2º ESPA SEMIPRESENCIAL 2015-
BLOQUE 9. UN SIGLO DE REVOLUCIONES: DE LA MARSELLESA A LA INTERNACIONAL a) Objetivos.
Ensemble narratives are not a recent phenomenon. In fact, they have been around for many centuries in literature, and for decades in cinema. Furthermore, they both influence and are influenced by popular media such as television. As will be addressed in this section, ensemble narratives, especially films, have received influence from soap operas from the second half of the 20th century. The typically multi-
protagonist narrative structure of soap operas, along with their popularity, had an impact on the number of ensemble films to be produced during the second half of the last century, which may have fostered their increasing popularity. On the other hand, the short story cycle is also connected to ensemble narratives with its multiple stories that tend to be interconnected even if it is just through a common theme or setting. Despite the fact that ensemble narratives tell a wide variety of stories, ranging from the Grail romances of the 12th century to “low-brow” films like American Pie, it is my contention
that they are particularly suitable for the representation of our increasingly globalized world. The characteristic interconnection among the multiple plotlines and protagonists as well as their coincidental crisscrossing alludes to the idea that, in our “shrinking world,” we are all intertwined.
Ensemble narratives, characterized by a fragmented narrative structure with several main characters, have a long tradition in cinema and, particularly, in literature. As previously mentioned, one of the first examples of narratives that have multiple
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protagonists is the 12th century Grail romances (e.g. Chrétien de Troyes’s Perceval),
which would also influence the eventual development of the novel in the 17th and 18th
centuries (Klarer 68). Rick Altman points out that these romances made use of “hyperbolic modulations,” which establish a relationship between characters, objects or experiences that do not seem to be connected in any way, “whereby the character followed in one chapter or section is replaced—after a short white space on the page— by a different character in the next chapter or section” (Altman 26).59 Therefore, in the
Grail romances, the plot would follow one character and then move to another with “[n]o explanation, no connection, no sense of spatial or conceptual leading” (26). Adding to this, it could also be argued that another aspect that ensemble narratives and the Grail romances have in common is the technique known as entrelacement.60 As
Elissa B. Weaver defines it, this technique comes from the French and the Italian chivalric traditions, and it “is an ordering of the narration in which narrative sequences are interrupted, separated, and recombined with other narrative sequences,” thus creating “suspense as the reader is made to read stories belonging to different plot lines before returning to the point of disjunction” (126). The multiple threads in ensemble narratives are indeed interlaced, thus making the reader/viewer wait until the discourse returns to a specific thread and protagonist.
Moving on to the 14th century, two other notable examples of ensemble
narratives are Giovanni Boccaccio’s The Decameron and Geoffrey Chaucer’s The
Canterbury Tales. Focusing on multiple, recurring characters and plotlines, these
medieval texts have been seen as predecessors of the short story cycle or composite novel, which can be considered ensemble narratives. In Boccaccio’s narrative, which
59 It was during the late-19th century when the white space between chapters started meaning a change of
character or plotline. In the 18th and 19th centuries, it would usually mean a jump in time (Altman 247). 60 Entrelacement appropriately means “to intertwine” in French, thus echoing the interconnections among
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would serve as inspiration to Chaucer’s, several characters gather in a villa sheltering themselves from the Black Death. Thus, the characters are intertwined by a common setting, a prominent feature in ensemble narratives. In the villa, the multiple characters tell a variety of stories that deal with different themes, some are meant to teach a lesson or set an example, being more didactic, whereas others have a lighter, more comic(al) tone, serving the purpose of entertaining. This narrative makes use of a frequent strategy to gather individuals from varied “classes, professions, and sexes” involved in an “emergency status provoked by a plague” (Altman 248). On the other hand, Chaucer’s work also focuses on a group of characters, although, in this case, they engage in a story-telling contest during their pilgrimage to Canterbury. As Mario Klarer states, in these two “cycles of tales,” there is a “frame narrative—such as the pilgrimage to the tomb of Saint Thomas Becket in the Canterbury Tales—which unites a number of otherwise heterogeneous stories” (13). The narratives that contain other narratives that are embedded are called “frame