How 'Good' are your Stories?

[Paul Whybrow]

By 'good', I mean how moral are your stories?

Does good always prevail over evil? It would make for a boring tale, were the goodies successful at defeating the baddies every time, for one thing we're advised to do as writers, is to make our protagonists suffer, then make them suffer some more, to the point where they look doomed.

Dare to Challenge Your Characters

The best stories, that remain memorable, contain moral ambiguity. If the good guy has flaws, if they've taken a shortcut that's illegal or reprehensible, it makes them more human. Character flaws in an otherwise strong hero create dramatic tension. Just think of Hamlet's indecision and self-doubt, when he's faced with how to avenge his father's death.

Antiheroes are popular: James Bond, Holden Caulfield, Severus Snape, Othello, Harry Flashman, Scarlett O'Hara, Jay Gatsby, Philip Marlowe, Becky Sharp and Emma Bovary stand out because they're not all good.

What about the ending of a story? Adult readers can handle ambiguity and disappointment better than children—and if your story is part of a series, it gives them something to look forward to. In one of my crime novels, the serial killer who my detective had been pursuing and had finally cornered in a Neolithic burial chamber suddenly disappeared in a sinkhole. Seemingly buried beneath thousands of tons of soil and granite, I may reincarnate him in a later story. Wary of making my hero look like a sap, alienating the reader, I gave my copper a strange victory, for he revealed that one of the victims was killed by a second murderer.

With young children, it's better to have a happy ending, for they're vulnerable and after all, morality has been taught through stories from time immemorial. This is not to say, that baddies can't be frightening and even fun.

Should children's books have a happy ending?

It's not just the moral correctness of a story that needs to be considered, for these days, the behaviour of authors is being scrutinised. Publishers are starting to get authors to sign morality clauses, absolving them of responsibility to continue to publish their client's books, if the author behaves in a deplorable way.

Opinion | Must Writers Be Moral? Their Contracts May Require It

This is potentially worrying, for what of the love lives of erotica writers? If a convicted murderer has gone straight since being released from prison, is it OK for him to pen accurate depictions of how to kill someone? Many famous writers from history were notoriously unstable and defiant of the law—their lack of political correctness made their books successful.

A publisher marketing how right-on, woke, unbiased, open-minded, politically correct and kind to their parents, children and pets an author is, might help them gain entry into heaven, but there's a danger that their clients will look like a bunch of goody-goodies whose books are bland and safe.

Reading should be stimulating and challenging, which sometimes means going near the edge of the cliff. Moral rectitude is off-putting.

How 'good' are your stories?

Do you deliver a moral message?

Is your image 'good' enough to sell books?

 

[Katie-Ellen]

I'm not interested in writing good v evil. I'm interested in roofs, walls and doors and windows. Foundations too, naturally. And attics and potting sheds, and we all know not to go into the basement, though actually, you might HAVE to. Some problems can't be fixed, those are the biggies, and then it's a case of what are you going to do about it? Or what can you do about it? What is in you to do about it? And maybe the answer is nothing particular as such. Or nothing that you can hold up and say, see, here is my solution. But the spaces in-between are where so much is lived.

 

[Robert M Derry]

I think grey morality is common in all forms of media these days. Good & evil archetypes are usually quite dull.

I'd refrain from having a negative ending for the sake of it though, you might risk alienating your reader for no good reason.

 

[Amber]

I'm not interested in writing good v evil. I'm interested in roofs, walls and doors and windows. Foundations too, naturally. And attics and potting sheds, and we all know not to go into the basement, though actually, you might HAVE to. Some problems can't be fixed, those are the biggies, and then it's a case of what are you going to do about it? Or what can you do about it? What is in you to do about it? And maybe the answer is nothing particular as such. Or nothing that you can hold up and say, see, here is my solution. But the spaces in-between are where so much is lived.

The space between the notes.

Although, we might mean different things.

I've always liked good vs. evil but I get really excited about it when good struggles with their own evil and vice versa.

 

[Carol Rose]

How 'good' are your stories?
I write romance, and it's a genre expectation that the hero and heroine be noble at their cores, even if they're flawed human beings. So I haven't much choice in the matter unless I want readers leaving horrible reviews or never buying my books again.

Do you deliver a moral message?
I try not to only because I hate being lectured to or preached to in books. An author shouldn't shove his/her own morality or politics into a story to the point I feel either of the above is happening to me. If they do, I'm disinclined to read anything from them again.

Is your image 'good' enough to sell books?
Absolutely no idea.

