1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:02,430 [MUSIC PLAYING] 2 00:00:14,110 --> 00:00:15,790 So the question that-- 3 00:00:15,790 --> 00:00:23,350 that people in books should be really nice people all the time 4 00:00:23,350 --> 00:00:29,740 and that women in particular ought to be very well-behaved, 5 00:00:29,740 --> 00:00:30,000 first of all it's not real life as we know. 6 00:00:30,000 --> 00:00:32,770 first of all it's not real life as we know. 7 00:00:32,770 --> 00:00:36,460 And second, women come in all shapes and sizes, ages 8 00:00:36,460 --> 00:00:40,030 and stages, heights and colors in different parts 9 00:00:40,030 --> 00:00:41,350 of the world. 10 00:00:41,350 --> 00:00:48,040 And to expect or demand that they be angelic and perfect 11 00:00:48,040 --> 00:00:50,630 is very Victorian. 12 00:00:50,630 --> 00:00:53,620 There is limited space on a pedestal. 13 00:00:53,620 --> 00:00:56,410 You don't get to move around a lot. 14 00:00:56,410 --> 00:00:58,780 So my view is that women are people, 15 00:00:58,780 --> 00:01:00,000 and that people are not perfect. 16 00:01:00,000 --> 00:01:01,200 and that people are not perfect. 17 00:01:01,200 --> 00:01:04,209 And that there are many, many different kinds of them. 18 00:01:04,209 --> 00:01:09,360 And why should that not be reflected in fiction? 19 00:01:09,360 --> 00:01:12,640 When you're writing, you're going to be looking at how 20 00:01:12,640 --> 00:01:14,840 people in the world you're writing about, 21 00:01:14,840 --> 00:01:17,890 if it's the present age or if it's the 50's-- 22 00:01:17,890 --> 00:01:19,990 those are two very different periods-- 23 00:01:19,990 --> 00:01:22,820 how they are performing gender-- 24 00:01:22,820 --> 00:01:25,870 which is always to a certain extent 25 00:01:25,870 --> 00:01:29,020 a way of presenting yourself in society-- 26 00:01:29,020 --> 00:01:30,000 to other people. 27 00:01:30,000 --> 00:01:30,400 to other people. 28 00:01:30,400 --> 00:01:34,750 What am I conveying to other people about myself 29 00:01:34,750 --> 00:01:39,130 by this performance of gender? 30 00:01:39,130 --> 00:01:43,480 So gender is partly dependent on how it is performed 31 00:01:43,480 --> 00:01:46,490 in a historical period. 32 00:01:46,490 --> 00:01:52,750 So what does it mean, for instance, in the Tudor era 33 00:01:52,750 --> 00:01:54,430 to be a male person? 34 00:01:54,430 --> 00:01:57,690 What does it mean to be a female person? 35 00:01:57,690 --> 00:01:59,560 What do those things mean when they're 36 00:01:59,560 --> 00:02:00,000 at different social levels? 37 00:02:00,000 --> 00:02:01,990 at different social levels? 38 00:02:01,990 --> 00:02:05,260 Because that, too, varies from age to age. 39 00:02:05,260 --> 00:02:08,520 Women actually lost a lot of rights in the 19th century 40 00:02:08,520 --> 00:02:10,880 that they had had earlier. 41 00:02:10,880 --> 00:02:12,370 And some of the things that they've 42 00:02:12,370 --> 00:02:15,460 tried to regain in the 20th and 21st 43 00:02:15,460 --> 00:02:19,840 were things they had had before the 19th. 44 00:02:19,840 --> 00:02:25,110 One of the big offenders was Napoleon Bonaparte, by the way. 45 00:02:25,110 --> 00:02:27,790 And let us mention that in the French Revolution, 46 00:02:27,790 --> 00:02:29,710 they're very vague on the Declaration 47 00:02:29,710 --> 00:02:30,000 of the Rights of Man. 48 00:02:30,000 --> 00:02:31,480 of the Rights of Man. 49 00:02:31,480 --> 00:02:33,850 But when a woman came along with the Declaration 50 00:02:33,850 --> 00:02:38,050 of the Rights of Women, they denounced her as a traitor 51 00:02:38,050 --> 00:02:40,050 and chopped off her head. 52 00:02:40,050 --> 00:02:43,840 So what does gender mean has been going on 53 00:02:43,840 --> 00:02:47,420 for a very long time. 54 00:02:47,420 --> 00:02:50,230 And in our age, we no longer think 55 00:02:50,230 --> 00:02:54,100 that there are only two packages, pink and blue. 56 00:02:54,100 --> 00:02:56,440 And science has backed that up. 57 00:02:56,440 --> 00:03:00,000 It's a bell curve, it's a continuum. 