Learning From Mulan
You may have seen the lovely Disney movie based on the story of Mulan, the girl who dresses as a boy to take her father’s place in the army. Even better is the original story, which is only 300-odd ancient Chinese characters. It begins like this:
Mulan was weaving. She was having trouble concentrating on her work. The previous night she had learned that her elderly father had been called to military service.
What a great beginning! Instantly you care. You could read every short story The New Yorker has published and not find a beginning as great as that. The essence of how a story should begin is so strong it reminds me of something that happened when I was a grad student. My roommates had cooked something with a lot of ginger. So that’s what ginger tastes like, I thought. I understood for the first time why ginger ale was called ginger ale.
July 17th, 2010 at 1:16 pm
Seth: I think that by “you” you mean “I” (that is, “Seth”).
July 17th, 2010 at 1:28 pm
yeah, agree with Andrew, that opening grips me not at all.
July 17th, 2010 at 2:18 pm
I’m fond of this opening paragraph from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas:
July 17th, 2010 at 5:41 pm
Andrew, I take it you don’t like Pauline Kael.
July 18th, 2010 at 3:57 am
Seth, the original story that you link to does not begin with
“Mulan was weaving. She was having trouble concentrating on her work. The previous night she had learned that her elderly father had been called to military service.”
Where did you get that phrase? The poem that you link to begins
“Ji-ji, again ji-ji,
Mulan faces the door, weaving.
You can’t hear the sound of the loom’s shuttle,
You only hear Daughter’s sighs.
They ask Daughter who’s in her thought,
They ask Daughter who’s on her memory.
“No one is on Daughter’s thought,
No one is on Daughter’s memory.”
Which beginning are describing as the fantastic beginning?
Which beginning are the other responders reading or responding to ?
July 18th, 2010 at 3:58 am
Which beginning are *you describing as the fantastic beginning?
July 18th, 2010 at 12:16 pm
Mike, I was summing up the beginning to emphasize the important elements. They don’t depend on the exact words.
July 18th, 2010 at 1:36 pm
Seth: As a statistician I prefer precision. I try to use “I” when I mean “I” and “you” when I mean “you.” I don’t always succeed, but I try. If you read your very own blog above, I think you might agree with me that the parts that are strongest are the “I” sentences and the parts that are the weakest are the “you” statements. The statement about “every short story The New Yorker has published” seems a bit silly to me too. I understand that you’re engaging in hyperbole, but it still seems silly.
July 18th, 2010 at 4:08 pm
Andrew, Pauline Kael wrote like this: using “you” to describe visceral reactions (“you can’t look away”). She had a reason for writing this way, and so do I: because I am trying to say that I believe others will have similar reactions. To use “I” would not convey this. In other words I didn’t mean exactly “I” so I didn’t use “I”. My comment about New Yorker stories was meant to say that among the several hundred New Yorker stories I’ve read, I can’t think of even one whose opening had even close to the same effect. Maybe I should have put like that, you might be right.