Backstory

There comes a point in every story, a big reveal, where you sort of get the chills. While I didn't get the chills at this point of the story, I definitely can pinpoint the moment.

The "chills" moment for me comes when Norris opens Chapter 20. After McTeague's violent act of murder, he has no choice but to leave San Francisco and return to the mountains.

I'm not exactly sure why I found this moment to be so poignant. Perhaps it is the big, open landscape Norris describes after such a long period of closed city space. Here we see something different. McTeague returns to his element.

There almost is a bit of a genre change from this point on. The rest of the novel feels like a Western. I'm still, however, trying to pinpoint why I find this part of the story to be so interesting.

And then it hits me.

Backstory.

When McTeague returns to the Big Dipper mine, Norris dangles a juicy morsel of backstory.

I love backstory. I often find myself even more intrigued with the past events in a character's life then the current narrative. Perhaps the reason for this is the mysterious nature of backstory. When we learn about a character's past, we aren't necessarily given absolutes. We get snapshot, vague little details. Backstory plays in the mind like legend. Since our mind ultimately gets to fill in the gaps of backstory, a certain wonder is created. It is exciting and interesting to imagine the life of a character before we knew that character. As McTeague visits the old mine and haunts the land he once called his home, no doubt memories flood his mind. I can not see those memories. I can only imagine them. I can only imagine the things that happened in McTeague's past.

Given McTeague's current explosions of violence, one can't help but wonder... were these the first? What little incidents in McTeague's past began the journey to the horrifying scene we just witnessed at the end of the previous chapter? We are told McTeague left the mines to become a dentist. Is that the only reason? Was there another episode of violent rage that left a body count up in the mountains years ago?

I guess we'll never know. But that's the beauty of large gaps in the backstory of a narrative. The mind is left to imagine.

WC: 399