A-Z Romance: Berne & Groundhog Day

Lisa Berne's The Redemption of Philip Thane is...Groundhog Day!

It IS Groundhog Day (even to the point of a runaway carriage ride) The rake, Philip Thane, has been sent to Whittlesey in January by his aunt to give a Plough Day speech, during which he introduces the Straw Bear. He encounters a bright young woman fascinated by folklore. He stays at a local inn. When he tries to leave the next day, a storm sends him back to Whittlesey. When he wakes the next morning, he is back in Plough Day. He goes through confusion, despair, acceptance...and so on. The lovely folklore scholar and he eventually fall in love.

 

The book is well-written. I skimmed most of it.

 

Here's the thing: I don't care that much for the repeat-a-day trope.

 

I don't mind it as a once-a-series episode. Star Trek did it. Stargate did it. And Groundhog Day is a clever and funny movie.

 

I don't find it specifically romantic.

I wondered at first if my issue was the idea of trying to change the past, an idea I philosophically dislike since OCD rehashes, "If only"s, and "What if"s are not even remotely helpful or character-forming. 

 

Quantum Leap doesn't bother me. However, in Quantum Leap, Sam isn't repeating his own life. He is living out other people's lives, and each choice leads to the next. In addition, Al remains a consistent and ongoing part of Sam's life. Sam learns more about Al and himself from episode to episode.

 

Likewise, regarding classic literature, although Scrooge goes back to his past, he doesn't change it. He learns from it and moves forward. 

 

And Back to the Future--where changing the past ends up changing Marty's future--is more about the adventure than about fixing everything. 

 

The problem with the repeat-a-day trope is not necessarily about revisiting the past. The problem with the trope, however fun, is the Love Boat problem.

 

That is, the idea behind repeat-a-day is that the main character undergoes growth or a fundamental shift in character apparently in 24-hours as a result of making constant improvements to the same order of events (rewriting an essay a hundred times until it gets an "A"). 

 

But change needs somewhere to go. I hate to reduce life to the somewhat reductionist idea of being sent to Earth to endure trials, proving whether we are good or bad. Rather, to borrow from C.S. Lewis, 

 

"[A] dangerous world [is] a world in which moral issues really come to the point. [C]ourage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point, which means, at the point of highest reality. A chastity or honesty, or mercy which yields to danger will be chaste or honest or merciful only on conditions. Pilate was merciful till it became risky."

 

In other words, once the couple leaves the "island" (boat), will the relationship retain the qualities that made is so attractive in the first place? (I don't take Love Boat seriously, so I'm okay with that question.)

 

Will Philip Thane remain reformed when faced with options elsewhere? (Will he be able to write ANOTHER essay, using what he has learned?)

 

That is, I like my romantic couples to build on what happened to them an hour before, day before, week before. Will they remain loyal when life DOES change?

 

With my favorite couples, yes: Elizabeth makes mistakes about Darcy and then learns the truth and questions herself. Darcy acts like a jerk and makes assumptions and then reviews his behavior. Jane grows up in fairly miserable circumstances, battens down her passion, and goes to work for Rochester, where she learns more about him. Rochester bumbles around with his life, meets Jane and finds a focus. Jane leaves, stands up to her nutty cousin, and returns.

 

Trajectory.

Again--repeat-a-day is a decent trope. But it doesn't have the romantic power of a person stumbling forward step-by-step and seeing/hoping/testing if each new choice will work in the future.

For those who love Groundhog Day and enjoy the trope, The Redemption of Philip Thane does give insight into the main character's growth.

Self-Sacrificing Archetype: Keep It Out of Romance

I love self-sacrifice in action movies. Spock sacrificing himself for the ship: fantastic scene!

It can be overdone. But quite often, the self-sacrifice makes for a spectacular finish. 

I am not a fan of self-sacrifice in romances. 

I don't mean Darcy taking responsibility for Wickham's bad behavior and then working things out so Elizabeth and her sisters don't bear the weight of Lydia's behavior for the rest of their lives. Not only do I consider Wickham to be Darcy's problem, but solving the problem with the least inconvenience to all involved is chivalrous. Chivalry is a positive attribute.

DemonCartoonist

What I'm referring to is members of couples who completely subordinate themselves to their significant others. They give up career opportunities, personality preferences, likes and dislikes...all so their lovers feel happy and comfortable and get what they want. 

