What makes you cry?
July 23, 2010 12:18 AM
I would like the ability to write an essay or piece of fiction that can make many readers cry.
After a bit of asking around, it seems that certain topic areas tend to make a reader cry - the death of a child or animal for example. My hunch is that there's more than just the topic though. That a writer who can make you cry is using a certain timing or rhythm or moment of reveal. But I can't pinpoint the specific charactaristics of writing that makes me cry. Do you have any ideas about what, specifically, makes you cry, in any piece of writing that does so? Or if that's too hard to pin down, can you name some of the writing that's made you cry?
(I hope this question doesn't make me sound too douchy ):
After a bit of asking around, it seems that certain topic areas tend to make a reader cry - the death of a child or animal for example. My hunch is that there's more than just the topic though. That a writer who can make you cry is using a certain timing or rhythm or moment of reveal. But I can't pinpoint the specific charactaristics of writing that makes me cry. Do you have any ideas about what, specifically, makes you cry, in any piece of writing that does so? Or if that's too hard to pin down, can you name some of the writing that's made you cry?
(I hope this question doesn't make me sound too douchy ):
If you read the "Pet Tales" column in the SF Chronicle you will get choked up. Unless you don't have a heart. But you probably have a heart so read it and find out.
posted by quadog at 12:48 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by quadog at 12:48 AM on July 23, 2010
When Judy dies in Seven Little Australians.
I've read the book maybe 100 times in my life. Maybe even more. I still re-read it regularly.
Even before I get to the tree falling, even as they set off to their picnic, I know what's going to happen and I'm already in tears.
I'm a blubbering mess by the time I get to, "It is so hard to write it. My pen has had only happy writing to do so far, and now!", and then the tree falls, and Judy is so badly hurt saving her baby brother, and then Meg is sitting with her much-loved sister while trying desperately to come up with a comforting hymn to recite to Judy as she dies. And then she invokes their dead mother.
"Oh! and Judy dear, we are forgetting: there's Mother, Judy, dear - you won't be lonely! Can't you remember Mother's eyes, little Judy?"
Insert Kleenex-sponsored break here.
I think it's the fact that I find the characters so believable, so imaginable, that it still hurts when Judy dies. I don't think it's a plot device as such - I think it's simply a side effect of reading the work of a damned good writer, who can make me care so much about fictitious characters.
posted by malibustacey9999 at 12:59 AM on July 23, 2010
I've read the book maybe 100 times in my life. Maybe even more. I still re-read it regularly.
Even before I get to the tree falling, even as they set off to their picnic, I know what's going to happen and I'm already in tears.
I'm a blubbering mess by the time I get to, "It is so hard to write it. My pen has had only happy writing to do so far, and now!", and then the tree falls, and Judy is so badly hurt saving her baby brother, and then Meg is sitting with her much-loved sister while trying desperately to come up with a comforting hymn to recite to Judy as she dies. And then she invokes their dead mother.
"Oh! and Judy dear, we are forgetting: there's Mother, Judy, dear - you won't be lonely! Can't you remember Mother's eyes, little Judy?"
Insert Kleenex-sponsored break here.
I think it's the fact that I find the characters so believable, so imaginable, that it still hurts when Judy dies. I don't think it's a plot device as such - I think it's simply a side effect of reading the work of a damned good writer, who can make me care so much about fictitious characters.
posted by malibustacey9999 at 12:59 AM on July 23, 2010
The very end of McEwan's Atonement, where [hover for spoiler] . The narrative had led me to believe something else, and I was completely taken in. It was like a punch to the stomach because I was not expecting it and it just felt so...wrong. The unfairness that the characters experience--the injustice of it, really--took my breath away. I don't think of it as a cheap device either--it was a good ending and I think McEwan is a skilled writer to have shaped the story that way.
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 1:28 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 1:28 AM on July 23, 2010
Darn, my hovertext worked in preview. Anyway, you can, uh, google for the ending of the book if you need to. Sorry about that!
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 1:30 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 1:30 AM on July 23, 2010
When Boo Radley appears in 'To Kill a Mockingbird'. The reveal is priceless and the very simple reaction is what makes the scene work:
'Hey Boo.'
Choked me right up when I read it the first time.
posted by Happy Dave at 1:58 AM on July 23, 2010
'Hey Boo.'
Choked me right up when I read it the first time.
posted by Happy Dave at 1:58 AM on July 23, 2010
Joint answer of SO and myself. The underlying theme most of the time is parting; in all guises (implied/anticipated/final), and presented by the writer as seen and felt by the characters in the book. (As opposed to "this character died, now be sad, reader").
