Liminality in writing

[Brutal_One]

Prompted by a recent thread about the spaces between ‘stories’ in the writing.



Life is waiting. Not just waiting in line at the grocery store or waiting to renew your driver’s license, but waiting to renew your driver’s license, but waiting to love and commit and find the work you were meant to do. Our lives are full of inconvenient setbacks, not due to some great cosmic mistake but because of some divine purpose we don’t comprehend.

In the waiting, we become.

Space?
Liminality is the in-between moments, the space between an inciting incident in a story and the protagonist’s resolution. It is often a period of discomfort, of waiting, and of transformation. Your characters’ old habits, beliefs, and even personal identity disintegrates. He or she has the chance to become someone completely new.

This is the middle of every great story. Liminal space is the period between Raskolnikov’s crime and his confession to detective Porfiry. It is the space between the murder of Bruce Wayne’s parents and his becoming Batman in order to protect others. Liminal space is Luke Skywalker’s apprenticeship in the swamps of Dagobah. It is Frodo’s long, slow journey to Mordor. Liminal space is the period between Elizabeth Bennet’s realization she likes Mr. Darcy and the moment she agrees to marry him.

Every story must have a protagonist who changes, and change happens through liminal space, this middle time of transformation. The word liminal means “threshold,” the door between one season of life and the next, the time between the wound and healing, the period between childhood and adulthood.

That’s why the middle of every story must be a period of liminality.

Discuss as it pertains to your writing. Brutal One

 

[sirhugs]

Awwww...THIS explains why my characters seem to spend so much time lingering in doorways, leaning against door frames...

 

[Omenainen]

Life is what happens to you when you’re busy making other plans.

 

[jehoram]

In our stories, it's the time between when their eyes lock and when the cum dribbles from her twat.

 

[Brutal_One]

In our stories, it's the time between when their eyes lock and when the cum dribbles from her twat.

Now there’s an answer!

 

[Voboy]

Frequently, my stories use this time for characters to decide what to do, or to figure out how they're going to lie about the things they plan to do.

 

[Enchantment_of_Nyx]

This isn't my understanding of the concept of liminality. Doesn't it generally refer to a transition between states, or to the area between the defined boundaries of one state and another? It's generally a transition between psychological states or social states, and the transition generally involves an evolution.

I understand the point being made about using the time when a character is waiting, but connecting it to liminality is throwing me.

 

[SamScribble]

That’s why the middle of every story must be a period of liminality.

My first 'heavyweight' editor told me, early in our working relationship, 'take absolutely no notice of anyone who tries to tell you how to write, especially anyone who tries to tell you what must and must not be included in a story'. And then, if I remember correctly, he produced a backgammon board and a bottle of red from a minor Bordeaux chateau.

 

[Brutal_One]

This isn't my understanding of the concept of liminality. Doesn't it generally refer to a transition between states, or to the area between the defined boundaries of one state and another? It's generally a transition between psychological states or social states, and the transition generally involves an evolution.

I understand the point being made about using the time when a character is waiting, but connecting it to liminality is throwing me.

The examples I provided were not mine but from the internet but what prompted it again was again a reference in reading the book on the Middle Earth Geography in the Hobbit and LOTR trilogies. The Reference to Radagast the Brown is made one of the five Istari wizards and he is described in those terms with a reference to such characters that were common in European writing but you correctly identify the concept. I am not suggesting that other writers are aware of it but transition between states is probably something that characters experience even if the author is not aware of it. It’s an odd thought hence the thread. Brutal One

 

[Enchantment_of_Nyx]

The examples I provided were not mine but from the internet but what prompted it again was again a reference in reading the book on the Middle Earth Geography in the Hobbit and LOTR trilogies. The Reference to Radagast the Brown is made one of the five Istari wizards and he is described in those terms with a reference to such characters that were common in European writing...

Sorry, but I'm lost again. I may be having a literal kind of day. What is it you're saying about Radagast the Brown? I'm following so far as that in the book you're reading, one of the Istari wizards makes reference to Radagar the Brown and describes him in some sort of terms with a reference to characters common in European writing. Describes him in liminal terms? And he is being compared to some sort of characters common in European writing? I'm not tracking with you.