Premise Nailed

By Mark David  

The Elements community on google+

Follow The Elements homepage

Premise revisited

I have discussed premise before, without arriving at any consensus. These communities can be used for something really at the very core of writing really meaningful stories that move and enthral us. This is my motivating factor as a writer. 

I have previously stated: 

'Somewhere along the line, we have to say stop and figure out what it is we are doing. That is when we have to discover the premise, so we appreciate what the story is essentially about and how it can end (Enders-first not included).'

I have always had the feeling that premise lies at the very heart of creating a great work of fiction, whether it is a book or a film. The media are different, yet the device I feel is the same. I knew it had something to do with showing human quality. Defining just what that was is not easy.

To illustrate this, I have spent time looking for an example that encapsulates what it is I have been feeling I know is the key to great fiction writing - so I can learn from it and apply this recognition to turn my fiction into something it aspires to be. Great. Cutting Edge.

My mission in this post is to define PREMISE once and for all - by illustration

We can say that the 'core' of the meaningful story – contains the motivating force. The genetic material for the tree: The seed, from which a novel will grow with a trunk (storyline), branches (subplots), flowers (generate ideas) and bear fruit (prove its point).

This is exactly what the De Niro character does in the example I was looking for. It is a line from a film by a great instructor with the best actors and cinephotographers in the business.

'A guy told me one time. Don't let yourself get attached to anything you are not willing to walk out on in 30 seconds flat if you feel the heat around the corner.' 

HEAT

This line is the best one I have found that illustrates what PREMISE is all about.

The premise is attached to the main character played by Robert De Niro. He, through the choices he is confronted with, fails to live up to his own mantra, sealing his fate. It is a tragic premise, preaching destruction. Mantra, because these words are a sacred utterance, a profound statement of being and a prediction of what will happen to those who do not listen to their inner voices and abide by it. It is a deep and fascinating premise. It was what HEAT is all about and why I think this one of the best crime-robbery movies ever made.

'If we want our stories to create resonance with the reader, we have to believe whole-heartedly in the premise. It doesn't have to be the only truth there is, but a possible — a likely truth that we can out out hearts into. That core of meaning  - this what a strong premise provides.' (from a post on G+)

The premise is based on character. De Niro is faced with the choice of starting a new life with the young woman he has come to love, or exact revenge on him who has been the cause of the events that has lead him to his current predicament. It is a battle between belief and circumstance not of his own choosing. 

When he comes face to face with his opposite, the counterpoint, the meeting is defined by the premise in the film.

The premise in HEAT is imbued with overtones of existence and fate and the choices we face when the going gets tough, placing us in situations we have no control over and have not chosen to be placed within. To rise above circumstance and walk the right path to a 'better destiny' than the one he is currently headed towards. It is universal and I'm sure rereading will show other examples from cultures all around the world.

The premise drives the entire movie and it can be defined as: 

Emotion is greater than reason (for the antagonist)

Even when the stakes are at their greatest. This is the story and character premise is in its purest form. It is embodied in the antagonist, the antithesis of the protagaonist (Al Pacino) who follows his motivation to hunt at the expense of his emotional life. The protagonist does not conform to premise and this is what sets him apart as being the antithesis of the crime running forwards in story.

The differences between them men and their motivation is brought to fruition in the climax of the film that follows the events, placing the Protagonist in a situation where his fate is decided: Life. Destruction. Order. Chaos. The premise drives the antagonist, and the entire story, though they could each have their own premise. 

As far as I am concerned, this understanding nails premise once and for all.

Relic of the Goths: The Kovel Spearhead

Sign up for the elements newsletter.  The Kovel spearhead is a central part of the core plot of the conspiracy thriller series The Elements on Mark-David.com.

Spearhead of Kovel

The Kovel spearhead is a unique relic of the time of the Goths that will feature prominently in The Elements.

‘The town itself lies in the North-Western Ukraine.’

‘Used to be Polish, before the Russians came along.’

‘Quite exceptional.’

‘A truly amazing find.’

‘Congratulations!’

‘But I am confused…’

‘You’re not the only one.’

‘First half of the 3rd. Century.’

‘Really, quite old.’

