Monthly Archives: January 2022

Show me don’t tell me.

I said, show me. So he did! — I said, show me. So they did!

The skilful use of body language to display character intent both in screenplays and novels is a necessary skill, since it forms part of the show-don’t-tell arsenal of techniques that makes writing visual.

Take the following snippet from my novelette, The Nostalgia of Time Travel.

To put you in the picture – Benjamin Vlahos, the protagonist of the story, watches an apparition, a version of himself, slumbering in a deckchair in his candlelit room while a cyclone approaches.

I could have written:

I stare at the slumbering figure intently. He seems pained, buffeted by raging nightmares. I can’t help but wonder about the extent of fear and regret tormenting him.

Pretty lame, right? Instead I wrote:

I study the ashen-faced man slumbering in front of me. His lips tremble. His eyes rage behind closed eyelids. His jaw grinds down on the bones of all the years.

This is better.

“Show don’t tell is one of the most powerful writing techniques in the writer’s toolkit.”

Although the body language centers around small actions, such as trembling lips and a grinding jaw, and throws in a metaphor to boot, it does a better job at conveying the tormented inner life of the sleeping figure. It obeys that much vaunted bit of advice of showing the reader the clues and letting her work out the emotion for herself, rather than handing it to her in a platter.

The use of body language to convey the inner state of a character is a powerful technique that helps to keep an audience or reader engaged in the story. It should always replace a spoon-fed description of a character’s emotions.

Summary

Use body language to describe a character’s inner life, and do so through the show don’t tell technique.

Catch my latest Youtube video by clicking in this link.

Tagline – how to use it in stories

The tagline captures the essence of Aladin.

A logline is a short pitch that sets up the story. It is intended to sell the story idea in just a sentence or two. A tagline is even shorter and is typically used to sell movies to an audience on a poster or billboard.

If the purpose of a logline is to attract interest in the story by creating the right expectation in agents, producers and the audiences, a tagline points to the specific emotions solicited by that story and may help the writer in the writing of the tale. Taglines are usually attached to film projects, but can also be applied to stories of any format, such as the paperback or kindle novel.

“A tagline exposes the emotional core of a story.”

Although usually written last as part of the marketing strategy, coming up with the tagline from the get-go can help the writer focus on the emotions through-line of the story.

From a technically perspective, taglines consist of three key elements: a repeating or punchy sentence structure and an element of contrast that solicits a specific emotion. Here are some of my favourite taglines:

‘Imagine if you had three wishes, three hopes, three dreams…and they all came true.’ Aladdin

‘In space, no one can hear you scream.’ Alien

‘Honour made him a man.
Courage made him a hero.
History made him a legend.’ Rob Roy

‘Someone said “Get a life” – so they did.’ Thelma And Louise

‘This is Benjamin…He’s a little worried about his future.’ The Graduate

‘A story of Love, Laughter and the Pursuit of Matrimony.’ Muriel’s Wedding

‘Don’t breathe. Don’t look back. The Dark Side of Nature.’ Twister

‘Everything is Suspect. Everyone for Sale. Nothing is what it seems.’ L.A. Confidential

Summary

A tagline highlights a specific emotion. It is used for marketing purposes but is also helpful in writing the story.

Catch my latest YouTube video by clicking on this link!

How to write gripping scenes

Hitchcock is a master of using gripping scenes to hold audiences captive.

IN a recent lecture on storytelling I was asked about how to write gripping scenes.

I find it helpful to organise the functions of scenes into separate layers. On one level a scene must showcase the hero’s actions such as a response to some challenge aimed against him. Actions fuel the so-called outer journey of the story—the plot.

But on an underlying level a scene ought to contribute to the hero’s inner journey. In other words, show how action arises from the values, beliefs, and background of the hero.

These layers make up a single dramatic unit—action and its motivation. But there is something else the writer can do in a scene to make it even more effective. The writer can offer the reader or audience more information than is available to the hero.

“One way to write gripping scenes is to reveal something dangerous your protagonist is unaware of.”

Suspense is ramped up if the hero is deprived of information available to the audience or readers. If the audience is aware that his wife is cheating on him with his best friend, or that there is a bomb in his car, or that his boss is planning to fire him, it generates tension which is partly dissipated only when the hero learns of this himself.

Hitchcock is a master of this technique. His films are studies of how to generate suspense by revealing to audiences things that the protagonist has yet to realise.

