Deus Ex Machina 

a place for musing about the ability to put into readable, entertaining form some of the fruits of imagination.

Why “Deus Ex Machina“? The “god in the machine” or the “motivating factor” is a common part of writing philosophy clear back to the Greek playwrights. In some cases, the god in the machine really is an overarching force that has the final say no matter what the puny protagonists may do or say to avoid the denoument (cf. Oedipus for instance). In other cases, the motivating factor is “incremental”: once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, any more than that is conspiracy.

I’ve always considered deus ex machina to be in many ways ME - that is, the author. When I write, I AM diety - except of course when the fictional characters I create prefer to “write the book themselves” (which happens much more frequently than anyone would believe - unless they write too!)

So Deus Ex Machina it is, and I hope you find something of value herein to take away with you.

This entry was posted on Monday, April 25th, 2005 at 7:29 pm and is filed under Musings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.