narratives” (Abbott 25). These frame narratives can be “either at the beginning, or at the end, or both at the beginning and end of a narrative,” as well as “interpolated at some point in the text” (Fludernik 28). This use of a frame narrative that connects or embraces multiple plotlines and narrative levels is present in many ensemble narratives, even though it is not necessarily an exclusive or characteristic feature, for frame narratives are used in single-protagonist narratives as well. In ensemble narratives, the multiple protagonists and their threads are part of an overarching plotline. The different threads are heterogeneous even though they are indeed intertwined and contribute to the plot as a whole. From our corpus, the most noticeable example is Romo’s El Puente/The Bridge, which has a circular structure, with a frame narrative at the beginning and at the end, precisely coinciding with Tomasita’s chapters—although the reddening of the Rio Grande is her fault, the other
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chapters and protagonists are connected to this main event and contribute to the overarching plotline in the narrative. A possible difference between ensemble narratives and short story cycles, in this sense, is the fact that the interconnection among protagonists and among plotlines tends to be more conspicuous in the former, while short stories may be completely disconnected from one another, only sharing the frame narrative as in the case of Chaucer’s narrative, or any other aspect such as themes or settings. In spite of this difference, the development of both the short story cycle and ensemble narratives are close to each other.
Ensemble narratives have also been influenced by different serials such as the magazine and newspaper serials. These journals published novels in multiple installments as well as short stories, which would contribute to the development of the short story cycle. Due to the prohibitive prices of books during the 17th and 18th
centuries, “large works” such as “histories, geographies, encyclopedias, romances, and the Bible” started being published in much cheaper fascicles—i.e. part-issue prints or “publication in numbers”—in order to “expand the market, and thereby increase profits” (Hagedorn 29). In the following century, the large majority of these serialized publications were fiction, both novels in installments and short stories. Subsequently, the birth and development of the short-story cycle during the late 18th and 19th centuries
were influenced by the regular publication of short stories in magazines (Klarer 13). The success of these periodic publications not only contributed to the development of the short story cycle, but also to the birth and evolution of the soap opera and the TV series, which have influenced ensemble novels and films too, as will be explored later.
The short story cycle or the composite novel, as proposed by Maggie Dunn and Ann Morris, can be traced back to the 19th century, reaching a mature stage during the
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Nagel mentions that the origins of the genre go way back to old literary works such as Homer’s Odyssey or the stories in A Thousand and One Nights (2). Medieval narratives such as the aforementioned The Decameron and The Canterbury Tales are considered precursors of the genre as well. By this time, these texts had already showed that “two ideas became clear in the concept of cycle: that each contributing unit of the work be an independent narrative episode, and that there be some principle of unification that gives structure, movement, and thematic development to the whole” (Nagel 2). Although the term “composite novel” originally made reference to novels written by multiple authors, from the 1970s onwards its use shifted towards a collection of stories that attains coherence once they are grouped all together; thus, the literary genre is defined by Dunn and Morris as follows: “The composite novel is a literary work composed of shorter
texts that—though individually complete and autonomous—are interrelated in a coherent whole according to one or more organizing principles” (2; italics in the
original). This interrelation may not be conspicuous enough. If that is the case, then, the readers should establish the connections, “perhaps by locating a unifying or regulating element bridging the individual stories that could help interpret and integrate the text- pieces even if their juxtaposed arrangement does not suggest an overt organization” (Puşcaş 213). One of the 19th century forerunners of the composite novel is the “village sketch,” which focused on the description of life in a particular location: “in such works one could capture ‘a sense of place’ in many minute particulars, including among these particulars an ethos of community that reflects the complex network of human lives” (23). Romo’s El Puente/The Bridge, for instance, explores a community living in one common setting: the book revolves around the U.S.-Mexico border as well as the complex and certainly complicated lives of those who reside there, especially, women.
