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Author Topic: Hands, Feet, Knees, and Elbows
J
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This is a question relating more to perception than fact, sparked by comments I've recieved from a couple of people regarding my WIP. (Anyone that wants specific context for the following question can find the relevant passage in F&F under "The Technician").

In an opening scene, the main character is showing how sympathetic he is <see, sarcasm> by working another guy over, said victim being duct taped to a chair. The main character is wearing smooth leather gloves. The main character strikes the other guy about the head and face a few times, and in the process tears up his knuckles.

I know without question from personal experience (boxing in college, krav maga for a couple years, and a very rough playground growing up) that a competent striker will almost certainly break or at least skin his knuckles if he hits another person in the skull with any force. (Case in point--the captain of the boxing team my first year on was attacked at a party. He delivered one punch that finished the fight and put the aggressor in the hospital with a broken nose and four missing teeth, but also tore all of the skin off of his knuckles and strained a ligament).

What I don't want is a debate about whether and how skulls can be punched without injury to the puncher--that reality is well beyond arguing for me.

My question is this--how does is look to a normal reader, without personal experience in the various pitfalls of slamming his own hands into hard objects, when the main character suffers injury when punching someone? Does a reader make any conclusions regarding the main character in response to that data? Does the reality of punching need to be somehow contextually explained to be palatable?

This might also be a good companion thread to "Gut Wounds," to discuss the various difficulties of writing realistic brawling.

[This message has been edited by J (edited August 30, 2005).]


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JmariC
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The issue I see would be skinning knuckles with gloves on. As a person who has worn leather gloves and punched abrasive brick walls (I was much younger back then), I know the I won't skin my knuckle.
I'll damage the glove or bruise my knuckles, but won't break skin when it's wrapped in leather.


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Robyn_Hood
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quote:
I know without question from personal experience (boxing in college, krav maga for a couple years, and a very rough playground growing up) that a competent striker will almost certainly break or at least skin his knuckles if he hits another person in the skull with any force. (Case in point--the captain of the boxing team my first year on was attacked at a party. He delivered one punch that finished the fight and put the aggressor in the hospital with a broken nose and four missing teeth, but also tore all of the skin off of his knuckles and strained a ligament).

I read an earlier version of this, and the only thing that I have a hard time understanding (as someone fairly inexperienced with hand-to-hand combat) is, if he is wearing gloves, would the skin really break? I would think the point of wearing the gloves would be to afford his hands a little protection and not just so he doesn't leave finger-prints.

I looked at your F&F thread and this stood out:

quote:
Blood also flowed from the burst knuckles inside of Clay’s leather gloves.

When I think of blood flowing, I imagine a pretty significant gash with blood pooling. If you said he felt the skin on knuckles break, I can buy that. Even if he notices it moisten inside the glove, I might buy that. But flowing blood? I don't think that creates quite the right image of the actual injury.

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Survivor
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There is a world of difference between hitting someone in a fight and hitting someone taped to a chair. It's just that simple. Now, I have some unfair advantages in either situation, but if I'm the one tied to the chair, a competent interrogator can hurt me a lot without suffering much pain at all.

I slam my hands into hard objects all the time, and I don't injure them much. Besides, going for knockout blows during an interrogation is beyond stupid. What on earth would be the point of knocking the guy out? You use openhanded blows against the side of the head, particularly the ears (commonly called "boxing his ears"). That will produce plenty of pain and disorientation in the subject without causing you any more pain than clapping loudly. Heck, even if you're going for a skull crushing blow in a serious fight, you hit with an open hand. You use your fist for attacking muscle groups and the abdomen, that's a basic of fighting.

I might have mentioned that I wear rings rather than gloves, and I prefer more subtle methods anyway. But competence is not an issue of preference. Bruising your hands unnecessarily is stupid.

It's true, I've never studied boxing, nor does it strike me as a very interesting sport. And I don't think that I've ever heard of Krav Maga, or at least I don't remember anything about it. The fundamental theories seem unsound for a martial "art", though they are well suited for simple brawling. They are not, in any case, applicable to controlled interrogation.


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Varishta
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A guy who hurts his hands while roughing someone up in a chair didn't seem very bright to me.

But then, as someone who hits and kicks several times a week (Kenpo/Jujitsu) I came to this with a bit of bias.


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benskia
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If you're really stuck, and the guy really has to skin his knuckles, then maybe there is a get around...

Jim was experienced enough to know that punching the guy directly in the face would take the skin off his knuckles, even though they were protected by the leather gloves, but he delivered the knock-out punch anyway.

Something along those lines maybe? You can probably do it better than this, this is just me flashing out a quick idea. Perhaps you could teach us readers a bit about how easily skin is damaged even for professional pain dealers. Squeeze in some of that information that you told us in your post, its interesting.


