Pathos (Persuasion, Pt. 3)

This is part 3 of my blog series about the art of persuasion. You can find part 1 here and part 2 here.

‘Whether you’re a power player who wears a weighty crown, or some poor soul with barely a pebble to his name… Nobody can escape death. But if you live your life so that when it comes, you’re satisfied, even if it’s not the end you were hoping for, you’ll have no reason to fear death.’

Megalo Box

Over the last two blog posts, we have journeyed through the ethos and logos of fictional storytelling. A story is only as good as the writer who crafts it and the logic that flows through it. Aristotle put great emphasis on both of these attributes, recognizing the power of status and reason in his work Rhetoric. Nevertheless, there is one final attribute that is every bit as important as ethos and logos. What is missing from the current equation is the very recipient of the speech, or in our case the viewer of the fiction presented! An audience serves as the ultimate judge of what is shown, and their pathos is at the core of it. Pathos is an appeal to emotion that puts the audience into a frame of mind. The creation of an ideal and potent pathos allows for any writer to gain full sway over the heart of their viewers, which greatly adds to the power of their work.

If the audience esteems a given quality, we must say that our hero has that quality, no matter whether we are addressing Scythians or Spartans or philosophers. Everything, in fact, that is esteemed we are to represent as noble.

Aristotle, The Art of Rhetoric

All of this is much easier said than done. You see, every person is different and is therefore difficult to reach in a coherent manner. Shared experiences are not universal, perception is not always reality, and clever speech can fall on deaf ears. So how does a writer of fiction overcome these obstacles and reach a transcendent pathos? Firstly, they have to admit that they cannot achieve universality. Not everyone will enjoy a certain story, no matter its quality. After conceding this point, it’s possible to move forward in a targeted approach. Aristotle recommends tailoring a speech for a certain audience, which is true even thousands of years later. A modern speechwriter typically has a target audience, even if they are writing for the president of the United States! Likewise, a fictional writer has to determine a specific audience even before they start their creative process. Specificity is the only way forward.

This being assumed, it follows that your friend is the sort of man who shares your pleasure in what is good and your pain in what is unpleasant, for your sake and for no other reason.

Aristotle, The Art of Rhetoric

Once the target audience has been sighted in, a writer has to select one of the seven basic emotional plots highlighted by Christopher Booker in his work by the same name. Broadly speaking, the plots are defined as follows: overcoming the monster, rags to riches, the quest, voyage and return, comedy, tragedy, and rebirth. While there many genres and sub-genres that complicate fictional categorization, the simple fact is that they all contain at least one of these plot threads. While this might appear to distill a plot down to its basic elements and miss the heart of the story, some sort of antagonistic force has to exist to define a protagonist. Characters and their predicaments within a well-established world are what truly sets a story apart, bringing us back to pathos. Aristotle highlights the nature of friendship, which is as close to a universality found within fiction and the emotional audience beyond. Motives become emotive.

The ambitious man does wrong for the sake of honour, the quick-tempered from anger, the lover of victory for the sake of victory, the embittered man for the sake of revenge, the stupid man because he has misguided notions of right and wrong, the shameless man because he does not mind what people think of him; and so with the rest—any wrong that any one does to others corresponds to his particular faults of character.

Aristotle, The Art of Rhetoric

If you think that all of this is beginning to sound scientific to you and not particularly new, then you are not wrong! Myths and stories are told time and time again, except with different casts and backgrounds each time they reappear. Universal truths and facts are foundational, so much so that men like Joseph Campbell discovered a monomyth across all time and space within humanity. Iteration is a natural state, bringing with it new colors and flavorings concocted by writers standing on the shoulders of their predecessors. 

The magic, however, comes into play when they make the audience think that their work is fresh! The television show Megalo Box is a great example of this, featuring a young and upcoming boxer by the name of Joe working his way up through the rankings to make a name for himself. Like any good boxing story, it is far from original, but the show contains a glamour and edge to it rarely found. In many ways, Joe is a blank slate meant to create a pathos for the viewing audience to insert themselves into and relate to his multitude of trials. Time and time again he literally picks himself up and keeps on fighting in the boxing ring.

