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How a house may be alive
Apr. 28th, 2008 09:48 pmor, the substance of secondary creation
We live in the world of primary creation, and the act of primary creation is that of creating things within the world from nothing. When we create, it is through secondary creation, using things within the world to make art. And that is enough definitions to start, at least.
I have been thinking lately about how a house may or may not be said to be alive. I merely use a house as a specific example of a general principle. There are three ways in which a house may be alive. First, it may be a true primary creation that is alive in the sense that a dog or cat is alive. It may breath and grow and have a personality. Second, the house may not be alive in any way, and is really summed up by its component parts. Third, the house may be alive in the sense that it is a secondary creation, and it is this that I want to talk about.
What do I mean when I say a house may be a secondary creation? Well, it is difficult to define, but I shall try. The process of secondary creation is that of the human creator who makes up a story. The story may be written, or spoken, or only imagined, but in the story the house is alive. If, for instance, I take my house and tell myself that it has a personality, if I tell the story of its history, or name it, or all of those together, I have begun the process of secondary creation. The house is not alive in the way that my cat is alive, so it is not properly alive, but neither is it merely the sum of its parts as in the second case. The house exists in a strange state that is neither alive nor not alive.
The house is a fairly straightforward example, so now let me complicate it. What about characters in books? Frodo is not alive in the same way that you are alive, nor even does he have a past existence, he did not once live as Austen once lived. But Frodo is real in some way. He is both more and less real than a rock you may pick up from the front yard. The rock has actual physical substance, it exists as a primary creation because anyone may interact with the physical rock. You may pick it up or throw it or anything you like. But the rock lacks personality, or emotions, or any kind of growth. Frodo lacks the substance to truly exist, but it is not that he does not exist. He exists in Middle Earth.
Middle Earth exists in the imagination, but I am not prepared to say that it exists solely in the imagination. Which bring me to another question that I cannot answer. If no one ever read Lord of the Rings again, if the books were entirely forgotten all around the world, would Middle Earth continue to exist as a secondary creation?
Though I have attempted to describe secondary creation, I am afraid that I cannot really say what it is beyond saying that it is the creation of a world that is less real than our own, yet still exists.
We live in the world of primary creation, and the act of primary creation is that of creating things within the world from nothing. When we create, it is through secondary creation, using things within the world to make art. And that is enough definitions to start, at least.
I have been thinking lately about how a house may or may not be said to be alive. I merely use a house as a specific example of a general principle. There are three ways in which a house may be alive. First, it may be a true primary creation that is alive in the sense that a dog or cat is alive. It may breath and grow and have a personality. Second, the house may not be alive in any way, and is really summed up by its component parts. Third, the house may be alive in the sense that it is a secondary creation, and it is this that I want to talk about.
What do I mean when I say a house may be a secondary creation? Well, it is difficult to define, but I shall try. The process of secondary creation is that of the human creator who makes up a story. The story may be written, or spoken, or only imagined, but in the story the house is alive. If, for instance, I take my house and tell myself that it has a personality, if I tell the story of its history, or name it, or all of those together, I have begun the process of secondary creation. The house is not alive in the way that my cat is alive, so it is not properly alive, but neither is it merely the sum of its parts as in the second case. The house exists in a strange state that is neither alive nor not alive.
The house is a fairly straightforward example, so now let me complicate it. What about characters in books? Frodo is not alive in the same way that you are alive, nor even does he have a past existence, he did not once live as Austen once lived. But Frodo is real in some way. He is both more and less real than a rock you may pick up from the front yard. The rock has actual physical substance, it exists as a primary creation because anyone may interact with the physical rock. You may pick it up or throw it or anything you like. But the rock lacks personality, or emotions, or any kind of growth. Frodo lacks the substance to truly exist, but it is not that he does not exist. He exists in Middle Earth.
Middle Earth exists in the imagination, but I am not prepared to say that it exists solely in the imagination. Which bring me to another question that I cannot answer. If no one ever read Lord of the Rings again, if the books were entirely forgotten all around the world, would Middle Earth continue to exist as a secondary creation?
Though I have attempted to describe secondary creation, I am afraid that I cannot really say what it is beyond saying that it is the creation of a world that is less real than our own, yet still exists.
