides, all too often a writer whose story I'm responding to couldn't care less about my opinions. It's a two-lane highway of indifference. I rarely submit my responses to stories of late.

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We're getting off topic here but ohh well...see its frustrating for me because I really do care about the thoughts of people that crit for me and appreciate their time, but I want a critique of my story, not just an explanation of why its not to their taste and how to make it their taste. As hard as it is when I do crits I really try to leave my preferences at the door or at least qualify them.

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I'm also not really refering to ability or apititude at all. More circumstances wherein the character chooses to perform (or not perform) an action even though other knowledge or common sense tells them they will suffer negative consquences, generally in pursuit of some specific goal.

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This sounds more like self-sacrificing characters than those who are "too stupid to live." So I'm confused about which kinds of characters you really want to talk about.

I can think of at least four possibilities:

Characters who do stupid things, as has been mentioned, so that there is a plot (the story is about getting out of the stupid mess they got themselves into--and is also referred to as an "idiot plot").

Characters who are not realistic about their situations or abilities or both and do things that make sense to them (and that the author makes clear to the reader), but that get them into trouble and they have to "learn better" through the course of the story.

Characters who know full well what could happen to them (the spooky old house may have bad guys in it), but they have no other choice (car caught on fire, it's hailing outside, and the character has a really bad cold), so they do something they know they shouldn't do.

Characters who know full well what will happen to them, but they are willing to pay the price of doing something that everyone else might consider stupid because something else matters more to them than their own happiness or safety (the truly self-sacrificing such as Frodo Baggins and Bella Swann).

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Characters who do stupid things, as has been mentioned, so that there is a plot (the story is about getting out of the stupid mess they got themselves into--and is also referred to as an "idiot plot").

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The story of mine that had the most effect on starting the conversation is probably closest to this. However, there are several things. It not a series of stupid actions but a single decision...the character reneges on payment for a service in order to aqquire something they've always had a burning desire for, and which the service enabled them to actually use. The character essentially rationlizes themself into it (also the character is a 13 year old, and while I consider someone of that age fully aware and responsible, its probably a bit easier for someone that young to talk themselves into something or out of fear of its consquences.) And, they dont get out of anything...the character suffers the full consquences of the choice.

The criticism I've recieved from a few is that because I establish him as being relatively "normal" and not specifically given to foolishness means theres no way he'd actually make the choice to renege. I submit however that desire of suffcient strength can be a very powerful motivator and that the ability of people probably especially the young to convince themselves "nothing will happen to me" can also be very strong.

It could be looked at in terms of the concept of the "fatal flaw" often spoken of in dramatic contexts. It could also be seen in the context of how frequently people in real life do things so foolish one would think no one not organically mentally impaired would do them.

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But it seems that as KayTi implies some folks just dont/cant/wont see flawed or foolish characters as belieavble.

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It may not be so much a question of believability as it is a question of whether the reader wants to identify with such a character, or whether the reader can even be brought to care.

For me "caring" and "interest" are the same thing, but I realize that for a lot of people the characters are the main thing that make them care about/be interested in a story, and if they don't find the characters believable they won't care. But one persons believability-breaking stretch is another person's depth-imparting tragic flaw.

Honestly my biggest thing I guess is just that I see so many people do stupid things in real life (things I'd never contemplate doing and "can't believe", so to speak, that they actually did) that it strikes me as odd to find it out of place in fiction.

The "truth is stranger than fiction" saying really does apply.

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But do we want to read about or spend time with people who do such stupid things?

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Well, some of us read about monsters and serial killers that we'd never want to actually encounter in real life, but I know what you mean. It's taste definitely.

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Merlion, as a critiquer who has reviewed multiple of your stories, I think you may have misunderstood, slightly, what these reviewers are objecting to. At least in my case, and I can only speak for myself -- what I have tried to communicate to you is: the problem in some of your tales (as I experienced it as a reader) is not the behavior of the characters, it is that their behavior is often not given motives, has little or no context, is not adequately explained. I have suggested adopting immersive more POV's in some cases, or even just throwing in a single sentence to offer the reader an olive branch. Something, anything, to help the reader understand why your characters sometimes behave the way they do. To me, this is fundamental. But you seem to view it as a failure on the part of the reader to understand, rather than as a failure on the part of the writer to explain. For instance, every time I've sent you a crit, you've responded to it as though it was an attack, emailing me a point-by-point response and countering everything I've said, dismissing every suggestion I've made. That's why I don't critique your stories anymore. I know I can't tell you anything

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None of the ones of mine you've read are the ones with the "TSTL" issue...the ones you've gotten are the ones with the "I can't identify with the characters" issue :-)

What your talking about here is a totally different issue that I have no problem talking about, but I'd rather not do it in this totally unrelated thread...please though feel free to email me if you want to talk about it.

