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I might have mentioned it before: I owe a lot of whatever I know about writing fiction to… Donald Duck. Reading Donald Duck taught me a lot about reading, writing, and writing fiction. Indeed, I learned to read and write before I went to school, thanks to Donald Duck.

My folks got bored of reading stories to me, so I had to figure it out myself. Then later, when I was maybe seven (memory is very thin ice when it comes to factual accuracy), I wrote my first fiction thanks to Donald Duck. You’ve likely read the story on the main Home for Fiction site:

One day, when I was perhaps seven years old, I read a Donald Duck mystery which was divided into two parts. The first one ended in a cliffhanger, and I sadly had no access to the second part. That was seriously devastating. I solved the problem the only way I could: I took pen and paper and wrote the ending the way I imagined it to be. Those three paragraphs were my first work of fiction.

Years passed. I’ve written a lot, I’ve read a lot, I’ve spent twelve years at the university studying and teaching literature, and overall I have a professional, high-level engagement with fiction.

Imagine my surprise when I realized Donald Duck had more to teach me about literature!

Rediscovering Donald Duck – and Fiction Lessons

Recently, for reasons beyond the scope of this post, I started reminiscing about Donald Duck – in the process I also rediscovered some other favorite comics of my childhood. Having a good memory is a superb gift for an author, and it also allows me to recall details in intricate ways. So, not only did I remember how it felt reading Donald Duck, I remembered plenty of practical details, too: From what stories involved to specific drawings and even dialogue.

This piqued my curiosity. In the internet era, could I find those old stories?

The answer was, of course, yes. I got myself a subscription for the Finnish version of Donald Duck, which has a brilliant archive going back to 1951. Every single story ever printed, with an efficient search engine – that allowed me to rediscover plenty of my childhood stories.

So I started to read; again.

And lessons about fiction started appearing; again.

What Donald Duck Is, as Fiction

I’m sure that analyzing Donald Duck from a critical perspective isn’t anything new. I bet there is plenty of academic research on comics in general and Donald Duck in particular. So, this is not what I’m referring to when I talk about Donald Duck teaching me still about fiction.

Nonetheless, we need some brief theoretical foundations, so let’s take a quick look at what a typical Donald Duck story is, as fiction. It doesn’t take much experience to identify certain elements that wouldn’t work in traditional novels.

• Poetic license turbocharged: When Donald and Fethry Duck are given permission by the Duckburg mayor to construct a metro station for the city, you know there’s not much wiggle room for factual, real-world-corresponding accuracy.
• Ambiguous fantasy and science-fiction borders. In a world where Magica De Spell casts a spell that is deflected by a contraption made by Gyro Gearloose, any kind of discussion about the ontological identity of either fantasy or science fiction is meaningless.
• Deus-ex-machina endings. You know my opinion on deus-ex-machina endings – or surprising-and-avoidable, as I call them in my own terminology. Again, Donald Duck fiction isn’t at all preoccupied by such things. After a gripping adventure of 50 pages, Uncle Scrooge’s Number One Dime is saved thanks to some random event that could be anything at all, from yet another secret Gyro contraption to alien intervention – taking the deus-ex-machina device (no pun intended) a bit too literally.
• Lack of Temporal Evolution. There are (though very rarely) new characters. There are also (again, very rarely) some insights into the past, perhaps explaining certain aspects of Donald Duck’s personality or history. But overall, nothing ever changes. This is the classical Superman problem, as explained by Umberto Eco: In the time span of one story, there is a clear closure; a new comic book brings with it an entirely new story, totally disconnected from the past events. Otherwise, the mythical superhero (or, in our case, Donald Duck) would portray an unacceptable mortality.

Yet, as I said, Donald Duck fiction isn’t at all preoccupied by such things. And still it works! And that’s where the lesson lies.

What Is the “System” of a Story, and Why It Matters

Continuing from Umberto Eco’s brilliant essay “The Myth of Superman” (you can find it in his The Role of the Reader: Explorations in the Semiotics of Texts), there is an important point regarding the suspension of disbelief. As Eco explains, reading Superman (or, again, in our case Donald Duck), requires the reader to acknowledge the destabilized temporality of the stories.

In other words, the “eternal present” state of the stories ceases to appear as such upon entering the system, that is, the world of the text in question.

In simpler words, still: Donald Duck fiction “works” if you immerse yourself in it.

Donald Duck stories precisely operate on the assumption that the reader enters the system. There is virtually no connection to real-life events (at least not in any but the most superficial or harmless manner), no symbolism, no existential allegories.

So, what does that tell us about writing? What did I learn, after all these years, from Donald Duck about fiction?

Placing Your Readers in a “System” Can Be a Way out of Trouble

In simpler terms: If, for whatever reason, you plan to write a novel that follows in Donald Duck’s steps – ergo, has no regard for issues like the ones I showed you earlier – you might get away with it if you make sure you place the reader securely in the system; the world of the novel.

That is not equivalent to “Oh, I’ll write such a steamy romance/gripping thriller that it will be immersive enough”.

Rather, the trick is to sever the connection with the outside world.

Genre fiction “works” (whichever way it does; beyond the scope of this post, but look at this) only insofar as it can succeed in creating a different, completely separate “universe” that is radically different from real life.

In plain terms: If you start embellishing a romance or a thriller with intricate contexts, existential agony, and allegories about our role in the universe, you’re asking for trouble.

Could it work? Maybe, particularly if you shifted it into something experimental. But it’s far more likely to become muddled. This is a virtual certainty if your aim is to simply stick to the genre.