Interview: Jericho · 2:29pm May 27th, 2013
Jericho has some of the most well executed worldbuilding, characterization, and humour I’ve seen in pony fanfiction. Recently, I had a chance to speak with the author, Crushric. Being a student of anthropology, he thought it would be interesting to use the point of view of a Teutschland pony to explore Equestrian culture from the view of an outsider, a theme rarely, if ever, seen outside of HiE. In this interview, he explains how he uses relevance, character, and comedy to avoid info dumping and have worldbuilding serve the story instead of the other way around.
Crushric: Gruß dich and howdy.
Amacita: Hi! You've got some time now for an interview?
Crushric: Indeed I do.
Amacita: Great! First question: what inspired you to write Jericho?
Crushric: In its current incarnation, it was born out of a desire to write something different but not weird, the kind of thing I like to read myself. I wanted to have fun with it, defy expectations, and present an interesting, memorable little story.
Crushric: Originally, I also began working on it as a project to get feedback on how I actually wrote. So in a way, it was to improve myself as a writer.
Amacita: Well, you've certainly succeeded on both counts. You’ve said before that this was a rewrite; what made you decide to rewrite it?
Crushric: Well, I'll be very, very frank: the original version made me flinch. At its height, it was over 700,000 words long, and it horrified me in hindsight. I still have some of those old chapters saved, and looking at them made we want to do a complete do-over, to present Jericho in a way that wasn't outrageously horrible. After all, since I began the original version (beta!Jericho, as one friend calls it), I actually managed to learn how not to write. With that knowledge, I took down everything and started from scratch, resolving myself to make it actually worth the time it took to read (I hoped, at least). I think it's much, much better for it. Analogy: If the current Jericho were a fine wine, the original was cheap, crappy American beer.
Amacita: Let's talk about the plot for a bit. Why did you choose to start it in the Ponyville Inn & Tavern?
Crushric: Because I felt like it'd be a good place to immediately bring about cultural problems between Equestria and Jericho's own culture. I thought I could make it funny if he started in a place where misunderstandings arose, and it would provide a setup for worldbuilding at the same time. Of course, the original inspiration for something like it was an off-hand remark by CartoonGeld, a reviewer from The Training Grounds, who questioned the original opening, and I'm infinitely glad he suggested it, since I was able to run wild with the idea and, I think, use it to good effect.
Amacita: What was the original opening?
Crushric: It was a rather dark opening wherein Jericho was essentially bleeding out as he stumbled into Equestria proper from the Everfree Forest. That itself was essentially a revamped version of the original, original beginning, wherein Jericho wandered through the ends of the Everfree before being beset by demons. It didn't really fit the tone of the rest of the story as well, and it created some mood dissonance. Plus, that original beginning led to Jericho meeting Fluttershy, and... that was poorly executed, in my opinion. The story wasn't quite as funny back then, and I didn't care for that as much. The current opening gave me a ton of flexibility to do whatever I wanted, which did not involve the Mane 6 appearing from step 1+1/2.
Amacita: Well, I absolutely love the opening you have now. The tavern scene with all the cultural misunderstandings... It was a great source of humour. For me, the comedy and Jericho's personality are really what makes the story work.
Crushric: I'm glad you think so, Amacita. From line one, I sought to basically say, "Hi, this is the tone of the story's narrator. No matter how dark and horrible the story might be, I'm still this narrator." It was the idea that if you liked the first line, you'd probably like the story and Jericho himself. If not, you pretty much knew this wasn't going to be your story.
Crushric: As for the narrator, he was another experiment into mixing the familiar and the strange, trying to create a memorable blend. I'm glad you think the result was worth reading!
Amacita: It's one of those stories where I can’t go one scene without seeing some gem of characterization, or humour, or exposition that makes me want to hold it up to the world and say, “Yes! This is how it’s done!”
Amacita: I think the readers of my blog would like to see some specific examples and techniques they can use in their own writing.
Amacita: So, the Lyra scene in chapter two goes smoothly from sexual tension to paranoia to some supremely well executed jokes about Lyra's cooking. How did you pull that off?
Crushric: Hmm... I started that off as simply as I could: put the metaphorical fish out of water (Jericho) in a strange situation (Lyra just being nice). I began with Jericho just sitting there in the rain, and then Lyra showing up and acting in a way that Jericho perceived as unusual, using bits of cultural dissonance to make Jericho unsure if this was normal here or not, and having him go along with her partly out of confusion. Then, I used this to worldbuild. When Jericho mentions he's a foreigner, Lyra goes a bit nuts and is beyond fascinated by him (which is actually a bit of a slight against how American girls are a bit crazy over foreign guys, buuut...).
