Archive for 2011
In the previous post, I said that to create convincing characters, the writer must first understand what motivates the people she or he is creating. This means that the writer must understand what moves the actions of his or her characters. The term “actions” in this context refers to plot — though it bears repeating […]
Read More
Characterization is a presentation of the personality of the people who populate a story. Characterization is primarily a depiction of motivation and motive. The reader must understand what makes the characters act in the way that those characters do. It’s been said that one of the truest tests of good literature is when you can […]
Read More
[Note: I’ve updated this post and changed the dialogue example] In Part 1 of this post, I mentioned that a fictional character is shaped by his or her words and actions, and that for this reason, plot and dialogue are the sine-qua-non of character development. The following, then, taken from an actual book (written in […]
Read More
If plot is the skeleton — that vital framework upon which the rest of the body is built — then characters are the soul. Characters are the reason we ultimately love or hate a story. “I’m sick to death of the inarticulate hero,” said John Fowles. “To hell with the inarticulate.” Characterization is in essence […]
Read More
Stories are important because human beings are conceptual. This among other things means that humans survive by use of their reasoning brains. Humans evolved neither the balls of bulls, nor the trunks of elephants, nor the claws of bears, nor the necks of giraffes, but the brains of Homo sapiens, with a capacity to think. […]
Read More
If you want to rivet readers, you must give readers something to worry about. Make the reader nervous. Make her feel intrigued. Make her curious. This issue, which is very closely associated with plot, is called suspense. Suspense is when your eyes are nailed to the screen. It’s when you’re coming out of your seat. […]
Read More
The fact is, I did not eat every day during that period of my life. Said the surrealist Andre Breton, explaining the possible provenance of some of his strange and early literature. They rowed her in across the rolling foam — The cruel, crawling foam — to her grave beside the sea. Wrote the English […]
Read More
There are 32 ways to write a story, and I’ve used every one, but there’s only one plot: things are not what they seem. – Jim Thompson. Anthony Burgess was slightly less stringent on possible plots: he put the number at about five. What distinguishes one plot from another? Or, to put that question more […]
Read More
Plot is a vehicle. It is the method by which you present your story. Plot is a purposeful sequence of events. In a well-plotted story, those events connect logically, culminating in a specific goal, or climax. “Life is an unceasing sequence of individual actions.” Said Ludwig von Mises. That is true. Plot is similar, but […]
Read More
(c)Ray Harvey 2011