Leonard Cohen's Advice for Novice OSR Referees
Leonard Cohen's How To Speak Poetry (1978) speaks to a time when the public performance of poetry was transforming into what Marc Smith would call "slam poetry" some six years later. Poetry and fantasy roleplaying alike quickly evolved in the following decades, but I see parallels in Cohen's "old school" approach to poetry reading and the advice my friends and I dispense to rookie referees and players of more modern editions who don't know what to expect. Let's examine a few passages and see what we can glean.
The Sympathetic DM vs. The Dispassionate Referee
Think of the words as science, not as art. They are a report. You are speaking before a meeting of the Explorers' Club of the National Geographic Society. These people know all the risks of mountain climbing. They honour you by taking this for granted. If you rub their faces in it that is an insult to their hospitality. Tell them about the height of the mountain, the equipment you used, be specific about the surfaces and the time it took to scale it.
Mountain climbing and dungeon delving are both dangerous affairs in their own right; simply surviving is impressive enough. In our storytelling, the temptation to soften circumstances through deux ex machina, or to embellish an encounter, to move the "cool thing over there" to right here where it might be more convenient, that pressure to perform is everpresent. One of the hallmarks of old school play is the objectivity of the information as one presents it. We're masters of nothing here; only the presenters of the world's truths as they appear. Cohen expands elsewhere to say "the poem is nothing but information," and a dungeon room or difficult trap might benefit from the same emotional distance.
Doing the Voice When You're Already Hoarse
You've watched so much Critical Role or Dimension 20, and now you want to run your first table. Only problem: you're not a voice actor, you have no public speaking experience, and your anxiety meds aren't strong enough to cover a fantastical hobbit performance in your friend's living room. Well, you're certainly not alone, and the entertainment you are watching on your phone or television is as unrelated to the game you're playing as Hamlet's theatrical sonnets are to the simple and somber descriptions of a typical poet. Cohen (and I) much prefer the latter:
Speak the words with the exact precision with which you would check out a laundry list. Do not become emotional about the lace blouse. Do not get a hard-on when you say panties. Do not get all shivery just because of the towel. The sheets should not provoke a dreamy expression about the eyes. There is no need to weep into the handkerchief. The socks are not there to remind you of strange and distant voyages. It is just your laundry. It is just your clothes. Don't peep through them. Just wear them.
There's plenty to unpack here, but the chief takeaway is: you don't have to execute a theatrical performance, you just have to show up with a dungeon you've at least skimmed, tell your friends how much you appreciate their patience and enthusiasm, and apologise in advance for not coddling them if they mess around and get their characters blown up, smushed, or charred to bits.
Furthermore, those events aren't metaphors for real life events, aren't holdovers from yesterday's argument, aren't symbolic of some greater personal failure. Mistakes happen, and actions have consequences. There's no need to convey some higher meaning, or to walk back the ramifications of an action because the player is really, really nice. It's gonna happen! So everyone needs to relax, and be able to laugh at our hobby's little absurdities. This holds double when you've written something just for your table:
This is an interior landscape. It is inside. It is private. Respect the privacy of the material. These pieces were written in silence. The courage of the play is to speak them. The discipline of the play is not to violate them... You are students of discipline. Do not act out the words. The words die when you act them out, they wither, and we are left with nothing but your ambition.
Acknowledge that what you're doing is tricky. You are portraying the world. Just being able to make yourself and your thoughts vulnerable is so tough, and dungeon writing is often a form of self expression that can get a bit personal if we are not careful. It's an exhausting, cathartic discipline; so do what you can to make it gentler on yourself (not easier; no copouts!) as you flex and build those creative muscles.
Take It Easy, Mountain Climber
Finally, Cohen's best advice, I think, is not to be Matt Mercer or Brennan Lee Mulligan or anyone else but yourself, and to not expect anything more of yourself or your audience than what you each can give:
Do not work the audience for gasps and sighs. If you are worthy of gasps and sighs it will not be from your appreciation of the event but from theirs. It will be in the statistics and not the trembling of the voice or the cutting of the air with your hands. It will be in the data and the quiet organization of your presence.
Perhaps eventually you'll find a "Voice" or two, some props or mannerisms. Inside jokes will form, serious moments will happen, and you'll find your table immersed in a fantasy world of your own making. Just, please, don't force it. Have fun, get to know the game and your feelings about it, and avoid the contrivances of others; you're sure to develop plenty of contrivances of your own.
I'll leave you with Cohen's last piece of advice, the one I need to heed the most myself: run the game when you're spent, and let the joy of your friends and your creativity fill your cup. Let this game rejuvenate you instead of draining you.
Avoid the flourish. Do not be afraid to be weak. Do not be ashamed to be tired. You look good when you're tired. You look like you could go on forever. Now come into my arms. You are the image of my beauty.