Writing Fiction Burroway – Flashcards

Fundamental element in fiction. Comic, tragic, or dramatic conflict is necessary because in literature only trouble is interesting. Possible conflicts: man/man, man/nature, man/society, man/machine, man/God, man/himself. Conflict settles both within and between characters. (pg. 251-252)

The crisis action is the last battle and makes the outcome inevitable, when the power struggle is decided and the outcome is inevitable. Final turning point, conflict is confronted that decides direction, must be connect to central conflict. (pg. 252 & 259)

Brief/non-existent, movement after climax.

A satisfying feeling of completion/conclusion. Shows how things resolve. (pg. 251)

A crisis action in mind, a moment when a person, an event, or a thing is seen in a light so new that it is as if it has never been seen before. The mental landscape of the viewer is permanently changed. It is a moment of reversal. (pg. 260)

Getting rid of phrases such as "she saw" and "she looked" to get more vivid writing (pg. 29)

Important because eyes are our most highly developed means of perception. Appearance prompts our first reaction to people. Includes features, shape, style, clothing, and objects can make statement of internal values that are political, religious, social, intellectual, or essential. A way a character "appears". Sound can also characterize appearance. The ways a character moves, but limited only to physical movement. (pg. 116-118)

Characters must cause action and be changed by it. Chance/choice, discovery/decision (first pair involuntary, second voluntary). Force outside of the character that gives response: and then what happens? Two techniques: building, and subtly hinting. Every story is a pattern of change in which small and large changes are made through decision and discovery. (pg. 118-119)

Can enter into a character's mind, sharing at its source internal conflict, reflection, and the crucial process of decision and discovery. Summary (He hated the way she ate), indirect (Why did she hold her fork straight up?), or direct (my God, she's going to drop the yolk!). Aristotle: "Thought is the process by which a person works backward in his mind from his goal to determine what action he can take toward that goal at a given moment". (pg. 121-122)

Indirect method of presenting a character - "telling" us the character's background, motives, values, virtues, and the like. Advantages: its use leaves you free to move in time and space; to know anything you choose to know whether the character knows it or not, and godlike, to tell us what we are to feel, and allows you to convey a great deal of info in a short amount of time. Disadvantage: distances the reader as all generalizations and abstractions tend to do. Direct presentation of characters is more engaging to the reader. (pg. 123).

Fully drawn out (pg. 128)

Those who exist only to exhibit a function or a single characteristic. Can be useful and necessary. (pg. 128)

Almost any reader can identify with almost any character; what no reader can identify with is confusion. This can come from not knowing fundamentals (class, period, region, race, profession, marital status, ect.) and the opening paragraph. Consists of two things: Appropriateness and Specificity (pg. 129-130)

Summarized as part of the narrative so that a good deal of conversation is condensed. Useful to get us quickly to the core of the scene, or when, for example, one character has to inform another of events we already know, or when the emotional point of a conversation is that it has become tedious. (pg. 74)

Reported in 3rd person so that it carries, without actual quotation, the feel of the exchange. Useful to get us quickly to the core of the scene, or when, for example, one character has to inform another of events we already know, or when the emotional point of a conversation is that it has become tedious. (pg. 74)

When the exchange contains the possibility of discovery or decision, and therefore dramatic action. Because direct dialogue has a dual nature - emotion within a logical structure - its purpose in fiction is never merely to convey information. (pg. 74-75)

Setting the mood, changes the relationship, advance the action, set the scene, reveal the past, and reveal the theme. (pg. 77-78).

Without it characters are unable to breathe. Part includes the setting, including the locale, period, weather, and time of day. Other part is tone, an attitude taken by the narrative voice that can be described in terms of a quality sinister, formal, solemn, etc. Concrete detail is helpful. Two facets: setting and tone. (pg. 167-168)

Method of treating time in fiction. Covers a relatively long period of time in relatively short compass, and is useful and often necessary device because it may give information, fill in a character's background, let us understand a motive, alter pace, create transition, or leap moments or years. Vivid and specific summary is enlightening. Called "mortar of the story". (pg. 209)

Method of treating time in fiction. Deals at length with a relatively short period of time. The "building blocks". Crucial means of allowing your reader to experience the story with the characters. A scene is dialogue and action that take place between two or more characters over a set period of "real" time. Has a turning point or mini-crisis that propels the story. Always necessary because it allows readers to see, hear, and sense the stories drama. (pg. 208-210)

Can be in scene or summary, easier and more effective in this medium than in any other, because the reader's mind is a swifter mechanism for getting into the past, and forces story to be time-warped to whenever and wherever. Pros: Useful way to provide background to character of history of events. Cons: Can be overused; consider dialogue, summary, reference, or detail. Used to reveal at the right point. Effective flashback: Provide a smooth, clear transition between present and past, which allows you to summarize necessary background quickly; if writing in past tense, begin the flashback in the past perfect (she had driven) about 3 times and then switch to simple past, avoid a flashback within a flashback, when a flashback ends be clear you are going back to the present. (pg. 219-220)

In extreme crisis people have the odd sensation that time is slowing down and things are remembered with clarity, and so you can artistically create intensity by using detail with specific focus and precision. Can work physically or emotionally. Use if we want reader to linger awhile and experience moments. (pg. 221)

The author is telling the story, can be subdivided again according to the degree of knowledge the author assumes. Omniscience: Total knowledge and tells us directly what we are supposed to think (playing "God"). They can: objectively report action of story, go into the mind of any character, interpret the characters appearance, speech, actions, and thoughts; move freely in time or space to give panoramic, telescopic, microscopic, or historical view; provide general reflections, judgments, and truths. Limited Omniscience: One in which the author may move with some, but not all, of the omniscient author's freedom. Author can see events objectively and grants access to the mind of one character - good for short story because it established point-of view character (means of perception); advantage is it mimics our individual experience of life which is that we know our own thoughts which can lead to the kinds of conflicts or struggles for connection that inspire fiction and also that it brings immediacy and there is no authorial intrusion. Objective Author: You restrict your knowledge to the external facts that might be observed by human witness; to the sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch - The reader learns by inference. (pg. 301-303)

Idiosyncratic and experimental. Assigning reader specific characteristics and reactions, which pulls you deeper intimately into the story. Some use to depict trauma, while others to feel more universal. It's used only when a character is referred to as you. Draws attention to itself, and is difficult to maintain. (pg. 304)

When one of its characters relates to the story's action and events. Term "narrator" is attached to refer to the teller of tale. If the character is a protagonist, using "I" and are at the center of attention then they are a central narrator. If they are telling a story about someone else and may be in virtually any position that is not the center, then they are a peripheral narrator. They both have limitations and cannot be omniscient. Must report what they realistically know. If they betray limitations, they are an unreliable narrator. (pg. 305)

Each new spoken thought should be enclosed by quotation marks and should have its own paragraph. Dialogue tag is for the purpose of identification, and said is usually adequate to the task. People also ask and replay, add, recall, remember, remind. Do not use unnecessary or intrusive. They should be used sparingly so as not to be "telling". (pg. 87-88)

It is necessary to portray sensory details that the reader may have experienced. Emotion is the body's physical reaction to information the senses receive. Avoid labeling emotion because it is seldom pure and there are often conflicting feelings. Anytime you as writer record an emotion without convincing us to feel that emotion, you introduce a fatal distance between author and reader. Avoid clichés with emotion metaphors. (pg. 28, 35)