Like when Frodo leaves Middle Earth: it's sad for Sam, who's left with all his memories alone. It's not sad for us readers. But we're made to share Sam's sadness, and that's what does the trick.
posted by Namlit at 2:17 AM on July 23, 2010
Like when Frodo leaves Middle Earth: it's sad for Sam, who's left with all his memories alone. It's not sad for us readers. But we're made to share Sam's sadness, and that's what does the trick.
posted by Namlit at 2:17 AM on July 23, 2010
The easiest way to make someone cry in fiction, film whatever is to introduce a character who is dead. Either give them a voice or allow them to interact with characters who are living. Death, dead people, pining for dead people and the wish to communicate with people who have died are the most emotive subjects you can use. Done well it can be devastating.
posted by fire&wings at 2:22 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by fire&wings at 2:22 AM on July 23, 2010
It doesn't make you sound douchy but it does make you sound like a bit of a robot. You had to ask around to find out people cry at the death of a child or animal?
They are definitely the tear jerker categories though. This Metafilter post about children accidently left in cars was one of the last things to make me cry. As you say though, it is more than just the subject. A lot of the power of that piece comes from the fact it is true, that it is the words of anguished parents who have lost their children.
There is a huge difference between this sort of reportage and writing an essay or (to an even greater extend) a piece of fiction. I'm not quite clear on why your goal is the "ability" to make someone cry but I would recommend tapping into your own personal experience. Presumably you have been sad before so your goal is to make someone empathise with your own pain to such an extent that they are overcome with emotion. However, this is a tall order and really just a subset of being a great writer so really I think the answer to your question is to improve your general writing skills ratehr than trying to deliberately manipulate people.
posted by ninebelow at 2:54 AM on July 23, 2010
They are definitely the tear jerker categories though. This Metafilter post about children accidently left in cars was one of the last things to make me cry. As you say though, it is more than just the subject. A lot of the power of that piece comes from the fact it is true, that it is the words of anguished parents who have lost their children.
There is a huge difference between this sort of reportage and writing an essay or (to an even greater extend) a piece of fiction. I'm not quite clear on why your goal is the "ability" to make someone cry but I would recommend tapping into your own personal experience. Presumably you have been sad before so your goal is to make someone empathise with your own pain to such an extent that they are overcome with emotion. However, this is a tall order and really just a subset of being a great writer so really I think the answer to your question is to improve your general writing skills ratehr than trying to deliberately manipulate people.
posted by ninebelow at 2:54 AM on July 23, 2010
Unless you're Charles Dickens, don't overegg the pudding. (Actually, Wilde famously said "One must have a heart of stone to read the death of little Nell without laughing"). For me, what makes a tragic plot turn really grab my emotions is understatement, spare dialogue, fragments of context. You know how in good horror movies, you hardly see the monster and your imagination does all the work of frightening you? Same deal with tears. Don't tell me how damned sad it is.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 2:59 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 2:59 AM on July 23, 2010
Acts of quiet courage, generosity and selflessness, particularly those seemingly mundane and unlikely to be noticed - the dedicated carer for an elderly parent or disabled child, the neighbours offering a helping hand.
posted by Abiezer at 2:59 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by Abiezer at 2:59 AM on July 23, 2010
I can't honestly say I've ever cried over a book, and I'm kind of confused as to what would cause me to cry over written words.
But obviously I'm in the minority?
That said, the few things that have resonated in my mind to the point that I stop reading for a little bit while I think them over, have always been about situations that happen to be familiar and troubling to me at that moment in time. So no magic phrase, or pattern. Just coincidence.
posted by HFSH at 3:27 AM on July 23, 2010
But obviously I'm in the minority?
That said, the few things that have resonated in my mind to the point that I stop reading for a little bit while I think them over, have always been about situations that happen to be familiar and troubling to me at that moment in time. So no magic phrase, or pattern. Just coincidence.
posted by HFSH at 3:27 AM on July 23, 2010
For some reason, what often gets me is when the death is expected to happen. It can be that the narrator has foreshadowed it, the character is sacrificing herself... there are a few ways to write it. But the crux of it is, someone involved in the story (it could be the reader) knows that the death is coming.