Crushric: From there, I play off their different, foil-like attitudes. Not personalities, but attitudes. If they were in the same state of mind throughout, the jokes wouldn't have been there. But by having their attitudes acts as sort of foil, I was able to build Jericho's character off of his interactions with Lyra in such a way that gave hints to his background, way of thinking, and other such things. I take Lyra's curiosity and use it to worldbuild; I use Lyra's house, belongings and decorations to tell the reader about her without ever saying anything; and I use Jericho's views of it all to express his character, thoughts, and background.
Crushric: That's the gist of it: developing a character through his thoughts and mood during his interactions. Even how Jericho narrates here shows how he thinks, like when he calls Lyra's tea “Lyra’s unconscionable ichor” and not “tea”. Sometimes just phrasing things like that can be entertaining in and of itself, and helps to tell jokes without every one needing a normal joke setup (which is one of the advantages that writing has over other mediums). Lots of good humor just comes from two (or more) people acting odd around one another.
Amacita: That's brilliant. So the conflict and comedy come from putting two characters together with very different attitudes/perspectives. It's like they were handed two completely different movie scripts and told to act out a scene; neither of them is antagonistic, but there are still enough misunderstandings to make it interesting and set up some jokes.
Amacita: I think you answered my questions about exposition before I even got a chance to ask: the way you used Lyra's curiosity about Jericho to do some worldbuilding and explain a bit about him, rather than just inserting blocks of dry facts into the narrative.
Amacita: How about we talk about characters next?
Crushric: Sure!
Amacita: One thing that I noticed was depth of character. Jericho seems to have a long history that he's constantly referencing, for example with Selena and her ancient song that he happens to recognize, and with Lyra and his line, “I’ve had far too many experiences with cute girls and poisoned drinks.” Even your minor characters like Cards seem to have a history to them. How do you work that into the story without it coming across as just telling the reader dry facts?
Crushric: I suppose it has to do with relevance. What would make you say something? Were I just sitting there, odds are I wouldn't be thinking of the cause and effects of World War II for no reason. There need be context to something. If I was trying to write a report of those things, then I'd bring them up. Odds are that I wouldn't randomly bring up how powerful the unions were in pre-World War I America unless, for one case, I were reading Howard Zinn's “A People's History of the United States” and had just read the chapter on that, and was still in a state of amazement at how much I didn't know. But in both cases, there's a buildup and a reason for it, and it tells you a bit of how I treat and think about certain things.
Crushric: In Jericho's case, I see him as a completed character. That is, most of his adventure and character arc happened before page one. Because of this, he has a lot of backstory, but he only brings it up when it's relevant. He's capable of telling little anecdotes and stories about himself, capable of talking about his culture when he's asked. The way he presents these stories, too, must not just be a laundry list of facts. For example in chapter seven, Jericho, trying to win over Lightning Dust's trust after doing something that greatly offends her, explains the phrase “Blood is thicker than water”, and how in Teutschland the phrase means “those whom you shed and spill blood with are more important than anything else”.
Crushric: This serves the dual purpose of (1) worldbuilding Teutschland values, and (2) a serviceable plot point, as Jericho uses this story to win Dust's trust, expressing through his culture why Dust is important to him.
Crushric: And then after that speech, his inner monologue goes: I like how you didn’t mention how that philosophy was a bit shaky when it came to non-Teutsche. What was it that former Chancellor De Gaulle once said? Oh, yes. “Teutschland has no friends, only interests.” This further worldbuilds, and it paints Jericho as something of a manipulative bastard towards other people.
Crushric: I'm always, always worried that when I worldbuild like that, it'll come across an as infodump, so I strive to only bring things up when relevant, and I try as hard as I can to help it build a character. So, my exposition tries to serve multiple purposes.
Crushric: So, to make a long story short: use references, worldbuilding, and character backstory to help build a character in the present.
Crushric: Make sense?
Amacita: That's a great answer. Probably the best I've ever heard. Everyone says "infodumping is bad" and "carefully work exposition into the story," but I've rarely seen an analysis of what techniques you actually can use to explain something, and I love your idea about using relevant exposition that does more than one thing.
Crushric: It's actually something I've done from the get-go, having exposition serve more than one purpose. What does it matter if a great war a hundred years ago in the East caused a great depression in Equestria? It doesn't really matter to the story, sadly. But if it's relevant to a character, it suddenly becomes important. If they care about it, why do they care? And what does their care mean for their character?
