- In search for linearity: looking for a cohesive story in a haystack
If one were to break up this book and re-organize it so that it reflects a linear storyline (that is, one with a clear development of characters and that leads to an acceptable conclusion), would the novel be easier to read? Or would the linearity point out even more the absurdity of attempting to find order in chaos? This project may seem, on the surface, to be utterly futile, but I think it would help the reader build an understanding of all the different roads this story travels and, upon a second and properly chaotic reading, be more aware of the different moving parts. My 10-step list already begins to enumerate certain characters, but the challenge here would be creating a proper sequence of events. For instance, by the end of the novel Tristram Shandy as we know it has not yet been conceived. This would have, then, to come first in the narrative. Book VII would most likely be closing the story, as it relates the adventures of an adult Tristram and his travels. Further, you would have to decide where and how the digressions come in and, ultimately, attempt to justify the narrator's eerie knowledge of his parents' lives prior to his birth. That being said, would it be thrilling to prove that this sequence of events is only readable when it refuses to be subjected to the absurdities of linear progression?
- Breaking up the Pieces: threading each individual story and its relation to the whole
As a side project to the above time (and space) challenge--or perhaps even a starting project to make the above easier--you could take my listing of characters in step X and rebuild each individual storyline. Uncle Toby may be the easiest to start with, but ever with him you may have to decide whether his battle stories count as part of a "previously on Tristram Shandy" side plot or whether they need to come in historically before any other relations. Similarly, although Shandy's mother indeed a central character (no mother, no homunculus!), she doesn't have many central scenes. Would you bother to create a separative narrative for her, or would she be just a supporting actor in someone else's story? In part, the answer to that question would depend on your goals for re-organizing the plot. If the objective is to reconnect all the characters to Shandy and understand their significance to the plot as a whole, than you might not have to recount every story, but merely reorganize the sequence in which the events take place. However, it you have a more ambitious desire to understand how Sterne constructs these individuals as different characters, and different models for building characters, than singling out even the tiniest of understudies would be mandatory.
- Material Girl--er, Text: collecting all occurrences of punctuation and visual interferences
Of course writing down each and every dash and asterisk would be a hopeless effort, not to mention pointless. But you could attempt to follow Moss' model and close read certain passages. If you agree with me (and, consequently, Moss et.al) that this work defies traditional reading approaches, the challenge would be to simultaneously demonstrate an understanding of the significance and careful production of these passages while also laughing at any efforts (including your own) to reconstruct the text as something fully understandable and approachable. Once you manage that, the exciting part of this project would be to find all the ways in which this book is more than a book--it's an art project and a performance piece and it takes advantage of the print medium in ways in which we have just started taking advantage of the electronic medium. It would also lead to an exciting reflection on the early business of print and all the work involved in setting words/images/spaces on a page.
- Themes and tropes: trace at least one theme going through the novel (really. I dare you.)
