TECH: Singing Plots? (Ye Moldie Oldie!)

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Original Posting March 6, 2014

Writer's Digest, August 2002, pages 24, 25, and 52 has an article by Wendy Blythe Gifford with the title "Make Your Plot Sing with Theme Music." The subtitle points out that "You're not writing the moral OF the story. You're writing the moral IN the story."

Gifford starts out by reminding us that "theme" often seems labored or didactic. However, she suggests "The theme (what the book is about) is the inner journey of the main character... The plot (what happens in the book) should be crafted to take the character on that journey. Change leads to choice that leads to change." External events mean characters have to make choices, which often leads to internal changes. The choices and those internal changes are the theme.

Most of the time, big changes mean big events. Why? Because we don't like to change. Calamities help push strong changes. But there are plenty of changes that can be catalysts. Change shakes up characters, and makes them think about their choices. But the events and the choices don't have to be melodramatic. Even small choices make changes. As a writer, you need to match the events and the choices with the length and nature of the inner journey of the character. You don't want characters overreacting, or missing making choices to match the events.

Take a character who is a driven, hard-working person. But one day they walk into work and the job is gone. What do they decide to do? Learn self-reliance, face their past, learn to trust other people? These will all lead to different kinds of stories, and different choices.

Learning lessons isn't a one time choice event. Basically, characters are going to try to fall back into their old routine, and you need to make that choice a disaster. And then give them another shot. What happens this time? You want the character and the readers to be unsure what the character is going to do, what they will choose.

Real life involves many lessons all the time. Fiction focuses on one lesson, creating unity in the story and consistency in the character. You want every major choice in the story to force your character to confront the core issue. "Throw the same choice at the character over and over, in different and escalating disguises." Frequently, other characters face the same decisions or at least parallel ones. However, secondary characters also can take opposite journeys, highlight one aspect of the main character's journey, or just take off on their own journey.

The genre themes -- love conquers all, justice triumphs, and so forth -- are not the individual story themes. Often, what the character learns supports the genre theme. For example, because the heroine learns to trust herself, love triumphs.

Gifford finishes by reminding us that this is a way. There are certainly exceptions. Some books are simply plot driven, with continuing characters who change relatively little. Sometimes you want to just make it up as you go (pantser) and you'll discover a theme as you confront a character with choices. You may want to think about theme, choices and changes, when you're revising.

In any case, don't write the moral of the story. Write the moral in the story.

There is a sidebar that suggests these points for a theme-driven plot:
-- Don't confuse a genre theme with your book's theme.
-- Focus on the one lesson your protagonist must learn during the book.
-- Create plot events that forced the character to choose between the old and the new belief.
-- Match the magnitude of the events to the distance of the inner journey.
-- Choose event strong enough to force your character to make new choices.
-- Create suspense about each choice and each outcome. The "right" choice may lead to a disastrous outcome.
-- Secondary characters have their own journeys. Be conscious of their effect on your plot.

So there you go. A theme by any other name? What lesson does the protagonist need to learn, and what will confront them with that lesson?

Write!

EXERCISE: What would your friend do?

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Original Posting March 7, 2014

Desire, blocks, and a character?

Here's a relatively simple exercise.

Start by thinking about something that you would like to do. Go on a trip, eat a gourmet meal, drink champagne, cure the common cold, dance with an elephant, talk with your dead grandmother, whatever your heart desires, write it down. Make it specific, concrete, as real as you can.

Next, make a list of the reasons you can't do it. No money, time, the neighbors would laugh, you don't know how to talk to dead people? What blocks you, what keeps you from doing it?

Finally, take a character in a setting like you, but different. Now let your friend -- your character is your friend, right? Anyway, let your friend have the same desire. You may want to add some more blocks and problems for your friend, if you like.

Now write up your friend sighing about wishing there was just some way to... And then setting out to do it, overcoming the blocks one by one, step by step, and enjoying that sweet reward... Or maybe not? Go on, dream about it. What does your friend want, how do they go about getting it or doing it, and what happens then?

You mean life with a zombie isn't much fun? Why, when I was your age...

Go on, write!