In the evenings, my wife and I like to close out our busy days by watching shows together from the many different series on various streaming platforms. And in the spirit of egalitarianism, we take turns choosing what to watch. When my eldest son wanders in from his long day of being a working stiff, it’s easy for him to discern, within a second or two, which of us has chosen that night’s selection: in keeping with my writing genre and literary tastes, my choices tend to veer sharply towards fantasy and science fiction, with a generous dollop of varyingly grim dystopian themes thrown in for good measure. My wife, God bless her, likes kinder, gentler offerings, and is reluctant to sample series which don’t possess a good measure of redemption… or the HEA (Happily Ever After). So even without knowing us much beyond that, you shouldn’t have much difficulty figuring out who chose the latest season of Outlander. (Hint: I’m not the one with the penchant for mommy-porn.)
Now, look: before you accuse me of lamentable unfairness, I’ve read all the Diana Gabaldon books (except the most recent one) and, courtesy of my wife, watched the previous seasons of the television show… and aside from the aforementioned mommy-porn and Ms. Gabaldon’s penchant to rather go on and on at times, I find the books reasonably entertaining… though they seem to have become less a story and more a sprawling, Compleat History of the lives of protagonists Jamie and Clare and Everyone Connected To Them In The Slightest Degree. I’ll admit Ms. Gabaldon is a source of inspiration to me, in a funny kind of way, because I figure if a marine biologist can become a wildly successful author, then there’s hope for a slightly used, retired career English teacher. But this latest season did give rise to today’s subject, which I’m calling The Immunity Syndrome. Numerous spoilers follow, so… you’ve been warned.
During this Outlander season, set during the American Revolutionary War, Jamie is an officer in the American army, and Clare, his devoted time-traveling wife, does complementary duty as a physician. During one awful battle, we’re presented with the old writer’s bait and switch routine: with bullets whizzing overhead, we fully expect Jamie, in the thick of things, to be hit… but… no! It’s Clare! How’s that for irony, Uncaring Universe? Ka-pow! Take that!
And it looks bad. Hit in the abdomen, spurting blood, Clare sinks to the ground. Oh no! Is this the end of our intrepid heroine? (Reminds me of the climactic teaser we used to get at the end of every Batman TV episode, when it seemed Batman and/or Robin were inexorably headed for a one-way trip to the great bat-cave in the sky.)
Well, no, of course not. Clare’s going to be (a tad) uncomfortable for a (remarkably) short while as she heals from a (primitive but still potentially lethal) lead musket ball lodged in her innards. Fortunately, she’s trained her favourite apprentice Quaker doctor, Denzell Hunter, to (conveniently) perform 20th century medical miracles with 18th century tools and knowledge. So she’ll be right as rain in time for the next episode. But I’m afraid Denny can’t really take credit for Clare’s miraculous survival and recovery. No, what she has to thank is… (ta da!) The Immunity Syndrome.
You see, Clare is The Protagonist. And what’s our first writing rule about protagonists, boys and girls? That’s right! You can beat the crap out of them, you can toss them around in life’s tempests --- in fact, you should ensure they’re inundated by Will’s ‘slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,’ giving rise to a plethora of hoary memes about the cruelty of authors. BUT… you can’t kill protagonists. They’re immune to shuffling off this mortal coil --- at least for the story’s duration. Which, of course, makes the whole notion of trying to make your audience think the protagonist is dead or dying rather a cheat. Because just like Batman, we know Clare has to survive. Without her, there’s no story. (Well, technically, there is, but I’d venture to say, based on my laughably ignorant male observations, that it’s the love story betwixt Jamie and Clare which largely inspires the fanatical loyalty of Ms. Gabaldon’s fandom, and if she was to foolishly kill that love story off --- no pun intended --- then the tale loses its narrative imperative.)
Ah ha! you crow. You’re wrong! What about George R.R. Martin, who’s made a (very profitable) career killing off (multiple) protagonists in grisly ways? Or even your literary daddy, Tolkien?
Well… no. Sorry to burst your bubble, folks, but I don’t think so. What George has done is made a (very profitable) career killing off main characters left, right and centre in his bloody Game of Thrones franchise. (My gentle wife, who wavered in her willingness to watch as the series savagely progressed, was, unsurprisingly, irrevocably done with it following the Red Wedding.) But there’s a difference between protagonists and main characters, a difference as big as Drogon. (If you know, you know.) In fact, when you get right down to it, it could be argued Game of Thrones doesn’t even really have a protagonist, at least in the traditional sense. Rather, it has survivors, and at least two, Tirion and Jon Snow, could be protagonists… though neither really winds up ‘victorious’ at the top o’ the heap. Then again, sometimes just surviving is a win. In this world or others.
And Professor T… well, he made a half-hearted attempt to convince readers, two thirds of the way into LOTR, that our intrepid protagonist, Frodo, was dead, struck down after a horrendous, stygian duel with a monstrous spider. But he didn’t bother trying to maintain the fiction very long --- Sam quickly discovered Frodo was merely stunned, not dead (unlike Monty Python’s parrot) --- and in any event, even 12-year-old me, reading LOTR for the first time, just KNEW Frodo wasn’t pushing up the daisies, that he’d be back trudging his way on his booby-prize mission quicker than you can say ‘one does not simply walk into Mordor.’ (Well, I was a rather precocious child, he murmured modestly.)
