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The Evils of Exposition
October 24, 2013
One of the enemies of interesting writing is exposition. We’re all guilty of it. At times, we need to provide backstory. The question is not only how we put this across, but how much we ask the reader to indulge us.
Let’s start with a basic premise: Bob is a sixty-seven year old widower who lives alone. His wife recently died and Bob is having trouble adjusting. This isn’t the story itself, though. The actual story is about Bob suspecting his charming young neighbour might be a serial killer, and Bob’s growing obsession to prove whether that’s the case. But, of course, we do need to set the scene of who Bob is.
So, let’s begin …
- Bob came home. The emptiness of the house confronted him. He grabbed a beer from the fridge and sank into the recliner. It was so quiet.
It hadn’t always been this way, of course. Once the house had been full of laughter and love and warmth. Bob remembered when he and Gloria had first bought the house forty-two years ago. Then there’d been the kids and lots of memories, good and bad. But now Gloria was gone. Bob couldn’t believe it. Gloria had died – a heart attack as she’d been baking scones. She’d collapsed and as Bob had held her in his hands, he’d called paramedics, but by the time they’d arrived it was too late. She was gone. Bob had cried over her body. He hadn’t wanted to let her go. The paramedics had to coax him clear. The kids, now fully-grown, had arrived and eased him away …
The first paragraph is simple enough: a man comes home and we know immediately that the house is empty and quiet. Even the act of getting a beer could be construed either as a habit or a method of coping. The twenty-six words in the first paragraph are hardly Hemmingway, but they do set the scene effectively.
The second paragraph is the evil exposition. As an aside, this is a brief example. Lots of writers – even established authors – will digress into reams of it to arm the reader with all the information they need to navigate the way through the rest of their story.
There are some nice moments in the second paragraph, but there are also opportunities to have explored Bob’s backstory evocatively, instead of just telling the reader about it.
Think about other ways we could’ve learned about Bob. There are easy methods, e.g. pictures of Bob, Gloria, the kids and grandkids might litter the mantel. Or Bob might begin to call to Gloria, to tell her he’s home, simply because it’s a habit that’s been ingrained over a marriage of forty-two years. We’re told Gloria died while baking scones; perhaps Bob feels trepidation when he goes into the kitchen, or when he faces the spot where she died.
The other thing worth considering – and a very important one at that, too – is we don’t need to know everything at once. Sometimes, as writers, we’re so immersed with our own cleverness, or to get our story out as quickly as possible, that we dump every bit of information we have on our readers. Here, these two paragraphs give us the length of Bob’s marriage, Gloria’s death, the means of her death, Bob’s heartbreak, the fact that Bob lives alone, that he has kids and they’re now full-grown, and on this list goes. But does the reader need to know all this as of yesterday?
Alternatively, this information could be seeded throughout the course of the story. We might toy with the reader, and tease the possibility that Bob lives alone – ah, so maybe he’s a crotchety old bachelor. But in a discussion with a neighbour, he might reveal he was married. Another mystery – Bob was married, but what happened to the marriage? Perhaps we paint him as a likely divorcee. Bob might feel a chill and quickening heartbeat whenever he goes into the kitchen and we might leave the reader with just that titbit. It’s intriguing – a hook. Later, we might fill out the details. One of Bob’s kids might show up and talk about Gloria’s death on the kitchen floor. We continue to fill out Bob’s history but do it in a way that’s interesting and evocative, instead of simply telling the reader everything. It also builds the mood and the characters, and does so while we continue to tell the rest of the story about the charming young neighbour possibly being a serial killer.
Exposition is a necessary evil at times, but it doesn’t have to become unwieldy. Think about how you intend to share any backstory.
LZ.
Finding the Right Path.
October 17, 2013
Last week, we talked about putting your characters through hell.
There’s something else you also need to do: be stingy with them.
A pitfall many writers fall into is handing their characters – particularly their protagonists – everything they need to traverse their story. Let’s use the simplest example – when characters are undertaking a journey, like a hero’s quest.
Here’s a basic plot: Bobalob is a fifteen-year-old villager. An evil warlord comes to the province. Bobalob finds out he is the heir to an ancient king, and thus he is capable of great magic and wielding a mighty sword, which transforms him into an undefeatable warrior. He goes out to meet the evil warlord.
How does that sound? Interesting?
The premise might be: the archetypal good versus evil. But look at how easily everything else happens. Everything Bobalob needs for his undertaking is handed to him. He hasn’t had to work for any of it. There’s no character development, no arc. We never see (or experience) what it would require of Bobalob to learn magic or to learn how to wield a sword or to deal with this responsibility of facing an evil warlord.
Think about any skill you’ve developed. Did it occur instantaneously? If you wanted to play tennis, did you just pick up a racquet and become a champion immediately? Or was it something you had to practice frequently, suffering setbacks along the way, all the while learning about how you could improve? Was there somebody you initially couldn’t beat, who might’ve in fact beaten you regularly, until you got good enough to triumph? How did that feel to finally achieve that victory?