Some examples: The fact that you find out on the first page of The Poisonwood Bible that one of the daughters will die, Harry Potter trudging through the woods as he steels himself for what he believes will be his final battle (in book 7), the last scene in Big Fish. There's something about the inevitability, but you still want to hold on to hope that somehow it DOESN'T happen, and then when fate takes over... tears.
posted by sarahsynonymous at 3:35 AM on July 23, 2010
Some examples: The fact that you find out on the first page of The Poisonwood Bible that one of the daughters will die, Harry Potter trudging through the woods as he steels himself for what he believes will be his final battle (in book 7), the last scene in Big Fish. There's something about the inevitability, but you still want to hold on to hope that somehow it DOESN'T happen, and then when fate takes over... tears.
posted by sarahsynonymous at 3:35 AM on July 23, 2010
W.G. Sebald does it for me, writing about loss and memory in a way that is sensible and kind and understated and deeply real. These lines at the end of a favorite chapter make me tear up every time: "And so they are ever returning to us, the dead. At times they come back from the ice more than seven decades later and are found at the edge of the moraine, a few polished bones and a pair of hobnailed boots."
This is a pair of very, very carefully arranged sentences. They are clearly written while also including an element of startlingness: each sentence ends on the most important word. They provide both a specific story-ending concrete detail and a more general observation that evokes the reader's memories, quietly allowing personal resonances to become part of the fabric of the text.
It's not hard for me to pick a favorite author.
Also, I cried really hard when I read Where the Red Fern Grows as a kid. Beloved dogs dying is an effective method.
posted by dreamyshade at 3:40 AM on July 23, 2010
This is a pair of very, very carefully arranged sentences. They are clearly written while also including an element of startlingness: each sentence ends on the most important word. They provide both a specific story-ending concrete detail and a more general observation that evokes the reader's memories, quietly allowing personal resonances to become part of the fabric of the text.
It's not hard for me to pick a favorite author.
Also, I cried really hard when I read Where the Red Fern Grows as a kid. Beloved dogs dying is an effective method.
posted by dreamyshade at 3:40 AM on July 23, 2010
If in doubt, kill a dog.
Yep, the one book that is guaranteed to make me sob combines Phanx's answer and sarahsynonymous' answer: in Where the Red Fern Grows the reader knows... but the main character doesn't and it's witnessing him learn about and then come to terms with what's happened that sets me off. If I were to diagram it in search of a pattern, here's how it would look:
- Character and motivation/exegesis established
- Hardship is overcome, exegesis temporarily resolved
- The Inevitable happens (good place to let slip a tear)
- Character figures out that inevitable has happened (*sob*)
- Character suffers but eventually comes to terms with inevitable through ... (*SOBSOBSOBSOB*)
- Red-demption (sobbing continues, etc.)
posted by carsonb at 3:50 AM on July 23, 2010
Yep, the one book that is guaranteed to make me sob combines Phanx's answer and sarahsynonymous' answer: in Where the Red Fern Grows the reader knows... but the main character doesn't and it's witnessing him learn about and then come to terms with what's happened that sets me off. If I were to diagram it in search of a pattern, here's how it would look:
- Character and motivation/exegesis established
- Hardship is overcome, exegesis temporarily resolved
- The Inevitable happens (good place to let slip a tear)
- Character figures out that inevitable has happened (*sob*)
- Character suffers but eventually comes to terms with inevitable through ... (*SOBSOBSOBSOB*)
- Red-demption (sobbing continues, etc.)
posted by carsonb at 3:50 AM on July 23, 2010
This story, "The Ugliest Pilgrim," by Doris Betts, always makes me cry when I read it. I think it's because the pain and the anguish and yet the hope in the narrators voice sounds so authentic. I can't tell you specifically what makes it sound so authentic though. It's mostly just that Betts writes with so much empathy. In this case, it's not the subject topic itself that makes me cry. It's the empathy I feel towards the narrator's pain that makes me cry and that empathy comes from her skill as a writer.
posted by gt2 at 4:04 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by gt2 at 4:04 AM on July 23, 2010
As someone was saying above, re: Dickens, it is a fine line between writing that inspires sudden, visceral emotional responses, and cheesy writing that inspires mockery. I suspect I am going to inspire some derision myself when I say that I think Stephen King is pretty good at this, especially when death is involved, as it almost always is.
Examples (prolly spoilery, if anyone cares):
- Oy's death at the end of The Dark Tower
- Ralph's self-sacrifice at the end of Insomnia
- a million different tiny things in The Stand, each of which involved the death of all that is familiar about the US
I don't know if any of it actually made me cry (except Oy; oh how I wibbled), but it just hits you like a rabbit punch to the gut sometimes.
