Hinting at History

[Ireth]

I have a scene in my WIP where the main villain's primary henchman, Jarl, comes across a good guy, Vidar, who had aided in the defeat of the evil Vaennherra, the predecessor to Jarl's mistress (in the "Dark Lady whom he serves" sense, not the "lover on the side" sense) some few centuries prior. The conversation goes something like this:

"I realize I haven't yet given you my name. I am Vidar Birgirsson."

Jarl's eyebrows shot up. "Not the same Vidar who defeated Vaennherra and destroyed the fortress of Langstein?"

Vidar smiled and shrugged one shoulder. "You're half right. I was not the one who destroyed Langstein, but I did have a hand in Vaennherra's fall."

Jarl will then go on to meet more characters who had also helped defeat Vaennherra, and express the same awe. This brief exchange ends up being very important as motivation for the main villain, who does not wish to die in the same way Vaennherra and his own primary henchman did. She goes so far as to search through a character's memories to find out exactly how Vaennherra was killed and by whom, so she can avoid the same fate. (Not that it'll save her in the end.)

But the real question is, is such a brief exchange enough to satisfy readers' taste for backstory? I don't want to slip into full infodump mode to explain that story -- even the memory-searching will be summarized as something like "She finally reached the man's memories of the day Vaennherra had fallen, and lingered long on them, not wanting to miss a detail that could prove deadly." Any advice on where the line is that I shouldn't cross?

 

[Feo Takahari]

This seems a little as-you-know. Maybe Jarl just asks "The Vidar?" and the narration mentions a little of what Jarl knows about him.

(There's no need to go into much detail if it won't be relevant to the present story. It could be as simple as "A man by that name had slain a tyrant, but that was a long, long time ago"--though it sounds like you'll need a little more to set up the current villain's motivation.)

 

[Penpilot]

I notice GRRM does this a lot in ASOIF. Eg Robert's rebellion and his battle at the Trident. Sometimes it's the start of a slow reveal, sometimes not. But what I think makes it work is from the character's reactions and the way an event is named should give a taste of what happened. And as you add to the reactions, hopefully, it's going to give the event a presence that sparks the reader's imagination to the point where the reader's imagination of what happened is way better than anything you can write.

You're pretty much doing that now, but I agree with Feo. Put some of that info in narrative.

 

[wordwalker]

You might emphasize the foreshadowing reaction more than the facts: who's afraid, or at least cautious, around someone like him.

 

[Ireth]

You might emphasize the foreshadowing reaction more than the facts: who's afraid, or at least cautious, around someone like him.

I'm not quite sure what you're getting at. Which "him" do you mean, Jarl or Vidar? Vidar isn't someone people have reason to be cautious around (except the villains), and nobody yet knows Jarl is evil except the one person who can kinda-sorta see through his disguise, so they won't be wary of him either.

 

[Justin Cary]

Sounds like plenty to start with. As you say, you are going to be exploring this character more fully throughout the book. I don't think a reader even wants a characters entire history right up front. In life we are content to meet people and not know every shade of their past. I think it is unnatural to expect the same in a book.

 

[Ireth]

Good point, Justin. Here's the excerpt as it is right now, in case anyone is interested:

Jarl huddled in a chair before the hearth in the common-room, a cup of mead in one hand and a hunk of brown bread in the other. He alternated between bites and sips, barely taking his eyes off the food or the fire, until the golden-haired light-elf spoke to him.

"I realize I haven't yet given you my name. I am Vidar Birgirson."

Jarl's eyebrows shot up. "The one who defeated the warlord Vaennherra, and destroyed the stronghold of Langstein?"

Vidar smiled and shrugged his right shoulder. "You're half right. I am not the one who destroyed Langstein, but I did have a hand in Vaennherra's fall. Though among ourselves we usually call him Bloðhar."

Jarl nodded, taking another bite of bread and thinking as he chewed. Bloðhar was quite a suitable name for one who had dyed his hair in the blood of his slain enemies, or so the tales told. Jarl had heard them all, of course, though they had most certainly been twisted and exaggerated over the years. Perhaps now he could hear what had really happened; Eydís would be very interested in that.

