Non-Humans R Us Newsletters

Anachronisms

First up you might wonder what anachronism means. Essentially it means “against time.” Now what could that mean? An example could be me writing with a quill pen as opposed to a ballpoint one or even using a typewriter instead of the computer in this day and age. Another example could be the plains folk such as the Amish, as well as Mennonites and others who live in a preindustrial form of society. Another form of this word is placing an item in a time period before the item was made, such as the John Wayne movie Comancheros which, while set in the 1840s, uses weapons that weren't created until the 1870s, or later, such as the Winchester rifle.

There are several forms of anachronisms, including but not limited to the usage of slang, customs, events, items that did not belong in that time, and even people themselves.

Now, you might wonder if using an anachronism is bad thing. Well, if you're making a historically accurate story, then using one would be improper. However, if your intention is to entertain, then using anachronisms are all right, just try not to make them stand out too much, such as having Abraham Lincoln be the president of the Soviet Union during the 1950s. Of course, some critics will notice them, so use them in an unobtrusive manner.

But what about time-traveling stories, or those where aliens land on an earlier Earth, or an Alternative History story? In this case, make sure that the natives act the way that they should. After all, a native of the American Civil War Era would have no knowledge of the Beatles, or Hippie slang.

Of course the biggest anachronism would be the language, as a story set in ancient Roman times would be written in the language of the author, in my case English. This is an understandable anachronism, because if the writer were to write in the native language of the time, no one would be able to understand the story. In fact, the author themselves would be unable to read it. A similar situation exists when dealing with aliens from other planets, or creatures from the lands of fantasy. In many cases, when the one group is off by themselves, what they say is written in the language of the author, and the same goes for the other group. However, when the two groups are together, the speech of the one group will sound like gibberish to the other. In these cases a process of learning each other's language occurs, or translators are used, so that the foreign language does not have to be written out. Of course, some may wish to show the foreign language is being spoken, and will use things such as italics, bolding, underlining, a change of font type, perhaps a change in the color of the words, or another process to differentiate the foreign language from the native language. Understandably, the language will be an anachronism, because odds are we’ll never meet up with the race that speaks that language.

Many times when we write a story, that takes place in the future, it is a given that things may not turn out the way we write. For instance, if one were to watch Back to the Future Part Two, which was made in 1986, but part of the story is set in 2015, people nowadays can see that some things do not come to pass, such as the ability to make cars fly, or make predictable weather, or any number of the other things that do not exist, in spite of the fact that several events ought to be taking place three years from. Other similar situations exist in many other stories; several things that were theorized to have happened by now, have yet to happen, including World War III (let's all hope that never happens in any of our lifetimes). Of course, some things that were once considered science fiction are now considered science fact, including submarines, robots, rockets that go to the moon, and more.

Of course, sometimes things are intentional anachronisms, such as Monty Python and the Quest for the Holy Grail. Anyone who has watched this movie, can note just how chock-full of anachronisms it is, from the police car searching for the Knights who murdered the one historian, to the one peasant explaining the details of the plague, and more than a few other things. This can be noted in Blazing Saddles, which is just chock-full of anachronisms to the point that you just will laugh at them.

Now, what about futuristic stories or alternative worlds? These are Unintentional, in the case of Future Settings, and somewhat Intentional in Alternative settings. Let’s take a look at some video games for such instances. In Freedom Fighters for instance, the Soviet Union tries to conquer the United States. The game was made in 2000, and was set at that time. Now, as everyone knows, the Soviet Union dissolved in the early 90’s, but in this game, it hadn’t, and had been important in World War Two, while the US hadn’t. In a similar vein, the game Homefront, made in 2010, dealt with an invasion of the US, but it was set in 2027 and North Korea was the aggressor. In that game, the Elder Kim died in 2012, and the Younger had managed to reunify Korea by 2013, and worked to take over the whole of East Asia; Japan, Vietnam, China, and so forth, by a number of means, conquest and diplomatically. Of course, as most who have kept an eye on Korea lately know, the Elder Kim died in 2011, and the Younger one has yet to reunify Korea. Let's just hope that life will not imitate art. After all, that would be very scary.

Overall anachronisms can be very tricky to deal with. They are against time after all. . As stated earlier, if writing a historically accurate story, one must not use any of them. Likewise, when writing to entertain you don't need to worry so long as they are not obvious to everyone who's reading the item. Overall, use caution when using them, as people may not take you as a serious writer if you constantly place them in your stories.

May this help you in the lands of sci-fi, fantasy and horror. See you next time.