Writing a Good Story

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WRITING A GOOD STORY
by James Huston

Everyone has a different method of telling a story. Whether it’s the structured cookie cutter outline from your twelfth grade English teacher, the build up to a punch line delivered by a stand up comedian, or the horribly transparent lie told by an innocent youth who thinks he might get in more trouble if he told the truth. I am not a scholar of literature, I don’t know how to tell a good joke, and I make it a point not to make up stories for the benefit of concealing a lie. The only time I ever make up a story is for the benefit of an audience with concerns to film making. The point is my credentials are unimportant. If what I have to say is of any use to you then it shouldn’t matter where you got the advice from. Both the oldest man on the planet and a new born child are equally capable of imparting little bits of wisdom here and there.


Story Telling: takes two
Story telling is, in my opinion, reliant only on two things to be well delivered. Firstly, one must focus on a prominent theme. Secondly, one must develop realistic characters. Building a solid foundation for these two things alone is by no means an end game. Instead I find that the rest of the story flows from these two elements.

From characters comes character development and character arcs. From character development comes background history. From background history comes culture. From culture comes places and settings. Creating a character and learning about where he comes from helps a writer think about where a character is going. For the character alone this is a character arc. Step outside of the box and you can see an outline for your story.

What really makes a story worth listening to though? I would have to argue that it’s not the characters, but instead the theme. From the theme stems meaning, philosophy, and reason. Albert Einstein once said “if you can not explain it simply then you do not understand it well enough.” While he may have been thinking of theoretical physics at the time the same statement rings true for story telling today. Often times characters and stories become to complex for their own good, and a writer gets lost on the street called Writers Block. Knowing the one or two themes that your whole story revolves around allows a writer to stay focused on what’s important. Often times simply knowing the theme will give you the ending to your story. I find that in the most profound stories the theme is always emphasized right before the end.

Let’s put it this way… imagine you’re on your death bed. Undoubtedly you think about two things. First, you ask your self did you live a good life. Second, you reflect on all the people you ever cared about. Right before you close your eyes and the picture fades you think of one more thing. It’s not a question, but rather the answer to your question. That’s what a story is stripped down to its barest form.

Good God! Magnificently spoken!

Still, I shan't choose between the two options in your poll. After I saw it as an interesting question, it as a rather impossible one. The one set can't exist without the other. But the one story could eb told without rea characters, it's more about the theme or the history of the places described in the story. Or there is no real theme, but perhaps the theme is locked inside the character, waiting to be released.

I'd go for character, though. One needs to be able to identify with a person in the story.

Bt I'm still unsure. As soon as the cloud of doubt leaves my mind, I shall vote.

For me, a mix of character and ideas (rather than overarching themes); I'm not big on the whole "this is a story about redemption, fatherhood and the search for existential yaaaawwnn" sort of thing, I'd rather see "battle, murder and sudden death!"

I voted theme.

No matter how well formed the character, the story is them running into the theme. It reacts to them, they it, and this change is what makes for a dynamic story. People are formed by events, and they form events.

I had a background, a set of events, and took years to find the characters. They could not be space fillers, they had to have a reason for how they reacted. One at a time, then as pairs, groups, they also had a response, and the group response is another character that affects them all.

The theme stays consistant, as I follow my characters over a decade. They all change, age, become almost someone else, but the theme keeps the story running. It is the reason they first act, coming to undersand, they act better, and it is still there at the end as they fill their proper place.

Theme is the background that brings the reader into the story in the first few lines, long before getting to know and identify with the characters. They are given the same problem, and then follow along as the characters deal with it. They are brought into the theme before the story develops, and then the characters.

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." Theme, some will make the best of the worst. Before location, story, characters, plot, unfold.

Of course it still takes a good story, characters which the reader can identify with, and ones who they can see why they do what they do, to see the range of response to the same problem by personalities. Some who seem alien, can have roles where the reader can fully become them, for a while see through their eyes. Someone very different, yet a few shared moments, the discovery of the same within their self.

The effect of all writing is playing upon the mind of the reader. Their judgement of a good book is they liked the ride. Everything is being defined for the reader, all to build their mental vision, and they should take away more than a few hours of distraction, they should learn things that will serve them for life.

The characters give something that they do not get in life, the ability to see through the eyes of another. They can share in causes, feelings, in a way they cannot with the people they know. It is a way to know themselves better, and get a better idea of the inner life of others.

Wow!

This discussion is going DEEP, I love it ! !!

Basically it's answering the question: 'What came first, the chicken of the egg?'

But then it's actually interesting!

I really enjoyed your reply, Inventor!

My point in having a poll was to get people to realize that both character and theme are nearly as important as the other. Whether you have a deep theme of philosophy and trying to better understand a complex world, or you have a nearly invisible theme centered around killing, action, and explosions. The theme is always there.

Now a theme can stem from the development of a character, or a character can be based off of a theme. The point is that the two are nearly identical in importance. So much so that it is up to the writer and the reader's perspective in determining what they feel drives the story.

Logically there is no definitive answer.


Be sure to check out the trailer for my upcoming film (Hacker Mind)

I would say you have to have a theme, a philosophy behind what you're doing - but your characters are what makes that theme live for the reader. They are very much intertwined, though.

You can write a story which is nearly all grand theme with little to no character development (look, for example, at Olaf Stapledon's Last and First Men, or Tolkien's Silmarillion). But it takes huge skill, and while works like that are magificent in their own way, they don't tend to be as popular with readers as a story that has characters they can care about.

Themes are good, but perhaps plot is what the theme would represent. Telling a story gets you the characters, which you can use to illustrate your point. The trick is to make people care about the characters, whilst not bashing the gentle reader over the head with a particular point...

I suppose it might be interesting to some people to have real people and a sturdy plot but to my mind what makes a memorable story is that it presented a point of view that I had not perceived before or that it twisted my perceptions in a very interesting way. The film "The Sting" continually fooled the audience as to what was occurring and it was a fascinating roller coaster of an experience although the obvious traditional simple plot of wreaking violence on a total bastard was completely masked by the clever misdirections.