The Challenge of Description

Monday, October 26th, 2009

A few weeks ago I was working on a late scene in The Winds of Winter, and it wasn’t coming together. I was wondering whether I should introduce an element that Shazemar (a sorcerer, the main character) deals with in my imagination, but which I hadn’t written into the story so far.

Somewhat coincidentally, I came across the Story Structure posts at Storyfix.com, and decided as a result of reading them that, yes, I did need to introduce that element, because pacing in the late scenes demanded a turn in the story rather than merely the progression of foreseeable events. But if I don’t set this element up early, it feels forced and arbitrary when I work it into the late scene.

I also could improve the story if I structured the beginning so that it posed more questions not immediately answered.

Both of these things indicate that I need to add material to the beginning.

Currently, Shazemar’s introduction is some ways in. The introductory scene is good. I wish I could move it right after “The Incantation of the Dragoness,” the opening scene, but both the action and the plot-significant remarks in it can’t happen any earlier.  And I need to cover some of what Shazemar’s up to before. So I need a new scene.

Thing is, Shazemar’s introduction is the scene that presently contains the ‘who are the (west) Debroans?’ material — the descriptions that give some idea of who they are, as a race and as a culture. The character description in this scene is in two blocks: first, of the group that’s travelling, so you get a general idea of the Debroans; then later of Shazemar as an individual. So it’s broken up. I don’t have one long chunk of description that makes the reader’s eyes glaze over because it’s too much to assimilate at once.

I tried writing a new earlier scene in which Shazemar is alone, and I’ve been having a problem with it. My description of Shazemar as an individual is good, but it doesn’t have adequate cultural cues, and I’m having a hard time working them in, because it makes the description too long. In my experience, you can ask people to focus on 3-4 elements of a description to form an impression. But if you start adding more than that, you have more an inventory than an image: the mind doesn’t form a coherent impression of so many items. I haven’t successfully licked this problem in this new scene.

I have an idea for a different approach to it, which I’m going to start on now. We’ll see if it works.

On other matters:

I still have more root canal work to be done, and I have a sinus infection. I will be updating, but not very efficiently. Look for a new section of Sigurd this week.

Next post will probably be about cultural cues in description. (Actually, the next post in the series turned out to be about first impressions in description).

Tags: cultural cues, description, story structure, Writing
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Story Structure

Sunday, August 30th, 2009

I got hung up while writing the next scene of my fantasy poem Dragon Winter. I think it’s necessary for continuity, but dramatically it was falling flat. I wasn’t sure why. I think I may have a handle on it, now, however.

I was idly reading Genreality (recommended for writers) when I came across a post briefly discussing author Larry Brooks’ Story Structure series, which begins, on his own Storyfix blog, with an article titled “Story Structure — Just Possibly the Holy Grail of Storytelling.”

Brooks discusses the structure of screenplays and novels; he uses concepts and some terminology often applied to the former. Some of this isn’t new to me: I’ve read it before. But the typical three act structure concepts of ‘rising action,’ ‘turning point,’ and ‘falling action’ do nothing for me. Neither did Syd Field’s stuff, last time I looked at it. I understand the ideas in theory, but in practice they’ve never generated a single concrete thought about any story I was trying to write.

Brooks doesn’t explain his concepts in the same way. Instead of talking about rising and falling action, he discusses the dramatic milestones in terms of information presented — what do the reader or the hero know, and when do they learn it?  That does map to the way I think about plot and presentation, so I stayed up very late Friday night reading the whole series and taking notes. I’ve spent today contemplating the application of Brooks’ principles to Dragon Winter, and making an outline of how my existing scenes map to the crucial points he discusses. It’s been highly educational, if mildly dismaying.

The middle of Dragon Winter is structurally OK.

The first half probably needs significant revision, for a couple of reasons:

1. My characters pulled a fast one on me. It’s only in writing the last scene I finished, well past the halfway point of the story, that I realized that the male main character and the female main character are betrothed. I wish they’d tell me these things earlier, darn it.
2. I actually hit a fair number of the points Brooks mentioned for the early part of the story, but not all, and they’re not necessarily in order. With the new relationship between the main characters, I can see how putting them in order and developing the missing stuff would strengthen the story.

There are a couple of scenes that I’ll need to chop up and rewrite, but most of the revision should be adding new material. I’m blanching a bit at the idea of revising, because I’ve been working on this story for so long already.

I’m probably going to keep writing forward from here, although I may go back and work on earlier scenes before I get to the end of the story if I have a particular idea for a new scene, or if I need time to distance myself from a later scene.

I don’t think all good short stories follow Brooks’ whole pattern (he’s talking about novels and screenplays, not shorts), but Dragon Winter is elaborate enough that it possibly will, and possibly should. I’m not going to swear to it. But I think I see in what way pulling closer to the pattern would improve the beginning of the story. And I think that not being consciously aware of the whole pattern — but knowing that something was wrong — is what’s been giving me trouble with these scenes at the end.

I’ve done a lot of work and a lot of learning over the past couple of weeks. I’m optimistic.

Tags: Dragon Winter, Genreality, Larry Brooks, story structure, Storyfix
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