58 00:03:00,000 --> 00:03:00,320 It's a bell curve, it's a continuum. 59 00:03:00,320 --> 00:03:03,250 And your character can be situated anywhere 60 00:03:03,250 --> 00:03:05,260 on that continuum. 61 00:03:11,430 --> 00:03:14,700 "The Robber Bride," the name comes 62 00:03:14,700 --> 00:03:17,370 from a gender switch on a Grimm's fairy tale 63 00:03:17,370 --> 00:03:19,860 called "The Robber Bridegroom." 64 00:03:19,860 --> 00:03:24,270 It's a female thief rather than a male thief, 65 00:03:24,270 --> 00:03:30,000 and it's structured like the opera, "Tales of Hoffman." 66 00:03:30,000 --> 00:03:30,700 and it's structured like the opera, "Tales of Hoffman." 67 00:03:30,700 --> 00:03:35,880 That is, it has a prologue, then it has three stories embedded 68 00:03:35,880 --> 00:03:39,540 within it, one for each of the three other characters. 69 00:03:39,540 --> 00:03:43,620 And then it has an epilogue, just like "Tales of Hoffman," 70 00:03:43,620 --> 00:03:46,530 the opera. 71 00:03:46,530 --> 00:03:53,460 So there is Zenia, who is the eminance grise 72 00:03:53,460 --> 00:03:56,970 of the piece, who appears in all of the stories. 73 00:03:56,970 --> 00:04:00,000 And then there are the three friends, 74 00:04:00,000 --> 00:04:01,680 And then there are the three friends, 75 00:04:01,680 --> 00:04:05,160 to whom these stories happen. 76 00:04:05,160 --> 00:04:10,230 And each one of them involves Zenia stealing their man 77 00:04:10,230 --> 00:04:12,060 but in very different ways. 78 00:04:12,060 --> 00:04:13,860 And she is the kind of character who 79 00:04:13,860 --> 00:04:19,200 can restructure her story and even her identity 80 00:04:19,200 --> 00:04:22,770 to conform with what might appeal 81 00:04:22,770 --> 00:04:24,150 to that particular woman. 82 00:04:24,150 --> 00:04:25,830 How does she get in the door? 83 00:04:25,830 --> 00:04:30,000 How does she gain their confidence and then betray it? 84 00:04:30,000 --> 00:04:30,690 How does she gain their confidence and then betray it? 85 00:04:30,690 --> 00:04:34,470 So it's that kind of character. 86 00:04:34,470 --> 00:04:37,530 And I wrote it in part because somebody said to me, 87 00:04:37,530 --> 00:04:39,750 there are no female con-men. 88 00:04:39,750 --> 00:04:42,690 And I said, oh yes there are. 89 00:04:42,690 --> 00:04:50,150 So Zenia became quite popular, oddly enough. 90 00:04:50,150 --> 00:04:52,310 I was in England, and I was talking about her. 91 00:04:52,310 --> 00:04:53,770 And I said, which of the characters 92 00:04:53,770 --> 00:04:56,990 in "The Robber Bride" do you identify with the most? 93 00:04:56,990 --> 00:04:58,920 And they said, Zenia. 94 00:04:58,920 --> 00:05:00,000 And I said why do you do that? 95 00:05:00,000 --> 00:05:01,550 And I said why do you do that? 96 00:05:01,550 --> 00:05:03,470 She's not a very nice person. 97 00:05:03,470 --> 00:05:05,240 They said, because women are tired 98 00:05:05,240 --> 00:05:08,120 of being good all the time. 99 00:05:08,120 --> 00:05:11,270 And it is indeed quite wearing to be expected 100 00:05:11,270 --> 00:05:12,490 to be good all the time. 101 00:05:12,490 --> 00:05:15,020 So I think in a way, she was an outlet. 102 00:05:15,020 --> 00:05:22,370 You enjoy seeing how they manage to deceive people and get away 103 00:05:22,370 --> 00:05:25,170 with what they get away with. 104 00:05:25,170 --> 00:05:27,750 Not that you would do it yourself, of course not. 105 00:05:34,890 --> 00:05:38,460 What makes a compelling villain? 106 00:05:38,460 --> 00:05:40,530 Yes, who was it? 107 00:05:40,530 --> 00:05:43,230 William Blake said, the devil has got all the good lines. 108 00:05:43,230 --> 00:05:45,930 It depends on what kind of novel you're writing, again. 109 00:05:45,930 --> 00:05:50,670 If you're writing Dr. Faustus, we 110 00:05:50,670 --> 00:05:54,040 watch Mephistopheles in action. 111 00:05:54,040 --> 00:05:59,450 So I think really it's a question of if you don't quite 112 00:05:59,450 --> 00:06:00,000 know what a character is going to do next-- 113 00:06:00,000 --> 00:06:02,330 know what a character is going to do next-- 114 00:06:02,330 --> 00:06:04,832 think of some of the noteworthy villains. 