Vassar College Digital Window @ Vassar Senior Capstone Projects 2014 How to Make it Rain: A Practical Analysis of Storytelling Forms Mira Singer Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalwindow.vassar.edu/senior_capstone Recommended Citation Singer, Mira, "How to Make it Rain: A Practical Analysis of Storytelling Forms" (2014). Senior Capstone Projects. Paper 354. This Open Access is brought to you for free and open access by Digital Window @ Vassar. It has been accepted for inclusion in Senior Capstone Projects by an authorized administrator of Digital Window @ Vassar. For more information, please contact [email protected]. How to Make it Rain 1 How to Make it Rain A Practical Analysis of Storytelling Forms Mira Singer Independent Program May 2014 Senior Thesis Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Bachelor of Arts degree in the Independent Program. ___________________________________________ Adviser, Nancy Bisaha _________________________________________ Adviser, Don Foster How to Make it Rain 2 Abstract The following is an experiment in practical analysis of storytelling media. The project seeks to explore what insights can be gained about media specificity and adaptation theory through the process of constructing a story and adapting it into background notes, a short story, a one-act play, and a comic book. A meta paper analyzes the constraints and opportunities afforded by each media as observed through the process of creation and adaptation. The historical notes will go last before the paper to facilitate more surprise in the reading experience. There are endnotes classified into H/N (historical note), A/N (author’s note), P/S (primary source), ED/N (editing notes), AD/N (adaptation note), as well as notation marking notes to do with form (F), observations (O), and revelations (R). These notes mean to comment upon the process of adaptation, delineate the connections to historical sources, and provide a window into the process of creation and revision. How to Make it Rain 3 Table of Contents 1) Title Page 2) Abstract 3) Table of Contents 4) Acknowledgements 5) Short Story 6) One Act Play 7) Comic Book 8) Meta Paper 9) Background Notes 10) Bibliography 11) Endnotes How to Make it Rain 4 Acknowledgements This project would not have happened without the constant support, brilliant insights, astounding patience, good humor, and friendship of my writing consultant thesis buddy, Mari Henie. She’s the reason the project met deadlines, and she helped me through the entire process from the most frustrating moments to the greatest revelations to the moments of ridiculous humor. Plus lovely weekly tea parties. I can’t thank her enough. Invaluable feedback and support was provided along the way by my advisors, Professor Nancy Bisaha and Professor Don Foster, as well by Director of the Writing Center Matt Schultz, Martha Minow, Joe Singer, Sarah Holden, Grace Terdoslavich, Vex Batchelder, Emily Kottler, Zach Boylan, Dorian Oberstein, Ian Claflin, Professor M. Mark, Gretchen Lieb, Anne Rayman, Bob Singer, and Sophia Della Bitta. Thank you all. I greatly appreciate your help, whether it be for writing amusing and helpful comments in the margins, participating in brainstorming sessions to develop new mythologies, pointing out historical inaccuracies, or participating in a cold reading of a draft of the play. This project would not have happened without you. Special thanks also goes to computer wizard Grace Terdoslavich, who on the spot wrote a brilliant computer program to alphabetize my rather ridiculous bibliography. Another special thanks goes to Julia Vrtilek, who jumped in at the last minute to proofread the comic book (Photoshop needs to work on getting spell check…). And thank you to everyone else who provided support, encouragement, advice, and excitement throughout this project—you know who you are. And thank you to every stranger who performed a random act of kindness to help in any way during that last tense week of work. You all helped make this happen as well. How to Make it Rain 5 HOW TO MAKE IT RAIN An Out of the Way Station Short Story Mira Singer Eyes wide as the sky, Alysan searched for sympathy her family’s eyes, but met only a circle of stony glares. Something like indignation seethed in her stomach, and tears pricked her eyes. Clouds gathered. Her control slipping, she knew she must leave before she committed a worse breach of etiquette. Feeling raindrops, she ran from the sacred grove to the seashore. When her toe touched the brine, she leapt into the air. Black hair turned to crow feathers, arms to wings. Up she soared into the stormy sky. Rain buffeted her, streamed from her feathers and eyes. The