Of Timeless Ways

I'm about half way through Timeless Way of Building and mostly enjoying it. I always appreciate approachable philosophic writing that attempts to bring forward complete systems of thought to critique human existence.

So far, I've enjoyed most Alexander's ideas about rhythm and process being prime in understanding life in general and how to help generate it. A space is made up of all the different routines that take place in it, and it is life generating or destroying dependent on how it affects the routines in that space.

Alexander also drives at an important element in all design or in all "building" as he might say: unity within diversity and diversity within unity. He's hit on the right trail about good design being interwoven with this principle, it is a way to give a set of things a similar and cohesive quality without ever making them the same.

As much as I'm enjoying it, I have some critiques as well. His impressions of rural European and gypsy life are inundated with a deep mixture of idealism and rose-tinted nostalgia. I have nothing in particular against Europeans and gypsies, but I hardly fancy that life in Europe is or ever was so free of things like war, displeasure and ennui as he seems to think. I mean, Europe invented ennui as far as I understand. Perhaps I digress, but I think though the impressions he calls up certainly sound like wonderful places to see, tour or even live, I know that they are not all completely free of darkness.

As an artist, I very much appreciate hand-crafted things, and the personality inherent in artwork versus mass-produced products, but I hardly think modernization and modern architecture are wholly to blame for a thinning of the human spirit. These things themselves emerge from forces within the human consciousness and from the pursuit of human life. Economic efficiency and productivity as, say, within the housing market all begin with human motivations of wanting to advance humanity, even if it's just wanting to advance oneself.

Alexander claims that the timeless way is egoless, one must step out of the way of the creation. I think this is true in a sense, but not because of the way Alexander seems to be phrasing it. Michelangelo famously discussed freeing his statues from the stone that imprisoned them, and my favorite director Miyazaki writes of coming to a point in creating a film at which the film begins to make him. Yet, they are masters and true artists, and their work is deeply marked with their intention and focus. I do not think the timeless way must be an egoless way in the strictest of interpretations, but simply a natural and compelling way. It is the point at which the thought in the creator's mind passes from "I will make a great X," to "I must work with my utmost skill to make the greatest X that I can." This removes pressure from making a great piece of art to doing great work, which is a process, as Alexander discusses, that gives way to good things.

I look forward to finishing it soon and having much more in-depth points.

I almost forgot. I rather like his book structure. It feels very natural, almost "timeless." Mostly, though, as a reader I enjoy the ability to go back and forth between reading the broad strokes the italicized portions create to examining the detail in the explanatory paragraphs. I feel more like I'm exploring a landscape or a space with this approach than simply reading a book. Or, perhaps I should say, he's giving the conceptualization a kind of multi-dimensionality or a scalability that gives it a more approachable presentation.

A Little Thought On Stories

I recently purchased the book Directing the Story by Francis Glebas, who did storyboard work for a number of Disney productions including Aladdin, The Lion King, Pocahontas and more. It's fascinating to read as Glebas presents the inner thoughts of the Disney story process. The mantra is that the director directs the story and through it, the audience's emotions with the goal of bringing about an emotionally satisfying ending. Glebas continually makes reference to the audience being "lost" in the story, if the film is well put together and the crew has done its job correctly.

Even more, though, a certain idea he presents caught my eye:

Many books that I have found on filmmaking say that we willingly suspend our disbelief when we watch a movie. There is no "willing suspension of disbelief."

Let's say I go to a movie. I buy a ticket—check. Buy popcorn—check. Find a seat—check. Willingly suspend my disbelief—what? I cannot remember ever going into a movie theater and willingly suspending my disbelief. I don't even know how. Belief is automatic. As long as the structure presents a filmic world that is seamless and doesn't break the spell by calling attention to itself, we get sucked into the world of the story.

While the nature of belief is worthy of its own long investigation, I think Glebas has a significant insight into the way we watch movies or read books. Why are we ever affected emotionally by fiction? Some works have deeper impacts on us than others, with impacts varying from passing glee or sorrow to a rich catharsis. But, the fact remains that they affect us.

In essence, I think Glebas is right, we don't "willingly suspend our disbelief" to watch or read stories, instead, we are all too ready to believe.

We believe because good stories are cast as little worlds or realities with their own rules and regulations, their own visual and narrative designs, a crystal rock whose intricacies refract and split the sunlight into infinite tiny beads of color that slide and dance as you tilt it.

Also, I'm beginning to wonder if the emotional impact of stories might not have something to do with my thoughts about the nature of perception as the most significant and basic act of the human being. There is obviously a perceptual difference between watching a movie about an explorer and being an explorer, but if these both document similar events, then we get to experience some small part of being an explorer when we watch the movie.

This may be messy, but basically stories/films/novels, allow us to experience the thoughts and emotions of being someone different. By being privy to the events in a character's life or the events of a plot arch, we become confidants of the narrative itself, like gazing through the intricacies of the crystal and take away the experience and insight into something that is at once smaller and larger than us.

P.S. - I recently checked out Timeless Way of Building, and plan to work through that in the next couple of weeks. Perhaps we'll have some good discussion out of it, your last post piqued my interest in it.