The Place For My Writers Notes

Original posting 30 April 2010

Writer's Digest, October 2005, pages 27 to 31, had an article by James Scott Bell with the title, "Pull it together." The subtitle was rather long, "You don't have to start from scratch when determining the best framework for telling your tale. Here are five classic plot patterns that will give your novel good form." Maria Schneider wrote the introduction, comparing the plot to a pattern that pulls "all of the pieces together into some meaningful whole." A plot gives your novel structure and lets you focus your imagination on other parts of your writing.

The five plot descriptions are excerpted from Write Great Fiction: Plot & Structure by James Scott Bell. Quest, revenge, love, adventure, and one against. A little description, essentials, and structure. So let's take a look at one...

The quest:

"a hero goes out into the dark world and searches for something." Physical items, people, knowledge, anything and everything.

Essentials:

• The main character is someone who is incomplete in his ordinary world.
• the thing searched for must be of vital importance.
• there must be huge obstacles preventing the protagonist from gaining it.
• The quest should result in the protagonist becoming a different (usually better) person at the end. A fruitless quest may end in tragedy.

Structure:

• the lead character shows some inner deficiency that the quest will help to remedy.
• There are often a series of encounters, giving the plot an episodic feel. The character encounters setbacks, struggles to overcome them, moving step by step closer to the objective.
• the final act often has a major crisis or setback, with a discovery or major clue transforming or providing a revelation.
• "The quest is a powerful pattern because it mirrors our own journey through life. We encounter challenges, suffer setbacks and victories but move on."

Revenge:

Revenge is an old plot pattern. You killed one of mine, I will kill one of yours. An eye for an eye, heroic revenge. Revenge is emotional.

Essentials:

• the lead character should be sympathetic, because revenge is often violent.
• the wrong done to the lead that initiates things usually isn't his fault or is out of proportion.
• desire for revenge affects the inner life of the lead character.

Structure:

• Act I introduces the protagonist in his ordinary world. It's usually comfortable, making the violent disturbance sharper.
• the initiating incident is the wrong, breaking the ordinary world.
• following the wrong, the protagonist has a period of suffering, which helps the readers empathize.
• the wrong often occurs through betrayal by an ally, and may involve framing the protagonist unfairly.
• the protagonist needs to discover who did it and how they can punish them.
• the obvious motive is revenge, but the deeper motive is to restore order. To try to return to the ordinary world.
• Act II focuses on a series of confrontations, frustrating the protagonist by circumstances or opposition, leading up to an opportunity to punish the opponent. But the protagonist is defeated.
• achieving revenge can be satisfying, although sometimes sacrificing the desire for the greater good can restore the balance.
• revenge plots explore human nature. You need strong characters.

Love

Either one of the lovers is the protagonist, or you can have parallel plots with both lovers alternating. Winning love, or overcoming obstacles to love, there's always opposition. Rivals, family, etc.

Essentials

• one or two people have to be in love.
• something has to separate them.
• do they get back together or not?
• one or both of the lovers grows because of the conflict.

Structure

• the structure changes a little bit based on what kind of story you are telling.
• Act I may have the lovers meet for the first time, and one falls in love. Act II then becomes the struggle to convince the other to love them in return.
• Or Act I may have both of them falling in love, while Act II introduces something that forces them apart. The lovers struggle to get together against opposition.
• sometimes lovers hate each other when they first meet. Then the challenges of act two teach them to love.

Adventure

"Adventure stories are among the oldest in literature. They originally created a vicarious thrill for the listeners or readers, who were typically stuck in one physical location for life. These stories were also used to inspire and encourage acts of discovery for the benefit of the community."

Even with travel much easier now, most of us live predictable lives. So we still wonder, what if I went looking for adventure? These stories answer that. The core of an adventure story makes the reader wish they were the protagonist.

Essentials

• The protagonist sets out on a journey. There is no particular quest for an object, just a desire for an adventure.
•  There are encounters with interesting characters and circumstances.
• the protagonist usually gain some insight because of the adventures.