So there you have it, the trio of elements within rhetoric! As Aristotle has made abundantly clear, rhetoric is not smoke and mirrors. Ethos, logos, and pathos are all necessary aspects of persuasion and cannot successfully exist without the others. Everything has a place in a purpose, especially in the art of fiction. The next time you’re enjoying the story, try to assess its rhetoric. Why is it compelling? Why is it convincing? Why is it cognitive? If the story is truly excellent, then you’ll have a hard time parsing out three aspects because the synergy is so strong!

Logos (Persuasion, Pt. 2)

This is part 2 of my blog series about the art of persuasion. You can find part 1 here.

‘My mother told me I’d grow up to be a good man. ‘Artyom’, she said. ‘My light’. And I believed her. When I spared a life, I believed her. And then when I kill, believed her. It was a lie. These things I have done. My hands are blackened with blood. My soul is damned to purgatory. If I could have my time again, I would, and then maybe I could become a good man.’

Metro 2033

Ethos. Logos. Pathos. As discussed last time, these three aspects of rhetoric serve to persuade the listener. If ethos is the exaltation of character and pathos is the exploration of the heart, then logos is the expectation of the mind. We derive our word logic from logos, indicating that reasoning is a core aspect of it. In his book Rhetoric, Aristotle discusses some of the basic components of logical rhetorical persuasion, namely enthymemes (an argument in which one premise is not explicitly stated) and syllogisms (a form of deductive reasoning where you arrive at a specific conclusion). While these are weighty subjects, it is critical to note that both enthymemes and syllogisms rely on some form of truthful evidence shared with the audience.

These details carry conviction: the audience take the truth of what they know as so much evidence for the truth of what they do not.

Aristotle, The Art of Rhetoric

There is, however, a big catch to rhetorical logos: it relies on truths that may or may not be seen. A public speaker can’t have every member of their audience see every truth they believe in, let alone present every bit of forensic evidence under the sun to them. Even a long criminal investigation and the ensuing court case cannot comprehensively construct a perfect reenactment for bored jurors. The mind must fill in the blanks whenever possible and be taught truths previously unknowable! All of these same principles apply to writers of fiction as well as their audience. Logic takes leaps, and every viewer must take the leap with the writer’s plot or be left behind. Only details and the narrative that accompanies them can serve as the bridge between the leaps and bounds found in logic. Aristotle advocates helping the audience to the conclusion that they can feel but cannot see, which helps harmonize expectation with reality.

This aptness of language is one thing that makes people believe in the truth of your story: their minds draw the false conclusion that you are to be trusted from the fact that others behave as you do when things are as you describe them; and therefore they take your story to be true, whether it is so or not.

Aristotle, The Art of Rhetoric

Logos, of course, does not exist in a vacuum. A writer cannot merely subsist on logic when fundamentals and emotion are also at play. Unity of the three is required, especially in fictional writing. The aptness of language brings about this unity, convincing the viewer of the false fictional reality you lay before them. A good example of this would be the Metro series. Metro is a video game trilogy based upon the novels of Dmitry Glukhovsky and features a dystopic world that has been forced down into metropolitan transit systems to survive the post-World War III nuclear winter. In this post-apocalyptic scenario, players control a hero by the name of Artyom who lives in the Moscow Metro. The first two games establish the world-building ethos of the narrative, featuring a distinct pathos of survival that deals with never-ending existentialism. It’s a troubled man navigating a brutal world.

And that’s where the logos of the third game comes into play. Metro Exodus details Artyom’s exit from Moscow in the search for new land to live in, bringing the story to a close in a dramatic way. Instead of investigating abandoned Metro rail lines, the cast of characters is on board a train journeying to real freedom. Everything in the third game expands upon its predecessors in a natural and logical way: gameplay, plot progression, and even the sound and visuals open up to reveal new aspects of the world. Unlike many video games, nothing is either forced or irrational. Artyom’s mission is clear and straightforward, yet full of twists and turns across an entire year of travel. The suspension of disbelief is held perfectly the entire time, leading to a gripping journey across all of Russia to an ending that is felt before it is seen. The logos of the experience integrates perfectly between ethos and pathos.

The use of persuasive speech is to lead to decisions. (When we know a thing, and have decided about it, there is no further use in speaking about it.)

Aristotle, The Art of Rhetoric

To reiterate, all of this rhetoric leads to an ultimate persuasion rooted in the power of targeted suggestion. An audience is brought not kicking and screaming but with great and delicate care to a conclusion that they might not have arrived at themselves. The writer is a conduit for a greater story, channeling electrical emotions in a manner befitting a well-insulated power cable. But what about this audience and how do they fit into the picture? Next time, we will dive deep into the pathos of the viewer and the emotions that reside within them!

