I love mediating on signs from nature. Lately, along the river trail I often walk, ducks are flapping and quacking and pairing up. Ducks have to do with helping us untangle our own emotions and live with greater emotional grace and comfort.Exploring the character emotional development at both the scene level and the overall story level allows for us as writers to explore our own emotions and the development of our emotional maturity both as writers and as people.Let's face it -- writing brings …
How to Write a Great Scene
Q:What are some steps a writer can take to create a good scene?A:The first draft is about getting the story down on paper. As you write this first draft, you may find yourself more comfortable “telling” the story in narrative or internal monologue. Even so, every chance you can, attempt to write moment-by-moment scenes using movement and action to convey or “show” the story rather than simply “tell” the story.The more you practice writing in scene, the easier and more automatic the task becomes …
Plot for Memoir Writers
Q: Memoir writers think they know the plot because they already know “what happened.” Can you talk about this issue a bit—is that way of thinking useful or should they revise their attitude toward plot.A: Plot embodies quite a bit more than more than just what happens in the memoir or a sum of the events.Plot is how the events in the story of your life directly impact the main character or the protagonist, in other words, you.Always, in the best-written memoirs, the protagonist is emotionally …
Why Bother Grasping Plot Concepts?
Q: Writers grow a little pale when thinking about plot. They feel constrained about the idea of thinking about plot, they don’t quite understand what it is and why it’s important. So my first question is to have you define plot, and tell us why a writer needs to understand why they need to grasp the concepts and skills of plot for their novel, memoir, screenplay.A: Let me begin by saying that plot and structure are not constraining. Plot and structure actually give a writer the form and …
Goals for You and for Your Characters
Successful writers establish long-term writing goals for themselves and long-term story goals for their protagonists and then set out to complete a series of short-term goals they believe will move them and their characters to success. Goal setting is not always as simple as it sounds. In teaching plot and from the plot consulting work with writers all over the world, I have found that self-professed “pansters” balk at setting goals for both their protagonists and themselves. If you are a …
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