Sleeping with Symbolism

A few months ago, I re-watched the suspense movie Sleeping with the Enemy. The story is about a young house wife (Julia Roberts) who fakes her death in an attempt to flee her nightmarish marriage, only to discover it’s impossible to escape her controlling husband. I still get chills thinking about it.

During one scene, the abusive husband hits Laura and she falls to the floor.  She pushes herself up to a sitting position, her long red hair spilling around her shoulders, legs bent to the side. At that moment, she reminds me of Ariel from The Little Mermaid. When Laura tries to stand, after her husband leaves, her legs are shaking so badly, she resembles Ariel after the sea witch turned her into a human, and Ariel takes her first steps into the new world. In Sleeping with the Enemy, this image is symbolic foreshadowing. What her husband doesn’t know is that Laura has been learning to swim, to overcome her fear of the water. She is a mermaid, so to speak. Soon after, she fakes her death in a drowning accident and escapes to a new life. The "mermaid" scene also symbolically foreshadows Laura moving to a new world (like Ariel did). She escapes from the massive, ocean-front property on Cape Cod to a cozy house in small town Cedar Falls, Iowa. Even the style of furniture is a complete opposite between the two places.

That evening, after Laura’s husband hits her, he gives her red roses and red lingerie. They are supposed to represent his “love”, but they really symbolize the physical and emotional abuse (blood, danger) she suffers at his hands.

After Laura escapes her husband, she takes a Greyhound bus to her new destination. As it arrives, we see Laura looking out of the bus window and the reflection of the American flag waving in the breeze. The American flag symbolizes freedom and the home of the brave. It’s the perfect symbol for Laura’s courage and the new life she hopes to establish in Cedar Falls.

Symbolism works both at a conscious and unconscious level. When we read a book or watch a movie, some symbols will jump out at us, especially if the creators have done a good job drawing your attention to it. With other symbols, you won’t stop to analyze it. For example, if the scene takes place in a room with green walls, you won’t be thinking that the director wanted to reveal the subtext of life. But you can guarantee someone behind the scenes purposely picked that color because of what it symbolized, and not because it was her favorite color.

In the first season of Criminal Minds (spoiler alert), there was one episode (Compulsion) in which fire and the number three were important elements in the show. Among other things, fire represents anger and divinity (Symbols, Images, Codes: The Secret Language of Meaning in Film, TV, Games, and Visual Media by Pamela Jaye Smith). The FBI behavioral profilers eventually figure out that the unsub (i.e. the serial arsonist/murderer) was starting fires based on the need to test her victims. If they survived the fire, they were free of the wrath of God. The number three (or rather the triad of the number three) would set off the unsub. The creators could have randomly selected any number, but three (like other numbers) has a symbolic meaning. In Christianity, it represents the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.  As the unsub lined up the three bottles of flammable liquid, before dousing her three victims with them, she made reference to the bottles as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

In the book (and movie) Where the Heart Lies, Billie Letts used a tree to represent life and growth. Pregnant seventeen-year-old Novalee (Natalie Portman) is abandoned by her boyfriend at a Walmart store. With nowhere to go (since her mother ran away with a guy years before), she secretly moves into the store. A woman (Stockard Channing) mistakes her for a young girl she once knew and gives Novalee a Welcome Wagon gift of a buckeye tree. As can be expected, the tree starts to die. Novalee tries to return it to the woman, who suggests they plant it in her garden, but only if Novalee comes by regularly to take care of it. This is the turning point in Novalee’s life (i.e. turning plot point). Ruth Ann’s actions are the first act of kindness Novalee has experienced in a while, and under the mothering of Ruth Ann, Novalee turns her life around. And of course (during the movie), we are reminded of this with regular shots of the growing tree.

In the buckeye tree example, the meaning behind the symbolism was obvious from near the beginning of the movie, and was carried throughout the story. In the Criminal Minds example, it was only obvious at the end of the show, when the behavior analysis unit solved the crimes.