As a reader, in addition to the statement above about an author's own morality or politics, I don't mind if the ending isn't a happy one, as long as the ending fits what happened throughout the story. For example, when an author always has one of the main characters die in the book, even when it makes no sense to the story that they do (Nights in Rodanthe, anyone???) other than it appears to be the author's trademark to end a story this way, it pisses me off to the point I stop reading that author.

 

[Katie-Ellen]

I'll read and watch good v evil, even though I don't set out to write it. A perennial dichotomy. It will never get old. And evil or at least misfortune often wins, and teaches hard lessons while it's an inescapable truth is, suffering is part of life. The birds and beasts know, every day is hard.

'The children of the dark are wiser than the children of the light.' One can see why they would be, depending on what they've learned from it.

I'll read and write to learn from the dark, but I'm looking for a point of light.

 

[Amber]

I'm not sure you're talking about morality because moral rectitude and morality are not the same thing. The constipated view of what is right and wrong held by those who think in black and white isn't morality. I think you're talking about societal norms and expectations. Which is to say, the sort of personal behavior the villagers are willing to accept from authors or those in the public eye before they storm the castle.

Are they willing to accept someone who talks about his daughter inappropriately?
Are they willing to accept someone who bullies other people in public?
Are they willing to accept someone who believes white nationalists might have a valid point?
Are they willing to accept someone who forms a romantic attachment to his adopted daughter?
Whose claim do they take action on? The woman who says she was assaulted or the man who says he really likes beer?

I think you know where this is going. All of the above are acceptable to us.

The list of horrendous things we are willing to accept is very long.

It doesn't matter that these things are talked about. That's a pretense. The things listed above are acceptable because they happen. The 'talking' about them is merely noise, hens scratching in the dirt. It's only when there is no discussion, when the sort of immoral behavior that goes on every day is so clearly unacceptable that there would be no discussion, that we can honestly say that we as human beings don't agree with this sort of behavior. Because at that point, the understanding that the action is wrong would be so bone deep that it would be taboo.

For me, it's not that they're famous or in the public eye and do these 'very bad things'. For me, it's that the general acceptance of these things in our culture is a reflection of our values. That makes me sad.

Other things happen every day and are met with a different kind of silence or lack of discussion that would take place if we believed exploiting other human beings was wrong. Every now and then there is a tiny bit of discussion. But it fails to really appreciate the reality. As a society we punish a poor credit score with much more vehemence than we do child abandonment.

We have a few taboos. We tend not to question them. Part of the reason Silence of the Lambs was/is so successful is because Hannibal Lecter is intelligent, successful, accomplished, sophisticated, and any number of good things we value. But he eats people. Cannibalism is one of our few taboos. Is it immoral?

Oh. I don't know. I tend to think the immoral part is most likely the murder. Who cares what's done with the corpse once someone's dead? I realize the answer to that question is--A lot of people. But my way of thinking is.... In the series of events where a person is murdered and then their brain sauteed, where is the individual being harmed. My personal belief is that once someone is dead, there's not much you can do to hurt them. And ... well ... funerals and rites are for the living .... mostly. In my opinion.

So, in contrast to the behavior of those in the public eye, the behavior of fictional characters is ... fictional. Also, we have the space, within fiction, to play, as Thomas Harris did. While he might have steered people around, he didn't make a moral argument for or against cannibalism. In general, the bar for violating a societal taboo in fiction is very high. What I mean by this is that if you're going to violate a societal norm, if you're going to break society's rules, those things that make us feel safe, it better not be gratuitous and you better do it well.

Most of the time I won't reject an author's - or any artist's - work because of something they do in their personal lives. But, I try not to see Tom Cruise movies because he makes use of a pool of slave labor available to him through his involvement with the Church of Scientology. I try not to see Woody Allen movies because there isn't any question that he exploited his adopted daughter.

Notice that both of these figures continue to live and breath in our society because in spite of all the drama around human trafficking and the metoo movement, we don't think these things are wrong. Not really.

If a publisher really insists on happy endings in children's books without any exceptions, this would not be morality they're exercising but a societal norm they're applying. It's my view that societal norms aren't bad things. Not in general. It's when there isn't room for exceptions. But ... you know ... I don't believe we're at the point where children's books all have happy endings (okay I know we're not). What say we criticize something that's actually ... I don't know ... happening? Why don't we worry about the really bad stuff? I mean ... if we're going to worry ... IF we're going to write about what's wrong with our worlds... why not ... look for something truly evil to beatch about?

Before I leave this site for the day (maybe)... let me share with you one of my favorite videos....

I'm a Rebel Just For Kicks Now, I've been feeling it since 1966 now....

EDITED to correct typos and because I can.