Why “FractalPast”?

I get asked from time to time why I call my business and my website “FractalPast”? A fractal is a mathematical concept, a geometry that comprises “a never-ending pattern.” According to the Fractal Foundation, “Fractals are infinitely complex patterns that are self-similar across different scales.” At every level of magnification, in other words, a fractal repeats itself in the same pattern. YouTube videos of fractal patterns can either relax or drive you mad—either way Pink Floyd on the turntable may be necessary.

​Nature is full of fractals. Perhaps the most familiar is the tree, whose recurring features repeat themselves at scale: the trunk and branches of the leaf, the trunk and branches of the branch, the trunk and branches of the tree itself. Watersheds, mountain ranges, and coastlines are all fractals: the same patterns repeat themselves at every level of magnification and every level of perception.
 
Fractals help me think about narrative. Like fractals, the stories we tell convey their meaning at every level of magnification.

Thank about how you scale—compress or expand—your story to any purpose in which you may find yourself. Some of these tellings are formal, such as when you rehearse a response in an interview to the question “Tell me about yourself.” Likewise, you may have a practiced answer to such a question on a first date, though undoubtedly emphasizing different aspects of who you believe yourself to be. You select and scale your answer: any one of us could easily fill hours of uninterrupted talking about ourself, but your date will surely end poorly if you do that. In each of these scenarios, one must select out of the infinite moments of one’s life the one or two incidents that best convey the themes we wish to emphasize.
 
One must choose, which means one must select and scale. If you know someone who is an adept storyteller, or joke teller, you know someone who has developed this capacity to scale and select narratives, on the fly.
 
If, on the other hand, you had a full book to tell the story of yourself, say in an autobiography, you would likely emphasize much more detail, go into much more depth on certain points, and aim for a fuller story. Same story, but told at a radically different scale, undoubtedly resulting in substantially different points of emphasis. At that scale, the story of yourself would look very much different from the previous scenarios. You would be called on to exercise a great deal of control over multiple themes lest the story spin out of control.
 
Now consider the ways in which a similarly-scaled medium can reveal different narratives. Consider a book, say three hundred pages, about the life of George Washington (the exercise works with any example). Such a book would go into much detail over his childhood, his youth, and other aspects of his development, in addition to his military and political careers. You would learn about his family, about what molded his character, about his virtues and vices. Much time could be spent on his personal affairs, his romances, and his ownership of slaves. All of this would illuminate his perhaps better-known military and political careers.
 
Now consider a book of exactly the same length, but which focused exclusively on his military career, George Washington as military commander. This book would have but little space for background on Washington’s youth, perhaps contained to an introduction. Much more space would be given to his strategic and tactical proclivities and his understanding of what warfare meant and how to conduct it. His personal virtues and vices may serve as background to that story, but a much different foreground would be disclosed.
 
Now consider yet another book, still of the same length, but focusing solely on one battle, the battle of Trenton, say. Such a book would examine in granular detail all aspects of Washington’s leadership at this one battle, examining his use of troops, his use of intelligence, his logistical planning, perhaps his relationship with his subordinates as well as the Continental Congress. We would learn about how this one battle influenced the larger course of the war, altered Washington’s approach to subsequent battles, and how it shaped perceptions of his generalship. There is, in fact such a book, and it comes in at over six hundred pages!
 
The scale—the size of the book—remains constant and provides a framework into which very, very different narratives can be shaped and molded. Just think about how different Washington would look if our three hundred page book focused exclusively on his ownership and use of enslaved persons.
 
Indeed, both the scale and the themes are scalable. One could write a two hundred page book on the entirety of the American Revolution, surveying not only the military conflict, but the political, ideological, and cultural development of revolutionary thought, as well as the legacy of the revolution. Likewise, one could write a six hundred page book on one battle of that war.
 
Narratives are fractals. Like the fractal, narratives are infinitely scalable and infinitely moldable to whatever purpose we choose. Whether we are writing a report, a memoir, a novel, a dissertation, or an advertising slogan, fiction, non-fiction, or some hybrid of the two, careful selection of scale and theme will provide a perfectly calibrated effect. Understanding how to shape, select, and scale a narrative is essential to success in this endeavor.
 
Writers must never forget that narratives are accommodating. We can adapt themes to meet a medium or alter a medium to best divulge a theme. Like fractals, narratives are scalable and flexible, and as such provide powerful tools for conveying meaning, that is, to move our readers.
 
The concept of the fractal helps me think about our stories, about the themes and ideas we want to convey in the telling, and how best to convey those stories in whatever medium we choose.
 
—David J. Snyder