Overdramatize or not?

maestrowork · Apr 27, 2008

I'm struggling a bit with the plotting. My hero's now in an internment camp (WWII). Things do happen. But they're not as huge and dramatic as you would see in war films (such as Schindler's List). No big group fights. No riots. No gangs. No shoot outs. No grand escapes and digging holes in the ground. No mass murders and random shooting of prisoners. Just human stories and survival. There are conflicts and personal struggles and threats and all that, but nothing epic.

Is that a problem? Would people expect to see a big production? Great drama? Bigger than life events?

IceCreamEmpress · Apr 27, 2008

I think that people who know about the internment camps know that they weren't full of those high-tension events. And people who don't know about them are unlikely to have any particular expectations.

ChaosTitan · Apr 27, 2008

I guess it depends on what you're writing. Is it a sensational, melodramatic view of internment camps? I'm guessing not. If your intention is to be true to actual experiences in the camps, be true to them.

dawinsor · Apr 27, 2008

I think there's room for a lot of different kinds of novels. To me, what matters is that your book fulfill the expectations it sets. The idea of internment camps may provoke some expectations in readers all by itself, so you may wind up having to be extra careful at the book's start to set up what kind of book this is.

Of course, not all readers will like what you do. More's the pity.

kuwisdelu · Apr 27, 2008

Have a quick read of Night by Eli Wiesel. It's very short, so if you're strong, you may be able to get through it in one night. It's pretty heavy, though (the material, not the prose, which is very poetic), which is the main reason it takes many people a lot longer.

It's a novella-lization of his own experience in a concentration camp with his father. There's nothing overly dramatic as you said, just the harsh, bare bones truth of it all. It's an excellent little novel, and I think it would help you out a lot with this part.

maestrowork · Apr 27, 2008

Thanks. I'm just worried that it's not gritty, dramatic enough. I've read some prison stories and they're rather grim and gritty, lots of drama (prisoners killing each other, surviving brutality, etc.) but I'm just not sure if that's the kind of story I'm telling.

IceCreamEmpress · Apr 27, 2008

maestrowork said:
Thanks. I'm just worried that it's not gritty, dramatic enough. I've read some prison stories and they're rather grim and gritty, lots of drama (prisoners killing each other, surviving brutality, etc.) but I'm just not sure if that's the kind of story I'm telling.

Well, that's not what happened in the camps (murder, brutality, riots, etc.) so it's not the kind of story you're telling.

Yeah, it's not going to be Escape from Stalag Luft III or The Bridge Over the River Kwai, but people aren't going to expect that either.

The impression I have from reading memoirs of internment survivors is that the tedium, along with the uncertainty and frustration, took a huge psychological toll.

CDarklock · Apr 27, 2008

maestrowork said:
Is that a problem?

I think it's probably what people who were really in the camps actually saw.

The question is whether you value authenticity more than drama.

WendyNYC · Apr 27, 2008

IceCreamEmpress said:
The impression I have from reading memoirs of internment survivors is that the tedium, along with the uncertainty and frustration, took a huge psychological toll.

This is how I always understood it, too, just from documentaries and museum exhibits I've seen.

maestrowork · Apr 27, 2008

CDarklock said:
The question is whether you value authenticity more than drama.

Both. Authenticity is great but if it's boring read (people sitting around feeling depressed), it won't work. But false dramatization won't work either, because that betrays the readers. I guess I'm trying to find that happy medium. A great read for the readers.

icerose · Apr 27, 2008

My suggestion is to write it, and if you find your bored as you're writing it, high chances are you'll bore the heck o ut of your reader. When you're done get beta readers, as you well know what they can do.

If I were writing it, I would focus on a small g roup of people who have the best story to tell, the most to lose, and the biggest struggle, or the biggest change from when they entered to when they left.

I wouldn't over-over dramatize it, you don't want a soap opera, but definitely make their struggles hit home.

Power of One was a good one.

RJK · Apr 27, 2008

Remember that these people had their basic freedoms taken away from them. Show this in simple daily activities where a character must ask permission to visit a neighbor. You could also show this by comparison showing a simple activity completed by a non internee and then what an internee must go through to accomplish the same goal.
If you maintain this theme throughout the book, the readers will become imersed in the lives of those in the camps.

Nateskate · Apr 27, 2008

maestrowork said:
I'm struggling a bit with the plotting. My hero's now in an internment camp (WWII). Things do happen. But they're not as huge and dramatic as you would see in war films (such as Schindler's List). No big group fights. No riots. No gangs. No shoot outs. No grand escapes and digging holes in the ground. No mass murders and random shooting of prisoners. Just human stories and survival. There are conflicts and personal struggles and threats and all that, but nothing epic.

Is that a problem? Would people expect to see a big production? Great drama? Bigger than life events?

Hi Ray. I think it's a fascinating setting for a story. It doesn't need those things to be a great story. Right now I'm thinking, "The Secret Life of Bees" meets "The Diary of Anne Frank". There was just enough Drama to keep it interesting, but much of it was about a person sorting through memories and current pressures to find their place in the world. External drama can be exchanged for internal drama. But I do think that Drama on some level helps.

