behalf.
Tim O'Brien, award-winning author of the short story "The Things They Carried," about Vietnam soldiers, uses objects as if they are biographies of each person.
Norman Bowker carried a diary. Rat Kiley carried comic books. Kiowa, a devout Baptist, carried an illustrated New Testament that had been presented to him by his father, who taught Sunday school in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. As a hedge against bad times, however, Kiowa also carried his grandmother's distrust of the white man, his grandfather's old hunting hatchet.
In order to use objects properly, you have to get to know your characters, and in order to do that, you need to ask yourself a series of important questions about who your characters are. What do they love or hate, collect or throw away? What do they like to see around them in their house? Are they art snobs or philistines? These, and many others, are questions that only you can answer.
Remember that great characters and the wild plot actions they undertake need solid ground and meaningful props to support them. Always ask, what needs to be seen in this scene?
STRIKING A BALANCE
Setting is where many writers get lost in chunks of narrative summary because it's easy, and even fun, to describe the setting. It's crucial to remember that setting exists mostly to serve as a way of both creating authenticity and grounding the reader in the scene (and story) at hand. If setting begins to take too much precedence, and distracts from your characters or storyline, then it needs to be tamed back.
Here is an example of well-balanced setting description, filtered through the character's perceptions, punctuated by small actions, from Jane Alison's lyrical novel The Marriage of the Sea:
Max landed in New Orleans like a sprinter. His cab barreled over the toxic empty highway into town, the battered streets and battered sidewalks and battered, crooked houses. He'd chosen the most romantic hotel, just beyond the Garden District, lopsided and seedy. Once he'd checked in he ran up the staircase, noting with delight the stained glass promise in the window: Let my beloved come into his garden and eat his pleasant fruits! Then he had barely put down his bag, barely phoned Sea & Air to provide a temporary number (should his fur teacup and cookbooks and secondhand Paul Smiths be lost at sea in their nailed, stamped crates), before he washed his hands, looked at his teeth, tried to order his fly-away ringlets, paced once up and down the room, lifted the receiver and dialed.
While a lot of detail is given to setting in this paragraph, it feels intimately connected to Max's perceptions, and sets the stage for the fact that he is setting the stage for the woman he is in love with.
When you describe setting details, in order to strike a nice balance and not overdo it, keep in mind:
• Setting helps create mood or ambiance that sets a tone for the scene.
In the scene above, there's a sense of preparation, of nesting almost, as Max prepares to see his love.
• Your protagonist needs to interact with the setting. This can be through his observations of it or by his physically engaging with it. The reader sees New Orleans through Max's eyes here—words like "romantic" and "battered" reflect his opinion.
• The setting needs to support your plot. Max is in New Orleans because he has come to be with a woman—a woman, it turns out, who will break his heart.
• Small actions help break up setting description. Because Max is moving around, the reader doesn't feel as though he is looking at a static scene. The scene comes alive.
STAYING CONSISTENT
Once you've done the work of establishing the place in your scenes and fleshing out the settings so the reader is clear on where your characters are, it's important to stay consistent. If there are long tendrils of night-blooming jasmine on the porch in one scene, be sure they don't later turn into wisteria.
Don't forget which way the front door faces as your characters
Tim O'Brien, award-winning author of the short story "The Things They Carried," about Vietnam soldiers, uses objects as if they are biographies of each person.
Norman Bowker carried a diary. Rat Kiley carried comic books. Kiowa, a devout Baptist, carried an illustrated New Testament that had been presented to him by his father, who taught Sunday school in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. As a hedge against bad times, however, Kiowa also carried his grandmother's distrust of the white man, his grandfather's old hunting hatchet.
In order to use objects properly, you have to get to know your characters, and in order to do that, you need to ask yourself a series of important questions about who your characters are. What do they love or hate, collect or throw away? What do they like to see around them in their house? Are they art snobs or philistines? These, and many others, are questions that only you can answer.
Remember that great characters and the wild plot actions they undertake need solid ground and meaningful props to support them. Always ask, what needs to be seen in this scene?
STRIKING A BALANCE
Setting is where many writers get lost in chunks of narrative summary because it's easy, and even fun, to describe the setting. It's crucial to remember that setting exists mostly to serve as a way of both creating authenticity and grounding the reader in the scene (and story) at hand. If setting begins to take too much precedence, and distracts from your characters or storyline, then it needs to be tamed back.
Here is an example of well-balanced setting description, filtered through the character's perceptions, punctuated by small actions, from Jane Alison's lyrical novel The Marriage of the Sea:
Max landed in New Orleans like a sprinter. His cab barreled over the toxic empty highway into town, the battered streets and battered sidewalks and battered, crooked houses. He'd chosen the most romantic hotel, just beyond the Garden District, lopsided and seedy. Once he'd checked in he ran up the staircase, noting with delight the stained glass promise in the window: Let my beloved come into his garden and eat his pleasant fruits! Then he had barely put down his bag, barely phoned Sea & Air to provide a temporary number (should his fur teacup and cookbooks and secondhand Paul Smiths be lost at sea in their nailed, stamped crates), before he washed his hands, looked at his teeth, tried to order his fly-away ringlets, paced once up and down the room, lifted the receiver and dialed.
While a lot of detail is given to setting in this paragraph, it feels intimately connected to Max's perceptions, and sets the stage for the fact that he is setting the stage for the woman he is in love with.
When you describe setting details, in order to strike a nice balance and not overdo it, keep in mind:
• Setting helps create mood or ambiance that sets a tone for the scene.
In the scene above, there's a sense of preparation, of nesting almost, as Max prepares to see his love.
• Your protagonist needs to interact with the setting. This can be through his observations of it or by his physically engaging with it. The reader sees New Orleans through Max's eyes here—words like "romantic" and "battered" reflect his opinion.
• The setting needs to support your plot. Max is in New Orleans because he has come to be with a woman—a woman, it turns out, who will break his heart.
• Small actions help break up setting description. Because Max is moving around, the reader doesn't feel as though he is looking at a static scene. The scene comes alive.
STAYING CONSISTENT
Once you've done the work of establishing the place in your scenes and fleshing out the settings so the reader is clear on where your characters are, it's important to stay consistent. If there are long tendrils of night-blooming jasmine on the porch in one scene, be sure they don't later turn into wisteria.
Don't forget which way the front door faces as your characters
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