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While there are some examples of narratives employing a variety of devices to foster the multiplicity of characters between the end of the Middle Ages and the advent of the modern era, in 1789,61 it was in the late 19th and early 20th centuries when
fragmented narrative structures and multi-protagonism became a prominent feature in literature. Realism emerged in France during the first half of the 19th century, reaching
its climax towards the end of the century. Late 19th century realist and naturalist novels such as Émile Zola’s Germinal (1885), Emilia Pardo Bazán’s Los pazos de Ulloa (1886), or Benito Pérez Galdós’s Misericordia (1897) feature a variety of characters, frequently with several protagonists, in an attempt to provide a comprehensive representation of the society of the time; they do so in what these authors claim to be realistic ways, including “factual details” that seemed to be “accurate” (Hawthorn 50).62
Realist writers break away from the “palpably supernatural” (Chodat 86), as well as the previous “romantic idealism, melodrama and a starry-eyed lack of concern for contemporary economic and social issues” (Fludernik 53). These novels include “‘low life’ and the experiences of those deemed unworthy of artistic portrayals by other artists” (Hawthorn 49). In his insightful and classic book The Rise of the Novel (1957), Ian Watt points out that the French Realists claimed that their novels distanced themselves from the “more flattering pictures of humanity,” because those narratives “were the product of a more dispassionate and scientific scrutiny of life than had ever been attempted before” (11), posing questions regarding the “rapidly changing social and political world” (Speight 30). This is one of the points of connection between the
61 Examples of ensemble narratives in those intervening centuries are the story collections in Renaissance
texts or, in the early modern period, the “Spanish Inn” novels, where different characters share their stories, (Altman 248).
62 It should be noted, however, that these realistic ways are mainly “based on illusion: the trick is to make
the world of the novel seem like part of the real world and not, as is generally claimed, to depict the real world. Instead of imitating reality, realistic novels refer to aspects of reality which are already familiar to readers” (Fludernik 55).
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19th century novels and our corpus: both focus on “ordinary,” everyday life.63 The modern novel, as Robert Chodat puts it, revolves around the “unheroic, the commonplace,” with “characters less defined by valorous deeds than by ordinary labor” and primarily belonging to the “emerging professional classes” and in connection to the “life of the family, which is typically a less tribal unit than in earlier narratives” (88). Most of the characters in the chosen narratives are part of these professional classes and develop ordinary labor, and even those that are not surrounded by commonplace contexts, such as the druglords in Traffic, are also approached and depicted in realistic ways.
Realist narratives are also connected to previous stages in the development of the novel as a genre, and not only the context but the characters too are subjected to realistic descriptions. Watt explains that characterization and the presentation of background are essential in the novel, paying special attention to the “individualisation [and development] of its characters [in the course of time]” and to the details regarding “their environment” and everyday life (18, 22). Furthermore, the realist novel explores the characters in terms of emotions and empathy as well, an issue that will receive attention later. Even though the realist novel is not the only one that addresses the emotional experiences of characters, John Gibson remarks that, in these 19th century narratives, the “minutia of life” is a “matter of affective concern”: “[w]e are often granted access to a character’s psychological interior as it registers the significance, both cognitive and emotional, of experience: of the ‘doings and sufferings’ that appear to be characteristic of creatures such as ourselves” (239). With regards to the relevance given to everyday life events and emotions, the selected narratives pay special attention to the social, cultural, political and economic context and issues such as globalization,
63 Yamashita’s Tropic of Orange would be an exception to this, for it does not focus only on the
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which are some of the primary pillars of the corpus. Furthermore, the exploration of the characters in relation to their context, their backgrounds and their emotions is of the utmost relevance too. Such information allows for a realistic depiction of those characters.
Apart from an exploration of a variety of characters and their contexts, it is worth noting that the 19th century realist novels also show that the individual’s behavior
is controlled by forces that are out of their reach (Altman 257). This is even more evident among naturalistic novelists of the period, most of whom shared the belief that “heredity determines a person’s nature, which determines his or her actions” (Cowburn 164). These ruling forces that foster a sense of determinism bring to mind one of the main characteristics of ensemble narratives: the characters and their coincidental interconnections seem to be the consequences of the whims of fate, as will be discussed later.
