Realism
Being an essay on reality from a narrative perspective.
Romanticism
Most role-playing games are
romantic. The characters are often larger-than-life, empowered, and free to pursue destinies. The Puzzlebox itself is a romantic setting, giving most people free will and exotic powers. Romantic authors appropriate to the Puzzlebox setting include Norman Spinrad and Robert Heinlein.
MU*-style role-playing, with its generous building rules and lack of formalist arbitration, has a strong tendency to be romantic.
Naturalism
The opposite of romanticism,
naturalism emphasizees powerlessness, lack of control, and the inevitability of the universe ruling over oneself. The American author John Steinbeck wrote many naturalist novels, such as
Of Mice and Men and
The Grapes of Wrath. Naturalist themes appropriate to Puzzlebox can be found in the works of Robert Anton Wilson and Stanislaw Lem.
Massively-multiplayre role-playing, with its emphasis on "leveling up" on a pre-determined program, frequent deaths and ressurections, and static environments, has a strong tendency to be naturalist.
Realism
The middle ground between romanticism and naturalism,
realism strives towards characters who have some control over their destinty, but also having fickle fate and the larger world having a hand in things. Realistic themes appropriate to Puzzlebox can be found in John Brunner's
Shockwave Rider and Alan Dean Foster's
Glory Lane
Realism has always had a hard time in role-playing games. Being "games", most people want escapist empowerment (i.e., romance) or mindless, channeled aggression (i.e., naturalism).
Modernism
As an writing theme,
modernism refers to a break from the 19th century writing (where morality was seen to be important) and more towards "realistic" portrayals of how people think. Words were viewed as the artificial construct they are, and radical new directions were pursued, such as the circular narrative of James Joyce's
Finnegan's Wake or the unreliable narrators of Faulkner's
The Sound and the Fury (which was originally to have been printed in seventeen different colors). Modernism could be described as "more real that real" -- experiments to work with or around the abstractions of prose.
Post-Modernism
The latter 20th century saw the rise of
post-modernism, attempting to combine the creative self-awareness of moderism with more realistic aspects. Also taking a page from the "more real than real" attitude, post-modernism often includes unlikely coincidences and humanist themes. Post-modern heroes are often scientists, autodidacts, and detectives, always learning, always pushing forward. Post-modern works appropriate for Puzzlebox include Douglas Adams'
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and
Dirk Gently, Holistic Detective series. Ayn Rand's
Anthem and
The Fountainhead are also strong post-modern works. On television,
The Simpsons and
Futurama rely heavily on having realistic characters in hyper-realistic settings, where brand names and cultural mores are amplified with satire.
"Out-of-character" chat during role-playing games, with its heavy intertexuality and ridiculous assertions, could be said to be post-modernism.
Magical Realism
A form of post-modernism,
magical realism is a specific kind of science-fantasy, often where "only one rule" is broken. Attempts are made to make the wondrous seem commonplace, or to describe the fantastic in mundane terms. Magical realism prefers to concentrate on characterization and plot.
Neil Gaiman has written many magical-realist books, often romantic in tone. Clive Barker's fantasy-horror could be said to be naturalist magical-realism.
- Interesting scholarly note: From what I've learned, Garcia Marquez wrote some stories about the situation his country and peoples were in at the time, they being written for a narrow purpose and then, after, someone labelled those stories as Magic Realism and then other people began calling other works by other authors 'Magic Realism'. I find it just a fun exercise in using my brain to think of Magic Realism just really being one writer's work for the specific purpose of one country's and one man's point of view; like a hammer that only works for one person is taken by another and used another way and mass produced --Zoe
- Gene Wolfe defined magical realism as, "Fantasy written in Spanish", as a reference to that. -- Camilla
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