Also, I most definitely agree with the "animal death = instant sobbity" mentioned above. When Fitz's bonded wolf companion died in Robin Hobb's Golden Fool fantasy trilogy, I was a helplessly gibbering mess.
posted by elizardbits at 4:22 AM on July 23, 2010
Examples (prolly spoilery, if anyone cares):
- Oy's death at the end of The Dark Tower
- Ralph's self-sacrifice at the end of Insomnia
- a million different tiny things in The Stand, each of which involved the death of all that is familiar about the US
I don't know if any of it actually made me cry (except Oy; oh how I wibbled), but it just hits you like a rabbit punch to the gut sometimes.
Also, I most definitely agree with the "animal death = instant sobbity" mentioned above. When Fitz's bonded wolf companion died in Robin Hobb's Golden Fool fantasy trilogy, I was a helplessly gibbering mess.
posted by elizardbits at 4:22 AM on July 23, 2010
Abiezer has it up-thread. Roger Ebert, FWIW, agrees, though not necessarily in the context of the written word. I don't think there is a formula, though, as far as weaving words; you can murder than language with an axe and I'll still respond if the concept is communicated.
(I cried at the end of the Sirens of Titan, for pete's sake. And Where the Red Fern Grows is a way for me to lose ten pounds of water weight.)
posted by maxwelton at 4:25 AM on July 23, 2010
(I cried at the end of the Sirens of Titan, for pete's sake. And Where the Red Fern Grows is a way for me to lose ten pounds of water weight.)
posted by maxwelton at 4:25 AM on July 23, 2010
If you want an example of what it looks like when an author "tries to make people cry" or makes the emotional response the point of the story, read Bob Greene's work.
For the record, I think it is disingenuous ("douchy") for an artist to focus on the emotional response rather than the truth of the story.
posted by gjc at 4:41 AM on July 23, 2010
For the record, I think it is disingenuous ("douchy") for an artist to focus on the emotional response rather than the truth of the story.
posted by gjc at 4:41 AM on July 23, 2010
I agree with sarahsynonymous that the most tearful times for me have been when I know it's coming... especially if you're allowed to hope for a second that maybe it won't. When things seem good and hopeful, and then one small thing that could easily have gone the other way causes it all to come crashing down -- that's the stuff.
posted by cider at 4:57 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by cider at 4:57 AM on July 23, 2010
I think you need to tap into common feelings that people don't have closure over.
The feeling of being misunderstood and wronged.
Of reaching out with your last breath and being rebuffed.
The quiet feeling of hope dying.
The show must go on feeling.
The feeling of loneliness and inability to reach out while an opportunity goes past.
The feeling ofbeing wronged or of sacrifice going unnoticed.
All of us feel self pity about things like that at some point. The trick is to not allow characters to express their feelings. If they wail and gnash thei. Teeth the effect is lost. The audience cries because the characters can't (or only in secret, or only subdued). Understatement increases the power.
posted by Omnomnom at 5:21 AM on July 23, 2010
The feeling of being misunderstood and wronged.
Of reaching out with your last breath and being rebuffed.
The quiet feeling of hope dying.
The show must go on feeling.
The feeling of loneliness and inability to reach out while an opportunity goes past.
The feeling ofbeing wronged or of sacrifice going unnoticed.
All of us feel self pity about things like that at some point. The trick is to not allow characters to express their feelings. If they wail and gnash thei. Teeth the effect is lost. The audience cries because the characters can't (or only in secret, or only subdued). Understatement increases the power.
posted by Omnomnom at 5:21 AM on July 23, 2010
I'll give you a hand and out myself as the OP of this post. That's what makes me cry.
posted by griphus at 5:55 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by griphus at 5:55 AM on July 23, 2010
It's both tapping into a common feeling and communicating the very, very small details that surround it. For example, if you're going to write about someone dying, it's not going to feel authentic unless you can capture the small, even banal things that you only know when you go through it. And even then, it won't be heartbreaking unless you capture the small details of that person that make him or her human. It's weird, but something about capturing the oddities of a person makes a character more human--just like me, or just like my father, etc--than does a description like "My father was a good man."
It's the kind of stuff you can't fake well.
From Gene Weingarten's "Fatal Distraction"--
Mikey Terry is a contractor from Maypearl, Tex., a big man with soft eyes. At the moment he realized what he'd done, he was in the cab of a truck and his 6-month-old daughter, Mika, was in a closed vehicle in the broiling Texas sun in a parking lot 40 miles away. So his frantic sprint to the car was conducted at 100 miles an hour in a 30-foot gooseneck trailer hauling thousands of pounds of lumber the size of telephone poles.
