Do sad endings have more impact than happy ones?Perhaps fairy tales have something to do with it, but most of us are not that trusting of happy endings. Sad and tragic endings tend to have more impact on readers: on their emotions, giving them food for thought, keeping them awake at night.
Would the Titanic be as interesting a movie if Jack had survived? Why is it that people are more fascinated by Macbeth and Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet rather than, say, Twelfth Night?
Even though we of the Biggles fanfic squad like to see our heroes happy and settled, isn't it more fun to see them get lost in the jungle, almost blown up by Erich, or trying to save a kidnapped wife? (Come on now...be honest...).
Well, judging by the effect that Marie has on some members of Biggles groups, after only one appearance in a WWI short story until nearly the end of the Biggles books (and she didn't say or do all that much in Looks Back) I'd say, yes, sad endings have a lot of impact.
ReplyDeleteHow many people are fascinated by Richard III? I bet Henry VII doesn't have a society all to himself... And look at the death of Scott in Antarctica, and Mallory and Irvine's death on Everest.
Tragedy has the power to grip the imagination in a way that happy endings don't. One reason might be that tragedy opens up endless possibilities for speculation as to how the tragedy might have been averted, thus continuing the story beyond its end, whereas a happy ending brings a story to an end.
As usual SA has about said it all, so I'm not going to say more on that - except Well, since you brought up Kidnapped wives - An exciting ride on a roller-coaster so to speak is great and does have an ompact, but it's always better to arrive in one piece at the end.
ReplyDeleteSA cannot possibly, even remotely have "about said it all"... !!!!!! Come on, someone will surely disagree with me **evil grin**
ReplyDeleteSA, perhaps I should have said that you've said more or less what I would have said but put more succinctly. i guess I was being too lazy to articulate. But you were right. Sad endings do tend to lead to a lot more reflection than happy endings. Of course, if we are referring to a certain ongoing saga on this blog then I would say that it's already had an impact. I really don't want to analyse what a sad ending would mean in this case. in fact, I don't even want to think about it!
ReplyDeleteUp til a few years ago, it was happy endings, hands down!
ReplyDeleteBut now I can see a lot more of the beauty and bitter-sweetness of a sad ending, and I'll often find myself thinking about the sadder ending for a lot longer than I would a happy ending. SA, you summed it up brilliantly :)
But that's just me. Don't get me wrong, I love a happy ending when everything works out perfectly, but I also like the endings when not quite everything works. Like when the over all ending is happy, but there is still a sad element to it.
Has anyone seen the movie "The Flemish Farm?" Sort of like that -- someone had to die to get the end result, but the final scene still left me smiling for ages afterwards. (Incidentally it was actually a movie filmed as a morale booster in the Second World War)
Or, there are those endings like the movie "Inception" when it cuts a split second before the crucial part!!
I've found that there is a current trend, especially in epic fantasy sagas (*ahem* Harry Potter), where readers expect to see one of the characters die in the last book, and in fact have come to expect that it will be one of the main characters, or one of the major side characters. Sirius' death, for example, must broken millions of teenagers' hearts, as did the death of Dumbledore. It also brought a sense of anticipation to the next book--who's going to die next?--and a sense of mortality to the character.
ReplyDeleteI myself often worry about writing tales with too overly happy an ending. Fanfics are different of course, because the readers more or less expect to see the characters come out in one piece.
And yes, SA appears to have said it all for all of us, as always :)
In that case, it's easy to sort ONE saga out. Sacrifice Jane!
ReplyDeleteI'm not so sure that she wants to be sacrificed...I will do my best, though.
ReplyDelete