truth hit her like the rain: no matter how far she flew, she was as trapped as those she’d tried to free.i A door appeared in the sky.ii She had to bank quickly to avoid crashing into it. She circled. She’d wished for a way out, but hadn’t expected an answer. To whom do deities pray? But if this door could send her away… anywhere was better than the hopelessness of here. She turned herself back into human form. Hovering before the door, she turned the doorknob.iii ☔ Jill painted a final dab of nail polish on the fingernail of the woman sitting across the manicure counter. “There you go,” Jill pronounced, stoppering the bottle. “All finished.” How to Make it Rain 6 “That is extraordinary,” said the woman, turning her hands to admire the concentric circles of red white and blue on each nail.iv The bright polish jumped out against skin the color of old linen, and easily outshone the faded shades of her bonnet, her black velvet headband,v and her shabby dress. “Careful; they’re still wet,” cautioned Jill. A rosy-cheeked teenager in a flowery pink and yellow dress with more ruffles than a bag of potato chips, she was a burst of color beside the older woman. “You can dry them under the lamp next to Izzy.” She gestured toward a woman seated at the end of a row of chairs by a wall, a pile of books and a packet of letters beside her. “Izzy” stiffened, fingers tensing on the book she’d been reading. With her finely tailored gown and veil, both of expensive black fabric, and the book covering her face, she might have blended with the shadows, had there been any. As it was, she stood out starkly against the delicate pink wallpaper.vi Still, she was doing her best to vanish in place—her discomfort read clearly in her book-spine posture and in the way her feet curled beneath the chair as if she was trying to touch as little of the room as possible. “ ‘Signoravii Isabetta Valiero,’viii please,” she corrected without looking up. “Or ‘Isabetta,’ if you insist on using Christian names.”ix “I haven’t gotx a Christian name,” said the other woman cheekily. She took the seat by Isabetta to dry her nails below the purple lamp, adjusting her patched skirts. “My namesake did take the name ‘Esther’ to hide that she was Jewish… Still, the Persians weren’t Christian, and neither am I.” She shot a challenging look at Isabetta, who buried her face deeper in her book. “And I don’t recognize titles,xi your nobleness. I stand with de Gouge, who said, ‘I believe true nobles to be those who never abandon reason, nature or the social good’—instead of those born into ‘the presumptuousness of a usurped power.’xii” How to Make it Rain 7 “It is you who presume, in judging me,” said Isabetta, glaring over her book with bespectacledxiii eyes set in a cloistered-pale face. “Only the Lord may judge, and you, I fear, have more to fear from Him than I,” she added matter-of-factly. “Good thing we Jews don’t believe in Hell,xiv then,” said Esther cheerfully. “But I do believe in the people’s duty to throw off the yoke of tyrannical hierarchies.xv You’re no better than I am.” Isabetta raised an eyebrow, looking unsure whether to be offended or intrigued. “Now, now,” chided Jill, straightening with a basin of hot water, “this is a neutral space. Everyone is respected as equals here.” She set the basin in front of Esther. “Here, hon. While your nails dry, let’s soak those weary revolutionary feet, hm?” “Thanks,” said Esther, letting out a contented sigh as her feet sank into the hot water. “Ooh, that feels nice.” “You sure you won’t try, Isabetta?” asked Jill. Isabetta eyed the bowl distastefully. “No thank you. Ornamentation is viewed as vain, and I am suspect enough.” “Then why are you still hanging around a beauty salon?” Esther asked. “Intellectual curiosity,” said Isabetta drily. Esther eyed her to see if she was mocking, then leaned her head against the wall, closing her eyes. Jill hummed the Doctor Whoxvi theme as she washed Esther’s feet. She heard a plink, and broke off, listening: a drizzle had started outside. “That’s weird…” said Jill, frowning at the window. “Doesn’t it rain here?” asked Esther sleepily. How to Make it Rain 8 “Never,” said Jill, shaking her head, strawberry blond corkscrew pigtails swinging. “Something’s up.” The rain turned from a drizzle to a patter to a downpour, until sheets of water rolled down the windows. Esther opened her eyes and Isabetta looked up from her book. Jill left Esther’s feet to soak, picked up a towel, and waited. When the rain streamed so thickly the entire parlor seemed underwater, one of two front doors blew open, letting in storm winds and a plump brown-skinned woman.xvii The door blew shut behind her, cutting off the winds.