Photo by Guilherme Stecanella on Unsplash
This post is part of my ongoing effort to articulate what a story’s essence is, why it is useful, how we identify it, and what we do with it after that. To do that, I may revisit territory I’ve already covered in this writing challenge series. One way to gain multiple perspectives on the same idea is to write about it at different times using different prompts. When we do this, we’re training our minds to slow down and look more closely. It’s as if we’ve driven a stretch of road several times, and now we’re going to get out of the car and walk, which enables us to observe the details that usually fly by unobserved.
The Story’s Essence
A story's essence is the distillation of what's most important to you about your story, captured in a clear, pithy statement. It's not the story itself, just as an essential oil isn't the plant it comes from. Rather, it's a fractal of the entire narrative, encapsulating its meaning to you as the writer.
Every story—fiction or nonfiction—begins as a thought, sensation, or experience. This is a spark that is a response to something we’ve sensed in some way. In a way, it’s a response to everything we’ve ever encountered. That spark is the story’s essence, what we want to convey with our story. What is essential to the writer? That can be a mood, a character, a situation, a place, a problem. The essence by itself is not a story, though it can feel like a full-blown story in the mind of the writer.
Narrative Cartography: From Essence to Coherent Story
We need a way to convert this essence into a coherent story readers love. Narrative Cartography is the process I’m developing to do just that. We distill the essence and build the elements around it so the story will express the essence. From this work, we create a map we can use to draft and revise a coherent story.
A coherent story is one that functions as intended, with all its necessary parts aligned and working together so that the essence is transmitted from the mind of the writer to the mind of the reader. When that happens, when it works, the reader recognizes the work as a story and gains access to the essence we intended to communicate.
If we start drafting without understanding what we really want to say, we may have a series of interesting events that unfold in a logical and linear sequence, but the whole may not create the experience of a story. A coherent narrative conveys meaning because it is more than what happened. A story is what happened, why, and what the protagonist did about it told from a particular perspective.
The Importance of Perspective
Perspective is vital. Perspective tells us from when and where the story is presented, but also through what lens and with what attitude toward the events. One way to get a feel for this is to watch multiple adaptations of the same written work. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë is instructive because there are so many versions. I recommend comparing the 2006 BBC television adaptation (written by Sandy Welch and directed by Susanna White) with the 2011 film (screenplay by Moira Buffini and directed by Cary Joji Fukunaga). The former is a faithful adaptation of Bronte’s novel, but the latter is a nonlinear presentation of the story. Why might the writer and director make this choice?
My sense is that Buffini wanted to make a different point. My sense is that the intended message is Jane got lucky. It turned out that Rochester was a decent guy, but given all that happened (for example, his dishonesty and willingness to jeopardize Jane’s legal standing as his wife), she might have done as well to dismiss the ghostly voice that called her back to Rochester. I could be wrong about this, but it’s one reason to present the events out of order.
Understanding Motivation
To write coherently we must understand what we want to say and how we plan present it. It helps us make the tens of thousands of decisions we must make and helps us stay the course when it gets tough because writing a story readers love is a lot of work.
This is not just about choosing the story world, characters, and events, though they are important. It includes selecting the perspective and genre form we use to present it to an audience. I sometimes describe this as the clothes we want the story to wear. For example, Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn is the story of a marriage that’s in trouble, but the events are dressed up as a thriller with life and death stakes. The events are presented in the form of written narratives by the two main characters, Nick and Amy. They present the same events differently because they have different goals they want to accomplish.
Here’s another way to think about it. When I go to the grocery store, I’m doing it to get food and other items I need. But I have a further goal that operates beneath what’s readily apparent. That deeper motivation or desire could be about getting through the week with minimum effort, providing meals that nourish my family, or expressing my creativity. The minimum effort trip might include frozen pizza and other instant meals. If my primary motivation is to nourish my family, I’ll fill my cart with healthy vegetables and fruits. There may be some overlap, but the deeper motivation will mean a different approach (time, attention, preparation) and different items in my shopping cart. If we tune into that motivation, we’ll have a more successful trip to the grocery store.
In the same way, when we unpack the inspiration for our story to understand what’s driving us, we can make more effective story choices that will communicate what we want to say. Aligning with our purpose increases the probability of a coherent story and one that readers love.
This post is part of a 75-day writing challenge and experiment. From September 9 through November 22, I'll be posting daily thoughts on writing, storytelling, and creativity based on recent readings or reflections. While my intention was to keep them very short—250 to 400 words—I've found that this range doesn't give me enough space to cover these topics adequately. I aim to keep them brief enough to be read quickly, but they will often be longer than 400 words.