John Leonard
I just got back from the final session of this, all in all an interesting event, but one the reading for which involved an unfortunately large number of encouters with the phrase "suspension of disbelief". I would not mind never hearing that phrase again. Here is a situation in which I might be called on to suspend my disbelief: you are trying to convince me of something which I find implausible on its face, but, you assure me, your argument, though lengthy, will eventually come to a powerful conclusion. Thus, even though I find your first steps a little shaky, I engage in argumentative epoche to see where things are going. Here is another sort of situation: you are relating to me a story about what happened and I find one of the relata implausible. However, you're a trustworthy sort and have more information, so I suspend my inclination to disbelieve you (which has only just now been activated) pending an improvement in my own epistemic situation. I have never yet, however, picked up a novel, or even listened to a recounting in real life of events actual or imagined, and had to turn off my natural inclination to disbelieve what I am told, because I do not have such an inclination.
Comments
on 2007-06-24 16:06:26.0, SEK commented:
So the next time I want to preface something you're likely to hear with "you're never going to believe this," I should stop, as it'll arouse your non-inclination to disbelief?
and, further, on 2007-06-24 16:20:37.0, ben wolfson commented:
As you can see, Mr K, I've allowed that I can find things implausible, and will do the customary thing with such, to wit, disbelieve them. If you think that I'm likely to disbelieve you, you can preface your comments with a remark such as you've mentioned, because that will at least signal to me that you know what you're going to say is implausible, and I'm more likely to suspend my disbelief (again, you'll note that I don't deny that this, too, occurs) if I know that you know what you're saying's implausible but you think it worth saying anyway.
But that sort of thing couldn't be what people mean by "suspension of disbelief" in literary contexts, because someone who didn't find certain events related in a novel implausible (say, an action is out of character, or seems irrational, or something like that) would be a bad reader. That something fishy is up in that sense is something one ought to attend to. There, though, one first feels the disbelief at some point already within the reading, and it may turn out to be justified (the action was misattributed by one character to another; the narrator was unreliable) or not (Byzantine goings-on, perhaps, and red herrings have made you misjudge what be the haps).
and, further, on 2007-06-24 16:26:01.0, ben wolfson commented:
To use an example taken from this one, I don't pick up a vampire novel and think “what the hell? there are no such things as vampires—oh right, it's a novel. Very well.” Do you have to do this? Do you even feel the slightest bit of disbelief when you start in on a novel? Disbelief of the right sort, that is.
and, further, on 2007-06-24 16:49:37.0, SEK commented:
Do you even feel the slightest bit of disbelief when you start in on a novel?
Frequently. My disbelief can only be won by a demonstration of talent. I withhold it until such a time as its investment is warranted.
and, further, on 2007-06-24 17:35:49.0, ben wolfson commented:
You're having me on.
and, further, on 2007-06-24 18:27:30.0, SEK commented:
Nope. This is one reason my taste in science fiction diverges from John, Rich and Adam Robert's: I need some semblance of realism before I dive into unreality. Adam's novels are textbook examples of how to introduce unbelievable elements into otherwise realist texts. I will say, however, that something like John Clute's Appleseed works precisely because it doesn't kowtow to the possible, i.e. because the world described is so foreign from any previously imagined, the realist strictures don't hold and I'm free to invest disbelief at my leisure. It's those that toe the realist I refuse to suspend for.
and, further, on 2007-06-25 14:01:35.0, rone commented:
Is it just me or are you having a semantic pissing match over "disbelief" versus "implausibility"?