The hard truth is some relationships may just not work. In my Star Trek fan fiction, I postulate that planet-dwellers (people who prefer planet life) don't fully understand ship dwellers (people who prefer a life of service on board a ship) and vice versa. Unless the couple can figure out a compromise, the relationship is simply not going to succeed. 

I distinguish between sacrifice and compromise. Compromise is about reality. I can't live in New York City right on Central Park because I'm not a billionaire. But I live in a great small city that gives me the same experiences in many ways. I also distinguish between sacrifice and choice. I get enormously irritated by television couples where one member of the couple realizes, years into the relationship, "Oh, wait, I don't want to be married to a soldier or police officer any more." 

Figure that out BEFORE the marriage, please (I realized people don't always think honestly and realistically and objectively before the fact). 

Unlike the working couple that makes concessions, the self-sacrificing archetype doesn't negotiate. It is the Little Mermaid walking around on pained feet, all for the sake of something she made up in her head. These sacrifices often fall into the category of unrequited love. 

One not so terrible version of this archetype takes place in Blue Sheep Reverie. Kai pretty much gives up his goals, self, plans, and everything else to Steel Lahti's need to lead the city. 

It is high romance--and high romance, to a degree, excuses the self-sacrifice. Kai knows exactly what he is doing. He is more Shakespearan tragic hero than dopey Little Mermaid (from the short story). 

Generally speaking, the romantic self-sacrificer is fairly awful stuff. I've always favored a version of Phantom where he rolls his eyes at Christine and gets himself a different life.

Romantic Tough Guys

I have a number of posts on laid-back tough guys. 

Below is my favorite example of a romantic tough guy. He is the sheriff, played by Wade Williams, from the Bones episode "The Witch and the Wardrobe" in which Angela and Hodgins get married. He is a stickler for the law, an upright noble man who believes in his calling. 

He is also a romantic, so when Angela and Hodgins get married in his jail cell, he throws confetti! 

The friendly judge who marries them is played by William Stanford Davis. 

The Hero-Worshipped Lover: Hilarious Punch Drunk Love

The hero-worshiped lover is not quite the same as the popular lover. Quite often, as with Kurosawa (Cherry Magic) and Yuichi (Only the Ring Finger Knows), the popular lover is initially avoided or disliked by the protagonist until the popular lover shows his weaknesses. Adachi figures out Kurosawa's imperfections before they start dating--most of his later doubts are about Kurosawa's expectations, not Kurosawa's character. He is amused by Kurosawa's flawed romantic possessiveness, not upset by it.

The hero-worshiped lover, on the other hand, is craved by the protagonist because the lover is supposedly wonderful and perfect. 

That is, the pedestal is part of the (initial) attraction/courtship. Although series like My Beautiful Man are able to point out the unfairness of "you must allow me to admire you" demands, many series that run with this archetype appear to remain on the worshiper's side. It's the ultimate fan experience: Isn't it great to get the hero's attention? Okay, now, the fan and hero will easily adjust to real life.

I find it creepy. Agatha Christie was right to present a worshiper (of her husband) as also the murderer of the thing she worships. The worshiper doesn't adjust to reality. The worshiper is entirely disillusioned and strikes out. 

The one major exception in my reading right now is the frank erotica Punch Drunk Love. Seon-woo is a worshiper. What makes the manga, at least Volumes 1 & 2, so funny, is that he isn't worshiping Tae-moon for the reasons Tae-moon suspects.

Tae-moon has been taken advantage of by praise-heavy sycophants in the past. He assumes Seon-woo falls into this category. Ha ha, he sneers. I'll take him to a scuzzy hotel. Then, I'll force him to crawl to me, etc. etc. 

Turns out, Seon-woo is so innocent (in some ways), he is thrilled by the hotel. Turns out, also, Seon-woo likes to be dominated during sex. Turns out, as well, that Seon-woo never imagined that Tae-moon was some sweet, good-humored, gentle soul (as Tae-moon portrays himself at work). He always thought Tae-moon was kind of a jerk. That's what he worships! Tae-moon is hot! He's got a great body! What's the problem?! ("Why would I care about your character?")

In fact, the manga heavily implies that Tae-moon is in greater danger of making Seon-woo out to be more of a good guy than he probably is--or, at least, more of a victim (he assumes that Seon-woo is unaware of his own good looks because Seon-woo was abused, not because he was raised by normal people--see below). 

