You know how sometimes you see or hear something for the first time…and all of a sudden, it feels like everywhere you go, there’s that thing? Like maybe someone makes a joke about a bicorn (as opposed to a unicorn), and then you are casually re-reading bits from The Chamber of Secrets (as one does as a fortysomething) and realize that powdered bicorn horn is a Polyjuice ingredient, and then one of your kids talks about a bike horn and you get all confused/flustered?
No? Just me?
Well, anyhow, that’s how I felt when I heard someone casually talk about “The Objective Correlative” in a webinar a little while back. (I put the “The” in caps because that’s the way it was said: THE Objective Correlative.) I wrote it down in great alarm, feeling (as I often do) imposter-ish for having absolutely no idea what that was all about.
But writing it down DID something. Suddenly, it was like I saw it everywhere—but not with much context. With apologies to Sir Paul McCartney, “The Objective Correlative” was a shadow hanging over me. It was time to figure out what the heck this thing “was.”
So, here’s what I have gathered:
Despite the insistence of my un-substantiated first round of Google results, it turns out T. S. Eliot did not coin the phrase “the objective correlative.” However, he is credited with popularizing it when he defined it in his 1919 essay, Hamlet and His Problems. “The only way of expressing emotion in the form of art is by finding an 'objective correlative; in other words, a set of objects, a situation, a chain of events which shall be the formula of that 'particular' emotion; such that when the external facts, which must terminate in sensory experience, are given, the emotion is immediately evoked.” So, it’s not a particular word, plot sequence, or endowed object, but the combination of them used to skillfully create a specific earned emotion in your reader (or, in the case of a play, your audience).
The Objective Correlative is also in league with Edgar Allan Poe’s so-called “singular effect” for short-form literary works (in his estimation, those that can be read in one sitting)—which he thoroughly explains here. Though Poe specifically refers to poetry and short-story prose in his examples, I cannot help but think the same holds for picture books!
Similarly, as I read Eliot and Poe’s words, I couldn’t help but reflect that both “The Objective Correlative” and “Singular Effect” ideas play in cahoots with Susan Rich’s excellent “A Picture Book is a Machine: Or, This Machine Tells Stories.”
What’s so hard about the whole concept of the objective correlative is less, well, the concept itself—and more the execution! It’s simply not an easy balance to achieve—at least, not without purposeful thinking and writing work. After all, it’s all too easy to get heavy-handed and turn off the reader—or to be too opaque and not affect the reader at all. (When I was studying marketing in business school, we were frequently reminded that communication is when a message is received and understood, not when a message is simply sent.) So, let’s make up a writing example to puzzle through what this means.
If we are to invoke a sense of sadness over love lost, it might be tempting to start with, for example, a scene at a cemetery. Perhaps we see a man throwing a flower onto a grave with a headstone that reads, “Freida.” Don’t get me wrong—this would be sad—well, sad-ish—winking at possible sadness. But it’s not exactly an earned sadness as-is! What if Freida was the man’s great-great-grandmother, whom he never even met? What if the man never knew Freida at all—he’s actually just there to scope out recent new heirs because he’s planning on running a long con on the vulnerable? IF the goal is to create a sense of sadness in the reader, it’s not there yet. Now, imagine another scene…the man is on the phone saying, “Don’t wait up…I’m going to visit Freida.” We see him carefully primping, then fretting as he selects which flower Frieda might like best. He then gets into a beautiful black car he hired just for the occasion, and while the chauffeur drives, he wonders how Freida has been doing since he last saw her—years ago. Perhaps then he “sees” her at the top of the hill—looking the same as she ever did, though maybe a little more weather-worn—and THEN our MC tosses the flower onto the grave—maybe then, we feel the loss as we realize this was no ordinary date. Though we have been marching toward the same “flower on the grave” emotional punchline, this time, it’s far more earned. Having said that, it’s a balance! If we show him then falling onto the gravesite, his fists pounding on the hard-packed earth, screaming, “WHY??? WHY, GOD!!?? FREIIIIIDDAAA!” and then, like, ripping up the grass and shaking his fists at the sky, we have summarily entered the land of the overwrought, where the reader is just as likely to chuckle at the absurdity of someone being so melodramatic and obvious as they are to feel genuine sadness.
Another key thing I learned is that juxtaposition (placing certain things close to each other to create organic opportunities for comparison and contrast) makes the whole “objective correlative” thing work. In the above example, the juxtaposing of our MC getting ready for his “date” is what sets up the emotional tug and pull of later finding out it’s a cemetery visit he’s going to. I think it’s important to note that juxtaposition doesn’t rely solely on pairing opposites! (After all, our MC, above, DOES consider this a date, of sorts.) It’s more of a system of related metaphors. Ideally, the comparing or contrasting you are doing is done in an interesting or thought-provoking way that helps build up the emotional goal you have set for the reader.
So, in essence: the objective correlative is the delicate system of emotional pulleys and levers that creates a specific earned response in the reader—not by the main character telling the audience/reader (or other characters) exactly what they are feeling, but by evoking that feeling through descriptions and actions that are as nuanced as they are effective—and that build to a specific earned emotional “payoff.” (Some modern critics refer to this system as “emotional algebra,” but that’s a bit too formulaic-sounding to my ears. “Emotional conducting,” anyone?)
Does this all sound very familiar? In a Venn Diagram, it would definitely mostly overlap with the infamous “show, don’t tell!” every picture book writer is urged to do in general, the main difference being that it’s specifically focused on how best to earn a specific type of reader emotional response. However, I do have to say that axiom gets overused—we need to do some telling for setup, for example. BUT when it comes to emotion, “showing” is ideal.
So! In effect, using the objective correlative means writing (and most importantly, revising) with a reader’s emotional journey (as well as the MC’s emotional journey) in mind—making sure all the instruments in the orchestra are playing from the same sheet of music. Purposefully building, word-by-space-by-word, a set of circumstances so compelling that any reader might reasonably be expected to arrive at a similar, inevitable emotional payoff.
Or, at least, that’s what I got from my journey into it! If I’ve missed anything, feel free to share in the comments!
Your “learning more every day” friend,
Elayne
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Um…Martha Brockenbrough? She diagnosed my MG title/ meaningful artifact/ problem of what to do next as an “objective correlative” problem 😜 still working on earning it!