Thinking of the Impish Article on females in fantasy, I bring to you my method of getting past cliche Aesops about commonly accepted morals and getting straight to the meaty goodness of why you think the message is worth building a story upon.

But first, obligatory quote from Limyaael. “Weaving in messages without being obnoxious, point 7”:
“...“Being sexist is wrong” or “Being racist is bad” or “Follow your heart” are, at this point, so banal and obvious that it’s really hard to write a story with these words at the heart and have it turn out original…. Why is being sexist wrong? Why is being racist bad?.... Show what these mean, explore the “whys,” and don’t just trust that the audience will know why. The presentation of these attitudes as gospel truth is the precise reason that they have become clichéd. Not many people bother to argue them anymore, so characters who do come off looking like morons, and the story remains simple and shallow.”

Thank you, Limyaael. May your ranting live on, forever.

When writing a research paper you first construct a thesis statement. The thesis statement focuses your research, writing and persuasion and challenges you to make valuable argument. The key for writing a great thesis statement is “state a reality, suggesting an action, and make the action reasonably refutable.” This all goes perfectly with fiction because it lends itself to narrative, action and motivation.

“Because the outer villages of Khemia have important magical contributions the city can use, the nobles should annex the villages and assimilate them from a distance, as not to damage Khemia’s culture.”

That is the thesis I came up with for the underlying plot in my fantasy story, a thesis that addresses in subtext racism, home rule, class and education.
My hero, a young, eager noble, thinks this the opportunity of a lifetime for everyone. The opponents have vastly different alarms: the villagers will use their citizenship to “invade” the city, polluting the culture; no, the villagers need more rights and their governors should be natives; no, this entire plan is a waste of taxes and time, we don’t need their magic.

Note the lack of Dark Lords or Always Chaotic Evil hordes. Annexing some land and giving poor people citizenship are actions that inspire reasonable opposition. I don’t need racist autocrats out to steal magic for conflict and even danger in my story.

Bypassing what is already known (Racism is Bad) allows me to get to what I really want to write about in this story: “Is your identity a reaction to others or from your own actions?”

Huh? How does this relate to the thesis?

Khemia calls them the “outer villages,” meaning that even the “city liberals” who want them to have more rights think of them as extensions of Khemia. The characters challenge the urbane, including the hero, to recognize the countryside as a separate unit with its own identity.

Khemia itself is the city-state in a region called the Western Reserve. What is it west of? A world power called the Central Kingdom. Khemia wants the outer villages’ knowledge so it can compete with and emulate Central.

My hero is inspired by the local “city vs. countryside” tension to ask larger questions. “Why should we emulate the Central Kingdom at all? Why do we call ourselves Westerners? We aren’t west of the Kingdom… They are east of us! (HAHAHA… Logical.)”

He abandons the “city vs. countryside” argument all together and Takes the Third Option, campaigning for a countrywide identity not based on imitation OR competition. Khemia needs self-esteem and the urbane and villagers don’t trust each other because everyone feels patronized.

Okay, then fund folktales and songs about how great all of Western Reserve is. Celebrate the country’s harvest in the city. Learn the city’s public administration in the country. Develop more skilled trading between the regions. (All of this has reasonable opposition from people who have different visions. Of course, there is asshole-ish opposition from people who get their power from other’s weaknesses and stop people from changing.)

In 10 years, could the hero see one nation of people? Could he see Khemia as the capital of an entire state, prosperous and proud, able to trade with Central and others and teach them a thing or two?

This whole argument is inspired from my ideas about the American South, about Black vs White, about the 50 states and other things… Also, on my insistence that Europeans are Orientals, as they are EAST of America, and our language should reflect a New World understanding. :-)

“I want to write what would happen if ANY region of America stopped focusing on how wicked, crazy, wrong every other region is and focused on nation-building within itself.” I know and you know that racism is wrong, but I want to argue that regional nation-building is the best for your state. Is bypassing another racism Aesop okay with you?

..... I can write articles? lol

I think it works just as good for the hero’s motivation and goal.

I used it to develop the goal of the people the hero works for, but since it isn’t his goal, he’s free to drop it and take that 3rd option. (Not that he wouldn’t be free to anyway. Either way, good character development.) Every protagonist should have a goal and a motivation behind that goal. “My Aunt is sick, so I must get out of the Land of Oz. Gotham is infested with crime and insanity, so I must be its dark protector.”

When a hero doesn’t have a goal, they cease being a PROtagonist and become an antagonist prop reacting to the real main character: the villain. And that villain is always a cartoonish Evil Overlord, because that is the only way to justify an antagonist hero spending his every waking hour to stop someone else from achieving their goals.

w00t!

Motivation is my favorite part of character design. Because I write whole societies, I create organizations first (with group goals and motivations), then zoom into members and make co-goals and co-motivations. Which is why my main character doesn’t make the initial plan that starts the story. No individualistic farm-boys for me, thanks.

In my Khemia story, there is an environmentalist group, the Rangers, from the city that looks out for the mountains of the countryside. The group’s motivation are the companies that want to blow up mountaintops to strip for minerals. Their goal is to pass a ban through the Parliament against this. (Which makes them an antagonistic group, but certainly not “bad”... or, at least, not by my politics. I’m being hypocritical already!)

But then I created three members to speak in the story. The leader, Woodlin, worships the mountains, but is grieved to learn that mountaineers distrust her because she is from the city. A businessman, Adobe, is a third-generation from the mountaineers, and wants to see the companies crumble, not just reform. A campaign manager, Arnesa works for the money which she needs to pay for her village friend’s citizenship.

Knowing what matters most for these minor characters helps me write their interactions with the main character and plot. Arnesa’s going to get offended by off-hand comments about villagers. Adobe is the only native, bilingual and knowledgeable, yet is more practical than everyone else because of his experience. Woodlin and my hero both stare in awe of the mountains, yet are humbled by their complete inability to adapt while on them.

Even they have reasonable opposition in people who ask “If these companies don’t get these minerals, how will our manufacturing industry prosper?” Or “What fuel do we use if not coal?” and “Many people in the mountains support this mining. Who are you, as a city-dweller, to ban it?”

Oi, how?

Well, being not-Christian, the anvils weren’t really much better in the Narnia books.

Personally, I’d say just write the story, and let people draw their own morals from it. It’s like life- you can interpret the things that happen however you want.

Very true. That’s why I think more in terms of groups than ‘good side’ or ‘evil side’. I’m not really ‘rooting’ for one side to win either, because both of them are about equal in most ways (except some major things, obviously).

If you develop motivation, though, I think you can avoid this problem for the most part.

I don’t use Aesops or any kind of moral message intentionally. I’m telling you a story, and you can take whatever you want from it. That’s my attitude, anyway.