Diagramming Babel (Part 13)

Diagram 13. A simple one this week. This is another charting-out of the entire novel. From bottom to top:

PROLOGUE
“King Dragon & “Scythe”

Babel

1/11

ALCYONE

Tuf

N&E

etc.

N&E

Annotations:

“King Dragon” and “The Word That Sings the Scythe,” both already written, have been reduced to prologue. Will has reached Babel and the story can begin.

Alcyone – note that her name appears in a dark cloud; Will could have fallen in love with a much less difficult woman – appears and disappears almost flightily. Small wonder her emblematic beast is the hippogriff.

I know what "1/11" means, but I'm not about to tell. As for "Tuf" . . . no idea. Maybe it's 7up? Nobody envies me my handwriting.

N&E – Nat and Esme– decisively disappear for an extended length of time. (This will become “Lord Weary’s Empire,” which I think of as Will’s Adventures Underground.) And later reappear equally abruptly and emphatically. This is so typical of each of them. "Hi, I'm back! Allow me to dominate your life until I decide to disappear again!" Thank God nobody's like this in real life.

That backwards-L shaped thingie with the squared-off hook at the top of the plot represents the ending. It's pretty much set in stone by now.

And . . .

I'm off to Philcon! Monday's post will be about the Necronomicon string quartet. I'm not kidding you.