Monday, April 29, 2013

The fifth wall

I think there is a fifth wall in literature.  The fourth wall (that which separates the audience from the action on the stage or screen) doesn't exist in literature because of the narrative string; the author talks to the reader through the narrative line.

The fifth wall in literature is the one that veils the missing fourth wall, as if the author and reader agree to not acknowledge the missing fourth wall by maintaining a one-sided relationship throughout the narrative--the reader is obligated to accept that the fourth wall has been lowered for the sake of the narrative string.

In Drinking at the Movies, Julia Wertz simultaneously creates a fifth wall and breaks it. There are a lot of moments in the book when the narration or the dialogue seems very much pointed at the reader in a casual way (the flimsy fourth wall).  But on page 162, Wertz literally comes out of the frame to speak to the reader. Wertz sets this up in the first frame by not including anything else in the frame except her body, taking her out of the context of any action or scene and putting her on my lap.  I knew immediately, "Oh, she is talking to me.  Not narrating or glancing my way, Wertz is talking to me."

The narrative line: As a white, middle-class American, I carry around a lot of guilt.  Looking at me, Wertz says, "Well, I could note that I grew up on welfare and I'm pretty poor right now, but that would just seem like a lame attempt to evoke pity and make me look cool."

Then in a small frame bridging the two main frames on the top row, Wertz puts her hand on the frame, breaking the fifth wall that is supposed to veil the reader / narrator relationship, and leans forward to say, "Did it work?"

Then the third frame (also without context of action or scene), the narrative line resumes (Luckily, the American infrastructure is designed with plenty of rationalizations…) and Wertz responds (with bored eyes), "What, It's not like I could pick where I was born. Besides, I dutifully spend 3.5 seconds feeling bad for third world countries before spending an hour trying to figure out who did or didn't get botox this year, thank you very much!"

The second and third rows of frames resume the action and scene context by including background (her apartment, a store). But in the third row, she breaks the fifth wall again by answering to the reader (with her hand on the frame), a question asked by her bottle of booze, "You mean your lonely, low-income, basement-dwelling life?" "That's the one!", Wertz replies.

This page (162) is the only time when Wertz drew herself without any background (top row frames) and the only time that she came out of the frame, breaking the fifth wall, to speak directly, without guise of the narrator incognito, to the reader.  This is also the last page of the chapter before the final chapter and I believe is the mechanism that sets up the conclusion as a "take-home message".  Wertz has let me in, she's talking to me, so that the last chapter feels more conversational and directed.  As if I'm no longer a voyeur reading about Wertz' life but am now a confidant being told about it.

2 comments:

  1. okay, i'll buy that. it's a lovely idea and you make it work
    e

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  2. Hi Darin! I just met with the rest of tomorrow's presentation group and we talked about breaking the fourth wall, too. It's interesting that Wertz speaks directly to the reader. I've been thinking about this in terms of intimacy. One interviewer points out that her simple style, and the sketchbook-style heading at the top of the page lend a sense of intimacy. I think both factors work to give an impression that we as readers are just casually hanging out with Julia Wertz; it's like she makes us her drinking buddies. In fact, I found myself concerned with her drinking, just as I would be with an actual drinking buddy.

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