On that day in June 2005, Terry had been recently laid off, and he'd taken a day job building a wall in the auditorium of a Catholic church just outside of town. He'd remembered to drop his older daughter at day care, but as he was driving the baby to a different day care location, he got a call about a new permanent job. This really caught his attention. It was a fatal distraction....
Four years have passed, but he still won't go near the Catholic church he'd been working at that day. As his daughter died outside, he was inside, building a wall on which would hang an enormous crucifix.
posted by sallybrown at 6:09 AM on July 23, 2010
It's the kind of stuff you can't fake well.
From Gene Weingarten's "Fatal Distraction"--
Mikey Terry is a contractor from Maypearl, Tex., a big man with soft eyes. At the moment he realized what he'd done, he was in the cab of a truck and his 6-month-old daughter, Mika, was in a closed vehicle in the broiling Texas sun in a parking lot 40 miles away. So his frantic sprint to the car was conducted at 100 miles an hour in a 30-foot gooseneck trailer hauling thousands of pounds of lumber the size of telephone poles.
On that day in June 2005, Terry had been recently laid off, and he'd taken a day job building a wall in the auditorium of a Catholic church just outside of town. He'd remembered to drop his older daughter at day care, but as he was driving the baby to a different day care location, he got a call about a new permanent job. This really caught his attention. It was a fatal distraction....
Four years have passed, but he still won't go near the Catholic church he'd been working at that day. As his daughter died outside, he was inside, building a wall on which would hang an enormous crucifix.
posted by sallybrown at 6:09 AM on July 23, 2010
An eleven-year old in my family cried unceasingly for hours after finishing Where the Red Fern Grows while on vacation. Just the thought of it started the waterworks even the next day. She had to force herself not to think about that book for the rest of the vacation. Other child tearjerkers: Polar Express, Tuck Everlasting. Death, parting, lost time . . . get the Kleenex.
posted by Elsie at 6:10 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by Elsie at 6:10 AM on July 23, 2010
One of the best pieces of theatre I saw pulled a neat trick - made us laugh then hit us with a whammy of tragedy. Laughing had opened us up, released all the blockades to feeling, so we were all so much more vulnerable when the whammy came. Floods of tears.
posted by L'Estrange Fruit at 6:31 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by L'Estrange Fruit at 6:31 AM on July 23, 2010
If you can find a copy that is not this ridiculously expensive (the library, maybe), Seeing Through Tears: Crying and Attachment might give you some insight. It's quite excellent. The author is also a friend of mine, but it's still good, I swear.
posted by rtha at 6:32 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by rtha at 6:32 AM on July 23, 2010
I very, very rarely cry over books or movies but when I do it is usually some juxtaposition of nostalgia and injustice. Something about idylic yesterday, longings for childhood, when things were sweet piled on top of something bad happening to someone/something innocent.
The example that springs to mind is from Fried Green Tomatoes when Smokey Lonesome, the homeless man, dies on the road, friendless, with only Ruth's picture in his pocket-- mute testimony to his hidden love for her. It chokes me up every time.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:42 AM on July 23, 2010
The example that springs to mind is from Fried Green Tomatoes when Smokey Lonesome, the homeless man, dies on the road, friendless, with only Ruth's picture in his pocket-- mute testimony to his hidden love for her. It chokes me up every time.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:42 AM on July 23, 2010
Step 1: Create a likable character that the audience identifies and/or sympathizes with. The story should also have a second character who is close to your likable character, who is frequently helped by her, whatever. Usually this second character will be the narrator.
Step 2: Kill the likable character. Or, advanced level: make it so the relationship between the two can no longer continue, but not by killing one of the characters.
(This is especially the formula used in a lot of kids' tear jerkers mentioned in the thread.)
posted by phoenixy at 6:43 AM on July 23, 2010
Step 2: Kill the likable character. Or, advanced level: make it so the relationship between the two can no longer continue, but not by killing one of the characters.
(This is especially the formula used in a lot of kids' tear jerkers mentioned in the thread.)
posted by phoenixy at 6:43 AM on July 23, 2010
I've only cried twice over books (that I can recall), once with the ending of Kazuo Ishiguro's Never Let me Go, and the second time when the bishop absolves Jean Valjean of his "crimes" about 200 pages in Les Miserables. Both involved tough transformative events that happened to extremely well drawn protagonists, and the realization that their lives would forever be a struggle, and their surrender to that struggle.
posted by Omon Ra at 6:49 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by Omon Ra at 6:49 AM on July 23, 2010
If in doubt, kill a dog
Oh man, sad but true. The ending if J.M. Coetzee's Disgrace had me sobbing on the New York subway like a demented panhandler. Animal suffering and death goads people's emotions because animals lack the narrative capacity to understand and get sufficiently angry about their abuse.