WittyandorIronic · Apr 27, 2008

I agree with Nate. Internal drama can be riveting, as can 'little' dramas. I don't know much about the Interment Camps, but I can imagine how difficult some of the little things could be. Not having access to fruit to bake a pie that you have baked every Sunday for 50 years. Watching the subtle (and not so subtle) disrespect and suspicion heaped against your sweet mother. The guards own internal struggle to justify their orders, their suspicions and worries, and their compassion. Sounds pretty dramatic to me.

maestrowork · Apr 27, 2008

Nateskate said:
Hi Ray. I think it's a fascinating setting for a story. It doesn't need those things to be a great story. Right now I'm thinking, "The Secret Life of Bees" meets "The Diary of Anne Frank". There was just enough Drama to keep it interesting, but much of it was about a person sorting through memories and current pressures to find their place in the world. External drama can be exchanged for internal drama. But I do think that Drama on some level helps.

WittyandorIronic said:
I agree with Nate. Internal drama can be riveting, as can 'little' dramas. I don't know much about the Interment Camps, but I can imagine how difficult some of the little things could be. Not having access to fruit to bake a pie that you have baked every Sunday for 50 years. Watching the subtle (and not so subtle) disrespect and suspicion heaped against your sweet mother. The guards own internal struggle to justify their orders, their suspicions and worries, and their compassion. Sounds pretty dramatic to me.

I have all that, actually. That's a relief to know those can be interesting and riveting without having a few knife fights.

Aggy B. · Apr 27, 2008

Drama doesn't have to be big. As someone already mentioned Night by Elie Wiesel is a great little book (though difficult to read sometimes.) Also A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Solzhenitsyn (Gulag not internment camp but there are similarities) which has even less "big" drama. But it's still interesting and tense.

Dale Emery · Apr 27, 2008

maestrowork said:
Both. Authenticity is great but if it's boring read (people sitting around feeling depressed), it won't work. But false dramatization won't work either, because that betrays the readers. I guess I'm trying to find that happy medium. A great read for the readers.

My guess is that there is no happy medium, and that the question of "how much dramatization" would better reframed as: Which events to dramatize?

Further guesses: If you're writing the story, there's some meaning in it for you. And you're wanting to express that meaning through a focal character, and the way that character acts and reacts in relation to the situation and the other characters.

So: What specific events might dramatize that meaning? What actions would reveal the essence of the focal character to us? What events would that character react to in a way the reveals something meaningful about the character and the situation?

Dale

Mr Flibble · Apr 27, 2008

There's also King Rat, about Changi. No huge drama, or what you and I would call huge. The little things took on a much larger aspect because of where they were. Someone getting caught stealing food was a huge thing. Bartering a packet of cigarettes for an egg might be the highlight of the week. If you capture that, you'll have all the drama you need.

Claudia Gray · Apr 27, 2008

All that matters is whether or not the scenes in the internment camp feel huge/powerful/etc. for your characters. If they are strongly affected, the readers will be. If they are not, the readers won't be.

LaceWing · Apr 27, 2008

Having seen that the question matters . . . the high drama of the setting could make an effective contrasting background to the personal stories.

Manderley · Apr 27, 2008

maestrowork said:
I'm struggling a bit with the plotting. My hero's now in an internment camp (WWII). Things do happen. But they're not as huge and dramatic as you would see in war films (such as Schindler's List). No big group fights. No riots. No gangs. No shoot outs. No grand escapes and digging holes in the ground. No mass murders and random shooting of prisoners. Just human stories and survival. There are conflicts and personal struggles and threats and all that, but nothing epic.

Is that a problem? Would people expect to see a big production? Great drama? Bigger than life events?

You can have a lot of drama without having epic drama. Intense or brooding drama, rather than 'big production' drama. As it's been said: it's all in the expectations.

Shweta · Apr 27, 2008

My personal feeling is that knife fights and casual brutality defuse the tension in written fiction, more often than they build it.

althrasher · Apr 27, 2008

I think you can cause a lot of drama and tension with some of the smallest things.

Also, to me it would make a huge difference what sort of novel this is. Is it based on character's individual growth? Plot-driven, one event to the next? For me, the latter would be much harder to sell with the little daily injustices and struggles.

I do agree with Shewta, though--if your characters feel that these are wearing them down and building their own stress, your readers will feel that way too.

Phaeal · Apr 27, 2008

People will probably expect the internment camp section of the novel to be consistent in tone and approach to the rest of the novel. If they've been reading an introspective literary piece that suddenly comes on like a high-concept spy thriller -- or vice versa -- that's when they're going to have cause to complain.

Perle_Rare · Apr 27, 2008

My great-aunt was a convent in France during WWII and was eventually displaced into an internment camp when the Germans took over the convent for military purposes. She told very few stories from that period of her life and the only story that trickled down to me was the following one: In order to get enough food to survive, the people in the camp would carry the recently deceased people along the food line so they could get an extra portion of food.

To me, this image is much more poignant than any riots, fights, digging or sensational escapes.

For a different story, my father-in-law's parents and siblings were kept in a refugee camp for a few months (before he was born). Apparently, they were there with a family from their previous neighborhood. These neighbors had never allowed their four children to play with friends for fear of them catching any disease whereas my f-i-l's siblings had never been so sheltered. Story has it those four kids died in the refugee camp for lack of having built up immunities to even the most common ailment. None of my f-i-l's sibblings suffered at all.

Survival can make for a facinating and riveting story.

Overdramatize or not?

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