Movies (and TV shows) are a great place to learn about symbolism, since the director, writers, set designers look for ways to insert it. Most of the time, we don’t notice it at a conscious level. It impacts us subconsciously. But when done well, it adds to the emotional satisfaction of the movie. If you apply the same principles to your stories, they will increase the emotional satisfaction your readers will get while reading your stories.

Do you watch for symbolism in movies and books? Do you pay attention to it in your stories?

 

Stina Lindenblatt @StinaLL writes New Adult novels. In her spare time, she’s a photographer and can be found at her blog/website.  She is represented by Marisa Corvisiero, and finds it weird talking about herself in third person. Her debut New Adult contemporary romance TELL ME WHEN and LET ME KNOW (Carina Press, HQN) are now available.

The Story Scarf

Last year, Sarah told us about "knitting a book is like writing a sweater" but I'm going to tell you that stories are scarves.
Actually, just this scarf.

This scarf is made with a mind-bogglingly simple pattern by fellow writer Ivy Reisner, simple enough that when I really started knitting and crocheting, this pattern was the first project I made -- and four of the first seven projects. And here's why it's like a story. It's made of scrap yarn.

Every line in that scarf is made of the yarn left over at the end of another project. So when I look at that, I see the green from some slippers I made my daughter, gold and blue from a hat I donated to the homeless shelter, blue leftover from fingerless gloves that went to someone on the Giving Tree, and yarn from a Christmas gift I sent to another writer when she was having a really terrible time. (She may read here, so that's going to drive her nuts, figuring out which is hers.) Most of the yarns are 100% wool, so they're warm and nearly waterproof.

It's all one piece now, and it looks like it belongs together. It was up to me to meld the materials so they all worked together. The only thing "new" in there is the brown, which I knew would work well with all the colors. And I left out a lot from my leftovers bag, too. The oranges, the pinks. They wouldn't have gone with the greens and golds.

Then I gave it a good soak and a wash, and I blocked it, and it's soft and supple and warm. 

Your stories are made of the "leftovers" of your life, the half-thought notions, the experiences that left you questioning your ideals, the stories you heard around the dinner table when you were too young to understand. Your stories emerge from the bits and pieces of a life lived fully, and when you're "crocheting" a story out of what seems to be nothing, you're drawing from the scrap bag of your own experience. 

And it's up to you the writer to decide what to include, what to leave out because it's a lovely bit but it just doesn't match the rest of the story, what new material to add to unite it all together. It's up to you to decide what order the scraps go in and just how long to make it. It's up to you to work the details together such that they seem as if they always were that way, no matter where they came from.

That's why there won't be two stories identical, no matter how similar they seem, and no one will ever have a scarf like this one. Even if another knitter had all the same leftovers in her yarn bag, she probably wouldn't put them together the same way.

Writers and knitters/crocheters know the value of a single effort. As Ivy Reisner says (again, although I don't have a citation for this one) that a single stitch alone isn't going to produce anything, but thousands of stitches do. As a writer, you know one single word alone doesn't produce a book, but thousands of words do. Stitch by stitch, word by word, paragraph by paragraph, row by row. And in the same way, one person alone can't end injustice or hunger, but many of us working together? I think that's pretty powerful. It's aggregate effort, and you're doing it every time you pick up your work.

Moreover, if your writing is a gift -- from God, from Fate, from the muses -- then you have a responsibility to use all that gift to benefit others. You're going to want to use up every last bit of your gift to bring light and warmth to others with this gift you've received. We belong to each other, so you're going to be leveraging your word-craft to help other people. 

Novels may be your passion, but you're also using your words every day to encourage, to explain, to persuade. You can be conscious about finding ways to volunteer your wordcraft -- maybe writing press releases for a charity or an organization you love; maybe helping a deserving student write a college entrance essay.  Maybe the best thing you can do for someone is to listen to them, because as a writer, you know and appreciate that what they're sharing with you is a story -- it's their heart.

To you all of these efforts might seem like just your "leftovers," but to other people, they'll see the whole of what you're doing and it will make their world better. 

