http:\/\/www.oed.com\/view\/Entry\/128481\u00a0 Nostos was OED’s word of the day today, and when I looked at its definition, it hit me that this is the perfect word to apply to very long-form stories, such as TV miniseries and multi-volume works that have a long, overall narrative arc as well as a short arc for each volume.\u00a0 These long, long stories often do circle back to a “homecoming” in which–however far they roam–they return to show how what’s been going on relates to the starting conditions.<\/p>\n
I throw it out here because my readers, and the other readers of very long-form fiction, often have no way to discuss the difference between the volume arc and “the whole thing” arc when talking to people who don’t read (or watch on TV) this form of story-telling.\u00a0\u00a0 This might help.\u00a0 (Also, I just like learning new words.)\u00a0\u00a0 If it appeals to you, start using it as “the long form’s circling back, completing not just a story arc but the full circle.”<\/p>\n
In Tolkein, it’s the return of Frodo and friends to Hobbiton, where the changes wrought while they were away doing other things is shown, just like Odysseus found changes at home when he got there.\u00a0\u00a0 I don’t think it needs to be a physical complete circle–but it needs to settle the big issues raised for the various important characters, putting them into a new relationship with themselves and their lives.\u00a0\u00a0 (No ending ever satisfies the reader who just wants MORE…but that’s a different issue.)<\/p>\n
Anyway…the nostos<\/em> of the Paks books comes in Crown of Renewal<\/em>, even though individuals have more years to live and more interesting things may happen to them.\u00a0\u00a0 Those who “knew Paks back when” and influenced her are now in the new places and relationships which resulted from her actions in the first three books.\u00a0 Her arc from peasant to paladin was set then; theirs took longer to resolve.\u00a0\u00a0 The nostos of the Vatta books will require getting the main characters settled into a stability–from which, of course, they could be further dislodged by LifeStuff, but probably not in this writer’s lifetime.\u00a0 But you never know.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" http:\/\/www.oed.com\/view\/Entry\/128481\u00a0 Nostos was OED’s word of the day today, and when I looked at its definition, it hit me that this is the perfect word to apply to very long-form stories, such as TV miniseries and multi-volume works that have a long, overall narrative arc as well as a short arc for each volume.\u00a0 These Read More…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[27,7],"class_list":["post-176","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-writing-life","tag-technical-bits","tag-the-writing-life"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=176"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":177,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176\/revisions\/177"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=176"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=176"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/elizabethmoon.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=176"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}