Story Thing! Primary vs. Secondary World?

[jhameia]

I've been considering what to do for my MA project. I asked my supervisor-to-be and the head of the English department if it's okay for me to incorporate creative writing into my project, and they like the idea. I'm gonna copy-paste what I wrote sometime last month about this on Silver Goggles:

Step 1: Identify postcolonial approaches on / readings of fiction.

Step 2: Attempt reading of primary texts using postcolonial approaches.

Step 3: Apply postcolonial approach to a new primary text, i.e., explore through some creative writing how a postcolonial approach might look like with the steampunk aesthetic.

I'm guessing I'll try to identify different schools of postcolonialism, and dedicated one chapter and particular readings to each, and then execute the approach I used at the end of the chapter. So it'll be an evolving story, of sorts. I haven't decided yet what the story will be, and likely, I won't know until I actually start the writing. But it'll probably follow my usual MO of exploring a particular setting and certain characters.

OK.

So, I have two choices right now:

1) Primary world, alternate history setting. Basically what I did with my two Straits steampunk story, in which I identified a significant event in history and altered it, and then explore what happens when that point of rupture occurs.

Awesome because: I have an excuse to borrow really old books and study more Malayan history. I've identified a time period I'd love to take a shot at: Selangor's first British Resident in 1874. Wikipedia doesn't actually have an entry on the first British Resident, but it has an entry on Frank Swettenham, who was Resident in 1889, and famously built a railway from KL to Klang, boosted the economy, stabilized the region more (the reason why Selangor had to have a British Resident in the first place was due to inter-ethnic conflict) AND was key in the creation of the Federated Malay States in 1895 (Selangor, Perak, Negri Sembilan, Pahang) (basically meant they were under the control of and were the responsibility of the British).

Not cool because: I'm not sure if I can handle the historical distance? I know the late 1800s are considered distant enough for most steampunks. Hell, Scott Westerfeld's Leviathan trilogy takes place in WWI. But I am not Scott Westerfeld and one of the reasons why dieselpunk makes me uncomfortable is that I don't feel enough historical distance from WWI to fictionalize it. My grandfather was born in 1911 or so. Also, without a background in history, I almost have to start from scratch here, just like I had to start almost from scratch with "Between Islands". (This problem may be mitigated by the fact that I WILL be going home to Malaysia in June for a vacation and could use that vacation time to research instead.) (But that is still a boatload of research to do and even though I've done it before it's still intimidating because this project is on a larger scale with a tighter timeframe and MOAR FEKS.)

2) Secondary world setting, which I'd have to build from ground up. I do this almost all the time, and real-world parallels wouldn't be hard to find, since I could adapt details from the histories of the Straits Settlement.

Awesome because: I'd have a lot less pressure to stick to facts, and because it's not primary world, I'd feel more free to have outrageous secondary world elements, like MAGICK and BALLS OF FIRE and MYTHICAL CREATURES and BOMOHS and BUNIAN living OPENLY (look, I want my own personal polong okay!) (OK actually the last two are not secondary world and are very much part of my actual culture BUT IT WOULD STILL BE TERRIFIC to not have to adhere to primary-world limitations of stupid things like RATIONALITY which I always feel I have to do when writing my Straits steampunk which is why they don't have a single fucking ghost yet).

Not so cool because: It feels like a cop-out? On a certain level, because it feels like if someone were to criticize me for what I'm doing I'd say "it's a secondary world!" and that's just not the goddamn excuse. I'd still do my research and heavy-duty world-building (because! world-building!) but I think I might feel the need to make it more "real" and try to do the actual history justice. Which might defeat the purpose of secondary world-building.

SILLY IRRATIONAL JHA IS SILLY AND IRRATIONAL >_<


I have about 10 days left to pick and choose which approach to go with, because that's when my proposal is due. Or I may propose both and see which idea gets more traction with the committee. Either way, it's going to be awesome.

Poll #5530 But maybe YOU have an opinion?

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 7

View Respondents

Which type of setting sounds better?

View Answers

Primary World: Frank Athelstane Swettenham has a cool middle name
4 (57.1%)

Primary World: Some other historical event, pls specify
1 (14.3%)

Secondary World: Bunian and bomohs
2 (28.6%)

Secondary World: A whole new world!
0 (0.0%)

Comments

[ratmmjess.livejournal.com]

My vote: #1. Because, yes, awesome. New and needed, because there's not enough--there can never be enough--alternate history written about non-US places by people from those places. (I'm much more interested in an alt-history Japan written by someone from Japan, frex, than one written by yet another white wannabe "otaku").

Are you possibly over-estimating how much history you'd have to put into the story, and how much research you'd do? I suppose that, with the emphasis on postcolonial schools of thought, you'll have to emphasize the world-building at the expense of characterisation and action...but perhaps not?

[fantasyecho.livejournal.com]

Possibly! The difference between Francis Light and Frank Swettenham is that there're more local names involves with Swettenham than there are with Francis Light, because of Swettenham's involvement with the Larut Wars and such. Also, Swenttenham did a lot of good things for Selangor; I'm going to be critical of his actions but I don't want to do his memory injustice either. And since the point of this exercise is to center locals' actions, it means I have to do research on the locals which is way, way harder, with less information available except through the writings of the British colonials.

[ratmmjess.livejournal.com]

"And since the point of this exercise is to center locals' actions, it means I have to do research on the locals which is way, way harder, with less information available except through the writings of the British colonials."

*slaps forehead* Duh. Sorry. Yes. Hadn't thought that through.

I still wonder if you're placing too much emphasis on research, though. If I'm wrong, tell me, but...couldn't you just do a reasonable amount of research, and then extrapolate from there? After all, the fiction part isn't going to be submitted for publication; it only has to be good enough to meet the standards of your MA supervisor (and, sure, your own internal critic) while also allowing for the various postcolonial approaches to be applied to it.

Really, you wouldn't even have to write an entire story--you could just do long passages/excerpts and then apply the approaches to them.

I'm sure you'll write a kick-ass story. But you shouldn't kill yourself for the fiction part of the project--the critical stuff will be difficult enough.

[fantasyecho.livejournal.com]

I'm probably just freaking out since I'm at the planning stage. And because I also have to link it to the postcolonial theory, it means the story is subject to change any which way, which kind of twigs my control-freak-ness. I have delusions of grandeur that it might get a bigger audience than my MA supervisor and whoever picks it out from the cabinet where past CSCT projects are kept, too.

[ratmmjess.livejournal.com]

Ah, well, far be it from me to interfere with someone else's control-freak-ness. :-)

[fantasyecho.livejournal.com]

I knew you'd understand!

[scott westerfeld (from livejournal.com)]

I also like the idea of a primary world with changes. Because if your world is based on the "real" one, then every piece of world-building has a Special Bonus Meaning: its difference from actual history. It's like going to a party with a strict dress code--it takes a much smaller deviation to make everyone's eyes go wide.

Plus, steampunk set in Malaysia would make some ears perk up, I think.