The Place For My Writers Notes

Originally posted 14 August 2007

Plodding Bewilderingly Through Plot and Structure (12)

So having almost forgotten to do this last week, where are we? Aha, chapter 5, middles. Those come after beginnings and I'm sure you're surprised to know they come before the ending. So what's filling the middle? Scenes! Scenes that stretch the tension, raise the stakes, keep readers worried, and build towards the climax in a way that seems inevitable, unrelenting, and remorseless. Actually Plot & Structure by James Scott Bell only has inevitable -- I added the other two. There's more detail coming up in Chapter 7, but this chapter focuses on the big picture.

Bell starts with death. Physical death, psychological death, and professional death. Action stories frequently have literal physical death hovering around the corner or down in the basement. But even coming-of-age stories often focus on a reason to live. Psychological loss -- the little death inside of us -- drives many great plots. Professional death, the loss of work, the meaninglessness of work, the professional duties -- the work world also drives many a plot.

A key to keeping the middle lively is a good opposition. Bell recommends a person, and even if it is a group pick a spokesperson who leads the opposition. Finally, make the opposition stronger than the lead character. Make the reader worry that the sympathetic character is going to be squashed. The other key point is to take time to figure out why the opposition character wants to stop the lead character, and what's good about the opposition character. You need to have empathy or emotional understanding even when the opposition character is a thoroughgoing melodramatic villain.

Now one of the important ingredients in a confrontation between your opposition and your lead character is adhesive -- glue. If the lead character can simply walk away and still achieve their objective, the reader may ask why they don't just ignore that stupid idiot. So you need a strong relationship or circumstance that holds the people together. Some other books talk about this as the crucible that forces the characters together. The lead needs to have a good strong reason to keep going and stick around. You have to figure out why the lead and the opposition can't withdraw from the action. The long middle then becomes various scenes of confrontation, mostly ending with setbacks for your lead forcing him or her to analyze the situation again and take some other action toward the objective. Some suggestions about glue:

1. Life-and-death. If the opposition has strong enough reason to kill, that's superglue. Staying alive is an automatic goal for most of us.
2. Professional duty. Lawyers, police, military people have duties that keep them involved even if they don't want to be.
3. Moral duty. When a child is kidnapped, the parents don't stop to count the cost and neither do nearby people.
4. Obsessions are strong glue.
5. Physical locations -- if no one can get off the island or escape the boat, then they have to face each other.

Okay. So that's the start of chapter 5, talking about the middles. We'll be looking at threats and opposition, and how you keep the opposition and the lead character together despite their ongoing confrontations. So next time we'll look at action, reaction, and more action -- ARM yourself!

And don't forget, write.
tin
k (oops, slipped)