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For instance, every time I've sent you a crit, you've responded to it as though it was an attack, emailing me a point-by-point response and countering everything I've said, dismissing every suggestion I've made.

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This is not how writers are expected to respond to feedback on the Hatrack River Writers Workshop forum.

On the Writers Workshop page where the forum is explained, it says

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The author may ask for clarification of another writer's comments, but any explanations, justifications, elaborations, and so on should be taken care of in rewrites. You can't explain things that aren't in the text to an editor, so you should get out of the habit of explaining them anywhere else.

If, after all feedback has been offered, the author would like to ask for more specific suggestions, or if the author feels that the intent of the story was misunderstood and would like help in making that clearer, the author may ask for further discussion along the lines of "brainstorming" with the other writers.

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Often a 'stupid' act is a short term means of escaping or deferring some sort of immediate pain.

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The author may ask for clarification of another writer's comments, but any explanations, justifications, elaborations, and so on should be taken care of in rewrites. You can't explain things that aren't in the text to an editor, so you should get out of the habit of explaining them anywhere else.

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I agree with this with one exception. In ongoing chapter exchanges for a novel I think it is sometimes necessary to give an explanation. If a critiquer points out something that I've failed to make clear, I'm going to revise to correct that. But the critiquer is not going to see the revised chapter and that information may be important in how the rest of the story is read. In that case, if a critiquer says something isn't clear, I think it's necessary to explain briefly, just so the rest of the novel is understandable. Often that part of the critique is phrased as a question. "Why did the character do such and such?"

Littered about are the bones of those who went so far as to cross the magical line and in their victorious moments realize the futility of their efforts, when the payout for even a "successful" published book might garner a sum representing one dollar per hour of dogged labor. Better to have worked the graveyard shift at 7/11.

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This subject reminds me of an unbelievable character, who responding to some unexpressable inner desire, endeavors in the face of statistically certain failure to reach a goal granted only to the anointed few.

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How peculiarly antithetical in a metafictive way to another boilerplate of story: a larger than life protagonist suffering insuperable struggles in dramatic contexts to address a high magnitude problem. Replace "character" or "protagonist" with "writer" and subtextual metafictional antitheses become apparent.

I think, however, the discerning determination of those two antitheticals is that of how well-disguised author surrogacy is in a story. Author surrogacy is an inalienable part of a writer's desire to write, but the question of where's the dividing line between self-indulgent appeal and audience appeal spans a broad landscape of age, gender, culture, temporal era, reading interest, and reading comprehension capacity.

thanks

edit to include emoticon
heh heh

Reading and deconstructing epistemic intertextual metanarratives happens to be one of my favorite pastimes.

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What your talking about here is a totally different issue that I have no problem talking about, but I'd rather not do it in this totally unrelated thread...please though feel free to email me if you want to talk about it.

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I happen to think it's exactly the same issue, and I'm surprised you don't see why I say so. I wouldn't have posted if I didn't think it was on point. You can easily have characters making bad decisions, doing things which seem foolish, etc. -- all without losing the audience. The trick is that the audience has to be given enough context and immersion into the character's thoughts, history, whatever, to understand what is being thought and felt at the moment of those bad decisions. It's the same solution to the same (underlying) problem.

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See, the thing is, you haven't read the stories in question here, nor peoples responses to them. Nothing was said about motivations or immersions. The criticism was quite specifically "I don't believe anyone would make this decision knowing its likely outcome."

You've critted 2 of my stories. Well, actually, one and a half. With the first one, you actually apologized to me for the tone of your critique. With the second one, my response to you was essentially "Yes, your right. A lot of people aren't going to identify with these characters, but thats how they exist in my mind. Thanks for your thoughts." No dismissing involved, only acknowledging.

So I'm not sure why like five months later you feel the need to come into a mostly unrelated thread and air grievences that took place in private and should probably have been discussed in private.

Here's a link, if it comes out right.

The most basic tool that writers have is not a pen or a piece of paper or a computer or wordprocessing software. Our most basic tool is vocabulary.

I appreciate extrinsic's efforts to be clearer to those who have neglected their study in the use of their most basic tool as writers, and I urge those who find his posts challenging to accept the challenge and not only learn from what he says but also learn from how he says it.