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JRune
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Speaking from experience: gloves are there to protect your hands from rending motions. Meaning splintering wood, sharp metal, glass, etc. Slamming a gloved fist into things can still mess them up pretty bad, as unless the gloves are specifically cushioned, the force of the impact is usually just passed straight through the material into the flesh. And few gloves are a snug enough fit that they're like a second skin.

As a man who's had more bloody knuckles than he should have, I've got to say that unless he tore *deep*, he's not going to bleed very much at all. Most tears aren't more than a layer or two deep under the skin. On the knuckles, especialy, any deeper than that and you're tearing ligament and snapping bone.

If it's imperative that he knock the guy out and get his hand a little messed up, have him take the glove off despite knowing better and punch the guy in the mouth. The teeth should suffice for rending the flesh (a common occurance in street fights) and a good punch to the mouth can knock a person out as readily as a punch anywhere else, if they're on the bring of exhaustion from an already savage beating. If you want it more believable, have him punch downward so the blow slides down the brow ridge, slips off the cheek, snaps the neck down and snags on the jaw, thus tearing the flesh.

That's about the best I can offer.


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J
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Useful points, everyone. Thanks for the insights.

[This message has been edited by J (edited August 31, 2005).]


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Survivor
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On a side note, the plot doesn't require that the guy injure his hands. It does require that the subject being interrogated not be knocked unconscious.

On the other hand, the plot necessities of that scene were local rather than global, the scene is there to introduce us to the main character and his methods, it isn't integrated into the main storyline. So it could have been a hand to hand scene rather than an interrogation scene.

In a full hand to hand scene, expectations change quite a bit. One important thing to remember on the subject of attackers injuring themselves is that this is only typical of "hard" martial arts and simple fighting techniques. "Soft" martial arts are quite different and do not favor attacks that can injure the attacker. They aren't less effective than "hard" techniques, though certainly a "hard" technique has the potential to deliever more damage in any given blow than the corresponding "soft" technique. Actually, that's not...it's accurate, but misleading. For instance, striking someone directly in the neck to crush the windpipe is a "hard" technique. Grabbing the head and twisting to break the neck is a "soft" technique.

Accurately showing the techniques a character is using in a fight, along with that character's understanding of other techniques, tells us a lot about that character. I have a modest ability in working what is generally termed "chi", enough that I can redirect the force of an untrained opponent's blow back so that it damages my attacker more than myself (I know, it does seem cruel, but did you really expect anything else from me?). Against a trained opponent or a weapon, I'm mostly limited to redirecting the force so that I don't get hurt as badly as would be the case otherwise. And against a real artist, I'd be pretty hopeless. Still, because of my natural inclination, I prefer "soft" techniques. I would see a character that didn't have any understanding of them as being very limited in skill. Really mastering a "hard" technique requires learning to use it properly to defeat "soft" techniques, not possible if you don't understand how "hard" and "soft" techniques work. For much the same reason, I'd see a character who preferred a "soft" technique but didn't understand that they can be defeated by appropriate use of "hard" techniques as being rather naive.


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Kathleen Dalton Woodbury
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Interesting stuff, Survivor.

Can you refer us to any written material that elaborates on the differences between soft and hard techniques and something about how each can effectively "beat" the other?

Any chance you'd be willing to write something up about them for the SFFW newsletter?


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J
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Good point, Survivor. Boxing and krav maga, (a practical defense fighting method developed originally by the Israeli military), which constitute virtually all of my experience, are both classic "hard" disciplines (although some boxers are starting to incorporate soft elements into their style. See, for example, Roy Jones, Jr., who never locks his elbows when delivering punches, leaves his fist unclenched until impact, redirects rather than blocks most blows, and, most importantly, is coming out of retirement to avenge his only two losses).

I guess for the specific issue of my story, the relevant information that makes the main character's injury make sense--nay, seem well-nigh unavoidable--to me is 1) He is a competent and devious fighter from neccesity, but by no means the master of any art; 2) What he knows in that arena is distinctly western (hands-oriented) and 'hard'; and 3) He just delivered several sliding blows (backhands), designed to inflict pain and cause shame without knocking out teeth or consciousness, but are also well-capable of chafing knuckle-skin clean off, even under a glove, and far more likely to do so than direct-impact strikes.

What I need to figure out now is how, without disrupting the story, to condense or imply all of that information so that a reader doesn't get turned off or get the wrong idea when the main character hurts himself.

I think the best place to start is probably some excellent suggestions I've received about changing the adjectives that I use to describe the injury

[This message has been edited by J (edited August 31, 2005).]