Characters should undergo similar transformations. We need to see progress, missteps, stumbles, so even if they’re trying to master something with which we can’t possibly have any empathy – e.g. learning magic, flying a spaceship, becoming a super-spy – we can at least empathise with their efforts. We all know what it’s like to strive for something, to struggle, the frustrations that come along with it (often we might want to give up), and the exultation when we succeed.
Nobody is instantaneously elite at anything they do. Even prodigies have to work to master their talents. So why should your characters have it any easier? Giving them everything they need is boring storytelling and it undermines any dramatic tension you might otherwise be trying to sustain. And the character undergoes no evolution. It’s a Before and After shot, with none of the in-between – and, in this case, the in-between is the interesting stuff.
You might think this seems applicable only to extraordinary adventures, but it remains applicable regardless. Whatever your story is about, don’t just hand your characters what they need. Make them struggle. So even if it’s something as simple as somebody wanting to know something about their partner, or trying to find out whether their child was truant, or whether their best friend has a problem, or whatever the case might be, make them earn it.
This doesn’t mean everything has to be some long-winded melodramatic travail. But don’t just hand things over.
LZ.
To Hell and Back.
October 11, 2013
I had an author – a lovely old woman – who churned out a couple of historical romance novels yearly. Her writing was good and her voice engaging. The only problem was that the characters would always get together within the first twenty-five pages. The rest of the books (another sixty thousand words or so in each book) involved the minutiae of the characters’ everyday lives, e.g. decorating the house, going on picnics, shopping, and that sort of thing.
I would tell this author that once the characters were together, the story was effectively over. This was the point where the last line should – in fairy tale speak – figuratively read, ‘And they lived happily ever after.’ The drama and captivation (of the story) should come from all the obstacles the characters had to overcome to get to this point. I cited Jane Austen as an example: Austen’s romances feature nothing but obstacles for the protagonists. That’s what hooks readers, builds their interest, and has them rooting for the characters. Once the characters get together, it’s over. Destination reached. My author, however, responded that she couldn’t bear to keep her characters apart.
It’s natural that we become attached to our characters. As we write, we get to know them; they endear themselves to us. Sometimes, they’ll surprise us, or even charm us. And, in doing so, they seduce us. We grow to love them as if they were real people. Their travails occupy our minds and, some times, because they mean so much to us, we decide to take it easy on them.
But easy is boring.
Our characters need to be pushed through hell – kicking and screaming (well, in our own heads at least) if required. Compelling storytelling comes through the journeys our characters undertake. Nobody’s interested in a story of a protagonist who wakes up to save the world and not only remains unchanging throughout, but triumphs with aplomb whenever faced with adversity. Nor is it interesting if a protagonist is going through any sort of upheaval which doesn’t push their boundaries.
We all have things that go in our lives. The question – as morbid as it can seem – is when does that become interesting? If somebody tells you they broke a nail or stubbed their toe, it’s mildly amusing – an anecdote that you’ll most likely forget. If they tell you they broke a nail, the finger got infected, they ran a fever, were kept awake the night with chills, they braved through it despite having to go to work the next day, the infection got into their heart, they collapsed, an ambulance rushed them to a hospital and a defibrillator was required to revive them, well, that’s interesting. That’s a story we’d probably want to hear, and one we’ll likely remember and even possibly retell.
The only thing we need to be mindful of is keeping everything in context. Don’t stack up problems for the sake of stacking. Issues themselves should both be logically constructed and have their own arcs. There’s no point writing a story about a character coming home to find their partner in bed with the neighbour, getting a phone call from their boss telling them they’re fired, and the bank sending a note that their foreclosing the mortgage, just for the sake of all these things happening. Find validation for pushing them to extremes. Find purpose in the turmoil, (even if it’s only purpose for your own justification).
Logically (and just as an example), the character might come home for lunch and find their partner in bed with the neighbour. They might go out to the local and get drunk, thus being late back for work, so the boss sacks them. Short of salary that week, they might miss a final payment to the bank, which results in the mortgage being foreclosed. There’s a logic in what’s occurring now, a causality. Now it’s up to the character to either spiral further out of control or to address these issues, (and, at some point, they will need to address things).
Think about your characters. Have you gone soft on them? Don’t let them fool you. Mistreat them. They might not like it, you might hate it, but your writing will be happier for it.
LZ.
Coping.
October 3, 2013
All of us face tumultuous times in our lives. It might be the death of a loved one, the break-up of a relationship, or the loss of a job. Whatever the case, there are always upheavals.
Sometimes, these events can be difficult to process. It’s not just the impact of the trauma, but making sense of the repercussions. The loss of a job, for example, might have financial implications that relate to the well-being of our families, as well as our basic ability to function in everyday society and pay bills everybody else would grumble about but take for granted.
Everybody deals with issues differently. Some charge ahead, without giving themselves time to think, accept, and reconcile what’s gone on. Instead, they bury it deep somewhere where it can bubble away until they’re ready to deal with it – if at all. If you believe in new age gurus and the like, unresolved feelings can manifest into physical ailments.