"It must have been quite the battle," he said, leaning toward Vidar in interest he didn't have to feign.

Vidar nodded, his voice soft and his expression distant. "Yes, it was."

Jarl opened his mouth to question Vidar further, but shut it quickly and turned his head at the sound of the door opening. A man walked in, running his hand through his light brown hair. His bright blue eyes met Jarl's, and he spoke with a smile.

"I heard something about a visitor. You must be Jarl. Eiríkr Hrœrekson, at your service."

Jarl's mouth fell open again. Of all the people he could have met here, this man was one of the last ones he had expected to see.

Eiríkr chuckled. "I take it you've heard of me."

"Of course," said Jarl, finding his voice. "But I never thought to see you alive. I mean, two hundred years... and you are only human!"

"Well, it hasn't been nearly so long for us." Eiríkr settled down in a chair beside Jarl's. "Less than two years at most. Time flows differently here in Faerie than anywhere else, especially the Nine Realms."

Jarl nodded, still wide-eyed. He added a measure of hero-worship to his voice when he spoke. "You're all but legend now, do you know that? They still sing songs about you."

Eiríkr's scarred face reddened a little. "Others deserve that far more than I do, I'm sure."

Vidar chuckled. "You are altogether too humble, my friend."

Eiríkr waved him off and grinned at Jarl. "Are you warm enough?"

"Yes, thank you." Jarl put the last of the bread into his mouth, his gaze flicking over to the door that Eiríkr had left open. Would he meet Björn here as well? The stories said he had a bear's strength, well befitting his name. That would be something to see.

---

The subject of the conversation changes here, so the rest of the scene is irrelevant. Does this work as far as striking a balance between narration and dialogue to get the backstory in?

 

[wordwalker]

You might emphasize the foreshadowing reaction more than the facts: who's afraid, or at least cautious, around someone like him.

I'm not quite sure what you're getting at. Which "him" do you mean, Jarl or Vidar? Vidar isn't someone people have reason to be cautious around (except the villains), and nobody yet knows Jarl is evil except the one person who can kinda-sorta see through his disguise, so they won't be wary of him either.

Hmm. Guess it would be that each time Jarl meets one of the past heroes, there are other people giving that hero a sense of respect for it in one way or another. That reminds us of that proof, and emphasizes its warning, that Evil Ain't Easy.

 

[Ireth]

Hmm. Guess it would be that each time Jarl meets one of the past heroes, there are other people giving that hero a sense of respect for it in one way or another. That reminds us of that proof, and emphasizes its warning, that Evil Ain't Easy.

Well, the thing is, a very few people in Faerie know about what Eirikr and Vidar did (defeating Vaennherra, destroying Langstein and other things), so people aren't going to be worshipping them as heroes. The most respect they'll get from their peers is that of mentors or friends.

 

[Deleted member 2173]

You might want to go deep first person on the mindreader. The fear, the disbelief.

Fear struck the breath from her chest. Can this be THE Vidar?

Something to that effect. Otherwise the dialog trends towards an infodump.

 

[Ireth]

You might want to go deep first person on the mindreader. The fear, the disbelief.

Fear struck the breath from her chest. Can this be THE Vidar?

Something to that effect. Otherwise the dialog trends towards an infodump.

Well, Jarl isn't the mind-reader; that's his mistress Eydis, the Big Bad of the story. She doesn't meet Vidar or the others until much later in the story, at which point Jarl has told her that these people are in fact THE Vidar and THE Eirikr and THE Bjorn who defeated her predecessors all those centuries ago, so there'd be no sense in her being awed or disbelieving. And the mind-reading is meant to allay her fear: "Okay, so this is how they killed Vaennherra and his henchman. Good, now I know what to expect if they should try to kill me." Unluckily for her when the climax rolls around, history does not repeat itself in exactly the same way. XD