General Story Writing Principles

Exposition §

• Exposition pertains to the facts that the audience needs to know to follow and comprehend the story.

• Good Exposition is Invisible.

• Show Don’t Tell - Never force words into a character’s mouth to tell the audience about exposition. Rather, dramatize exposition by showing natural scenes that indirectly pass along the necessary facts.

  • Rationale: Humans do not spout exposition for no reason. They should have a common sense understanding of their own world. Characters do not tell other characters what they both should already know.
  • Rationale: Respect the audience’s intelligence.
  • Dramatized exposition serves two purposes:
    • To further the conflict of the story
    • To convey information.

• Convert Exposition to Ammunition - let characters use what they know in their struggle to get what they want.

• Parse Out exposition:

  • Never include anything the audience can reasonably and easily assume has happened
  • Never pass on exposition unless the missing fact would cause confusion.
  • Keep interest by withholding information except that which is absolutely necessary.
  • Reveal only that exposition the audience absolutely needs and wants to know and no more.

• Pace the exposition: Least important facts first. Applicable especially to characters — no one starts off by telling their darkest secrets.

• Exposition will not fix a story that has little to no conflict.

Variants §

• Powerful revelations come from the Backstory of characters — previous significant events in the lives of the characters that the writer can reveal at critical moments to create turning points.
• Flashbacks
  • Dramatize flashbacks — treat the flashback as a scene. Write it as a scene.
  • Use only when necessary — do not bring flashbacks until you have created in the audience the need to desire and know.
• Dream Sequences disguise an objective truth with metaphors derived from the unconscious. They are to be avoided because:
  • They do not matter to the overall plot.
  • They still tell the information rather than showing it. Actions in a dream sequence do not matter.
• Montages - rapidly cut images that radically condenses or expands time. They are to be avoided since they are “telling” while wrapping it in flashy effects.
• Narrations - can serve as counterpoint to the story. However, use them appropriately. Do not simply bore the audience with the narrator telling the exposition.

Challenges in Writing §

Problem: Keeping the Audience Interested §

• Appeal to intellectual curiosity — keep the audience wondering what will happen next.

• Appeal to emotional concern — keep the audience invested in the characters and the story values at stake. Appeal to the audience empathizing with the characters, and the (positive) values they have.

• Some techniques. All involve controlling the knowledge of the audience relative to the characters.

  • Mystery - the audience knows less than the characters. Create but conceal exposition to arouse curiosity.
  • Suspense - the audience and characters know the same information. The audience moves along with the characters as they progress to the story. This appeals to both concern and curiosity.
  • Dramatic Irony - the audience knows more than the characters. This appeals solely to concern as the audience dreads what the characters are about to experience. Curiosity is now rooted in understanding the subtexts.

• Beware: If the reward for audience concentration becomes a sudden subversion of expectations, the audience will feel frustrated.

  • False Mystery - a counterfeit curiosity caused by concealment of fact. This suggests a lack of exposition.
  • Cheap Surprise - a sudden surprise that disrupts narrative flow, but because of a lack of exposition.

Problem: Keeping the Audience Surprised §

• Leaning to Tropes are fine. Leaning to Cliches is not.
• Audiences want to be surprised. Do not write scenes that play out the same way the audiences expect them to play out.. Fulfill the promise but not in the way they expect.
• True Surprise springs from the sudden revelation of the Gap between expectation and result. It is followed by a rush of insight into the subtext. “There is more to the story than what is seen.”

Problem: Coincidences §

• Coincidences are the enemy of meaning in story. At the same time, coincidences are a part of life.
• Solution: Dramatize how coincidences enter life meaninglessly, but in time gain meaning.
  • First, bring coincidence in early to allow time to build meaning out of it.
    • Pointless coincidences are those that influence a scene, but which is never later addressed or reflected on by the characters.
    • Do not use coincidence beyond the midpoint of the telling. As the story progresses, it should be determined by the characters.
  • Second, never use coincidence to turn an ending. Never use Deus Ex Machina.
    • Deus Ex Machina erases all meaning because the story was resolved by coincidence rather than by the characters.
    • Exception: If the meaning of the film is that Life is Absurd, then coincidences can resolve the endings in service of this theme.

Problem: Comedy §

• The root of comedy is frustrated idealism — we want the world to be perfect, but humans will find some way to ruin this. Comedy is an angry, antisocial art.
• Comedy works only when the audience laughs. When a society cannot ridicule and criticize its institutions, it cannot laugh.
• Comedy allows the writer to pause the narrative drive and interpolate a scene that serves no purpose?
• Comedy tolerates coincidences and deus ex machina if …
  • The audience is made to feel the protagonist has suffered enormously
  • The protagonist never loses hope.
• Make the audience laugh by illustrating the gap between expectation and reality. Use comic surprise rather than cheap gags.

Problem: POV §

• Point of View pertains to the physical angle we take to describe the scene.
• Point of View affects empathy and emotion.
  • If the POV follows a character, the audience will tend to empathize with that character.
  • If the POV follows the whole set piece, the focus will be on the set piece, not the characters.
• The more time spent with a character, the more empathy as a result of witnessing his choices.

Problem: Adaptation §

• Remember: The medium of a work is important in conveying its message. Adapting from one medium to another is not easy.
• Adaptation should take into account the strengths and weaknesses of the medium.
• Adaptation demands a willingness to reinvent. Keep to the spirit of the original, but reinvent how it is told.

Problem: Melodrama §

• Nothing humans do in and of itself is melodramatic. Drama is not melodramatic, it is human
• Melodrama is not the result of overexpression but under motivation; not writing too big but writing with too little desire.
• Melodrama is rooted in a dissonance between motivation and action.

Problem: Plot Holes §

• Plot holes are logical gaps in the story which makes it lose credibility.
• One fix is to fill in the plot hole with another scene, however this is awkward because it serves no other purpose.
• Another way is to ask: “Will the audience even notice the plot hole?”
  • If the audience notices, another approach is expose the hole and deny it is a hole “Things just happen. Don’t worry about it..”

Description §

For Visual Media §

• Prioritize the visuals. Descriptions are almost unnecessary.
• If describing what needs to be put on screen, do not use metaphors and similes that cannot be rendered on screen.

For Text §

• To write vividly, avoid generic nouns and verbs with generic adjectives and adverbs attached. Favor the actual name of the thing instead for the description to stand out
• Avoid the phrase “There is … / We see / hear”. Use active voice. Advice here applies.

Imagery and Poetry §

• A poetic text is one that has enhanced expressivity.
• Poetry involves not describing the literal reality, but through imagery which connotes images that represent the literal reality.
• An image system is a strategy of motifs that repeats in sensation with great variation and subtlety throughout the story. Image systems are subtle to increase the depth and complexity of aesthetic emotion.
  • We may make use of existing imagery (external) or use a usually mundane piece of imagery given new life (internal)
• Symbols move us as long as we don’t recognize them as symbols>

Links §

• McKee
  • Ch. 15 - Exposition
  • Ch. 16 - Various Problems and Solutions to Writing
  • Ch. 18 - On Text