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Survivor
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Oh, the subject of hard vs. soft martial arts is far too large for me to really cover fully. But you can use Tai-Chi and Judo as starting points for soft techniques. Shaolin is a term that sometimes encompasses all hard martial arts in China, mostly because the term has a certain catchet and does refer to a very hard form of martial arts. Western styles of wrestling, though they have some elements in common with Judo, tend to be more hard and rely on raw strength and weight very heavily (on the other hand, it took a long time for Judo practitioners to admit that either consideration was important in Judo).

Typically, most fighting styles that are not composed on a "whole body" theory of martial arts tend to be "hard" in the sense of emphasizing strong discrete attacks and the force you can put behind them. Softer styles often have been influenced heavily by Chinese techniques, though some are entirely independent of Chinese influence.

I think that if you have a really compelling reason for your character to do something, then he can do it. I'm just not sure that there's a good reason to injure himself, given that the point is to impress the disparity of the situation on his subject. As long as he's hiding it with the gloves, it might work.


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Varishta
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http://www.faqs.org/faqs/martial-arts/faq/part1/

Go a quarter of the page down to question #3 for a good, basic definition of "soft" versus "hard" martial arts.

[This message has been edited by Varishta (edited August 31, 2005).]


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Kathleen Dalton Woodbury
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Great site. Thank you, Varishta.

Interesting that they mentioned "Brazilian Jujitsu" but not capoeira (unless that is what they meant by Brazilian Jujitsu).


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JRune
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Actually, they did mention Capoeira, in the "which type is right for me" section. They mentioned it as a good form of all-body physical work-out, along with Muy Thai and a few others.

Capoeira is a pretty interesting martial art, but for my money, I'd still only bother with Krav Maga. And only that because it's been tested in the field and is, as I understand, the only one that developed out of need to survive rather than other purposes.

Some have said Jeet Kune Do evolved for that reason, but Bruce Lee didn't have that in mind when he created the art. He had in mind creating the ultimate martial art.

If you want, J, I can always give you the schematics for my invented martial art (to be used only in stories, not actually studied or heavily analyzed) Shichi Poa. It might be an interesting style for your character to use. It involves seven places to strike a man, with varying degress of pressure, to harm them, debilitate them or kill them out-right.

It's meant to be a close-quarters quick and deadly no poetry language that is all about surviving and getting away.

[This message has been edited by JRune (edited September 01, 2005).]


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franc li
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I can't even tell you how uninterested I would be in reading a story that involved someone beating up a captive and then caring about how much it hurt himself.

But I just finished posting elsewhere that no matter what you do, there will be someone somewhere who doesn't like it.


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J
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I take your point, franc li. But, alas, without rationalistic egoism manifesting itself in the dispassionate use of violence, there would be no room for internal conflict in the protagonist.

Kathleen--capoeira is different from BJJ. I've tried my hand at BJJ with some practicioners at my krav maga gym. Man, what an incredibly effective style! Two 45 minute sessions of "rolling" (as they call it) with those guys opened my eyes to whole new worlds of fighting.

[Edited to call Kathleen by her correct name.]

[This message has been edited by J (edited September 01, 2005).]

[This message has been edited by J (edited September 01, 2005).]


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Minister
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It took nearly the whole fighting world by surprise when it showed up in the UFC events. And it corrected a lot of mistaken assumptions, I think, about one on one fighting.

By the way, I was thrilled to see in your post that Roy Jones Jr. is coming out of retirement -- I hadn't heard. Any idea when his first fight will be? (I know, this is off topic; sorry.)


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J
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Oct. 1. Even better, it's a rematch against Tarver.
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Minister
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Awesome. I wish sometimes I had cable.
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J
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Egads. I just realized that I referred to Kathleen as "Katherine." Apologies. It's bad enough that I mislabel people in my speech--now my writing suffers that faux pas as well!
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Kathleen Dalton Woodbury
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Thank you, J.
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JRune
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Must be a mental glitch of J-named people. I keep calling my best friend's boyfriend "Peter" when I know good and well he's Patrick. And I call Jessi "Jenni" far too much. It just takes a really long time for names to fully cement in my head...
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Minister
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It's not just a J thing, because I've done the same thing to poor, longsuffering Kathleen. And others. Lots of others. What was my name again?
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Inkwell
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Despite the fact that everything I'm about to add is redundant and superfluous, I'll sound off anyway.

The martial arts I've studied, or 'fiddled' with, over the years have varied in both technique and the execution thereof. One thing I've noticed in the Korean martial art of Soo Bahk Do (until recently called Tang Soo Do...the Moo Duk Kwan variation, anyway) is that students are trained to strike with a 'snap'...especially when breaking boards/cinder blocks or delivering blows to harder parts of the body (i.e., the philtrum, or base of the nose...which can cause significant disorientation). This 'snap' is actually a practical use of physics. It is concentrating a force between 1200 newtons (the average beginner's strike) and 2800 newtons (an advanced student's) on a very small area at high velocity. Just to illustrate the 'power' of the latter figure...breaking a "typical concrete slab 1 1/2 inches thick takes on average only 1,900 newtons (Rist)."

