Writing - Foreign Influences & Plot Devices

 I never heard of K-drama until I read Yumi Lee's review of The Sense of Wonder by Matthew Salesses, Linsanity and the Art of Escape. I think I have a better idea, but even if I do not, this part interests me:

The best K-dramas luxuriate in formal constraints and conventions rather than chafing at them (see Search: WWW, for example, or Business Proposal). What does it mean for the K-drama form to provide the frame of reference for the story of Linsanity, which itself has come to frame the ways we understand the limits of Asian racial belonging in the United States? Why does Salesses place an Asian American story within an Asian cultural form? The Sense of Wonder establishes the rules of the K-drama—“the tropes [are] my favorite part,” Carrie declares at one point—and then uses them to slowly upend our narrative expectations.

Is that not the goal of every writer? Like since the day after Homer finished his epics? 

What interests me is the use of an Asian form. I found much of interest in watching Bollywood movies – stories within stories, tones shifting – and I have tried to capture that idea. 

I do not think of this as appropriation as much as learning there are different strategies for telling our stories.

K.M Weiland wrote in What Are Plot Devices? (Why You Should Be Cautious) :

The trick is to do so in a way that honors the entire context of the story. Each event should arise naturally from the story’s cause and effect. Any time something in a story seems to exist solely to explain a previous event or further a future event, that’s the sign of a contrived plot device. By contrast, a successful plot device is one that seems to exist solely for its own sake—as if it were just as important as any other event—which allows it to seamlessly integrate with the rest of the story.

It seems to me the tropes mentioned in the review do not fail ms. Weiland's test, or her 8 examples of plot devices.

Of the particular novel under review, the reviewer points out to a different story being told:

But of course, a reversal of the “American dream” narrative can’t undo what’s been done. At the same time that diasporic Asian narratives are imagining reverse migrations to Asia as a form of escape, Koreans living in South Korea describe it as a neoliberal, heteropatriarchal hellscape where ordinary working people can barely survive: “hell Joseon.” Perhaps it’s a historical irony that life in Korea can look like a dream from the vantage point of those of us living in the land that sired hell Joseon—hell America. Once, when I visited Korea as a twentysomething, I met up with an older cousin before joining up with a group of Korean Americans traveling as part of an educational exchange program. I explained to him that we were looking to learn about Korean history and reconnect with Korean culture. My cousin, on a quick break from his crushing work schedule, looked at me skeptically and suggested that instead of trying to “find myself” in Korea, I should just concentrate on living well at home in the United States. When The Sense of Wonder describes the K-drama, it doesn’t call the setting of these shows “Korea”; instead, the narrator says, “Once upon a time in dramaland.” Maybe we’re all looking for an escape from hell.

Not being an immigrant, I have nowhere to go to escape from the defects of American life. On the other hand, I have relatives who think the immigrants on our southern border present some deadly peril for the country. I wonder if between these three stories – ethnic Americans finding themselves not quite so happy with America, white Americans thinking immigrants endanger the country, and those immigrants thinking America will save them – there is not a fourth story of people trying to survive because that is what life is, just survival. Maybe that last group will find a way of improving America.

sch 8/17