# What new gimmicks have been invented in writing in the last 100 years **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 12, 2002, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968 "2002-10-12T16:05:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Fern\_Forest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/71c47a/32.png) [@Fern\_Forest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fern_Forest)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2002, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968/21 "2002-10-14T00:30:24Z")
I see your Baron Munchhausen and raise you a _Moll Flanders_ 1722. Although it’s not really as blatant. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2002, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968/22 "2002-10-14T00:35:44Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Hunsecker \* > **And the extensive use of typography to add emotion in Mark Danielewski’s _House of Leaves_** The use of typrography was quite innovative in _Tristam Shandy_, by Lawrence Sterne, published between 1759 and 1767. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2002, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968/23 "2002-10-14T01:05:40Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by grendel72 \* > …The unreliable narrator (eg. Fried Green Tomatoes, Lolita) was first used in the 20th century I believe… According to my English Lit teacher, it was first used in _The Great Gatsby_. ---
**Author:** ![capacitor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e47774/32.png) [@capacitor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/capacitor)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2002, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968/24 "2002-10-14T04:09:50Z")
Forgot the most important thing of all: the development of the anti-hero in mainstream lit. There were some folk tales based on less than heroic characters and outright scoundrels, such as Stag-O-Lee and Tom Dula (Dooley). But it didn’t become vogue until the tales of Jesse James reached the East. Then stories of others such as Bonnie and Clyde, Billy the Kid and Butch Cassidy apture the American imagination. Al Capone and other gangsters served as the Wild Urban East anti-heroes. Soon even the law-abiding admit to certain flaws. We see influence in shows today such as _Firefly_. ---
**Author:** ![capacitor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e47774/32.png) [@capacitor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/capacitor)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2002, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968/25 "2002-10-14T04:11:09Z")
apture= **captured** ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2002, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968/26 "2002-10-14T05:25:19Z")
> [@](#): > > Forgot the most important thing of all: the development of the anti-hero in mainstream lit. I take it you’ve never seen Shakespeare’s Scottish play? Let me assure you, MacBeth is far from heroic. And **DrFidelius** , it’s indisputable that comic books/graphic novels are literature. Whether they’re good literature is admittedly debateable. How about the solvable mystery? Poe’s _The Murders on the Rue Morgue_ is generally credited as being the first mystery story, but there, the reader isn’t presented with the essential clues until the final denoument. What was the first mystery where sufficient clues were presented in the body of the work? If you want to push it up even further, mysteries where the unveiling is set off in some way (blank page between, mirror writing, etc.), so as to give the reader a specific point at which to figure it out. Another gimmick which I suspect is new: Interactive stories, a la _Choose Your Own Adventure_. ---
**Author:** ![Katisha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bcef8e/32.png) [@Katisha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Katisha)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2002, 5:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968/27 "2002-10-14T05:40:36Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Chronos \* > \*\*I take it you’ve never seen Shakespeare’s Scottish play? Let me assure you, MacBeth is far from heroic. > \*\* I’ll see your Macbeth and raise you a Richard III! And isn’t conversational tone, as mentioned by **gex gex** , a trademark of Mark Twain? ---
**Author:** ![Humble\_Servant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/47e85d/32.png) [@Humble\_Servant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Humble_Servant)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2002, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968/28 "2002-10-14T14:30:22Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Little Nemo \* > \*\*I’m pretty sure the author’s publicity circuit on TV morning shows is less than a hundred years old. \*\* Reading tours by authors were very popular in the 1800s. I’m thinking of a tour of American literary societies (often women’s clubs) that I know Dickens did in the 1880s, from which he made big money. He wrote an account that was quite critical of the experience. These touring authors were quite the celebrities, and travelled feverishly from town to town. There’s nothing new under the sun (except maybe for the videotape;)). ---
**Author:** ![Kaitlyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/73ab20/32.png) [@Kaitlyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaitlyn)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2002, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968/29 "2002-10-14T15:06:19Z")
\*\*You have the jigsaw puzzle effect from Pulp Fiction \*\* This was done earlier in The Killing. \*\*You have the backwards time from Memento \*\* Betrayal **You have alternate history from Run Lola Run** Last Year At Marienbad The children’s novel existed before 100 years ago, but almost exclusively as a didactic device designed to teach children proper manners and behavior. The novel written primarily or exclusively for children’s entertainment is a form that was very rare until the 20th century. ---
**Author:** ![FallenAngel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@FallenAngel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FallenAngel)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2002, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968/30 "2002-10-14T19:22:09Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Chronos \* > \*\*How about the solvable mystery? Poe’s _The Murders on the Rue Morgue_ is generally credited as being the first mystery story, but there, the reader isn’t presented with the essential clues until the final denoument. What was the first mystery where sufficient clues were presented in the body of the work? > \*\* I may well be remembering incorrectly, as it’s been a whole lot of years since I studied Poe in HS lit., but wasn’t it “The Purloined Letter” that gets “first mystery story” credit? ---
**Author:** ![gex\_gex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/94ad74/32.png) [@gex\_gex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gex_gex)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2002, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968/31 "2002-10-15T13:46:34Z")
> [@](#): > > _originally posted by Number Six_ > The children’s novel existed before 100 years ago, but almost exclusively as a didactic device designed to teach children proper manners and behavior. The novel written primarily or exclusively for children’s entertainment is a form that was very rare until the 20th century. **Alice in Wonderland**? ---
**Author:** ![OxyMoron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/e9a140/32.png) [@OxyMoron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OxyMoron)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2002, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968/32 "2002-10-15T14:43:56Z")
Indeed, Gex, but that’s about it, and explains part of the book’s enduring appeal: when it arrived it was pretty much sui generis. Books for young readers’ _enjoyment_ are much more of a 20th-century innovation. [Ursula Nordstrom](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0064462358/ref%3Dcm%5Fbg%5Fd/002-2754896-1412820), director/force of nature of Harper Bros’ children’s department from 1940 into the 70s, deserves much credit for recognizing that preachy just wasn’t good enough: her mission was to publish “good books for bad children.” That helped give us _Goodnight, Moon_; _Where the Wild Things Are_ (she discovered Sendak, who was a 22-year-old window-dresser at FAO Schwartz); _The Runaway Bunny_; \*Charlotte’s Web; \* and _Harriet the Spy_. ---
**Author:** ![Kaitlyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/73ab20/32.png) [@Kaitlyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaitlyn)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2002, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968/33 "2002-10-15T14:47:26Z")
Alice isn’t a novel in the strictest sense of the word in that it’s a series of loosely connected vignettes and doesn’t contain a central story arc. It is, however one of the prominent examples of children’s literature written specifically for children’s entertainment rather than moral education previous to the 20th century. And before anyone starts naming others (eg Tom Sawyer or The Secret Garden), I am aware that there were children’s novels before the 20th century, hence my reference to such books being “very rare”. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-new-gimmicks-have-been-invented-in-writing-in-the-last-100-years/131968.md?page=1)