Shit, now I'm tearing up again.
posted by zoomorphic at 7:01 AM on July 23, 2010
Oh man, sad but true. The ending if J.M. Coetzee's Disgrace had me sobbing on the New York subway like a demented panhandler. Animal suffering and death goads people's emotions because animals lack the narrative capacity to understand and get sufficiently angry about their abuse.
Shit, now I'm tearing up again.
posted by zoomorphic at 7:01 AM on July 23, 2010
.... So much so that I can't properly format my answers on an iPhone
posted by zoomorphic at 7:02 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by zoomorphic at 7:02 AM on July 23, 2010
I have trouble pinning it down, but for me, these were some books that made my cry. Death seems to be a pretty common theme here.
Where the Red Fern Grows
Bridge to Terabithia
Little Women
The Road
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
Number the Stars
Charlotte's Web
The Outsiders
Of Mice and Men
posted by mgogol at 7:23 AM on July 23, 2010
Where the Red Fern Grows
Bridge to Terabithia
Little Women
The Road
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
Number the Stars
Charlotte's Web
The Outsiders
Of Mice and Men
posted by mgogol at 7:23 AM on July 23, 2010
When I cry in fiction, it's not generally over the death of someone. It's because someone showed an act of kindness in an unforgiving world and gave a character hope. That will make me bawl my eyes out. I wish I could think of an example, but my mind is drawing a blank.
posted by patheral at 7:38 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by patheral at 7:38 AM on July 23, 2010
I think it has to be the death of an innocent (child, animal, idiot) or the sacrifice of someone nobler than the reader/narrator.
Where the Red Fern Grows is obviously the first (including the more abstract death of innocence.)
The Lord of the Rings is the second. Not only Frodo is leaving Middle Earth, but the elves as well. The world is literally diminished by their passing.
If you want a classic, all out tearjerker you can combine them. That's where you find something like A Bridge to Terabithia.
posted by ecurtz at 7:50 AM on July 23, 2010
Where the Red Fern Grows is obviously the first (including the more abstract death of innocence.)
The Lord of the Rings is the second. Not only Frodo is leaving Middle Earth, but the elves as well. The world is literally diminished by their passing.
If you want a classic, all out tearjerker you can combine them. That's where you find something like A Bridge to Terabithia.
posted by ecurtz at 7:50 AM on July 23, 2010
For some reason, I've been finding the back page of the NYT magazine especially poignant lately. The situations tend to be pretty typical, but there's something very human in the way that they're described. There was something particularly touching about the story of the recovering alcoholic who refused to give the coconut man yet another loan, for example.
I've also found similar writing in The Sun. I think that familiarity gets that tear, not necessarily death or classic tragedy.
posted by Gilbert at 7:56 AM on July 23, 2010
I've also found similar writing in The Sun. I think that familiarity gets that tear, not necessarily death or classic tragedy.
posted by Gilbert at 7:56 AM on July 23, 2010
When I cry in fiction, it's not generally over the death of someone. It's because someone showed an act of kindness in an unforgiving world and gave a character hope. That will make me bawl my eyes out. I wish I could think of an example, but my mind is drawing a blank.
posted by patheral
THANK you, patheral. I was reading this thread thinking I must be the most stone-hearted man for not feeling blubbery at the death of characters, human or canine, in books and movies. But then your comment reminded me of times I have teared up and it's exactly as you describe.
One scene I recall is in the Gene Wilder version of "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory". Right near the end, when Charlie places the candy on Wonka's desk in apology and turns to go. Then Wonka looks up and, in a moment of deep and touching humanity, says "So shines a good deed in a weary world." Oh, my heart!
I'm happy to report that just writing that last paragraph has tears flowing down my face.
posted by darkstar at 8:36 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by patheral
THANK you, patheral. I was reading this thread thinking I must be the most stone-hearted man for not feeling blubbery at the death of characters, human or canine, in books and movies. But then your comment reminded me of times I have teared up and it's exactly as you describe.
One scene I recall is in the Gene Wilder version of "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory". Right near the end, when Charlie places the candy on Wonka's desk in apology and turns to go. Then Wonka looks up and, in a moment of deep and touching humanity, says "So shines a good deed in a weary world." Oh, my heart!
