The Novel as a Museum Exhibit

Ishmael Reed's Ragtime has an unusual variety of footnotes, images, definitions, citations, newspaper clippings, and other such non-narrative bits thrown in with the somewhat jumbled story. This certainly throws some readers off, and some may find this format to be objectionable, but I actually like the way Reed tells the story. It seems almost like an exhibit at a history museum, where artifacts are displayed next to descriptions of the world they were part of and there is an occasional helpful little placard explaining what the heck some of these things are.

I can think of a few other novels that could be construed as having this layout. One is 2312 by Kim Stanley Robinson, which takes advantage of its miscellaneous extra documents to explain some of the technologies and cultural norms present in its science-fiction setting (such as a section from a do-it-yourself book on how to colonize an asteroid).

The other novel, which many more of you have likely heard of, is The Hithchiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. This one is somewhat more structured in its use of extra documentation than 2312, but still: every once in awhile, we get a break from the usual adventures so we can read a section of the eponymous encyclopedia that tells us the wonders of towels, dolphins, mice, the Infinite Improbability Drive, species that are mostly harmless, and Pan-Galactic Gargleblasters.

I happen to like the story + supporting documents approach enough that I've considered using it for one of my own long-term writing projects.

And when I say long-term, I mean long-term.

In sixth grade or so I created a set of characters who I just kept on thinking up stories for (Note "thinking up," not "writing." There are very few finished stories). Thing is, as I got older, my writing style and writing tastes changed, and I kept reimagining not only plotlines but also the themes and setting these characters existed in. If you placed the original characters in a room with their more recent incarnations, they wouldn't recognize each other. Or be able to breathe the same atmosphere, for that matter.

Here's the short explanation of the premise: The current rendition (unfinished, as always) features two sentient alien species living in a major political mess on a large moon orbiting a gas giant in a distant solar system. Then one day, a human spaceship discovers their civilization, and the political mess just gets worse. Some characters are trying to use humanity's new diplomatic influence to bring peace to the moon. Others are trying to use humanity's superior technology to bring peace in an entirely different way. And of course, humanity is busy with its own war against a fourth sentient species, and would greatly appreciate any help from its new acquaintances.

Anyway, since I prefer to write in the first person, the problem is: who do I use as a narrator?

The original alien character who's stuck with the story for six years?
The human journalist?
Or one of the other characters involved?

The answer is Yes.

It's potentially confusing (Mumbo Jumbo certainly is), but ideally I'd throw in a couple of historical documents and narrator's notes into the story. The original alien character would be primary narrator; after all, he's sort of the center of attention. The journalist can be passed off as the document's translator, adding her own notes to explain certain aspects of alien society and even filling in accounts of events she was present at but the alien character wasn't. And to give human readers the full story, she'll include a number of historical documents from the time.

Gimmicky? Sort of. But does it accomplish what I'm looking for? Yes.

That's probably similar to what went through Ishmael Reed's head when he was deciding what "extras" to add into Mumbo Jumbo.*


*which, I must point out, I have found to be far less confusing than Mr. Mitchell's warnings suggested it would be.