Quote:
Originally Posted by Timdog
I've noticed that a lot of anime have the inner thought of the characters yet most Western stories don't seem to have this. Is this due to culture? I know not all anime is like this, but it just seems very common. And do you think it helps or detracts from the story. In my creative writing class (yea I know, not like that is the be all end all of writing), my professor taught us that too much inner thought is a bad thing and instead what the characters are thinking should be shown through their actions and other things like symbols instead of actually saying, "Joe thought to himself, '...'".
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I'd say that the "difference" arises from your subjective point of view. It's quite possible that you have not read broadly enough in the field of English/Western literature. Pick up any number of
Booker Prize-winning novels, or even the shortlisted ones that did not win, and you'd easily find complex stories driven by complicated characters whose thoughts are seldom linear or entirely clear.
If you're up for a real challenge in piecing together a character's "inner thoughts", I'd recommend James Joyce's
Ulysses. It's a landmark in English literature that made "
stream of consciousness" narrative popular.
I like manga just as much as any forum member here, but I'm under no delusion about how lightweight an art form it is when compared to a full-blown novel in any language.