Kind of like my scarf. Although it's not mine anymore because last night I gave it to the homeless shelter. The recipient won't know which strand came from a hat I made for a friend and which is from the hat I made for my son. But I hope he wears it and feels warm all over. Warm and loved.

Stay warm. Warm others.

---

Jane Lebak is the author of The Wrong Enemy. She has four kids, three cats, two books in print, and one husband. She lives in the Swamp and spends her time either writing books or making scarves. At Seven Angels, Four Kids, One Family, she blogs about what happens when a distracted daydreamer and a gamer geek attempt to raise four kids. If you want to make her rich and famous, please contact the riveting Roseanne Wells of the Jennifer DeChiara Literary Agency.

The Emotional Impact of Symbolism

by Stina Lindenblatt @StinaLL

©Stina Lindenblatt

One way to create a richer story is by weaving in symbolic subtext. This is also a great way to reveal the story’s theme. I know, you’re now groaning, no thanks to flashbacks to your high school English class. But it’s not hard to add symbolism when you consider how many things in our world have been assigned different meanings. For example, we associate red with passion, anger, embarrassment, danger, power. Crows are symbolic with death and magic. Symbols are also effective when you give them meaning based on your own story. If a character swims in your story, swimming or the water the person swims in might be symbolic, and is woven throughout, further heightening the symbolic subtext.

Subtext works both at a conscious and unconscious level. When we read a book or watch a movie, some symbols will jump out at us, especially if the creators have done a good job drawing your attention to it. With other symbols, you won’t stop to analyze it. For example, if the scene takes place in a room with green walls, you won’t be thinking that the director wanted to reveal the subtext of life. But you can guarantee someone behind the scenes purposely picked that color because of what it symbolized and not because it was her favorite color.

In the first season of Criminal Minds (spoiler alert), there was one episode (Compulsion) in which fire and the number three were important elements to the show. Among other things, fire represents anger and divinity. It was eventually determined that the unsub was starting fires based on the need to test her victims. If they survived the fire, they were free of the wrath of God. The number three (or rather the triad of the number three) would set off the unsub. The creators could have randomly selected any number, but three has a symbolic meaning. In Christianity, it represents the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.  As the unsub lined up the three bottles of flammable liquid, before dousing her three victims with them, she made reference to the bottles as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

The movie Sleeping with the Enemy is about a young woman who fakes her death in an attempt to escape her nightmarish marriage. During one scene, the abusive husband hits Laura (Julia Roberts) and she falls to the floor.  Laura pushes herself up to a sitting position, her long red hair spilling around her shoulders, legs bent to the side. At that moment, she reminded me of Ariel from The Little Mermaid. When Laura tries to stand, after her husband leaves, her legs are shaking so badly, she looks like Ariel after the sea witch turned her into a human, and Ariel takes her first steps into the new world. In Sleeping with the Enemy, this image is symbolic foreshadowing. What her husband doesn’t know is that Laura has been learning to swim, to overcome her fear of water. She is a mermaid, so to speak. Soon after, she fakes her death in a drowning accident and escapes to a new life.

That evening, after Laura’s husband hits her, he gives her red roses and red lingerie. They are supposed to represent his “love”, but they really symbolize the physical and emotional abuse (blood, danger) she suffers at his hands. After Laura escapes, she takes a Greyhound bus to a small town in Iowa. As it arrives, we see Laura looking out of the bus window and the reflection of the American flag waving in the breeze. The American flag symbolizes freedom and the home of the brave. A perfect symbol for Laura’s courage and her new life.

Symbols can show up once in the story, or they can be repeated throughout the book. They can be obvious, as what happens when the camera zooms in on the symbolic object, or they can be subtle, nothing more than a mere mention in the middle of a paragraph. Movies are a great place to learn about symbolism, since the director, writers, set designers look for ways to insert it. Most of the time, we don’t notice it at a conscious level. It impacts us subconsciously. But when done well, it adds to the emotional satisfaction we get from watching the movie or when reading a book.

Do you watch for symbolism in movies and books? Do you pay attention to it in your stories? 

Stina Lindenblatt @StinaLL writes young adult and new adult novels. In her spare time, she’s a photographer and blogging addict, and can be found hanging out on her blog.  