Structure

• Act I briefly introduces the life that's being left behind, and then the protagonist leaves in search of adventure.
• Act II often consists of a series of mini plots or adventures, with colorful characters and settings.
• the challenge of the adventure plot is avoiding simple episodic stories without any relationship.
• often the character change or reflection, the new understanding, ties it together

One against

"There are times when we must stand up for what we believe, even if most people are against us. This takes a lot of inner strength -- more than in most other plot patterns. We value reputation. The one-against story is powerful because the lead carries off that moral duty, and we admire him for it."

Essentials

• the protagonist embodies the moral code of the community.
• There's a threat to the community from the opposition, who is much stronger than the protagonist.
• the protagonist wins by inspiring the rest of the community.
• that inspiration may come through self-sacrifice.

Structure

• Act I presents the protagonist as hero. It also presents the threat by the opposition, or the declaration of their fight.
• Act II develops the conflict, with characters passionately committed.
• Act III is where the community stands up to the opposition.

"Plot patterns free up your writing. When you have structure, you can be more creative because you don't have to worry about having a cohesive plot."

Original posting 27 November 2007

Spinning Webs with Plot and Structure (25)

And just in time for 6x6, here comes chapter 12 of James Scott Bell's handy little book on Plot & Structure. What's so good about that? Well, chapter 12 is about plot patterns, which can be quite handy when you are trying to fill out a plot in a hurry.

Skipping lightly past the question of just how many basic patterns there are, with vexatious references to 36, 3, 20 and 7 as particular favorites, let's take a look at the patterns. You may also want to take a look at 20 Master Plots (see http://community.livejournal.com/writercises/47510.html for a list, or http://community.livejournal.com/writercises/tag/master+plots for a bunch of stuff) or perhaps the Writer's Journey (see http://community.livejournal.com/writercises/1390.html for a book review).

Bell starts out with the venerable and still widely used Quest. Our hero searches for something. The Lead needs something or is somehow incomplete in the ordinary world where they start. The thing they are searching for must be vital. And there need to be major obstacles to getting it. Usually the Lead changes significantly at the end.

The structure of the Quest is very straight forward. In the beginning, the Lead needs something and gets motivated to go look for it. The doorway of no return is where the Lead starts the Quest. Encounters, conflicts, and setbacks make up the middle. The second doorway is often a major crisis or set back and often involves some discovery or mayor clue. And the finale, the climax, revolves around finding the object of the search and learning the lesson of the search.

I think I'll skip lightly through the list of patterns that Bell describes. We all know these, and making up your own description of the fundamentals and the structure is good practice. Or you can buy the book. It's pretty good. So Bell also describes:

1. Revenge - they done him wrong, and now he is going to return the favor
2. Love - it takes two to tangle, and will these two do it?
3. Adventure - What a thrilling place to go, what a rollercoaster ride!
4. Chase - will they catch up or not? Who will win?
5. One against (I would call this Taking A Stand) - to dream the impossible dream
6. One Apart (aka the anti-hero) - the outsider
7. [Rise in] Power - from rags to riches, and what happens next
8. Allegory - don't take this literally (e.g. Animal Farm)

Are any of these unfamiliar? But the trick is to put your own characters in their own setting with their own goals, conflicts, etc. using the pattern as an underlying guide. Or perhaps mix a couple of them? For example, suppose one person is intent on their quest, while the other is busy with love. Oops!

That's chapter 12. I'd suggest two exercises. First, think about your favorite stories and novels, and make up your own list of your patterns. (These are a few of my favorite tales?) Second, pick out the bones of those patterns, perhaps in a one page summary.

Third, of course, (No one expects the Spanish Inquisition!) would be to do a short story based around one of those patterns, or perhaps combining two. You could do that for the 6x6 coming up!

And that's the short version of Chapter 12! Watch for chapter 13, common plot problems and what you can do about them, coming soon to a mailing list near you!

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