Amacita: It reminds me of something I read: great dialogue characterizes the speaker as well as the subject. When a character says something, they're not just moving the conversation along; they're revealing a bit about who they are. And when your viewpoint character describes someone else, it also says something about the way they see the world and the people around them. So like exposition, great dialogue also serves multiple purposes.
Crushric: And as I tend to do, I turn dialogue and exposition into one in the same, defining a character by how they speak. If I threw out one of Jericho's own lines, odds are you could tell it was him speaking (at least in the context of the story). If somepony is either being nonchalant about atrocities or making jokes at these atrocities, you know who it is. Selena's speech patterns were a bit more awkward in tone. Cards tends to be more hesitant around Jericho, and later on she tries to act the voice of good-guy-ism. Lightning Dust tends to be a bit cockier, a bit better at handling bad things than Cards, but not as well as Jericho. Lyra is playful and curious. All of these should be communicated to the reader by how the character speaks alone, with body language thrown in there for good effect.
Crushric: That's just how I see it, at least.
Amacita: And that is a big part of why your story was accepted for posting. I've had to reject a lot of stories for long, boring info dumps, and just today I had to reject an otherwise good story because the main character was lacking in personality.
Amacita: By the way, when I was reading, I couldn't help but wonder how much of Jericho’s character is based off of you.
Crushric: Me? Well, I'd like to think I gave him a few of my opinions, tastes, and some of my worst traits, but... I'd like to think he wasn't like me. For instance, Jericho's kind of a heroic sociopath (his defining character trait, really). That's where a good deal of the humor comes, because his condition makes him capable of just not caring, whereas I tend to actually care in at least some form. And while I might be able to spin jokes and quip rapidly, it's not the style of humor Jericho has.
Amacita: How about the language and cultural issues? It that also something from your own experience?
Crushric: Yes and no. See, I'm a student of anthropology. I studied foreign cultures, learned about them, found the views and ways of living fascinating, and incorporated the beliefs of anthropology into my writing. You can see it where Jericho asserts that no culture is inherently better than another, which is Jericho rejecting ethnocentrism, the idea that one's own culture is the best. My skills in that field help me to understand cultures, and thus I spun a tale that had these a major theme. In fact, to help me write Jericho, I taught myself how to speak German. Seriously. My studies of anthropology generally helped me write about a topic that I don't think is ever explored enough in pony fanfiction, at least not outside of HiE.
Crushric: So I created a new culture by blending various ideas together and threw it in with how I see Equestrian culture being, and I let that help me characterize characters. Jericho's views and opinions are different than most any Equestrian would have. As he said about his religion, “... the sixth tenant of the faith is ‘you shall not murder’. It does not say ‘you shall not kill’. I mean, yes, you could interchange those two things sometimes, but to murder and to kill are two different concepts. Murder is wrong. Killing is just a fact of life in this world we live in. The faith makes the distinction quite clearly. The faith teaches that there is no shame in taking somebody’s life for the right reasons.”
This itself is a concept rather alien to Equestrians but normal to him. It helps me express his view of the world, but it does not demean other points of view.
Amacita: In chapter five, Jericho has a monologue where he explains that, “apart from Teutschland, this world is a hell that wants to kill and rape you.” Was he exaggerating? Because it's a bit hard for me to reconcile “no culture is better than any other” with “if you step outside of Equestria, you're gonna get raped.” Am I misunderstanding this?
Crushric: He was exaggerating, yes. Hyperbole for point. Outside of Equestria isn't that bad, though if you read the comics, outside Equestria is horrible for other reasons (chupacabras, vampire jackalopes, trolls, giant murderous spiders). Seriously, those things are all canon.
Amacita: Fair point :-)
Crushric: It's part of the charm of the pony world. Equestria is so nice, and but stray from the road and everything will kill you dead.
Amacita: Well, we're at the two hour mark now. Let's try to bring this to a close.
Crushric: Sorry I took so long.
Amacita: No problem. This was an awesome interview :D
Crushric: *Shrug* What, just a crazy fellow rambling? If you say so...
Amacita: Anyway, thank you for taking the time to talk to me. I will send you a link to the blog post when I put it up.
Crushric: Cool. Oh, and can I say one last thing?
Amacita: Okay. Go ahead.
Crushric: My editor is a Danish monster Viking warrior riding upon a flying longboat of doom, and all authors should quaver in fear, lest his gaze fall upon them and their works of literature.
Crushric: Auf Wiederseh'n, folks!
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