115 00:06:04,832 --> 00:06:07,290 Hannibal Lecter, you don't know what he's going to do next, 116 00:06:07,290 --> 00:06:09,170 and that's what makes him interesting. 117 00:06:09,170 --> 00:06:12,320 You have to engage with him. 118 00:06:12,320 --> 00:06:14,600 You have to keep your eyes on him, 119 00:06:14,600 --> 00:06:18,860 because you may change his line of defense. 120 00:06:18,860 --> 00:06:22,150 He may change his tactic with without warning. 121 00:06:22,150 --> 00:06:23,700 Unpredictability. 122 00:06:23,700 --> 00:06:27,490 So surprise me. 123 00:06:27,490 --> 00:06:30,000 And if you're surprising me, you're engaging me. 124 00:06:30,000 --> 00:06:31,190 And if you're surprising me, you're engaging me. 125 00:06:31,190 --> 00:06:33,940 If your surprise is convincing. 126 00:06:33,940 --> 00:06:41,230 Likability is a factor when you're choosing a roommate. 127 00:06:41,230 --> 00:06:43,920 But it's not necessarily a factor 128 00:06:43,920 --> 00:06:48,160 when you're creating a living character. 129 00:06:48,160 --> 00:06:51,270 You will find people saying the central character isn't 130 00:06:51,270 --> 00:06:53,610 likeable. 131 00:06:53,610 --> 00:06:57,240 And you'll find other people saying 132 00:06:57,240 --> 00:06:59,950 that's not the only criterion. 133 00:06:59,950 --> 00:07:00,000 So Captain Ahab is not in any way likable. 134 00:07:00,000 --> 00:07:03,330 So Captain Ahab is not in any way likable. 135 00:07:03,330 --> 00:07:05,790 But he is compelling. 136 00:07:05,790 --> 00:07:07,470 Let's put it that way. 137 00:07:07,470 --> 00:07:12,660 There's a book by John Gardner called "Grendel." 138 00:07:12,660 --> 00:07:16,410 and it's from the point of view of the monster 139 00:07:16,410 --> 00:07:19,890 Grendel in the Beowulf story. 140 00:07:19,890 --> 00:07:21,720 It's absolutely riveting. 141 00:07:21,720 --> 00:07:25,610 He's a completely unpleasant character. 142 00:07:25,610 --> 00:07:29,550 So a character can be very vibrant and alive 143 00:07:29,550 --> 00:07:30,000 although not likable. 144 00:07:30,000 --> 00:07:32,280 although not likable. 145 00:07:32,280 --> 00:07:36,660 So think of the people in your life. 146 00:07:36,660 --> 00:07:41,670 Think of the people that you're interested in hearing about. 147 00:07:41,670 --> 00:07:44,700 What have they done now? 148 00:07:44,700 --> 00:07:46,860 What have they got up to now? 149 00:07:46,860 --> 00:07:50,070 What sort of a mess are they in now? 150 00:07:50,070 --> 00:07:52,130 On the other hand, there is Mabel, 151 00:07:52,130 --> 00:07:55,740 who is always well-behaved. 152 00:07:55,740 --> 00:07:58,080 Are you interested in hearing more about Mabel? 153 00:07:58,080 --> 00:08:00,000 No, not particularly. 154 00:08:00,000 --> 00:08:02,250 But if I tell you that Richard III has just 155 00:08:02,250 --> 00:08:04,050 murdered all his relatives, you're 156 00:08:04,050 --> 00:08:06,430 probably going to perk up. 157 00:08:06,430 --> 00:08:11,070 And I think that comes from our deep evolutionary background. 158 00:08:11,070 --> 00:08:15,870 When things are stable, we don't have to pay that much attention 159 00:08:15,870 --> 00:08:17,100 to them. 160 00:08:17,100 --> 00:08:20,130 It's when the wolf comes out of the woods 161 00:08:20,130 --> 00:08:22,680 that we get very alert. 162 00:08:22,680 --> 00:08:25,800 So dangerous and unstable characters-- 163 00:08:25,800 --> 00:08:28,507 characters we can't necessarily predict, 164 00:08:28,507 --> 00:08:30,000 characters that we don't know whether they're telling us 165 00:08:30,000 --> 00:08:30,840 characters that we don't know whether they're telling us 166 00:08:30,840 --> 00:08:32,220 the truth or not-- 167 00:08:32,220 --> 00:08:36,650 they hold our attention in a way that Mabel doesn't. 168 00:08:36,650 --> 00:08:43,500 I got Mabel out of "The Pirates of Penzance," yeah. 169 00:08:43,500 --> 00:08:45,770 She's always very good.