Plot is Conflict

When we sit down in front of the computer screen to write a story we think of plot. Consciously or not, we think of plot. Plot can be defined as the series of events, chronologically arranged, that make up a story. This last week as I took a break from school I read an excellent chapter on a little book titled “The Art of Fiction,” by Ayn Rand. The chapter in question “The Plot-Theme,” deals with plot and how the apprentice writer should go about structuring (plotting) his stories. She argues that plot is conflict. A series of chronologically arranged events don’t constitute a story worth anything. Plot is conflict. When we sit down to write a story we should ask ourselves something like: “how am I going to plot the conflict of this story,” as opposed to “how am I going to plot this story.”

This realization (plot = conflict) is crucial in my understanding of how to construct a story. It’s amazing how a simple word can provide a totally better perception of things. It is like that scene in Shrek where he tries to explain to donkey the nature of an ogre by using an onion as an analogy. (I hope you can understand what I’m trying to say).

For me plot was a series of events chronologically arranged. So, when I sat down to write a story I just had to think of the events that will make up that story. Not anymore. Now I think about plot as conflict. The next time I sit down to write a story I will think about events that make up the conflict of my story. Ayn Rand says: “To appreciate what makes a good plot situation, you must identify not only a character’s specific purpose, but also all the conflicts that this purpose necessarily engenders.” In other words you must come up with all the necessary scenes that will lead to the central conflict of your story. She suggests: “Before you construct a story, you must decide on the central conflict, which will then serve as the standard telling you have to include in order to fully develop this conflict, and what is superfluous.”

Another word that can help you understand the nature of plot and conflict is action. Action equals conflict. A literary equation would be. Plot = conflict = action. In other words write meaningful scenes for your story. Scenes that will lead to the main conflict in your story. Get rid of any scene/s that will not contribute to the main message of your story, and will not lead the reader to the main conflict.

 Check this book out by Ayn Rand:

This one is a classic by John Gardner: 

How many kinds of plots you think are there? 

The Importance of Conflict

Conflict is perhaps the most important ingredient in a story. Without it, the story is flat and lacks intensity. The difference between fiction and real life is that real life is boring. We do the same thing every day; we eat at the same time, we go to work, we talk to the same people, we watch the same TV shows, and we probably go to bed at the same time every night. I know what you are thinking, what about all the memoirs that are coming out lately? You are right. If you’ve had an interesting life so far I would encourage writing about it. Even in memoir, the reason they were written is because they have a good deal of conflict. In his excellent book Story in Literary Fiction, author William Coles says that “conflict can be physical, mental, or emotional. The action is presented by placing the reader in the scene or by narrative telling, and resolution involves a change in the character, either a reversal of some thought or trait in the character or the character’s recognition of something not understood before.”


Conflict is anything that will prevent the character from achieving his goal. In order to write a good story, we must have conflict in mind. Donald Mass says, “where there is conflict, there is rich soil to plant a story.” So how can you add conflict to your story? First, determine your protagonist’s goal, and then just start thinking about thing that will make things hard for him to achieve that goal. That simple.

Two books to check

David Benioff, City of Thieves, and Joe Hill 20th Century Ghost

                  

Style

This week I'll write about style as in grammar style. As you write your stories and novels you will acquire a personal style. In your early days you probably try to emulate your favorite authors hoping to discover your own. This is a good thing and I would encourage you to imitate your favorite writers as much as you can.

Discovering your own style is a long journey. It will take hours of writing before you can actually start noticing a particular form in your writing. I feel, after more than 5 years writing every single day that I’m now developing my own voice. I can think of many things that can help you find your own style; reading all kinds of genres and authors, writing in all kinds of styles and forms, and grammar. Yes, grammar. You are probably thinking: “What are you talking about?” That’s a given. Not necessarily. I write my stories in my first language Spanish. English still feels awkward to me even though I am writing this blog in English. I noticed that paying attention to a few grammar principles, my writing improved tremendously. I will share two principles that have improved my writing. These two principles are taken from the excellent book by Roy Peter Clark, Writing Tools: 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer.

1.              Order words for emphasis. Place words at the beginning of the sentences and at the end of a sentence or paragraph. Consider for example this sentence by Shakespeare: “The Queen, my lord, is dead.” That word dead at the end of the sentence resonates with special power.

2.              Watch those Adverbs. Use adverbs to change the meaning of a verb. At their best adverbs spicy up a verb. At their worst they express meaning already contain in it. Consider these two sentences.

I smile happily.

I smile sadly.

Which one works best? I think the second sentence as the word smile contains the meaning of happily.

Consider applying these two principles to your writing and start noticing how your writing changes dramatically. 

Check these two books: 

See if you can stand Irvine Welsh's style and use of grammar in his famous novel Trainspotting

Check Roy Peter Clark talks about one of his favorite tools: "Order Words For Emphasis."

Why You Need to Show and Tell

One of the first writing tips you’ll receive as an apprentice writer along with have your main character always want something is the show don’t tell advice. Show don’t tell? What does this mean? Basically it means that by showing you are creating a picture in the reader’s mind as oppose to just enumerating a bunch of facts about something. Because fiction’s main purpose is to create an imaginative world for the reader is necessary then that our writing is vivid and evocative rather than informative.

In his book, This Year You Write Your Novel, novelist Walter Mosley argues that the highest possible praise for the fiction writer is a complement like “the words came right up off the page.” He says that when the reader feels that he is actually experiencing the sensations and emotions, the life and atmosphere, the novelist is showing rather than just telling. He offers some good advice that all of us should consider when we are writing our stories:

            “It is often better if you use images and physical descriptions rather than mere informative language to present people, places, things, and events in your novel. To be told that someone is violent or seems to be violent is too general; the reader is left to come up with their own notions of Piggott based upon their personal experience with violence.”

Is telling a bad thing? Telling is a great and necessary element in your story. Am I supporting both then? Yes, I am. Telling creates a balance. You don’t want to write your entire story show-writing from beginning to end. You will tire your readers. They need to take a rest from all the action, and that’s when you tell-writing. Telling is necessary when you need to summarize, or create background for one of your characters. So, How do you choose when to show, and when to tell? I’ll borrow Alice LaPlante advice from her book Method and Madness. “Ideally, these two elements of writing are organically intertwined. That is, what we tell doesn’t just echo or repeat what we show. We use the two together to achieve whatever effect we want. When a section of “telling” can be eliminated without taking away from a creative work’s meaning, then by all means cut it, and allow the showing to carry the piece. But the opposite is also true: often we can tell something more efficiently, elegantly, beautifully, or subtly than we could hope to do if dramatazing it. in such cases, we should eliminate the dramatization, or scene, in favor of the narration.”

Now go write. 

Check out this two amazing books where you will find both; showing and telling equally balanced.

Junot Diaz The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

Jhumpa Lahiri, Interpreter of Maladies

Check this brief interview with Junot Diaz