Background

A time of the migration of a tribe vast in number who travelled south from their homelands in present day Sweden and the Baltic coast, a tribe of warriors who had a not so insignificant impact on the Roman and Byzantine empires. A warrior cult that also returned back to their homelands taking with them something of the culture of Rome and Asian peoples back with them. This is all Wikipedia has to say about the Kovel Spearhead:

The head of a lance, found in 1858 Suszyczno 30 km from Kovel, Ukraine, dated to the early 3rd century. The spearhead measures 15.5 cm with a maximal length of 3.0 cm. Both sides of the leaf were inlaid with silver symbols. The inscription notably runs right to left, reading tilarids, interpreted as "thither rider", the name either of a warrior, or of the spear itself. It is identified as East Germanic (Gothic) because of the nominative -s (in contrast to Proto-Norse -z). The t and d are closer to the Latin alphabet than to the classical Elder Futhark, as it were <TᛁᛚᚨᚱᛁDᛊ>. 

An 1880 casting of the spearhead is exhibited in Berlin, an 1884 casting in Warsaw. The original was looted by Nazi archaeologists from its Polish owner in 1939 and it was lost altogether at the end of WWII.

Characteristics

The crescent form on one side of the spear head is a magical symbol, picked up by the Goths in their wanderings south. They brought them home to their people. Such a mark is called a tamga, inlaid in silver featuring crescent-shapes and arrow symbols thought to have been picked up by the Goths when coming into contact with people on the Black Sea. The use of such symbols in the Kragehul spearhead, similar, though not identical to the Kovel spearhead uncovered at the Kragehul bog near Flemløse in Denmark. 

The runes on the Kovel spearhead read 'thither -rider'. The correct translation in Danish — favors someone or something that is going somewhere. Til means to, rid is the Danish root, like English, for ride - rids would be taken for riding, horses being the only source of transport for most in those days. A better translation is travelling towards ... placing emphasis on the action to the object: the runic inscription describe’s the spears trajectory.

The inscriptions on the Kragehul spearhead are of a different nature and read:

‘I am called the Herul Muha, Ansugisal’s (son). I cry a roar resoundingly, I invoke hail in the spear.’ 

(Macleod and Rees: Runic Amulets p 78)

The magical use of the spear in the warrior cult is well known in Germanic tradition. Hurling a spear into or over the enemy before a battle was a way of giving them to Odin, sacrificing them to the God of battle. As the Voluspá says: Odin had shot his spear over the host. (Rune Lore, Edred Thorsson, Weiser)

The Heruli could very well be a tribe of the Ostrogoths who migrated back to their homelands travelling across the Danish Isles back to what in time would be called Gothia. However, it is also the swastika tamgas that draw attention. No doubt this is what attracted interest in the spearhead. As well as the concentric circles  - this could be interpreted as a sun symbol. Or - as the shield pattern of the Heruli seniores, a Late Roman military unit composed of Heruli warriors. 

The Kovel spearhead had been in the Ukraine, looted from a private Polish collection by SS-Untersturmführer Peter Paulsen, a member of the Nazi SS group called the Ahnenerbe, meaning literally 'ancestors inheritance'. The official mission of the Ahnenerbe was to unearth "new evidence of the accomplishments and deeds of Germanic ancestors using exact scientific methods." The Ahnenerbe later conducted experiments and launched voyages in an attempt to prove that prehistoric and mythological Nordic populations had once ruled the world. 

Paulsen had been assigned to Poland after the German invasion in 1939. Reinhard Heydrich, then head of RSHA, sent Paulsen back to Kraków in order to seize additional museum collections and it could well be that this included the Kovel spearhead. 

So what happened to it?

The spearhead was taken to the Ahnenerbe’s headquarters at Dahlem, Berlin. After that nothing is known, so it seems likely that is was appropriated by perhaps even Himmler himelf and taken to Wewelsburg? It has never been seen since.  

Spearhead of Dahmsdorf-Müncheberg

A similar spearhead is the spearhead of Dahmsdorf-Müncheberg inscribed with ranja (ᚱᚨᚾᛃᚨ) (Ulfilan rannja, meaning "router".) This displays similar methods of silver inlay and tamgas including the crescent moon and others of unknown origin. As with the Kovel spearhead, a swastika is used as a decorative motif, together with the three-armed spiral or trifos inscription. Both represent the forces of nature often associated with the sun.