So… writers, don’t try to sell your readers short with this silly notion their protagonist is going to die. It just doesn’t happen (especially if you’re writing in first person).
To paraphrase Will, ‘tis not a consummation devoutly to be wished.
Now, look: before you accuse me of lamentable unfairness, I’ve read all the Diana Gabaldon books (except the most recent one) and, courtesy of my wife, watched the previous seasons of the television show… and aside from the aforementioned mommy-porn and Ms. Gabaldon’s penchant to rather go on and on at times, I find the books reasonably entertaining… though they seem to have become less a story and more a sprawling, Compleat History of the lives of protagonists Jamie and Clare and Everyone Connected To Them In The Slightest Degree. I’ll admit Ms. Gabaldon is a source of inspiration to me, in a funny kind of way, because I figure if a marine biologist can become a wildly successful author, then there’s hope for a slightly used, retired career English teacher. But this latest season did give rise to today’s subject, which I’m calling The Immunity Syndrome. Numerous spoilers follow, so… you’ve been warned.
During this Outlander season, set during the American Revolutionary War, Jamie is an officer in the American army, and Clare, his devoted time-traveling wife, does complementary duty as a physician. During one awful battle, we’re presented with the old writer’s bait and switch routine: with bullets whizzing overhead, we fully expect Jamie, in the thick of things, to be hit… but… no! It’s Clare! How’s that for irony, Uncaring Universe? Ka-pow! Take that!
And it looks bad. Hit in the abdomen, spurting blood, Clare sinks to the ground. Oh no! Is this the end of our intrepid heroine? (Reminds me of the climactic teaser we used to get at the end of every Batman TV episode, when it seemed Batman and/or Robin were inexorably headed for a one-way trip to the great bat-cave in the sky.)
Well, no, of course not. Clare’s going to be (a tad) uncomfortable for a (remarkably) short while as she heals from a (primitive but still potentially lethal) lead musket ball lodged in her innards. Fortunately, she’s trained her favourite apprentice Quaker doctor, Denzell Hunter, to (conveniently) perform 20th century medical miracles with 18th century tools and knowledge. So she’ll be right as rain in time for the next episode. But I’m afraid Denny can’t really take credit for Clare’s miraculous survival and recovery. No, what she has to thank is… (ta da!) The Immunity Syndrome.
You see, Clare is The Protagonist. And what’s our first writing rule about protagonists, boys and girls? That’s right! You can beat the crap out of them, you can toss them around in life’s tempests --- in fact, you should ensure they’re inundated by Will’s ‘slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,’ giving rise to a plethora of hoary memes about the cruelty of authors. BUT… you can’t kill protagonists. They’re immune to shuffling off this mortal coil --- at least for the story’s duration. Which, of course, makes the whole notion of trying to make your audience think the protagonist is dead or dying rather a cheat. Because just like Batman, we know Clare has to survive. Without her, there’s no story. (Well, technically, there is, but I’d venture to say, based on my laughably ignorant male observations, that it’s the love story betwixt Jamie and Clare which largely inspires the fanatical loyalty of Ms. Gabaldon’s fandom, and if she was to foolishly kill that love story off --- no pun intended --- then the tale loses its narrative imperative.)
Ah ha! you crow. You’re wrong! What about George R.R. Martin, who’s made a (very profitable) career killing off (multiple) protagonists in grisly ways? Or even your literary daddy, Tolkien?
Well… no. Sorry to burst your bubble, folks, but I don’t think so. What George has done is made a (very profitable) career killing off main characters left, right and centre in his bloody Game of Thrones franchise. (My gentle wife, who wavered in her willingness to watch as the series savagely progressed, was, unsurprisingly, irrevocably done with it following the Red Wedding.) But there’s a difference between protagonists and main characters, a difference as big as Drogon. (If you know, you know.) In fact, when you get right down to it, it could be argued Game of Thrones doesn’t even really have a protagonist, at least in the traditional sense. Rather, it has survivors, and at least two, Tirion and Jon Snow, could be protagonists… though neither really winds up ‘victorious’ at the top o’ the heap. Then again, sometimes just surviving is a win. In this world or others.
And Professor T… well, he made a half-hearted attempt to convince readers, two thirds of the way into LOTR, that our intrepid protagonist, Frodo, was dead, struck down after a horrendous, stygian duel with a monstrous spider. But he didn’t bother trying to maintain the fiction very long --- Sam quickly discovered Frodo was merely stunned, not dead (unlike Monty Python’s parrot) --- and in any event, even 12-year-old me, reading LOTR for the first time, just KNEW Frodo wasn’t pushing up the daisies, that he’d be back trudging his way on his booby-prize mission quicker than you can say ‘one does not simply walk into Mordor.’ (Well, I was a rather precocious child, he murmured modestly.)
So… writers, don’t try to sell your readers short with this silly notion their protagonist is going to die. It just doesn’t happen (especially if you’re writing in first person).
To paraphrase Will, ‘tis not a consummation devoutly to be wished.
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