Ethos (Persuasion, Pt. 1)

This is part 1 of my blog series about the art of persuasion.

‘I have a big problem with people who start a conversation by praising someone.’

Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken!

Roughly 2,400 years ago a man by the name of Aristotle wrote a little book called the Art of Rhetoric. The study of elocution was never the same, as pretty much all writing related to persuasion thereafter springs from this book. Aristotle’s work was very much a treatise on effective persuasion, making it a must-read for any writer of speech. Lawyers, critics, politicians, and many other professions are all heavily dependent upon persuasive speech, making the basic analysis of it fundamental to their very professionalism. Likewise, any creative writer worth their salt must also fully understand rhetoric and the eponymous book that elaborates on it. But what does it mean for fiction?

While I will spend the entire blog series elaborating on the necessity of rhetoric, I will hit the high points first. You see, if a work of fiction is not persuasive it will fail to convince any viewer in question. But why does the viewer need to be convinced? As stated many times before, the suspension of disbelief is the most critical aspect of any fictional work. This is the minimum threshold that allows the viewer to embrace the story presented to them and be entertained by it. Otherwise, they simply can’t buy into the fiction being presented, let alone enjoy it on any level. The plot has to be persuasive, the characters convincing, and above all the narrative must ring true in a compelling way.

Of the modes of persuasion furnished by the spoken word there are three kinds. The first kind depends on the personal character of the speaker [ethos]; the second on putting the audience into a certain frame of mind [pathos]; the third on the proof, or apparent proof, provided by the words of the speech itself [logos]. Persuasion is achieved by the speaker’s personal character when the speech is so spoken as to make us think him credible.

Aristotle, The Art of Rhetoric

Aristotle does an excellent job of outlining the three modes of persuasion. Ethos relates to personal character and the appeal to ethics by way of credibility. This can take many forms, but a good example would be a medical doctor speaking about their field of expertise. After all, a speech about cardiovascular health is much more persuasive when given by a cardiologist! At the other end of the spectrum, we have pathos, which is an emotional appeal that creates an emotional response. This could be a friend persuading you by pulling your heartstrings. Lastly, logos is the reason behind it all: logic, facts, figures, and all the other truthful elements that when strung together can convince.

It is not true, as some writers assume in their treatises on rhetoric, that the personal goodness revealed by the speaker contributes nothing to his power of persuasion; on the contrary, his character may almost be called the most effective means of persuasion he possesses.

Aristotle, The Art of Rhetoric

Ethos is a tremendous means of persuasion for the creative writer, even outside of their work of fiction. Established writers have credibility through their past success, meaning that their new novel might have their pen name in larger text than the name of the novel itself! This is especially true for prolific writers like Stephen King, who even goes so far as to create aliases for certain novels to distance himself from his own brand recognition. Likewise, credibility can be found inside the fiction as well. A writer’s prose can make or break any narration, no matter how promising the basic material is. There is not much use for ore until it is been refined by smelting and molded into something of value.

Eizouken

Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! is a comic book turned animated TV show by Masaaki Yuasa, one of the great animation directors of our time. While somewhat fantastical in its depiction, Eizouken chronicles the ordinary lives of four high school girls seeking to become animators before graduation. Both entertaining and educational, the show narrates the highs and lows of animation: constrained budgets, daunting time crunches, stifled creativity, and the ultimate ecstasy of presenting your finished work to an audience. All four of the young women are hilariously eccentric in their own ways but profoundly united in the quest to deliver great animated stories to their high school (and beyond).

The narration should depict character; to which end you must know what makes it do so. One such thing is the indication of moral purpose; the quality of purpose indicated determines the quality of character depicted and is itself determined by the end pursued.

Aristotle, The Art of Rhetoric

An animated show about animation works far better than a fictional live-action docudrama, as Yuasa himself knows everything about the detailed processes as an industry veteran! The ethos of the show soars at every opportunity, convincing all viewers that what they are seeing is real in the truest sense. This is the real deal backed by real experiences. Every time the girls are confronted by a skeptical student council their dialogue drips with authenticity, so much so that one cannot help but conclude that Yuasa and his staff once spoke something similar to cynical animation studio business executives. Truly, there is power in the maxim that one should write about which they know!

Next time, we will tackle the logos of storytelling and its implications!