As I compose this my students are spending 10 minutes answering some key questions to develop their novels:
- Where does your story begin?
- When does your character change? How? Why? How close is that to the beginning?
- What is the most important change your character must make? Why? How and when does this happen?
- Who is the person/thing standing in their way?
I use these as an introduction to plot and dramatic through line, slowly introducing the writers to the idea of what matters most in storytelling. I think that as a writer the teaching of this stuff helps me to fully realize the writing life. Once upon a time I thought that life was mainly about experiencing and writing, but I think teaching has a valuable role in the life. I believe that teaching exposes you to writings greatest moments and faults all writ large in the eyes of the students. By being a teacher you consciously accept the role of question answerer, therefore you have to know a fair amount about the craft and about how to live that life in order to send that information to the eager.
In short, teaching keeps you honest.
So I ask these questions and give them ten minutes to figure out what it is they are trying to say in the story. This is after spending two weeks talking about the characters, so that they recognize that there is no story without a character, and furthermore there is no story without a character that needs to change for one reason or another. That transformation is the story. That is what I try to get to the root of when we open a new semester of story making.
As I write this I am reflecting on the end of several stories. The seasons of four of my shows came to a conclusion over the last few weeks with the last of them, The Strain, closing soon. This being the year of sci-fi I’ve been treated to a number of stories that deal with this idea of What If.. and expose the protagonist to the need to change and allow us to watch this develop over a series of short stories/conflicts/episodes leading us to the end of the season and the major dramatic change set up from day one. Most shows slip up. It is hard to maintain that thread over 10-22 episodes. This is why I believe many shows fail. Some don’t. The pacing and storytelling enhance the character growth tremendously. The Walking Dead is a prime example where by the latest season we can see how far Rick has come.
More on this later… ten minutes gone means I have to teach.