I'm happy to report that just writing that last paragraph has tears flowing down my face.
posted by darkstar at 8:36 AM on July 23, 2010
Dylan Thomas' "Fern Hill" is probably the most surprising cry I've had in awhile. A carefully modulated yet gloriously ALIVE, nostalgic recounting of childhood's glory. I read it every now and then and it hits me afresh every time. I once foolishly tried to read it aloud to a friend and wound up way too choked up.
It could be because it reminds me of specific elements of my own childhood, i.e. it perfectly captures the happiest time of my own life, so YMMV.
posted by bovious at 8:43 AM on July 23, 2010
It could be because it reminds me of specific elements of my own childhood, i.e. it perfectly captures the happiest time of my own life, so YMMV.
posted by bovious at 8:43 AM on July 23, 2010
@patheral & @darkstar, did you see "The Secret of Roan Inish?" There's a scene where the grandmother who has been cruelly, forbiddingly dismissive of any talk of selkies (mystical human/seal hybrids) et al is confronted with the news that one of the selkies may be her long-missing, beloved grandchild, and her help is needed to return him to humanity.
Without a word, she starts gathering blankets and other supplies to help him.
I don't know if that "beat" has appeared in other movies but it's so powerful to me that I try to recreate it occasionally in my own shows. I almost made myself cry during a production of "Charley's Aunt" by placing it near the end, when the servant Brassett saves the day. :)
posted by bovious at 8:48 AM on July 23, 2010
Without a word, she starts gathering blankets and other supplies to help him.
I don't know if that "beat" has appeared in other movies but it's so powerful to me that I try to recreate it occasionally in my own shows. I almost made myself cry during a production of "Charley's Aunt" by placing it near the end, when the servant Brassett saves the day. :)
posted by bovious at 8:48 AM on July 23, 2010
Speaking of the death of animals etc., Richard Adams did an amazing thing at the end of "Plague Dogs." The narrative ends with the dogs Rowf and Snitter in a doomed attempt to swim to freedom. After giving you time to cry over that, Adams announces he is going to tack on an optional, "happy" ending. The happy ending has all the tear-jerking elements of a real "happy" ending, but when I read it at least, I was crying over the unfairness of the "real" ending and the cruelty of the deus ex machina artifice of the "happy" ending. A bravura performance.
posted by bovious at 9:06 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by bovious at 9:06 AM on July 23, 2010
I don't cry a lot about books, but I always cry when I read Little Women and Beth dies. I think she meets a lot of the qualifications people have set out above: she's a child who dies after a long illness; she has been the center of her very close family - everyone loves and trusts Beth, even when they are squabbling among themselves; she makes Jo feel like a better person; and she is close to death once and survives, only to finally succumb.
posted by Sukey Says at 10:12 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by Sukey Says at 10:12 AM on July 23, 2010
This FPP did it for me today.
posted by Obscure Reference at 5:05 AM on July 23 [mark as best answer] [+] [!]
Oh god, I hadn't read that. Jesus.
Thank you everyone for the ideas. I think I'm beginning to get a sense of some of what makes this happen.
posted by serazin at 10:21 AM on July 23, 2010
posted by Obscure Reference at 5:05 AM on July 23 [mark as best answer] [+] [!]
Oh god, I hadn't read that. Jesus.
Thank you everyone for the ideas. I think I'm beginning to get a sense of some of what makes this happen.
posted by serazin at 10:21 AM on July 23, 2010
Something about the ending of Blindness (semi-SPOILER: regarding the rain and washing on the balcony), not in a plot or even clear on-paper meaning sense but rather straight-visual-poetic-sense, really got to me in a way books almost never do. So for me it has a lot more to do with small encapsulated wonderland visuals, not the major structure or thesis or whatever, not the on-paper meat and bones but the tiny scenes that illustrate it perfectly, succinctly. Other good examples, albeit movies not books: the overwhelming themes in Let the Right One In and I'm Not Scared can be devastating, and I know that intellectually, but what got to me viscerally where small visual moments (and again SPOILER): the very last scene that snaps shut abruptly and beautifully with Oskar and Eli on the train and sun coming in through the windows, and the sound involved, and the scene with him holding his breath underwater and the sound there too, or the golden fields shuddering in the wind that the boy in I'm Not Scared rides by on his bicycle every afternoon.