Others switch off, if not shut out the world, or medicate to dull pain – whether that’s medicating through drugs or alcohol, or even eating, or some other binge behaviour (e.g. shopping). This isn’t so much about coping but desensitizing. The pain remains. We just dampen it until we get used to it.
Few of us truly learn to deal with setbacks, to assimilate them into our lives, and to move on. It’s just not something we’re taught, either by family or in schools. So we stumble, put ourselves back together as we best can, and move on – or at least try to resume moving forward. For many of us, moving forward equates with equilibrium being restored, even though it might not have been.
Art – in any form – is something that allows us try to make sense of what we’re feeling. The reason for this is there’s no wrong or right to the outcome. It’s not like a mathematical calculation, which can have only one right answer. Stories can take any evolution to get to their destination; poets are often flaunting the rules; and painters can be indifferent to precision (as in reproduction) as long as their work captures what they’re feeling.
Put twenty people in a room and tell them all to draw the same black cat, and you’ll get twenty different black cats. Ask them to describe that same room, and there’ll be twenty different interpretations. We all think differently, view the world differently, and express ourselves differently. We are unique and no matter how similar two people can be – consider identical twins – they never are.
When you do face problems in your life, art is a perfect way to explore what you’re feeling and to try to make sense of it all. Art can deal with abstracts and help conceptualise them into manageable (or at least understandable) commodities. Moreover, art can help us find our way, to deconstruct our turmoil and reconstruct it into something we assimilate and accept into our lives. Nothing else works on quite the same level.
Next time you face a setback and are wondering how to cope with it, give art a try.
To that end, Busybird will also be hosting a Creative Arts workshop beginning Tuesday 8th October. The workshop will run for eight weeks, with three hours per session, and explore your relationship to stories through different mediums – painting, drawing, sculpting, journaling and collage – with a qualified art therapist. Feel free to email or phone us with any queries or bookings, or you can book via Eventbrite by clicking here.
LZ.
Adaptation
September 26, 2013
It’s interesting to note changes that are applied when books are adapted for the screen.
Usually, some of these changes are a result of condensation. A novel might have four hundred pages to tell a story, and has the opportunity to be languorous, teasing subplots and drawing on an ensemble of characters. An adaptation might decide to collapse some of these subplots, e.g. an adaptation character might assimilate the arcs of two (or more) characters from a book.
In JRR Tolkien’s The Fellowship of the Ring, the Elflord Glorfindel meets Aragorn and the Hobbits on Weathertop after Frodo is stabbed. Following this, Glorfindel doesn’t feature much more in the story. He’s there to demonstrate the futility of power in the battle of the Ring. In the movie, Glorfindel is cut entirely. Elrond’s daughter, Arwen – Aragorn’s beloved – takes his role, which serves to introduce her as a character (in the books she barely figures) and also furthers the relationship subplot between her and Aragorn.
Conversely – and usually as a matter of a expediency – sometimes subplots are eliminated entirely. In Peter Benchley’s Jaws, oceanographer Matt Hooper actually has an affair with Chief Brody’s wife, Ellen, resulting in tension between Hooper and Brody when they go to sea to hunt the shark. No such subplot in the movie.
Some changes would seem a result of largesse, as if the filmmaker is trying to wrest some ownership over the source material. I’m sure their counter would be that the changes are essential, a way of interpreting the book that the material otherwise did not allow them. An interesting (although almost impossible exercise) would be to see how two different people interpreted the same material for the screen.
But screenwriting – as an art-form, (even if lots of Hollywood movies today are about as far removed from art, and form that matter, as possible) – is an exacting taskmaster where you’re required to work within strict and (in some regards) restrictive parameters.
A great example of the differences is introspection. In a book, your character can think about what’s happened. Back-story can be introduced simply by memory. In fact, sometimes writers get carried away with the freedom to digress and provide all the information required to arm the reader with as much knowledge as they need to navigate their way through the story.
How do you communicate the same information in a film? The easiest answer is voiceover. A voiceover allows a character to tell the viewer everything they need to know. An alternative is a text crawl, e.g. think of the Star Wars franchise, and how the stories are set up by the scrolling text at the beginning of each film. But these are almost cop-outs. Narration is descried in screenwriting, while a text crawl – ironically – relies on providing information the same way a book would.
Whilst an adaptation can remain faithful in many ways, in others logistically it’s impossible. Some adaptations suffer from a failure of translation. Others excel. Some (few) are better, belying the catchcry of, ‘The book’s always better.’ Probably most of the of the time. But not always.
Think about something you’ve written (or are writing), and how it would work as a film. Given the opportunity, how would you translate it? A conversation between two or more characters that unfolds over ten pages might be captivating in a book, but ask an audience to sit through ten (or even five) minutes of conversation, and most are likely to switch off.
How about a scene where your protagonist breaks up with their partner and stays heartbroken in bed for two weeks? In a book, you can accomplish this in a couple of sentences. But how would you relay the same information (and same passage of time) in film?
Adaptation is an interesting exercise, and can actually help develop your filter for tight writing.
LZ.