Writing from the Inside Out (13 page)

After I have the important plot points (as few as three, five, or eight, and potentially more), I put together at least three subplots within each main point. I will also want to mine the material generated in previous marathons. (Even a single phrase could become a key subplot later in the book.) For example, I might have written about a ring. Is there a peculiar energy I associated with my description of the ring? Maybe it is important to the book. When writing continually, I usually do not keep track of where I have been. The page is generous, and rereading brings surprises.

Any one given subplot might not be active within each main plot point (otherwise it might grow to compete with the main plot), but each subplot point will recur at least once in the book, so for each subplot point, be sure to find points when it can recur. For example, regarding the ring I wrote about, perhaps the ring's owner is later discovered. Perhaps the ring had been made from someone else's wedding band.

I am most interested in the subplot points, which is why I spend most of my time with them. Not all books are — or want to be — hero's tales, but my writing has certainly benefited from familiarity with the working of this archetype.

 

 

Narratives hold the reader's attention in essentially two ways:

through mystery and suspense.

mystery
encourages the listener to lean toward the
past
for resolution

suspense
invites the listener to anticipate the
future
for the dispersing of tension

I can utilize either or both. If I hit a snag during a marathon, I can turn to this exercise. I'll pull something from recent memory within the story's plot and use it as a structural device. For example, let's say I am writing during the marathon and, at this point, my two main characters (Alfonso and Beatrice) are sitting in their car…

To create the structural tension of mystery, ask questions, but don't give the reader the information he needs to solve the mystery. For example, maybe Alfonso mistakes something about the car, and Beatrice is alarmed, because she is concerned that Alfonso has been stealing cars, or she wishes they had a better car, which raises money issues, and Beatrice thinks about her gambling addiction, convinced that the reason she has lost so much money is that the casino is against her…

To create suspense, continually raise the stakes for the protagonist. Allow the protagonist some success, but then create more problems for her. For whatever reason, as readers, we want our protagonists to suffer. Using the above example, let's say that Alfonso is at a stoplight sending a text message, and the light has turned green, and Beatrice knows not only that he has no license, but also that there is a copious amount of cannabis in the trunk and that the grey car behind them seems to be ready to turn on its red and blue lights…

 

 

If viewed from a certain distance, any given person could be summed up by a figuration. It's an example of irony: I'm reading a story in which a character seems to be completely expressible within the already-understood description of a
type
. Reading, I understand that the character, as conveyed, is a real breathing individual, and yet, he's being conveyed as a type. Trimming off the individual aspects of a person can be funny, and, for sure, can impart some of the mystery of knowing someone.

How the characters are treated in a story raises the question of the narrator's relation to them. I learn something about the narrator when what I know of the characters revolves around one or two of their traits. Think of the characters in Woody Allen's films. His films feature one great (cutting) line after another. The way his characters squeeze themselves into figures sheds some light on actual human experience. Figuration is insightful shortsightedness.

If you've not seen his film
Midnight in Paris
, I won't be spoiling it for you to mention that several characters surrounding the protagonist serve as a constant antagonizing force. These characters repeatedly act in abstracted ways, which comes off as extreme — yet, they also accurately express how it feels to be in the main character's position. When it's right, figuration allows a greater contrast of energy and emotional force to play out.

Figuration is good when it encourages attentiveness to characters as they evolve. In general, character is that elusive thing most readers prize when reading a creative work. And character is what, as a writer, I seek to express by spending my time and energy producing work in my own way.

What distinguishes an authentic character has to do with how his/her details do not add up to anyone else's story. Instead, the authentic character, the individual, rises above externally imposed shaping. When an individual works to live what really amounts to someone else's life — or the life he imagines is supported by society — he's working to become a figure, which amounts to a removal from his personal energies the challenge of living true to intuition. An individual's identity is always beyond what can be characterized; at the same time, when I'm telling a story, I hope to try.

Suggestions are often made to writers that they should know everything about their characters. I should be able to list what my characters had for breakfast, describe their homes, and give a survey of the important occurrences in their pasts. Although some of this information is certainly useful — and is often helpful for conveying the eccentricities of real people — I would never suggest that these exercises are the right way to go about understanding someone. I could spend years learning about someone's belongings and would only have uncovered a greater mystery. (This idea is explored wonderfully in Robert Boswell's book
The Half-Known World
.)

It is possible to work both ways — to construct characters from figures (by letting them breathe in ways that do not fit with their service to the story), and to construct figures from characters (by summing them up: “She was the sort of woman who prided herself on how quietly she sipped her soup”). The right way depends largely on what you want the speaker's relationship to be with the story's world and with the characters within that world. Some stories want every character to be developed, and other stories want only figures. Usually, there is a mix of both, and the choice often has to do with how you want to pace your story, fast (cutting) or slow (dramatic).

If the narrator is omniscient, knowing everything about the main players, what does the narrator do with that information? How does it affect the tone? How do I want it to affect the tone?

If the narrator is not omniscient, what is being expressed by his/her relationship to the other characters (or figures) as conveyed to the reader?

Is the reader felt to be a character (known intimately) or a figure (known, perhaps, as a projection)?

Is there anything unknown that is necessary to conveying his/ her humanity? Am I supplying characterizations in excess of what conveys a real human being?