As for my husband who cries all the time at books and TV and movies, yeah, what was mentioned above. A dog dying will get him every time (another SPOILER: he cried a bunch at The Unbearable Lightness of Being). If I recall, he even got a little teary at Oblomov for god's sake.
posted by ifjuly at 11:29 AM on July 23, 2010
As for my husband who cries all the time at books and TV and movies, yeah, what was mentioned above. A dog dying will get him every time (another SPOILER: he cried a bunch at The Unbearable Lightness of Being). If I recall, he even got a little teary at Oblomov for god's sake.
posted by ifjuly at 11:29 AM on July 23, 2010
One of the best pieces of theatre I saw pulled a neat trick - made us laugh then hit us with a whammy of tragedy.
Yes. I cried my eyes out on an airline flight overseas, so much so that my husband was worried about me, as the last scenes rolled in Marley and Me on my Ipod screen.
It is loss, and especially the loss of the innocent and loving, that always gets me in my teary spot. And preceding humor or accompanying understatement, or both, makes the teariness that much more inevitable.
posted by bearwife at 12:15 PM on July 23, 2010
Yes. I cried my eyes out on an airline flight overseas, so much so that my husband was worried about me, as the last scenes rolled in Marley and Me on my Ipod screen.
It is loss, and especially the loss of the innocent and loving, that always gets me in my teary spot. And preceding humor or accompanying understatement, or both, makes the teariness that much more inevitable.
posted by bearwife at 12:15 PM on July 23, 2010
I rarely rarely cry at anything that I read, but damn the end of Dianna Wynne Jones' "Dogsbody" very nearly got me.
posted by Wuggie Norple at 7:05 PM on July 23, 2010
posted by Wuggie Norple at 7:05 PM on July 23, 2010
Bridge to Terabithia made me cry (and still does), but not the part where Leslie dies. The part that always gets me is when Jess's horrible teacher Monster Mouth Myers calls him out into the hall, and just when Jess thinks he's going to get another lecture, she breaks down crying and tells him how sorry she is for his loss, and how she recently lost her husband. It's the moment Jess realizes that everyone is human and everyone experiences loss.
Huck Finn's revelation, "All right then, I'll go to hell," made me cry. Small acts of heroism from unlikely sources tend to do that to me.
posted by stennieville at 7:42 PM on July 23, 2010
Huck Finn's revelation, "All right then, I'll go to hell," made me cry. Small acts of heroism from unlikely sources tend to do that to me.
posted by stennieville at 7:42 PM on July 23, 2010
It's almost always death that makes me cry. The three books/essays that get me every time are:
Stone Fox ever since third grade I can't even think about that book without getting choked up. If I were an actress you'd merely need mention it for the most convincing scene of misery conceivable.
The Book Thief Despite Death(the narrator) telling you the entire time who's going to die I was still inconsolable.
and (shortest but somehow the most hard hitting) A Million Words just scroll down a bit.
All of these feature a person or dog dying. Dogs get me everytime. As far as the death of a person goes, I'm not sure what, specifically, makes me cry. Some things just hit me a certain way.
For non-death tear inducing reads, I tend to well up for anything heroic - animals saving their owners, kids standing up for each other, unexpected tales of kindness. Excesses of positive emotion I guess. Events that make me happy to hear about them. This.
posted by abitha! at 9:40 PM on July 23, 2010
Stone Fox ever since third grade I can't even think about that book without getting choked up. If I were an actress you'd merely need mention it for the most convincing scene of misery conceivable.
The Book Thief Despite Death(the narrator) telling you the entire time who's going to die I was still inconsolable.
and (shortest but somehow the most hard hitting) A Million Words just scroll down a bit.
All of these feature a person or dog dying. Dogs get me everytime. As far as the death of a person goes, I'm not sure what, specifically, makes me cry. Some things just hit me a certain way.
For non-death tear inducing reads, I tend to well up for anything heroic - animals saving their owners, kids standing up for each other, unexpected tales of kindness. Excesses of positive emotion I guess. Events that make me happy to hear about them. This.
posted by abitha! at 9:40 PM on July 23, 2010
David Sedaris is a master of the twist that will take a story that has been 100% funny and flip it so you're crying.
Two excellent examples are The Youth in Asia, and "Repeat After Me" from Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim.
posted by MsMolly at 8:19 PM on July 24, 2010
Two excellent examples are The Youth in Asia, and "Repeat After Me" from Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim.
posted by MsMolly at 8:19 PM on July 24, 2010
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"I will not forget you," he said to us, as if in his own country he were more than a great king...and I think I know where that country is.....
There's a man up here called Christ who like violins."
I'm all choked up now just having got this out to quote it exactly. You'll never guess the context and subject matter if you don't read it.
posted by deep thought sunstar at 12:30 AM on July 23, 2010