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writerstorm Sep. 10th, 2010 12:10 am)
capri0mni posting in writerstorm Sep. 10th, 2010 12:10 am)Okay... So, this isn't part of an actual story or a full-born plot bunny(yet), but just a thought-bone that my imagination has been chewing on, and I'm feeling compelled to work it out.
There's the "Secret Life of Toys" trope, where a child's toys are intelligent beings with lives of their own. Pixar's Toy Story movies are the latest version of that, but there's also The Brave Tin Soldier and The Velveteen Rabbit (and I think there was a horror movie, Chuck).
Anyway, I've latched onto the notion of an old book somehow becoming intelligent, and having a life of its own, by "absorbing" some of the thoughts and memories of each of the people who've read it over the years: One person's anger in reaction to a particular part of the story, one person's happy memories triggered by another part, someone else's boredom and daydreams, and so on. And each of those separate parts gets knitted into a whole new identity, and "mind," which becomes independant from the original intention of the book's author.
The thing is: the whole reason to have awareness and intelligence is so that you can interact with and move through the world. It's easy to imagine dolls and other toys in this way because they have bodies (of a sort).
How would a book, with an intelligence and will of its own, act on its will? It's hard to be a protagonist (or antagonist) if you can't actually do anything for yourself.
Since "Body" equals "Movement," at least on some level, I'm thinking that the book's mind might be bound up in the movement of pen on paper, when its letters were formed...
But I don't know. Any ideas?
There's the "Secret Life of Toys" trope, where a child's toys are intelligent beings with lives of their own. Pixar's Toy Story movies are the latest version of that, but there's also The Brave Tin Soldier and The Velveteen Rabbit (and I think there was a horror movie, Chuck).
Anyway, I've latched onto the notion of an old book somehow becoming intelligent, and having a life of its own, by "absorbing" some of the thoughts and memories of each of the people who've read it over the years: One person's anger in reaction to a particular part of the story, one person's happy memories triggered by another part, someone else's boredom and daydreams, and so on. And each of those separate parts gets knitted into a whole new identity, and "mind," which becomes independant from the original intention of the book's author.
The thing is: the whole reason to have awareness and intelligence is so that you can interact with and move through the world. It's easy to imagine dolls and other toys in this way because they have bodies (of a sort).
How would a book, with an intelligence and will of its own, act on its will? It's hard to be a protagonist (or antagonist) if you can't actually do anything for yourself.
Since "Body" equals "Movement," at least on some level, I'm thinking that the book's mind might be bound up in the movement of pen on paper, when its letters were formed...
But I don't know. Any ideas?
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...I'd forgotten that, consciously, though, until you mentioned it.
Although, with the diary, isn't it "just" a vehicle for Tom Riddle's consciousness / ghost? And so it's not actually its 'own person'?
From:
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Yeah, but it's a little more autonomous than that, since it can interpret and interact with the outside world. Though I suppose you could argue that it's not the book itself that has sentience but Tom Riddle. I'm kind of the opinion that at that point, Tom Riddle and the book were pretty, oh, symbiotic, since the Tom Riddle the book knew had been pretty much overcome by Voldemort. But that's splitting some pretty fine hairs. :)
Anyway, what if the book could take the ideas/characters/objects described within and make them real, only they'd be vulnerable to the same things the book was vulnerable to? So, a book about King Arthur could project a semi-corporeal King Arthur, but expose him to water or fire and he'd wash away or go up in ashes.
From:
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That's the interpretation I came away with, from the movie. I might change my opinion, though, if I ever get around to reading the original, and see if Rowling's word choices influence my understanding.