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wait and see
Feb. 27th, 2006 11:47 amYesterday was a high pain day. I hid behind words and food. Today is post-pain grump, so I am out of hiding.
One of the curious things about chronic illness is finding what inhabits your mind. A thought lurked from Saturday afternoon till now and if I banish it - I tell myself - I can also banish the pain. Or the memory of the pain, since today my muscles are melted, not spasming.
When I teach pre-teens, I keep thinking "this is the generation who was brought up with images that can be realised." Instant gratification - no hidden boojums, all monsters spelled out and all magic visible. They have TV and video and DVD and all sorts of other devices which give life to fantastic thoughts. Playing quest games isn't a matter of dice and paper, but mice and movement.
Some years ago, my mother and I talked about this and wondered what it would mean for writers and for the arts in general. Would these kids want everything spelled out and graphic simply because that was what they knew best and because it was intellectually and emotionally simpler for them? Would they demand instant gratification in the plots of their favourite books, or would they eschew books entirely as too slow and not giving them that immediate reward for cravings?
The answer - at least for the kids I see - is 'no'. So many of them want to write, which is *not* the easy way out.
More than that, in Saturday's class I did that Harry Potter history vs Muggle history thing again. We came to "Harry Potter magic is saying a spell and getting a fireball and blasting a wall down with it" and we discussed other spells and what they did. Muggle magic, we worked out, was far less certain than magic in the Harry Potter world. You could say a spell, but you had to hope and wait and you thought it might not do anything, but it was still worth making an effort just in case your observations were wrong, and magic was real. It was this latter type of magic that caused two dozen eyes to light up, and when I went round the circle to ask was their story using Harry Potter or Muggle magic, almost all of them said "Muggle". They didn't want instant gratification and drama - they wanted expectation and tension.
For the record, more boys than girls wanted fireballs that blast and more girls wanted amulets that may or may not have an effect. The girls were more likely to write about the maker of the amulet and why she was making them and how selling them, and the boys to detail how many soldiers were scorched by the fireball. Overall, though, both boys and girls valued wishing and hope above splat-bang.
I know my samples are small and that this is the result of pain-ridden obsession rather than research, but it is still reassuring. These kids don't want 'show' or 'tell' - they want 'maybe: wait and see'.
One of the curious things about chronic illness is finding what inhabits your mind. A thought lurked from Saturday afternoon till now and if I banish it - I tell myself - I can also banish the pain. Or the memory of the pain, since today my muscles are melted, not spasming.
When I teach pre-teens, I keep thinking "this is the generation who was brought up with images that can be realised." Instant gratification - no hidden boojums, all monsters spelled out and all magic visible. They have TV and video and DVD and all sorts of other devices which give life to fantastic thoughts. Playing quest games isn't a matter of dice and paper, but mice and movement.
Some years ago, my mother and I talked about this and wondered what it would mean for writers and for the arts in general. Would these kids want everything spelled out and graphic simply because that was what they knew best and because it was intellectually and emotionally simpler for them? Would they demand instant gratification in the plots of their favourite books, or would they eschew books entirely as too slow and not giving them that immediate reward for cravings?
The answer - at least for the kids I see - is 'no'. So many of them want to write, which is *not* the easy way out.
More than that, in Saturday's class I did that Harry Potter history vs Muggle history thing again. We came to "Harry Potter magic is saying a spell and getting a fireball and blasting a wall down with it" and we discussed other spells and what they did. Muggle magic, we worked out, was far less certain than magic in the Harry Potter world. You could say a spell, but you had to hope and wait and you thought it might not do anything, but it was still worth making an effort just in case your observations were wrong, and magic was real. It was this latter type of magic that caused two dozen eyes to light up, and when I went round the circle to ask was their story using Harry Potter or Muggle magic, almost all of them said "Muggle". They didn't want instant gratification and drama - they wanted expectation and tension.
For the record, more boys than girls wanted fireballs that blast and more girls wanted amulets that may or may not have an effect. The girls were more likely to write about the maker of the amulet and why she was making them and how selling them, and the boys to detail how many soldiers were scorched by the fireball. Overall, though, both boys and girls valued wishing and hope above splat-bang.
I know my samples are small and that this is the result of pain-ridden obsession rather than research, but it is still reassuring. These kids don't want 'show' or 'tell' - they want 'maybe: wait and see'.
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girliejones