i really DO want world peace!

[hth]

So after A Certain Amount of Time cooking up this novel idea, my problem right now is that it's too damn big. Not just in the sense of long -- I think I'm attacking it like a television show, as if I think I'm going to have to keep it running for eight years, and I want to make sure there's plenty of room for new stories to come along. (Heh, now that I think about it, it's not entirely *un*like The X-Files. Only with intrigue instead of conspiracy, and instead of the FBI -- barbarians. Look, just take my word for it.)

After watching it not work and not work and not work for weeks now, I'm trying to deconstruct and diagnose, and here's my problem, I think. If Chekoi remains the main character (and since I generate characters in batches, it's not always a guarantee that the one I was originally viewing as the protagonist will stay in that spot), that character goal thing that's supposed to drive the plot forward? It's just too *much.* It's very true to the way people think and feel -- he wants to change the world, and lord knows plenty of people want to do that, at one time or another in their lives -- but it's not a *story.* I have this whole infrastructure of race and culture conflict, and where he fits into it, and his political sympathies and the complications thereof. But it's not a story.

I dunno, I'm fishing, and I'm not even sure what for. What do you DO if you want to save the world? (The fact that I don't know the answer to this question might be indicative of bigger problems than just this novel, but let's not focus on that right now.)

Comments

[ratcreature]

What do you DO if you want to save the world?

Get depressed eventually?

Or if you don't, the most common thing seems to be to try to disprove Adorno's opinion of "Es gibt kein richtiges Leben im falschen." and try to change the immediate surroundings to be bearable and closer to the own ideals, while sort of giving up on the big systematic changes. Thus you get e.g. people who started out as squatters who wanted to change the capitalist way of housing ownership and nuclear family living, finally making an agreement with the city and buying/leasing their squatted building, so that they themselves are living in a communal structure, while not being threatening to the "outside" anymore.

Or those who don't create niches tone down their goals and go mainstream and try to change things from within.

[stakebait.livejournal.com]

Well, it depends. Save the world from what, and who are you?

You can start a resistance movement, or join one. Or a terrorist movement, or start one. You can run for office. You can write manifestos or editorials. You can make provocative art or music. You can go among the people and work with them one by one, like a social worker or a nun. You can march in the streets. You can sieze the means of production. You can become a martyr, or try to. You can try to get in the at top and become a role model. You can become disillusioned with the lack of results and/or compromises required by all of this and retreat deliberately into the purely personal sphere. I'm sure there's more I haven't thought of.

Late

[kimberlyfdr.livejournal.com]

I know I'm late in the game, but happy birthday!!!

Re: Late

[hth-the-first.livejournal.com]

Hey, thank you!