The first half of the 20th century witnesses the emergence of modernism, which
introduces characteristics that are often present in ensemble narratives (see section 2.2). Authors such as James Joyce, Virginia Woolf or, in the U.S. context, John Dos Passos with his extensive experimental novels, break away from conventional narrative structures and strategies. The literature of this period rejects and challenges “traditional realism (chronological plots, continuous narratives relayed by omniscient narrators, ‘closed endings’, etc.) in favour of experimental forms of various kinds” (Barry 79). Some of the changes that modernism brings are the focus on subjectivity, reflected by the stream of consciousness technique, a departure from the objectivity that an “omniscient external narration, fixed narrative points of view and clear-cut moral positions” mean, the experimentation and combination of literary genres, and the use of “fragmented forms, discontinuous narrative, and random-seeming collages of disparate
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materials” (Barry 79). Innovative and experimental narrative strategies are also present in the postmodernist literature of the second half of the past century. Postmodernist fiction is generally characterized by “bricolage or pastiche,” the “juxtaposition of ‘low’ with high culture,” and the “mixing of styles and genres” (Nicol 2).64
If ensemble novels have a long tradition in literature, ensemble narratives in cinema are not a recent phenomenon either. Nevertheless, ensemble films “used to be considered of interest only to art-house audiences” and only in recent times has the number of their followers started to increase (Aronson 167). In fact, it was not until the last two decades of the 20th century that multi-protagonist films became more popular,
in part thanks to the attention received from critics. The origins of this genre can be traced back to silent movies like Intolerance (1916), by D.W. Griffith (Azcona, Multi-
Protagonist 9). An even more relevant example among classical Hollywood movies can
be found some years later, in a sound film, Edmund Goulding’s Grand Hotel (1932), which materialized the idea of gathering most of the Metro Goldwyn Mayer’s stars in a single motion picture. Hollywood studios became more interested in this type of films after the Second World War, as exemplified by the 1946 musical The Best Years of Our
Lives (Azcona, Multi-Protagonist 11). By this time, multi-protagonist films already
included some of the distinctive characteristics that would eventually get consolidated: “an inclination towards open endings (although not in the case of the musicals), a concern with the (love, sexual, or friendship) relationships between the characters rather than with a strong cause-and-effect line of action, and a special amenability to combine with a multiplicity of genres” (Azcona, Multi-Protagonist 13). During the 1960s,
64 For instance, the parody inferred by the wrestling match between SUPERNAFTA and El Gran Mojado
points at the mix of “low” and popular culture with more “serious” and intellectual issues. Furthermore, by introducing Arcangel’s political poems, Tropic of Orange combines poems with the novel. However, this inclusion of poems may also allude to the combination of narration with other forms of texts used in earlier times, like the multi-protagonist “prose romances of the late Renaissance,” which often used white spaces not only to move from one character to the next, but also to include “stories, letters, poems, tomb inscriptions, legal manual, and what-have-you” (Altman 246).
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although there was a slight increase in the number of ensemble films being produced, they were still the exception to the norm. At the time, as David Bordwell states in The
Way Hollywood Tells It, while some movies would focus on one or two protagonists,
other characters and their plotlines were relevant as well (95).
Despite the growing popularity of ensemble movies, they would remain an oddity until the 1970s. One of the milestones in the development of ensemble films was the 1970s “disaster movies.” These motion pictures enjoyed widespread popular acceptance, in part due to their all-star cast. Also alluring was the fact that they “revolve[d] around a life/death situation caused by either a natural disaster or a human action in which the efforts to escape and/or control the catastrophe feature[d] as the strong line of action that unifie[d] their multi-protagonist casts” (Azcona, Multi-
Protagonist 15). Furthermore, this type of narrative does not have a specific protagonist.
The several plotlines that comprise the film might have their own heroes or heroines. Thus, there is not a unique hero or heroine. As a consequence, the film devotes approximately the same amount of time to each of the characters. The fact that during the 1970s ensemble films would have all-star casts would serve at least three practical purposes: first, to avoid misleading the spectators, who might think that a certain