Sign up for the elements newsletter

The Elements community on google+

Fictionalising the Cold War: No James Bonds here

By Mark David  

The Elements community on google+

Follow The Elements homepage

At the moment I've just seen the TV-series The Company. This wasn't ground breaking television, but it did a great job of visualising the cold war. The Company is a three part miniseries part being in East/West Berlin that was particularly atmospheric. Berlin in the fifties, East Berlin still a wreck from the war, it's all there. But before getting into a thread about The Company I want to backtrack a bit and explain the reason for my interest in this series.

I admit it, the Cold War fascincates me. Nowadays it seems any crime or mystery thriller revolves around the role of that little handheld computer we call the smartphone: GPS, tracking people, discovering messages revealing secrets. Television predominantly. The problem for fiction is, it often ties the story down to a series of often-seen incidents we have seen so often before. You know, where the protagonist gets that just-in-time sms or receives a tip off as he walks past the house where the bad guy lurks, or the police task group following someone to an area coordinating their position from the ubiquitous three sender-masts on the mobile grid, closing in for the kill. Yawn. It was interesting the first time around ...

Perhaps one of the main reasons I trashed the 21st century for the twentieth. It just seemed to make so much sense. No phones. Characters in extremis, cut-off from the outside world. I loved the idea of fictionalising the cold war because it's possible to go back to a time when agents and the victims of deception really were on their own. No online ... anything. No safety rope. No contact. Nada. Other than themselves and what an individual can pull from the mass of grey matter unencumbered by appointments, friend requests or surfing the net for the not-quite-essential info about the latest reality TV-show.

A Reference of Past

Perhaps another reason is I grew up under the cold war. It is a part of my psyche as much as JVC v. betamax, Video Killed The Radio Star and MTV. I was born of the radio age but grew up in the video age and have seen the entry and subsequent changes to society brought about by any small-packaged electronic device that ever came into existence. Except those used in the world of spies.

I decided to go with the flow on this one - use what you know, I told myself. And what is better than the knowledge of the way the world used to work, polished into understanding by the comfort of historical distance? I wanted something without mobile phones. I wanted isolation. And intrigue spiced with deception.

I'm currently developing the back plot of The Elements that involves experts in the shadows. Puppet masters who successfully nurture a psychology of fear and deception. I keep looking around for good fiction that has captured this in the way I want to but admit I have to look hard.

No James Bonds here

Who has ever heard of James Jesus Angleton? Otherwise known as 'Jim.' Well I had. Because of writing what I'm writing. This guy is total legend. The archetypal master of subterfuge, deception and counter deception. He was the one man who could navigate through the wilderness of mirrors. The man who collected and analysed thousands of small unrelated little pieces of information. He was the only one who knew the picture could only come into focus by relating these pieces to each other. 

It was about finding those relations. So the spy became the detective as well, except Angleton knew he was working against masterminds as chess masters - and the analogy is made in the last part of the 3-part series. The masters of the all-powerful KGB creating worlds within worlds for the CIA and MI6 to get lost in. 

One of the reasons - of many - for writing a cold-war based series was my interest in writing about the effect on the players of a hidden game of masters. The Company features real people, in particular Michael Keaton's portrayal of James Angleton was well conceived and executed. The gaol master too. Sleep deprivation. Perception of the game by just thinking it through. Year by painstaking year.

The Way It Was

Keaton comes real close to the kind of feel I've been looking for. If they could have gotten hold of Willem Dafoe - who really looks like Angleton himself - with the same depth Michael Keaton then the series could have been complete ... The thing is, The Company really brought the audience under the skin of ...  not knowing what the f*** was going on. Because that was the way it was. 

So much fiction these days dots the eyes and crosses the t's it seems like the creators regard their audience as children. I find very little that satisfies my ever-hungrey appetite for prime-quality fiction these days. The Company did that. Nothing is what it seems to be. Who can you trust? Who is the mole? We were kept guessing to the end. And even afterwards, provides a very good platform for reflection.

The point of this blog is to make a simple point that I think it's very okay to let the reader or watcher make up their own minds as they wander within the wilderness of mirrors.