What happens through the bulk of a scene is not really something which can be easily taught, because, as I mentioned earlier, the bulk of a scene relies heavily on other aspects of writing. However, there is one aspect of a scene which belongs in its own category, which is how the scene ends. You might think that how a scene ends is just as difficult to generalize as what happens in the scene, but in fact there are only four possible ways for a scene to end, all in relation to a character’s goals in the scene. The four results are: “Yes”, “Yes, but…”, “No”, and “No, and furthermore…”.
Essentially, there four possibilities depend on two aspects of the scene. The first is whether or not the characters achieve their goals. Obviously, if they do, then the scene ends in a “Yes” or “Yes, but…”, and if the don’t, then the scene ends with a “No”, or “No, and furthermore…”. However, there is another difference between these endings, depending on whether or not the characters actions have resulted in some other consequence which they must now react to. If the characters are not forced to react, then the answer is a straight “Yes” or “No”, and if something occurs which the characters must respond to, the scene ending is a “Yes, but…” or “No, and furthermore…”. Read more…
Writing a story is often a balancing act. Good writers are always aware of these balances, so that they can use them actively. One such balance I have examined is between scene and sequel. Another balance that I want to turn to now lies between timeline and plot. I want to start with the more basic of these notions, the timeline.
Some of what I will be recounting is taken from E. M. Forster’s excellent lectures which are complied in his work, Aspects of the Novel (you can find a mostly complete copy here), which I am currently reading. However, he calls what I will be talking about “the story”. Because I like to use that word in a more general sense, and because I think the word timeline suits my purposes here better, I will use it instead. The timeline is simply the sequence of events that occur in the story. I mean this as literally as possible, simply the different things that happen, connected by an “and then” all the way to the final scene. For example, “Anna got up, then she took a shower, then she ate breakfast, she went to the store, she came home, played with her dog…” and so on and so forth. Read more…
Having already discussed sequels, I want to talk a little about their counterparts, scenes. The simple definition of a scene is the part of the story where the “action” of the story takes place. That said, this doesn’t really tell us much. In particular, we need to know what kind of action actually makes a scene a scene. Sequels can contain action, just like scenes can, but they have other defining qualities that set them apart. The question is whether there is a similar way to distinguish scenes from the rest of a story. If anything, I would argue that scenes, considered broadly, contain a particular kind of action, where characters pursue the goals they established in the previous sequel.
Scenes themselves are not really subject to many problems, but they are often greatly affected by other aspects of a story, such as pacing and motivation. The only severe problem has to do with the essence of a scene, the goals of characters. One of two things can go wrong with a goal. First, the writer can fail to actually give their characters goals to pursue. This sounds really basic, I know, but every writer falls victim to this occasionally, including myself. I also think that this is often the cause of writer’s block. When a writer feels blocked by a story, it is usually because they don’t know what their characters should do next. The only way to solve this problem is to get to know your characters better so you understand what is at stake for them in the story. Read more…
