A quick overview of some of the elements of creative writing.
We’ll come back to “Difficult People” later. Right now, let’s look at four basic elements of creative writing. In this section, we’ll make a quick overview of some of the elements of creative writing, all of which will be covered in greater detail in later lessons. The overview will help you know what to look for when you read a short story and what to include when you write one.
Three of the key elements of plot will be discussed here: causes, connections, and conflict.
If your friend mentions to you that she went to a movie last night, you will likely say, “What was it about?” or “How was it?” What this probably means is, “What was the plot?&rduqo; or “What happened in it?&rduqo; If she were to say, “It was about war and people died,” that wouldn’t tell you much. But if she says, “It’s about a soldier who goes away to war and is wounded. He is sent home, but his fiancé can’t handle how he’s now crippled, and he can’t either, so . . .” then we’re getting into a plot with possibilities. Plot deals with such causes and connections.
A plot needs to be stated as one or more sentences. War is a concept or idea, but not a plot. “A soldier is wounded; his fiancé leaves him,” is a story or a series of events, but not necessarily a plot. But if you say, “A soldier is wounded, and because of this, his fiancé leaves him,” then you have a basic plot—events connected and related. The interconnectedness provides meaning and interest and moves the story out of the realm of randomness. Real life sometimes seems random, and we sometimes can’t make connections or figure out why something happens; but in literature, we like meaning and connection.
You’ve probably heard the idea that nearly all literature can be classified as either man vs. man, man vs. nature, or man vs. self. This is pretty accurate, and it illustrates the point that conflict is an essential element in creative writing—a story generally deals with man vs. something. Through such conflict, the characters feel and display emotion and take actions that try to resolve the conflict. It’s these emotions and actions that interest the reader.
We will discuss more about conflict in a later lesson, but for now, take my word for it: Conflict is essential in your writing. Without it, the reader finishes and asks, “So what?” There will be more about plot in unit 2.
Since two later lessons deal at length with characterization, we’ll be brief here. Robert Newton Peck, an established author, wrote a book about how to write fiction. His title says it all: Fiction is Folks. By this, Mr. Peck means that while fiction is potentially lots of things, it’s most importantly about “folks”—people, characters, actors and reactors, heroes and villains, superstars and average Joes.
Think of characters you’ve read about like Huck Finn, Harry Potter, or Bilbo Baggins (The Hobbit). Unless you have quite recently read the stories these characters appear in, you probably couldn’t tell me too many specific things that they did. But don’t you feel that you know them? I’d even suggest that once you’ve read the novels these characters starred in, you will never forget them. Of course, a plot is necessary to bring these characters to us, but what we remember longer than the plot is the person. There will be more about characterization in units 3 and 8.
The single most important way a reader learns about characters is to “listen” to them talk. Let the readers “eavesdrop” as in the following example:
Two boys are on a hillside where a ditch crosses a slide area. They’ve climbed up on a flume and are throwing rocks down to the road below. Look at how much you can learn about one of the boys just by listening to a few sentences of dialogue between the two.
The sound of a vehicle stopped our throwing. Even before it came into sight, I recognized the growl of Thomas Henry’s old truck, heading back from town. Edward suddenly crouched down.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Don’t want my dad to see me,” he whispered.
Not that anybody would see us anyway, we were so high above the road. “Why not? And why are you whispering?”
“Might be mad. My dad—he might be mad.”
“About what?”
“About climbing the flume.”
“Why would he?”
“Don’t know. Just might.”
It was strange. Edward crouched on the ditch bank until the truck was clear out of sight up by our house.
Do you get the idea that there’s a story here? That the relationship between Edward and his dad is potentially interesting? In just a few sentences of dialogue, Edward revealed something interesting to us, and it may make us want to know more. What is there between the two that would make him fearful of being seen by his dad even when he could give no reason for it?
Of course, the author could have saved space and merely said something like this: “Edward was afraid of his dad.” But that comes across as a fact, rather than as a story. It doesn’t get our interest in the same way as when we pick up clues by “eavesdropping” on characters talking. We’ll learn more about dialogue in unit 4.
Tone is matching the message to the words used to convey it. Here’s a negative example that makes it pretty easy to understand. Think of calling your dog in your kind, dog-calling voice. But instead of saying, “Here, Doggy! Here, Doggy! Come on, boy! Here’s your dog chow!’ you say—in the same sweet voice—“You rotten, miserable cur! Come here, you pestilential old stenchbag!”