 

Being Subtle With Subtext

Fiction is like an iceberg. Only twenty-five percent of it is visible (the words on the page). The other seventy-five percent is known as subtext. Subtext enables your reader to see that more is going on than what is in the text. It enables you to create a richer, more emotion packed story. It’s the part that is tricky to convey, but when you do it right, it makes for a compelling story. 

There are numerous ways to show subtext, this post will cover three of them.

Action and Dialogue

Imagine your character has an issue with his car. The door has a major design flaw that the automaker knew about, but while the character’s car was under warranty, he was never warned it might be an issue later on. Naturally, the door’s status deteriorates after the warranty expires, and he’s left with a hefty repair bill. He goes back to the dealership and asks if anyone during his regular service appointments checked the status of the doors while the car was under warranty.

The last thing the service guy wants to do is answer the question. He’s been coached on how to approach it. He keeps avoiding a direct answer. Meanwhile, he’s shifting nervously on his feet and shooting panicked looks at his co-workers while they pretended he doesn’t exist. He knows he’s failing miserably at keeping to the script, and this makes him more nervous. 

When you write dialogue, ask yourself what is really happening that the character isn’t saying. Then show it. Have your main character interpret the other character’s actions and body language. Occasionally have your character misinterpret them to misdirect the reader. But make sure it’s believable. If your reader can guess the truth behind the subtext, your misdirection will come off as contrived and your character will sound like an idiot. Nothing irks a reader more than when he feels manipulated.

Symbolism

One way to create a richer story is by weaving symbolic subtext into it. This is also a great way to reveal the story’s theme. It’s not hard to do when you consider how many things in our world have been assigned different meanings. For example, we associate red with passion, anger, embarrassment, danger, power. 

Subtext works both at a conscious and unconscious level. When we read a book or watch a movie, some symbols will jump out at us, especially if the creators have done a good job drawing your attention to it. With other symbols, you won’t stop to analyze it. For example, if the scene takes place in a room with green walls, you won’t be thinking that the director wanted to reveal the subtext of life. But you can guarantee someone behind the scenes purposely picked that color because of what it symbolized and not because it was her favorite color. 

In the book Where the Heart Lies, Billie Letts used a tree to represent life and growth. Pregnant seventeen-year-old Novalee is abandoned by her boyfriend at a Walmart store. With nowhere to go, she secretly moves into the store. A woman mistakes her for a young girl she once knew and gives Novalee a Welcome Wagon gift of a buckeye tree. When the tree starts dying, Novalee tries to return it to the woman, who suggests they plant it in her garden, but only if Novalee comes by regularly to take care of it. This is the turning point in Novalee’s life. Ruth Ann’s actions are the first act of kindness Novalee has experienced in a while, and under the mothering of Ruth Ann, Novalee turns her life around. And of course (during the movie), we are reminded this with regular shots of the growing tree. 

Imagery

The use of imagery, such as a metaphor or simile, can enrich your story by adding subtext. For example (Whispers by Dean Koontz): 

“ . . . Mr. Frye believed that his mother—I think her name was Katherine—had come back from the dead in someone else’s body and was plotting to kill him. He hoped that the Marsden journal would give him a clue about how to deal with her.”

Joshua felt as if a large dose of ice-cold water had been injected into his veins. “Bruno never mentioned such a thing to me.”

If Joshua had said, “Hey man, you’re spooking me here,” the scene would not have been as powerful. He doesn’t want the other person to know just how unnerved his is about the situation. But the reader needs to know this.

It isn’t always necessary to spell out the subtext for your readers. Often it’s more satisfying for the reader if you let him figure it out for himself. That’s the beauty of fiction. It exercises our brains. However, if the subtext is confusing and is going to frustrate the reader, then definitely have a character spell it out. 

Do you enjoy writing subtext? Is it something your focus on when editing a draft?

Stina Lindenblatt writes young adult novels. In her spare time, she’s a photographer and blogging addict, and can be found hanging out on her blog, Seeing Creative.