In A Guide to Supernatural Literature, Everett F. Bleiler, of Kent State University, identifies six “statements” from which “countless stories can be generated”:
1. A man injures another man (and may be punished).He then analyzes each of these “statements,” relating each to his Guide’s “Index of Motives and Situations” (omitted here):
2. A man rebels against the heimarmene (and may be destroyed).
3. An outlaw power touches upon a man (and may be punished).
4. A good power touches upon a man (and may transform him).
5. A man is caught up and carried along by the heimarmene.
6. A man eases or repairs damage to the heimarmene, thereby helping other men.
a. A man commits murder--time gap--punishment by avenging ghost.
b. A man usurps power and oppresses--time passes--punishment by Fate.
c. A man is negligent to others--disturbances--possible resolution by outside party.
d. A man profanes a grave--is haunted by hostile dead--is punished.
e. A man injures another--is punished by avenging powers.
a. A man will not accept death--tries to buy life--is cheated.
b. A man will not accept death--appears after death--may be a nuisance.
c. A man will not accept powerlessness--uses arts--may be punished.
d. A man will not accept his identity--assumes another--is punished.
e. A man acts as a creator--creation gets out of hand. In science fiction, this is motif of the mad scientist.
f. A man affronts the gods--is punished.
g. A man will not accept the deaths of others--awakens them--usually loses.
h. A man will not accept temporary limitations--seeks to remove them--may succeed.
This encounter with the outlaw power has four commons situations, plus several others that are less common. The common situations involve fairies, temptations by the Devil, the hostile dead, and vampires. In each. . . there is a flaw or fault associated with the human that puts him in danger of the outlaw power. In abductions by fairies, the woman must yield sexually to the fairy, which yielding is usually accompanied by some sort of glamour. In temptation by the Devil, the human is usually motivated by greed or lust for power. With the hostile dead, the human is usually trespassing against warning, and is defying a ban. In the vampire story, the victim must give the vampire an initial invitation. As for the ending, the fairy abduction usually ends with the disappearance of the woman. If she returns at all, it is with horrible disfiguration. In the diabolic temptation the Devil almost always wins, and there is little that can be done about the hostile dead. Vampires, however, do permit an escape. Sentence 6 is usually applied, and the human is rescued by outside aid.
3. An outlaw power touches upon a man (and may destroy him).
a. A man meets power--a man’s flaw or gives power a hold over him--man is destroyed or threatened.
b. A man meets power--resists it--may win.
c. A man meets Death--diversions--Death wins.
4. A good power touches upon a man (and may transform him).
a. A man meets power--is victorious--receives gift.
b. A man meets power--is receptive to gnosis--is instructed.
c. A man meets power--has undergone tapas or equivalent--is elevated.
5. A man is caught up and carried along by the heimarmene.
a. Fate needs correction of crime--display--revelation.
b. Ignorance needs correction--death--surmounting of death.
c. Life pattern must be continued on basis or morality--death--path determined.
d. Fate needs correction--sensory limitations removed--adjustment.
e. Ignorance needs correction--man is apt--knowledge imparted.
a. Horrors--invocation of savior--allaying.
b. Disruption--invocation of savior--allaying.
c. Danger threatens--intervention--safety.
This encounter with the outlaw power has four commons situations, plus several others that are less common. The common situations involve fairies, temptations by the Devil, the hostile dead, and vampires. In each. . . there is a flaw or fault associated with the human that puts him in danger of the outlaw power. In abductions by fairies, the woman must yield sexually to the fairy, which yielding is usually accompanied by some sort of glamour. In temptation by the Devil, the human is usually motivated by greed or lust for power. With the hostile dead, the human is usually trespassing against warning, and is defying a ban. In the vampire story, the victim must give the vampire an initial invitation. As for the ending, the fairy abduction usually ends with the disappearance of the woman. If she returns at all, it is with horrible disfiguration. In the diabolic temptation the Devil almost always wins, and there is little that can be done about the hostile dead. Vampires, however, do permit an escape. Sentence 6 is usually applied, and the human is rescued by outside aid.
Bleiler next offers some tips as to how writers may extend or diversify these basic narrative situations. Among these expansion “techniques,” he lists:
. . . duplicating sentence material, interweaving sentences, adding the matter of life, generalizing, rendering more specific, treating figuratively, treating more literally, negating, turning scientific, allegorizing, combining characters, subdividing characters, using offset in various ways, fragmenting, temporally or
geographically. . . .
- Abduction, supernatural-by the dead, ghosts, demons, monsters.
- Adam and/or Eve.
- Afterdeath evolution--soul into form of life--necromorphs--reincarnation.
- Age changes--fountain of youth--rejuvenation.
An excerpt of an individual entry from the Guide illustrates the general approach to specific discussions and suggests the value and use of his tome: In discussing the film The Thief of Bagdad, Bleiler summarizes the plot: To win the hand of a caliph’s daughter, rivals compete to bring her the “most remarkable gift”: “Props then include a flying carpet, the fruit of life and death, an all-seeing idol’s eye, a cloak of invisibility, a magic rope, a magic casket of wishes.”
His summary allows the reader to see that the basic situation that Bleiler describes is has an important function: it establishes the reason, cause, or motive of the action that follows in the remainder of the story, namely the introduction of the various “props” and the ultimate wining of the contest for its prize, the hand of the caliph’s daughter.
Bleiler’s Guide uses some terminology that may not be familiar to the general reader, even of supernatural, or contranatural, literature:
- Heimarmene: A complex term that suggests one’s personal fate, or karma, but also the universal wheel of fortune, or cosmic destiny. It also suggests the dependency of the one’s character and individual destiny upon the interactions of cosmic forces and events, such as, for instance, the alignment of the stars. One must be in the right time and place, within the great wheel of fortune, to triumph. If, on the other hand, he or she is born, as Hamlet was, when “time is out of joint,” the individual may come to a bad end. Basically, one may think of heimarmene as the rule and operation of fate.
- Tapas: “Tapas” is a Hindu term that means religious austerity. Living the simple, plain life is considered a preparation for the understanding and acceptance of spiritual truths. In Catholicism, something of the spirit of tapas is seen in vows of silence and poverty and in the season of lent and its practices, which include fasting and penitence in preparation for Easter.
- Necromorph: Literally, this word means “death-form,” and may be applied to revenants, such as ghosts, vampires, and zombies as well as to corpses and skeletons.
Bleiler, Everett F. The Guide to Supernatural Fiction. Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 1983.
Note: Bleiler is also the author of The Checklist of Science Fiction and Supernatural Fiction. Glen Rock, NY: Firebell Books, 1978, 266 pages.
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