Maxperson
Morkus from Orkus
I would argue that those are just unorthodox methods of narration. They're still communicating ideas. Synonyms of narration include portrayal and sketch.
I would have liked to have seen that.
Is RPGing a *literary* endeavour?
- Thread starter pemerton
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I would argue that those are just unorthodox methods of narration. They're still communicating ideas. Synonyms of narration include portrayal and sketch.
I would have liked to have seen that.
Maxperson
Morkus from Orkus
No.
A lot of people with great ideas have been ignored by people, because the one with the idea didn't say it right. A lot of horrors have happened, because someone with a bad idea that people generally wouldn't listen to, were sold on it by someone saying it the right way. How you say something is very often more important than what you are saying.
I agree with this in terms of writing or public speaking. (I have often worked with students who somehow think that the good idea buried in their grammarless "paragraph" should exonerate them from a low grade.)
With gaming, however, I am more forgiving. This ties into the concept of a game being collaborative, more like a conversation than a speech or a piece of writing. In conversations, people are also more forgiving about poor word choice and other delivery flaws. If you've ever suffered the peculiar torture of having to type up recordings of conversations, it's immediately apparent that live conversations are a bloody mess. Grammar is shoddy; vocabulary is used incorrectly; there are awkward pauses and unnecessary repetitions; people are cutting each other off; etc. The participants in those conversations, however, may not even notice these rhetorical flaws, especially if they are deeply engaged with the content being discussed.
RPGs are, I think, closer to a conversation in this regard. Once people are engaged, together, with the fiction, they're not as hung up on rhetorical quality. Some tables may apply a more formal aesthetic to portions of their games. I'm thinking of tables where the GM tends to deliver longer narrations, or where players deliver big in-character speeches. But even then, much of the back-and-forth outside of those elements is far less formal and structured. A few pages back, I posted about a game with a bunch of English teachers who like to create speeches and literary tidbits for their characters. In that game, when the cleric reads his latest bit of liturgy, we are apt to clap if it is especially good. Clearly, word choice and literary quality matter in that context. But, even in that game (which is fairly unusual in my experience), the majority of our time is spent in informal conversation where the quality of delivery is far less important than the fictional situation. The quality of that situation, in terms of player engagement, does not, in my experience, depend primarily on the rhetorical quality of the GM's delivery.
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lowkey13
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lowkey13
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Manbearcat
Legend
I think the fault line here is going to be if you answer “yes” to the below two questions, and pretty much all iterations possible of good/bad/mediocre on either side of the balance.
I would have to answer “yes” to all of them because I neither conceive nor have I experienced anything approximating a tight (or even shabby) coupling between the two.
I’m like most people; good at some things, better at others, and only sometimes am I on the top of my game of all things at once (be it an intellectual enterprise like GMing or a martial one).
My post-mortem reflections upon instances of my GMing have shown me that I’ve had plenty of simultaneous instances of:
1) Inspired (how well it hooks into PC Dramatic Need and forces a defining choice) framing > lacking evolution of gamestate/fiction > rather insipid exposition
2) Meh framing > exciting evolution of gamestate/fiction > evocative but minimalist exposition
3) Awesome > Awesome > Potent but minimalist
4) Awesome > Crap > Potent, evocative, lacking brevity
And everything in between.
I’m all kinds of GM.
Often consistent, energetic, and on top of my game.
Rarely uninspired and going-through-the-motions.
Sometimes mentally blocked, fatigued, and frustrated.
The only correlation to bad gaming that I can draw is when either of my Framing or Fiction/Gamestate Evolution Post-Resolution is off.
Hence why I put them hierarchically at the top, connect them to understanding dramatic device, but don’t correlate them profoundly to certain facets of exposition skill (I do correlate it to some aspects; the ability to communicate with economy but provocatively almost certainly has an amplification effect...one way or the other...but not a causal effect...hence why it’s lower on the hierarchy).
I would have to answer “yes” to all of them because I neither conceive nor have I experienced anything approximating a tight (or even shabby) coupling between the two.
I’m like most people; good at some things, better at others, and only sometimes am I on the top of my game of all things at once (be it an intellectual enterprise like GMing or a martial one).
My post-mortem reflections upon instances of my GMing have shown me that I’ve had plenty of simultaneous instances of:
1) Inspired (how well it hooks into PC Dramatic Need and forces a defining choice) framing > lacking evolution of gamestate/fiction > rather insipid exposition
2) Meh framing > exciting evolution of gamestate/fiction > evocative but minimalist exposition
3) Awesome > Awesome > Potent but minimalist
4) Awesome > Crap > Potent, evocative, lacking brevity
And everything in between.
I’m all kinds of GM.
Often consistent, energetic, and on top of my game.
Rarely uninspired and going-through-the-motions.
Sometimes mentally blocked, fatigued, and frustrated.
The only correlation to bad gaming that I can draw is when either of my Framing or Fiction/Gamestate Evolution Post-Resolution is off.
Hence why I put them hierarchically at the top, connect them to understanding dramatic device, but don’t correlate them profoundly to certain facets of exposition skill (I do correlate it to some aspects; the ability to communicate with economy but provocatively almost certainly has an amplification effect...one way or the other...but not a causal effect...hence why it’s lower on the hierarchy).
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lowkey13
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darkbard
Legend
Well, of course, and I agree this is why we will never agree on the argument: because of the definitions. Context matters, especially when it comes to such nebulous concepts as "literary/literature." I'm pretty sure pemerton, Manbearcat, (not sure about Bedrockgames), etc. don't consider these posts literary, though it's clear you do.
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lowkey13
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darkbard
Legend
My last post-
Do you ever feel like you keep saying, over days and weeks, that people are talking past each other, because of definitions, and you keep saying that, and every now and then, someone will say, "Hey, you know what Lowkey, you know what the real problem is, definitions! I mean ... context matters, buddy."
....and you just kind of want to smash your head repeatedly into your desk? Ever get that feeling?
Aye, but for the context of this discussion, pemerton pretty clearly describes from the beginning (I would argue, though others, like [MENTION=6785785]hawkeyefan[/MENTION], have framed this as almost from the beginning, i.e., with some early supporting posts) the intent behind his use of the term "literary."
Rather than people jumping in and obfuscating the discussion with arguments over alternative definitions, why not engage the OP on the terms presented? Or just, y'know, not get bent outta shape by the usage?
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