To better explain my point, I'll quote a passage from one of my old research sources...back when I actually had to do some research for my written martial arts tests.

quote:

Of course, the best boxers can punch as quickly and powerfully as any black belt. Why can't they break concrete blocks too? The answer lies in the nature of their punches. When a boxer throws his fist, he usually ends the movement with follow-through. This gives the punch maximum momentum (golf and tennis players follow through for the same reason), and it can help knock an opponent down. But the impact itself is diffuse: It's meant to jar an opponent's brain, not crack his skull.

A karate chop, on the other hand, has no follow-through at all: it lashes out like a cobra and then withdraws instantly. When a black belt hits a slab of concrete, for instance, his fist touches the block for fewer than five milliseconds, and yet the block breaks with a resounding crack.

To understand how this works, Jearl Walker, a former Tae Kwon Do student who now teaches physics at Cleveland State University, set up a study much like Feld's and McNair's. A well-thrown fist, he found, reaches its maximum velocity when the arm is about 80 percent extended. "That's exactly what my tae kwon do master had taught me," Walker says. "You learn to focus your punch in your imagination so that it terminates inside your opponent's body, rather than on the surface. To deliver the maximum power, you want to make contact before the slowdown begins."

The purpose of all that focused power is brutally obvious: to break bones and rupture tissue. But success also depends on more subtle forces. Solid as they seem, all materials are at least slightly elastic. Whack them in the right spot and they will start to oscillate. A punch with a follow-through would dampen such oscillations, but a karate chop, by pulling away at the last moment, lets them move freely "If you tweak a rubber band it goes up and down, and the same is true if you tweak a board or a brick with a much greater force," Feld says. "When they reach their elastic limits, they start to yield. In other words, they break."

Fortunately for most of us, reaching that limit in bones is no easy matter. Feld says bone can withstand 40 times more force than concrete, and a cylinder of bone less than an inch in diameter and 2 1/3 inches long can withstand a force of more than 25,000 newtons. Hands and feet can withstand even more than that, because their skin, muscles, ligaments, tendons, and cartilage absorb a great deal of impact. As a result, a well-kicked foot can absorb about 2,000 times as much force as concrete before breaking.

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1511/is_5_21/ai_61692484


So, in a nutshell, various elements come together to create a good strike. And yet, as Survivor mentioned previously, open-hand techniques such as palm strikes are more effective on the 'hard' vital points of the body. They're much less painful for the striker and more agonizing for the strikee, let me tell you. However, toughening up the palms helps even more...the average person would probably feel 'discomfort' if they tried to use a palm strike without previous conditioning. The same is true of standard punches. I used to (and still) do push-ups on my knuckles on a hard floor to toughen the skin, ligaments, and bone in my hands. It does help...trust me. So, if a character has had formal martial arts training, or is aware of this fact, he/she would be able to minimize damage to his/her own anatomy.

Ok. I'm done.


Inkwell
-----------------
"The difference between a writer and someone who says they want to write is merely the width of a postage stamp."
-Anonymous


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Survivor
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Ugh, knuckle conditioning. That's probably the main reason I prefer open hand blows, if it comes to that. I'm a total wimp about building up scar tissue in my knuckles.
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J
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I've heard two sides of this. I've heard multi-dan blackbelts swear that concrete floor pushups (and I've down a few thousand) and sandpaper and rolling bamboo and the rest can make a person's hands as hard as rock; I've heard others of equal prestige swear that such conditioning is entirely psychological. The evidence I've seen seems to support the latter. It's an interesting question.

But, alas, engaging in such conditioning would be substantially out of character for my character--too inefficient.


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Survivor
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It won't make your hands as hard as rock, but it isn't just psychological. Basically, any place on your body that doesn't have friction ridges is not meant for exerting much force against other objects/bodies.

So if you want to hit hard things with your unprotected knuckles, you have to condition them first. Part of this conditioning is to simply build up the skin to be more like the skin on your palms and feet, thicker and tougher (and a bit rougher, too). At another level, you're conditioning the joint to be able to take impacts from an angle that joint doesn't naturally like. This involves stressing the bone and cartiage so they grow in a distinctly abnormal pattern to resist force applied at an unnatural angle.

There are some important psychological effects, though. For one, a person that has trained their fists for unprotected combat will probably have a lot more confidence about it, in addition to having better abilities. Also, a person who sees a heavily scarred set of knuckles coming knows that this punch doesn't usually get pulled.

In either case, the inevitable sacrifice of dexterity (and prettyness ) you'll suffer if you keep such training up long enough isn't just a matter of psychology.


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