The miscommunication is based entirely on stories each man has made up about the other. 

The outcome, so far, is Cary Grant-worthy farce.  

Bad eyesight. But they have no cavities!

*Note: I used the British "worshipped" for the title, and the American "worshiped" for the post.

Everybody in Romance Should Have a Job: Royalty

 Actually...

 I don't think royal jobs are a good idea with romance. 

Mostly because I think anyone who wants to marry a royal--and isn't Kate Middleton--is an idiot. 

But also because being royal is both more demanding and less demanding than a regular 9-5 job. That is, it imposes more demands in terms of continual "on-stage" performances before the public but...

It isn't exactly like operating on someone or answering the phone or stacking fruit or faxing updated reports. It isn't even like making financial decisions regarding the stock market and hoping they don't flop. Or putting forward an advertising campaign and hoping it doesn't sizzle.  

It involves both more nitpicky audience attention and less "yes, you will actually answer for this particular decision" demands. Royals do answer for things in the court of public opinion. That still isn't the same as the insurance adjuster who forgot to send an important document to the law firm so lost the law firm the case--and got fired. 

True story. 

In addition, the royal "job" entails accepting certain assumptions--such as, yes, you have to answer those dumb questions and look good on camera and pretend not to be tired and annoyed and not beg off because you really don't care about that particular cause. Yes, you have to listen to lectures about not making the crown look bad...

In other words, the characters have to accept a whole bunch of things that most romances fight AGAINST. 

Most romance royalty books, in my opinion, try to have their cake and eat it and hate it and extol it all at the same time. Royal life is demanding! But the people love me! And I will do whatever they need! Except I must do what is right for me! I do have to go to meetings! But I will always make time for you! 

Yeah, right. 

The best royal romances, I would argue, are indirectly about royals. Out of fantasy manga, the following stand out: 

• The Royal Tutor, which is about the royal tutor instilling discipline into the young princes
• Titan's Bride in which the prince's consort is from another planet
• Selfish Mr. Mermaid, in which the prince mostly lives in the human world and only goes home when he has to
• The Other World's Books Depend on the Bean Counter, in which the noble's job is mostly to keep his accountant boyfriend from overworking
• Barbarities, in which the main characters' jobs are to stay alive during Renaissance-type infighting between royalty, the Church, and other parties
  

Generally, speaking, it's best if the royals actually have a specific problem to address.

Learning from Fan Fiction: Every World Needs Rules, even Heaven

My Emma Lathen fan fiction is based around Damien Smith (a new character) and John Thatcher (Lathen's detective). The fan fiction starts in heaven, where Damien's recent arrival requires that he and John give testimony about their relationship, namely why they should be together. 

Damien, John, and their advocate review each of the cases they worked together to explain how they came to fall in love and then live together, despite "lying" to a great many people (in the 1970s) about their relationship. (Neither of them cheated on anyone; Thatcher's wife died five years earlier.) 

That's Part I. 

Part II is Damien and John solving cases in heaven (or, rather, multiple heavens). The cases they solve have to do with people they met during the original cases. 

The premise here is based on my belief that death doesn't actually solve anything (which is one reason killing off a character is a writing cop-out). I get exceedingly tired of the idea that dead people get all noble and sweet-tempered the moment they die. 

Thatcher is younger in heaven.

The aura is the same.

I also don't buy into the idea that once a case is solved on Earth, the dead would be satisfied and whisk themselves off to strum harps on clouds. Why wouldn't they take revenge in heaven on people who forced them to "shuffle off the mortal coil" too early? ("I had so many plans! You ruined everything!")

But that position immediately raises the issue: Would heaven let that happen?

I realized that I needed to make up rules in order for Part II to work. 

The Rules

1. New arrivals end up in the heaven/town/region that fits their moral code. They can change heavens. But no matter what heaven they want to settle in, they must go through a "confession" for that heaven (become citizens).

2. The "confession" is not about admitting sin but rather about giving the council (of angels) and the human individual a chance to assess, "Am I in the right place?" 

3. If the confession remains incomplete, the new arrival is at the mercy of other members of that heaven/town/region. The angels cannot protect them.

