Thinking aloud about Idiot Plots.

[randomness]

"James Blish has said that much of sci-fi relies on Idiot Plots, defined as stories 'kept in motion solely by virtue of the fact that everybody involved is an idiot.'"

(Gregg Easterbrook, two-thirds of the way down the very long page http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=easterbrook/060425)

It occurs to me that it might be more plausible to have characters do unfathomably dumb things because they're crazy.

But maybe it's hard to write fictional characters who are both sympathetic and insane? Wait, I guess that's Bridget Jones.

Okay, maybe the readers and viewers of SF don't identify very well with people who act irrationally? Or at least not as well as the readers of some other genres?

Comments

[tribacibee.livejournal.com]

I agree that fiction (of any kind, SciFi included) is rife with Idiot Plots, a narrative structure only slightly less irritating than a plot of endless coincidences. However, I think that (unlike the coincidence plot) the Idiot Plot stems from an attempt at ambitious storytelling. Some of the best characters in literature (again, SciFi included) get into trouble because of their blind spots. Ender Wiggin has his siblings and his "games." Harry Potter has (as Hermione puts it) "a thing about saving people." Gilgamesh has a blinding thirst to be remembered. Anna Karenina has an absolute belief that she is meant to be a heroine. It is these very human flaws that trigger the very best kind of plots, and if writers aim to create characters with plot inducing flaws sometimes (often) they overshoot and wind up with idiots and idiot plots.

I could give an impassioned rant about Baltar, but don't want to bore you silly.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Oh, no question that character flaws can trigger really good plots; that's why I toss out the "insanity plot idea". The characteristic which distinguishes "idiot plots" is that a character depicted as competent and clueful acts in a manner which is undeniably dumb. That is annoying.

If someone is *supposed* to have a blind spot, and acts in a way which is fundamentally in character with that blind spot, I call that good characterization.

But I do wonder if it's harder for people who idealize rationality to understand or sympathise with someone whose behavior is irrational, or who behaves in a way people who idealize rationality can't understand.