In my science fiction thriller, The Level, the protagonist, a man suffering from amnesia who is trying to escape from a derelict asylum, is unaware that he is being stalked by someone brandishing a meat clever, a man who bares him a grudge for some past offense. But the reader is, and this generates additional suspense for the protagonist with whom the reader identifies.

Not all scenes are candidates for this sort of treatment. Strategically chosen, however, this technique significantly ramps up tension that keeps readers and audiences engrossed.

Summary

Write gripping scenes by presenting well-motivated action. When appropriate, sprinkle such action with suspense.

Catch my latest YouTube video by clicking in this link!

How to structure emotion in stories

Structuring emotion in Othello. — The structure emotion in Othello.

This article explores how to structure emotion in stories.

I recently talked about how to avoid interrupting the creative impulse resulting from excessive preparation of a novel or screenplay. (To view, click here).

I suggested that for some writers knowing the protagonist’s obsessive desires is enough to get us writing.

Here is Lajos Egri on the subject:

Egri states that it isn’t enough to identify a desire in the protagonist. We need to uncover its underlying causes too: Is Othello’s action driven by jealousy? If so, we need to know that before jealousy there is suspicion; before suspicion there is antagonism—a primary motivator of hate; before antagonism there is disappointment.

“Learn how to structure emotion in stories as a precursor to writing success.”

Identifying the underlying emotions that drive our characters will help us propel them through the story. Strong ambition, for example, implies the need for fame, wealth, power. But all of these might stem from a suppressed but potent sense of insecurity. In constructing that particular sort of character, then, the writer knows that she has to include scenes which explore these emotions.

In my YA novel, The Land Below, Nugget’s hatred for Paulie, the story’s protagonist, arises from jealousy. Anthea, the girl he loves, seems to like Paulie, a mere labourer, more than him. Being a Senator’s son, Nugget believes he is the superior choice. Her preference for Paulie, undermines his fragile confidence in himself.

Additionally, he fears that his failure to procure Anthea will diminish him in the eyes of his father, whose success is difficult to emulate. Coming up with a plan to defeat Paulie, therefore, stems from his jealousy, which in turn, springs from his insecurity.

In brief, then, exploring the chain of emotions that results in a character’s obsessive desire, is a useful spur to the writing process.

Summary

To properly structure emotion first understand the chain of emotions that lie behind your protagonist’s desire to achieve some tangible goal.

Catch my latest YouTube video by clicking on this link.

Inner and outer motivation in stories

Sarah Connor: Inner and outer motivation in The Terminator.

What is the difference between inner and outer motivation? Merriam-Webster defines motivation as:

1a: the act or process of motivating. b: the condition of being motivated.

2: a motivating force, stimulus, or influence: INCENTIVE, DRIVE.

Typically, the hero’s inner motivation springs from his or her mental life – values, needs, background. These elements, in turn, guide the physical actions that arise in response to some outer challenge or opportunity, in other words, the outer motivation.

Importantly, it is the outer goal that first catches a reader’s or audience’s attention, ordering the events of the story in a visceral way—as in a story about a man who uses his superpowers to try and save the world. Any inner persuasion lies beneath the surface of the tale and is revealed as the story progresses. The outer motivation, then, is the initial cause that starts the hero down a certain path.

Inner motivation, however, is important because it helps to keep the hero’s physical actions to that path. Together, outer and inner motivation form an integrated unit – the description of the event-driven action and its justification.

“The combination of inner and outer motivation serves to explain character action reaching for an external goal.”

The Terminator, for example, is about a waitress who wants to prevent a time-traveling cyborg from murdering her. That is her outer goal. But her ability to do so needs to be grounded in her traits of resilience and determination.

Ghostbusters is about a fired university researcher, and his team, who wants to make cash by ridding clients of ghosts. Acumen in the paranormal field and the need to survive in a harsh real-world environment outside the university result in the creation of a ghost-busting business.

In Breaking Bad Walter White’s desire to provide for his family in light of his seemingly fatal illness, drives him to cook meth. But as the story progresses we realise that he is increasingly propelled by a desire to regain the power and reputation he lost when he sold his share of his company years previously, for a pittance. In one telling moment of hubris, he demands of a dangerous drug distributor, “Say my name!”

The hero’s inner and outer motivation, respectively, then, can be understood as his physical pursuit of the goal, guided by the reasons that drive him.

Summary

Inner and outer motivation explain why the hero physically responds to some external challenge or opportunity in the way that he or she does.

Catch my latest YouTube video here!