GDC Chapter 4
One of the steps or stages of Campbell’s Hero’s Journey is the refusal of the call to adventure. It is essential that we humans grow and develop, but we usually aren’t eager participants in the process by which this happens. To grow we must be challenged, and there’s a strong strain of laziness in our species. We want a whole lot but like to convince ourselves that if we just wait around long enough someone will give us things we don’t yet have without our doing something new to bring them about. Characters in narrative are no different; they don’t want to break free of the routine they’ve established (at least, they don’t if they’re genuine). No matter how gregarious and daring the character, any really great story will take them somewhere they would prefer not to go.
There are two ways of doing this. The first is to force the characters to act by throwing them into a situation that doesn’t leave other options. This is by far the less effective of the two options. The second is to create a character who develops sufficient motivation to break them out of the comfort cycle of the natural world and propels them into the supernatural. But traveling in the supernatural realm of the dramatic is dangerous. There are many heroes who never return. Because of this, often stories have a gatekeeper character who guards the heroes path onto his journey, someone to discourage them from daring the irregular.
This chapter is the guardian’s chapter. Peda represents the halfway place between the mundane and the extraordinary. He does this in several ways: his heritage is mixed, part human and part elf; he lives neither all the way in town or completely in the wilderness; and he is a peculiar mix of domesticity and humility and exotic powers and experience, all in one comfortable package. He is some who has made heroic journeys before and wants to spare the three children from having to go on theirs. That Scamp and the others are dissuaded follows the common pattern of the rejection of the call to adventure. But that call returns with much greater severity when Peda is killed. This chapter gives us a glimpse of an established hero, one far better suited to the demands of this story than any of the children. That he does not survive the story makes the second call to the children more potent and clearly dangerous, making their acceptance—and Scamp’s youthful if unwise enthusiasm—a sign of heroic character. But here in this chapter, the kids are still just kids, and when a big problem comes up, they do exactly what wise children do—they take it to a trusted adult.
This is also a point I wanted to include in the book. All too often children’s stories show heroic children by making them independent of adults; they become adults in all ways but stature and sometimes they way they speak. I didn’t want that in this story. I wanted these teens to be aspiring adults, but to also be clinging to some of the protection that comes with depending on others in childhood. When children go on great quests without their parents or caregivers, it’s really hard to believe that they do it because they’re confident enough on their own. This is why we see so many inattentive stepfathers, wicked stepmothers, and dead parents: it gives the storyteller an excuse to get the kids out on their own. I didn’t want to depend too heavily on dead parent syndrome for this—or any—children’s story I write. I have Scamp’s parents be absent, true, but its because they are struggling to make a living in an environment devastated by war. They are away, not because they’re bad parents or are irresponsible, but because they don’t have a choice. And with them gone, I show that Scamp and Dannika, and to a lesser degree Mather, all still gravitate toward adult authority figures, like Peda. I hope that this gives the story a more genuine feel than some that have kids and teens saving worlds while their parents and other adults stand back and watch helplessly.
Pg. 34, paragraph 3, line 2: “Shal’het.” This is a term inspired by the Qualinesti “Shalifi” or “Master” used by Dalimar when addressing Raistlin Majere. As Peda is half elven but of Kagonesti lineage, I wanted a similar sounding term that was harder and harsher, as I imagined the language of wild elves would be. So I took the delicate “Shal” and ended with an abrupt, sharp combinations of sounds, and “Shal’het” is the result.
Pg. 35, paragraph 1: Anyone who thinks I stole the idea for these steps from Shaolin monks, you’re exactly right. They use them to improve balance and focus in their martial arts training.
Pg. 36, paragraph 5, last two lines: This statement shows both Scamp and Dannika’s need to grow a bit more into wise adults. Dannika believes that doing things with false gravity is a mature approach to life; Scamp has a difficult time seeing past the distractions of the moment to consider the long term consequences of every day actions. Their perspectives create friction between the two friends, but they also allow them to learn from each other, which is an essential component of genuine friendship.
