Talking Heads: Plot Creation

How do you approach building plot in your story?

Imelda Wei Ding Lo (Editor):

I think about what drives the story and what makes the most sense to the reader.

Without a clear plot or theme, the story won't make sense to the reader.

It would just be a form of entertainment for myself, which isn't my intention.

Teté DePunk (Editor):

It's a relatively new discipline for me.

Plot was something I thought would naturally happen after I developed the character(s).

Turns out that for an organized story, you need to lay down a foundation of what motivates your character(s) and how theme unifies character and plot. But you can't, I've learned, have characters and themes without plot.

I'm still learning how to construct comprehensive plots. It's not something I've mastered yet, but I'm grateful for every step of the journey.

R. N. Roveleh (Editor):

I used to think writing plot was easy and that, as long as my characters are strong, the story would simply flow. Until the details bogged me down, and the novel

I was writing never saw the light.

Plot is the road from A to Z, the itinerary from where the characters stand before their struggle to the people they become, the medium through which theme becomes embedded in the reader's mind.

Plot is the process through which the main character solves (or attempts to) their inner struggle or a difficult situation they find themselves in. Plot is a device that helps highlight character and theme, and if it becomes the focus, the story loses its relatability, because readers care not about what happens but about why this matters to the characters.

So, the question I ask myself when creating plot — whether the story has a heavier one or relies more on thoughts, ideas and emotions — is not "what happens next?" but rather "what situations would get my themes and characters across in the clearest, most engaging and meaningful way?".

Emmanuel Adanegbe (Author):

To the question, building plot for me starts from interest which I dwell on continuous in my thoughts.

From these interests of mine, I begin to form stories around them and then characters to bring the story to life. For "Gahiji," it started with me thinking about a person choosing peace in the centre of a war.

From there it was only a matter of choosing a particular event and characters to bring my story to life. That's it.

Ashwini Gangal (Author):

As a reader, I process ‘plot’ as ‘this happens, then that happens, then that happens…’

But strangely, as a writer, plot is just a vague sense of time and place. For me, the fulcrum of the story is the character/s. And the mood.

As a concept, plot is something I use to refer to the story once it’s done. For example, ‘The one about the girl who sprouts wings…’ or ‘The essay on how tea ties Indians together…’

Plot is something I don’t agonize over as much.

Frederick Pollack (Poet):

I don’t write stories but poems; poems don’t require plot. Aristotle distinguished drama, in which plot creates both rising and falling tension, from epic, whose tension derives from the relentless accumulation of related, gripping incidents.

Brecht based his “epic theater” on this distinction. I am not, for the most part, a lyric poet. In the lyric, the reader’s necessary tension is evoked through the creation of an emotional state - which, however complex, is essentially static.

In modern lyrics, the need to analyze metaphors and symbols generally coincides with the growth of emotion; both create tension, and that tension may not be released.

In a narrative poem, as I see it, the story itself – not plot – is the important metaphor. Elaborate lyrical metaphors get in its way; hence my laconic style. Some of my poems are purely narrative.

Most, including those here, are lyric/narrative hybrids. They set up, by various means, a context, an incident, and tension, suggest several meanings, and stop.

Carrie J. Knowles (Author/Artist):

My approach to writing short stories is to create a character and a situation/conflict then let that character's strengths and weaknesses struggle to resolve the conflict and build the story line/plot.

As I write, I'm always asking myself the same question: "What will my character do now?"

As the story develops, the character develops as well, and somehow, after many revisions, the plot and the character build together to a resolve in the end.

Once I know how the story ends, I go back to the beginning and make sure that the main character has what he or she needs to create a satisfying, sometimes surprising, but (hopefully) believable resolution of the inciting incident.

One of my goals, in writing any story, is to create a situation in which my character is able to grow and realize their own potential as they come to the resolution/end of the story.

As a writer who likes character driven plots, I never really know what my character is going to do or think until each line is written and the story is finished.

It's a slow process, but one I find fascinating.

Jonas David (Writer)

I take inspiration from books like Maldoror, or Solenoid, or those by Sebald or Aira, which leap unbounded from topic to scene to impossible happening and back again at a pace that can speed or slow or stop on a whim.

It has been my dream as a creator to have that kind of power in my own worlds, to do anything and go anywhere at any moment.

So why don’t I?

For a long time I was bound and constricted by the torturous devices of Plot and Narrative which kept me on paths leading only through the familiar.

I would painstakingly search for the exact structure that would allow me to go where I wanted to go, instead of just going there. I often worried and labored so long over crafting the plotbox that would contain my words that I managed little actual prose at all.

These days, I try my best to shake off those clinging, petulant little creatures that perch on my shoulder, crying into my ear, demanding that things ‘make sense’ or ‘lead somewhere.’

I instead force myself to charge off the path into the brush and weeds and swarms of biting insects, into unpredictable landscapes with new views. This can, of course, lead to confusion, miscalculation, and hours of wandering in frustrated circles before crawling home bruised and exhausted. But when it works, it is far more satisfying than any plan.

Mick Donaldson (Writer)

I have a confession. I don't ever have a plot in mind when I start a story let alone plan a plot outline, as recommended by some writing course.

My embarkation point for a story is always an emotional imbroglio between one or more characters.

The characters quickly loom large inside my head becoming friends and confidants.

I spend more time pacing the hallway outside my office listening to and watching them, than I do at the writing desk.

They come up with the plot, all I do is write it down.