Creative writing - Mike Sanders 2014
Constructing your story’s world
Potent setting
Character, setting, and types of stories
In this chapter
· Writing your own world
· Viewing setting as through a camera
· Creating atmosphere
· Using action to establish setting
In previous eras of literature, long descriptions of setting were often admired and respected, but most modern audiences want their stories to get to the action sooner. The same transition has taken place more quickly over the past few decades in mainstream film. However, don’t let these trends convince you to sell setting short or abandon it altogether. In fact, if you don’t use it wisely, you risk alienating or even losing your readers.
It helps if you think of setting as more of an exciting opportunity rather than a duty. Just as some plays can get away with almost no stage design or props, some narratives can get away with minimal setting. Yet consider how much information you glean from settings in your everyday life.
Imagine, for example, you’re going to a party at a house you’ve never visited before, given by people you don’t know well. You aren’t sure what to expect, and you’re a bit nervous. As you walk toward the house, you might look at the front lawn as you approach the house. Is there a fancy birdbath, a plastic kiddie pool, or pink flamingos? You’ll probably look at the house itself. Is it large or small? How many lights are on? Do you hear music and if so, what kind? By the time you ring the doorbell and/or saunter in, you already have a much better idea of what to expect, just from a fairly unconscious assessment of the setting. It makes you a bit more comfortable having some idea of where you’re going and what you’re walking into.
Setting does the same thing for readers of a narrative. The question is, how?
DEFINITION
The location, or locations, in which a narrative takes place is called the setting.
Thankfully, concrete base elements of setting exist:
· Location Are we on a football field or in a prison cell? In Berlin or in Tokyo? On Earth or in outer space?
· Time When is your narrative taking place?
· Historical time Is it the modern day, the seventeenth century, or some imagined past or future time?
· Seasonal time Is it autumn or spring?
· Daily time Is it morning or evening?
· Weather What’s the temperature like? Is it humid or arid? Is it raining, or is there only distant thunder?
You needn’t give your readers information about all these things in every narrative. Just include the ones that are most relevant—the ones that will communicate something useful and interesting (and perhaps symbolic) to your audience.
WATCH OUT!
Setting provides writers with a sometimes-overwhelming desire to describe things. So watch out for runaway adjectives and adverbs because too many of them will weaken your writing. You needn’t avoid them completely, but try to use strong, specific nouns and verbs whenever possible.
Constructing your story’s world
If you’re not going to set your story in the present time and in real-world locations, it’s usually best to come up with the basics of your own world before you move on to a narrative. Your environment affects your life, so your created world plays a crucial role in it. Simple.
Now for the hard part. Where does your setting begin? You might have a fantasy Earth, or an Earth-based world. You might decide your story takes place on another planet, on a spaceship, or under water. That’s the beginning.
What follows is deciding what the physical world is like: what do people build with, warm themselves with, wear for clothing? The type of world affects these things. You can’t easily get away with bonfires underwater, for example, so it’s not very likely that your characters use them in spiritual ceremonies—that is, unless you explain how your created world possesses different physical laws.
When you have a good idea what kind of world your narrative is takes place in, you can start looking at what inhabits the world. If yours is a slightly alternate version of Earth, are your animals the same ones found here? Or could they be mythological, something completely new, or a combination?
Keep in mind that realistic consideration plays into the most fantastic worlds. If, for example, you have three dozen kinds of fanged, claw-wielding monsters, be sure they plenty of prey. They opposite can be true, too. Think of all the deer that inhabit U.S. cities and suburbs. This is because humans hunted wolves to extinction in many areas, so the deer have no natural predators.
Just as important is the society that whatever advanced inhabitants have: government, law, the arts, recreation, education, religion, types of jobs, the economy, etc. Don’t worry, though. You won’t need to go into detail and explain all these things, but you will need to know the answer if the narrative calls for it.
To decide on the society, you’ll also have to determine the “when” of your world. Is it based on the Dark Ages? A far-distant super technological future?
I realize all these world-building variables I’m throwing at you can seem overwhelming. What many writers do is sit down with good ’ol pen and paper and draw a map of their world. How many continents are there? Or are there any? It’s not something that works for everyone, but it has proven useful for many published writers.
It’s amazing how much the layout of a map can inspire more story ideas than a single person could ever write in a lifetime—and how a map provides a lot of rules, too. If your characters are living on the coldest, highest peak of the most treacherous mountain range in the land, you can readily imagine the hardy folk you’re dealing with. Then, you can research societies in our own world to support them. Do your hardy, snow-dwelling people resemble the Norse, or are they more like Inuit? Note all the options and details you have.
IDEAS AND INSPIRATION
Don’t make your created world more complicated than necessary; stick with what you’re comfortable with. A lot of science fiction fans, for instance, know a lot about science, technology, and space, and they will take delight in pointing out your mistakes. The same is true of Civil War buffs and all manner of enthusiasts. So although you’re creating your own world, you can’t toss away all the rules. Stick to your own areas of knowledge, or conduct the necessary research to be sure knowledgeable readers will buy into the world you’ve created.
So go be creative, but remember that your readers are Earth dwellers like you who know the rules of this world better than any other. They’ll feel insulted if you try to throw out all the rules they’re used to without sufficient justification or explanation.