Pg. 37, paragraph 7: I am a big believer in this statement, that difficulty in life has very little to do with the actions we take as much as it does our awareness of the consequences that will result from our performance. Self consciousness comes, not because something is hard, but when we feel that performing well matters. This is a huge key to writing well. We often mistake our own emotions of insecurity and uncertainty about our work for poor writing. What our emotions tell us, particularly in a rough draft, is almost never true. If you’re certain that the two pages you wrote today are so bad that nothing is salvageable and, in fact, proves that you should stop writing so as not to embarrass yourself further, give the passage a month to cool and you’ll be surprised. The same is true of those times (very rare for me) when you write a passage and end drunk with visions of your own brilliance. Come back to that passage after it’s cooled and you’re likely to find writing a bit less pristine and ingenious than you first thought. This isn’t bad or good; it’s just true. When we focus too much on the outcome of our actions, we sometimes forget the best way to tackle the action itself. So for writers out there, don’t always look beyond the mark. Write every paragraph and line and word as best you can, and don’t judge it immediately. The last thing you need is to hamper your talent with the premature realization that what you’re doing is very important to you. Remember, what you end up with is very important to you; what you start out with in rough draft is so malleable that as long as you have something on the page, you’ve done well.
Pg. 39, paragraph 2: It’s remarkable how differently people can view common things, including words. Those who know me are aware of my somewhat unhealthy fascination with semantics—Somewhat? You must mean “somewhat” in the way that a moth is “somewhat” drawn to a burning house, and is “somewhat” damaged when the heat crisps it bitter black. And in the way that you are somewhat annoying. Anyway, because this is my story, there had to be a few places where I include little treatments on language. This is one, and I think it works well. It shows how greatly Scamp’s experience has shaped his personality, but it also shows how the connotative meaning of a word—representative of Scamp’s feelings—can change when considering that word and concept in a new context, in this case, Peda’s presence. This shows Scamp reevaluating his world. He’s growing. That I was able to drop in a bit of semantics is simply a bonus.
Pg. 40, paragraph 1, line 1: “fudging.” This is a good illustration of how third person can still communicate a character’s voice. I didn’t say that Scamp thought about lying, because in his mind he wasn’t thinking about lying. He makes a distinction between fudging the truth and a baldfaced lie. This not only adds a unique voice and flavor to the story, but it reveals Scamp’s character. Writing every page and passage in a strong POV voice will do more to help most writers than nearly any other technique I know.
Pg. 40, paragraph 8, last two lines: “He told himself he was trembling at shadows like a baby.” POV characters must be self aware. They must consider their own thoughts and emotions, and act as if these are relevant. Here, Scamp has an impression, and he actively reprimands himself, calling himself names in order to stimulate courage. The best stories don’t have characters react merely to the plot; they use the plot to provoke emotions and thoughts in the POV characters, and make the characters respond to themselves as well as exterior circumstances.
Pg. 41, paragraph 9, lines 1-2: “…Scamp had never been too fond of reading…” While I love to read and have since I was a boy, I do not believe, as some do, that every intelligent person (or child) is a natural reader. I do believe that reading can develop raw intelligence better than almost any other exercise, but I do not believe it is essential to being a “smart” person. In Scamp I wanted to show an atypical intellect, one that interacted with the world primarily on a creative base; an improviser rather than a scholar. Plus, I’m hoping some reluctant readers will see this and feel a little encouraged that even heroes in books sometimes have mixed histories when it comes to reading.
Pg. 43, paragraph 6: Here is the moment when Peda, the guardian or gatekeeper to the supernatural, turns away the children’s first opportunity to accept the quest. Not only that, but he commands them to dismiss even the idea of moving into the dramatic world of the supernatural. Note the warning not to tell others. Stories are always about great actions—even if that action is stubborn inactivity—and great actions rarely bring consequences only upon the actor. Just as stories are never happy (though they can end happy), they are never safe. A safe story is a boring story.
Pg. 44, last paragraph: One of the less often discussed heroic traits is kairos, named after the Greek personification of opportunity. It might best be thought of as having a sense of the right or most opportune moment. Heroes and larger-than-life characters often act as others do not because they sense when important moments have come. Where others would long ago have given up or would continue to cling to strategies that aren’t working, a great character will recognize a moment of change and try to rise to the occasion. They may not always succeed, but it is the action more than the result that is heroic. Here, Scamp shows heroic potential that has not been developed. He has a sense of how important this moment is, and that it is very possible that such will not come again in his lifetime. He still walks away. Contrast this with the moments he seizes upon at the end of the story: dropping the cow on the dragon, leaping off the cliff, throwing the tablet to safety when he is certain he is going to die. From the beginning of the story, Scamp is one of those rare individuals who has a sense for important moments; by the end of the story, he has become the kind of person that acts in such moments.