What is Split Realism?

What is Split Realism?

Split realism is a fictional technique in which characters experience a momentary or abrupt disconnection from ordinary reality due to overwhelming events physical, psychological, emotional or spiritual. Then the narrative continues, alters or ends. This split may happen  in two ways.

External split (e.g. magical or improbable phenomena).

Internal split (e.g. mistaken assumptions / identity or spiritual recourse).

Split triggers (awe, grief, fear, shock, or revelation).

The technique is not novel. However, what is novel about it is the specific use and mix up with magical realism. In magical realism fantastical elements coexist with aspects of ordinary everyday life. Otherwise, split realism captures a rupture in narration or perception of characters when facing moments of crises. Unlike magical realism the rupture is momentary, situational and resolved when the emotional or narrative shock ends.

A good distinguishing example is the movie, The Red Balloon, which follows the story of a Parisian boy who has a sentient balloon that has a close personal relationship with him. However, the interaction between boy and balloon is not momentary. And the balloon has no alternate view or belief to the boy’s own. The relationship between boy and balloon is not down to an abrupt event such as awe, grief, dread, shock, or prophecy.

In this brief essay, we define split realism to clarify what it is and why it differs from magical realism or similar. Split realism as the momentary withdrawal of a character from ordinary reality due to an unexpected event, action or speech that overwhelms. The reality splits between two or more persons or entities as a reaction.

The momentary nature of split realism implies resolution of the split is possible and swift when the causes of the split ends or clarification is available.

The withdrawal of the character can be either external in reaction to shock events or circumstances. The withdrawal can also be internal, into the personal assumptions or meanings of one character that differ from that of another character. We can illustrate this by giving examples of both magical and split realism.

Referee and the Tiger: External Split

Imagine the case expressed in three scenarios of a referee who goes to survey a field where he is booked to referee a game tomorrow evening. The empty pitch’s spotlights are on at 22:00 hours. From out of nowhere, he spots a full-grown tiger on the pitch ten metres away from him. First case: The man’s reaction is to become invisible and a strong noisy breeze breaks making it impossible for the tiger to track the referee by sight, smell or sound. Second case: instead of becoming invisible, the same breeze blows but there is a power blackout, and the pitch is in total darkness. In the first and second cases an improbable event occurred by magic or coincidence and the referee enters the safety of his car. Third case: the referee recites Ayatul Kursiy, Maha Mritunjaya or Psalm 91 from the holy scriptures and the tiger walks away. The third case is split realism because the referee withdraws into the hands of God who hears his prayer. He too enters his car unharmed.

Discovery With Grace: Magical but Momentary

In Nane’s story, Discovery with Grace, during a phone chat between the protagonist who lives in London and Grace, a female scientist based in Nigeria they fall in love. The rupture is the shock of love that overwhelms him; for several years he had lived a solitary and sexless life. The love and affinity between the two the reader can infer from a sentient and coloured fluid that flows out of the protagonist’s mobile phone. The fluid takes a tall oblong shape and reacts to comments the protagonist makes over the phone and he sees it. It is thus magical and stands for the affinity between the two new lovers who are 6,000 miles away from each other. The fluid is only active during phone calls between the lovers making it momentary.

Is My Name Okolo Too: Misunderstood Identity

In another of Nane’s stories, Is My Name Okolo Too, the unnamed protagonist receives a birthday card and gift from a female friend he had not seen for years. She addresses the card to Okolo with love xx. Okolo is not his name. The error comes from her assumption. Friends who visited the protagonist and her while the two were together had called him Okolo. Okolo is a name Pyrates address each other by. So, she thought it was his surname. The gift and card she intended as a surprise on her way from the airport, and she had no time to ask his full name. This is why she withdrew into the assumption of Okolo.

Logic of One: Grief-induced Existential Split

In the story Logic of One, the protagonist in a bar in Greenwich, London with his friend learns from a phone call his fiancé has died in a plane crash. He withdraws into an image of himself in the bar’s toilet mirror and explores the meaning of his life. He then gets another call that informs him his fiancé is alive, and her death was a case of mistaken identity. Despite his relief he returns to the mirror looking for another meaning to his life. The resolution came too soon and he searches for another rupture.

My Name Follows Me: Spiritual Consequence with Delayed Resolution

In the story, My Name Follows Me, Evo, a chartered accountant, finds that since he joined a University Campus Grown Fraternity, he has had a long streak of bad luck. The story tells of how the names initiates receive in desolates places often enables the spirits of dead people to take possession of their lives. The initiates receive names with anti-establishment bents, names like Smelly Penis, Ceaseless Prayer or Evo’s own fraternal name Erroneous Ledger – the reason he makes frequent and silly accounting mistakes. The christening and initiation are momentary. The deviation in the technique is until years later the resolution becomes possible by a change of name and the counsel of a former member who is now a world leading psychologist in the area of post cult rehabilitation. The outcome is ambiguous.

Conclusion

We thus conclude that the distinct aspects of split realism are momentary rupture, swift resolution with exceptions, and the responses to internal and external overwhelming. These criteria distinguish it from magical realism but overlaps between the two exist. Split realism may be a useful tool for analysing and framing fiction that deals with abrupt shifts in reality, external or internal.

In another article we shall explore aspects of split realism further.

Grimot Nane