I have recently been asked to write a reply to this question to writers: Which is more important, strong characters, great plot twists, or epic settings?
My immediate response was that it should be characters, of course. Unless you can identify with the characters and feel some empathy with them, why would you be bothered about what happens to them? And both as reader and writer I would go along with this. As a reader, if I don't like any of the characters in a book I lose interest in what happens to them, which surely can't be the aim of the writer? Currently it seems to be quite trendy for books to have an "unreliable narrator", which I find maddening. If I have spent most of the book feeling empathy with this character, to find out at the end that he or she is actually a thoroughly nasty piece of work makes me feel cheated, and as if I've wasted my time feeling sorry for them.
And as a writer I like to feel I know the characters really well, and ideally empathise with them, before I can start telling their story. They have to feel real to me, or why would they feel real to anyone else? Having said that, at times I've come up with a plot before finding the characters to tell it, and I know PD James always said she had to have the setting in her head before she could start a story. So I guess it's all subjective.
When I mentioned this Blog to my husband, he immediately said, "Plot, of course!" And that made me think. Up to a point he is right. A story with brilliant characters but no decent plot would be pretty useless, especially if it was a story for children. Children really need a good plot to get them involved and keep them there - though I'd argue that the characters still need to be strong to keep them interested. Admittedly Enid Blyton's characters were somewhat cardboard, but it was her plots that kept children going back and back to her books. And I'm sure J K Rowling's amazing plots would still be compelling even if we weren't rooting for Harry, Hermione and Ron.
So as a general rule it would seem that character and plots are both important.
I then began to consider settings - "epic settings", as the question said. I'm not sure what exactly makes an "epic setting" - it sounds as if it should be some amazing place that would look well on the big screen as a Blockbuster, but maybe that wasn't what the questioner intended. Places like that don't appeal to me as a reader, but maybe they do to a child? I believe the important thing about the setting is that it should encourage readers to lose themselves in another world. When I was growing up I became so immersed in the worlds of Anne of Green Gables, set on Prince Edward Island in Canada,
Malcolm Saville's Lone Pine Five, set in and around the Long Mynd in Shropshire,
the stage of Sadlers Wells and the wilds of misty Northumberland in Lorna Hill's books, that I felt I knew them as well as I knew my home. And they were far more exciting!
Again, Enid Blyton knew her market: The Castle of Adventure, The Island of Adventure, The Mountain of Adventure etc. - all these settings encourage children to believe themselves there.
Similarly, as an adult reader I know which settings most appeal to me. I'm always interested in books set in Cornwall, the west country and Scotland, all of which I know and which inspire my imagination. Further afield I am also inspired by books set in places I know a little, though sometimes I find a book about some place of which I know nothing but which really calls to me, which means the writer has really brought the place to life on the page for me. Similarly children, who have not necessarily travelled widely, have to rely on their own imaginations to take them to the worlds they read about. So it is here that the writer's power has no bounds: sometimes places they only know via their imagination retain their magic for years.
So I've come to the conclusion that all three of these elements are really important when telling a story. What do others think?
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5 comments:
It's a topic endlessly fascinating to writers, I think, Lynne!
Personally, I think character and plot are neck and neck, with setting a close second.
Doesn't plot dictate character, to a large extent? You invent/find/create characters to tell the story you want to tell.
But then, characters push and change the plot -- and plot pushes back. It's really hard to draw a line between character and plot. Both have to be involving.
For me, setting isn't as important, but it is important. 'In Space, no one can hear you scream.' - And no one can come to your rescue either. You're all alone, trapped inside the ship's tiny capsule with a monster -- while outside is nothing but the vast, indifferent emptiness of space. 'Alien' wouldn't have been the same if set in Swindon.
I agree with Susan but, looking at it the other way round, if any of the three fail then I usually won't be able to finish the book. Characters definitely matter most to me, but occasionally I can read a book with cardboard characters and crazy plot just for the setting. The best example would be Erskine Childers' The Riddle of the Sands, which must have one of the finest evocations of place of any novel, yet has (to me anyway) unconvincing characters and an unbelievable plot.
Thank you for your comments, Susan and Paul - which just goes to prove that there's no right or wrong way to look at this question, it's just whichever suits you best. (And the thought of "Alien" set in Swindon gives the whole importance of setting a different twist!)
Perhaps if two out of the three come over strongly, the book will work for a reader?
I'd say I'm fonder of an interesting setting and a good plot, rather than strongly and deeply investigated characters who go nowhere and where nothing happens - but that's just my reaction for this moment, today, and another time I'd go for characters . .
So why am I trying to get one character's motivation exactly right so I can understand why he does something dastardly?
Intriguing question, Lynne.
Thanks, Penny - good luck with the motivation!
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