I do like the pithy summaries of the Bard's plays by the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust (shakespeare.org.uk)
Here's a few favourites...
A Midsummer Night's Dream: "People get lost in the woods. Puck manipulates their romantic affections and (in one case) anatomical head shape. They put on a play."
Twelth Night: "Viola thinks her brother is dead. He thinks she is dead. Everybody thinks that she is her brother. Everybody thinks that her brother is her. Shenanigans ensue."
King Lear: "King divides kingdom snubs daughter, goes mad. There's a storm and everyone dies."
Troilus and Cressida: "Troilus loves Cressida, but she betrays him. Achilles loves Patroclis, but he is killed. The Trojan War goes on. No one is happy."
The Merry Wives of Windsor: "Falstaff tries to pursue two married women. The women are smart; they put him in a river, dress him as a woman, and bring him to a haunted forest. Everyone is happy."
As You Like It: "All brothers hate each other for some reason. Rosalind dresses up as a boy and convinces her crush to hit on her while she's a boy. Everyone is married by a Greek God."
Henry VIII: "Cardinal Wolsey is shifty. Henry divorces Katherine and marries Anne. Queen Elizabeth is the most extraordinary being ever to be been, praise her."
What are the pulp archetypes? Pulp novels are usually written quickly and rely on a formula, but do they use different archetypal characters to other fiction?
Let's take a look at a few...
The Outlaw is a classic pulp archetype: from Dick Turpin onwards lawbreakers have been a staple of the genre. Crime never pays, but it's exciting and trangressive!
Some pulp outlaws however are principled...
As Bob Dylan sang "to live outside the law you must be honest." Michel Gourdon's 1915 hero Dr Christopher Syn is a good example. A clergyman turned pirate and smuggler, he starts as a revenger but becomes the moral magistrate of the smuggling gangs of Romney Marsh.
Given the current heatwave, I feel obliged to ask my favourite question: is it time to bring back the leisure suit?
Let's find out...
Now we all know what a man's lounge suit is, but if we're honest it can be a bit... stuffy. Formal. Businesslike. Not what you'd wear 'in da club' as the young folks say.
So for many years tailors have been experimenting with less formal, but still upmarket gents attire. The sort of garb you could wear for both a high level business meeting AND for listening to the Moody Blues in an espresso bar. Something versatile.
Today in pulp I look back at the publishing phenomenon of gamebooks: novels in which YOU are the hero!
A pencil and dice may be required for this thread...
Gamebooks are a simple but addictive concept: you control the narrative. At the end of each section of the story you are offered a choice of outcomes, and based on that you turn to the page indicated to see what happens next.
Gamebook plots are in fact complicated decision tree maps: one or more branches end in success, but many more end in failure! It's down to you to decide which path to tread.