4. Angels also have agency. Some of them believe in the Mike-Baxter-do-it-yourself-and-learn-the-hard-way approach to moral self-understanding. Some believe more in the social-work model. Some demand that humans earn money to take trains between heavens. Some give out free passes. Some, like Castiel, may even focus entirely on one human or set of humans.

5. The cases that Thatcher and Damien handle in multiple heavens (as consulting detectives) mostly deal with people switching heavens for a variety of reasons. Because these non-citizens have not yet completed their "confessions," they are open to assault by thugs and others. They can't be killed. But they can be kidnapped, stalked, attacked, stolen from, locked up, accused falsely, and otherwise inconvenienced.   

Continuing Story

So Thatcher's now-dead wife, who married him until "death we do part" and always saw herself as somewhat above the whole soulmates' cliche, has discovered that (a) the angels don't care how advanced/down-to-earth she is in her thinking, in part because she no longer is on Earth; (2) soulmates have cache in the heaven she has selected. 

In other words, the reputation that she had on Earth as a smart, practical, "sure I'm faithful but he is only a man, and marriage is about compromise, ladies" wife of a powerful banker--a reputation that was honestly acquired--no longer carries the same weight. 

She consequently detests Damien and doesn't understand Thatcher's consistent low-key refusal to go "back" to what worked on Earth. 

So she hires thugs to take Damien into a different heaven before he finishes his confession. 

Damien was rather sick of the heaven he was in anyway. He wants to be with Thatcher. But he is far happier in the Victorian Steampunk with Modern Attitudes heaven that he has ended up in. (His boarding house is run by a woman who doesn't mind him having a boyfriend but does insist on "no shenanigans before marriage!").

Thatcher tracks him down. Damien finally agrees to complete his "confession," after which he and Thatcher move into the heaven Damien prefers (Thatcher has the easygoing moral code of a guy who can basically end up anywhere). Steampunk heaven is their home base though they are often asked by angels to investigate disappearances and problems elsewhere. 

* * *

Why Rules Matter

Both Part I and Part II are a fun way to explore the books and various characterizations. In Lathen's first Thatcher book, Banking on Death, the victim is a completely self-absorbed man who is always looking for an angle. He doesn't bother to revenge himself on anyone when he gets to heaven--nobody ever mattered to him that much. (In fact, he keeps ending up in heavens that petition to have him thrown out. Eventually, he goes to work for the Borgias and wheedles his way into the good graces of each relative in turn.) 

But the original book includes his bitter, shrewd, selfish and hysterical mistress, who loathes the man's estranged wife for no very good reason. 

That mistress WOULD try to take out her grief on someone in heaven, such as the estranged wife. Thatcher and Damien would have to figure out who is, say, spreading false rumors about the estranged wife, then track down the culprit and get her removed to another heaven. 

But if everything was all sweetness & light--or if everything was "yeah, whatever, it's just anarchy with angels"--then, well, my detectives wouldn't have much to do. 

People have to be able to behave badly for my detectives to have something to investigate. And the problems have to be repairable for my detectives to have long-range goals.

Dysfunctional Relationships in Mysteries: Plan versus Reality

"Does anyone have a plan like ours?"

One of my favorite Diagnosis Murder episodes, "Till Death Do Us Part," starts with the murderers--a spoiled daughter and her clueless fiance--imagining the murder they have planned. They imagine themselves as slick operators who impress the wedding guests at their upcoming nuptials. They imagine the victim, the father, as a jerk. They imagine his wife, the woman they intend to frame, as snide. They imagine the murder going off without a hitch as the detectives find all the clues they planted.

The episode then switches to the actual day. The couple are vain, pompous, disorganized, and kind of stupid. The father is kindly. The stepmother smooths things over. The two murderers keep making mistakes. Items that were supposed to be in certain places get lost. The dog laps up part of the poison. The maid vacuums. And so on.

 

The murder still occurs, and Mark Sloan naturally finds out the truth. For the purposes of this blog, the great insight into the relationship is that the two bad guys are "made for each other." They have the same dysfunction, and their dysfunction is tied to their murderous impulse. 

 

Their dysfunction? They think they deserve more than they have earned or than makes any actual sense. The groom resents his father-in-law's rejection of his completely ridiculous business proposals. The bride asks her stepmother to fetch nail polish that is already sitting on her vanity. They don't see their own arrests coming because they believe so thoroughly in their self-made stories.

 

Very funny. Very chilling.