“All writers are amateurs in a craft that knows no masters.” – Ernest Hemingway
I always find this quote comforting. If someone this famous and talented considered himself an amateur - well, then…braid my hair and call me Pollyanna.
I’ve been studying the craft of writing a long, long time and found it’s true what t, hey say – the more you learn, the less you know.
If stories were Legos, the final product would be a rainbow of color, one for each story element: character, goal, motivation, conflict, scene, sequel, disaster, setting, pacing, back story, foreshadowing, theme, premise, symbolism, motif, crisis, climax, resolution…just to name a few.
Then there are the many ways to convey these elements: exposition, introspection, dialogue, point of view, tone, voice. Plot. Sub-plot. Prose. Punctuation. Show, don’t tell. And don’t get me started on grammar.
There are countless plotting methods. The Three Act structure. The Four Act structure. The Hero’s Journey. The Character Arc. Discovering Story Magic. Storyboarding. The Seven Steps of Structure. The courageous, seat-of-your-pants writer who starts at page one and keeps writing until The End.
And let’s not forget: research, critiques, revisions. First drafts, second drafts. Final drafts. Synopses. Manuscript preparation. Query letters. Rejections.
Need help? Search the internet. There are thousands of articles on every aspect of writing: Six Points about Character, Plot, and Dialogue You Wish You’d Have Known Yesterday, 8 Ways to Bring Fiction to Life, Top 10 Plotting Problems, 12 Steps to Planning a Scene, 13 Prime Principles of Plot, 14 Steps to Better Dialogue, 20 Master Plots, 36 Dramatic Situations, 78 Ways to Start Your Next Book or Article, 1000 Verbs to Write By.
Still with me? There’s a reason writing is not for the timid. It’s enough to propel the sturdiest person towards an analyst’s couch.
Does it comfort you to know we’ve all been there? I hope so. We cope in many different ways. Some don’t even bother learning craft. They just sit in front of a computer and pound away, blissfully ignorant of the rules. Others learn as they go. Still others devour chocolate by the pound or swig wine by the barrelful.
I’m something of a combination. I started out naïve then scrambled onto the craft bandwagon when critiques returned with comments like, “Is this going anywhere?... Does this character have a goal?... That shrew is the heroine?” The last was from my sister. Love hurts.
Clearly I had some things to learn. Always will. I continue to inhale books, read all kinds of fiction, and attend writers’ conferences. And write, write, write. I only hit the bottle in extreme cases. Never alone. Hardly ever. Well, except that one time…
Isn’t this encouraging? If you’re overwhelmed, start small. Think GMCD.
GMC is writer shorthand for goal, motivation, and conflict. Debra Dixon wrote the definitive book on the subject. If you’re a writer-in-training – Ernest Hemingway would certainly think so - I recommend it. The ‘D’ tacked onto the end stands for disaster.
Goal is what the character wants, the prize he must gain to solve or avoid a problem. Motivation is the reason the goal is formed. The why. Conflict is the roadblock thrown up to prevent the character from achieving the goal. Disaster is the consequence of action taken to overcome that obstacle – often the hero’s worst nightmare. He either fails to get the goal, or gets what he wants but finds himself worse off than before.
Once a goal is set, the character must decide how to proceed. He acts. Action forces choices. Choices create consequences. The character reacts to these consequences, rethinks his course of action, and rededicates to a new plan, surging onward in a spiraling cycle of choice and consequence until the big black moment (the story-level disaster) is reached and the hero conquers all.
Triumph depends on a couple of things. First, his own personal baggage - belief systems, moral code, coping mechanisms, personal vulnerabilities, character traits, and world view, to name a few. And second, how much he learns on the journey.
There are two types of GMCD – internal and external. External is the physical, tangible goal, the motor that drives the plot and action of story. Internal is the character’s inner life, the spark, fuel and catalyst that powers the engine oscillation of choice and consequence.
In The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy’s external goal is to get back home. Every choice she makes is steeped in the need to see Auntie Em. Her internal goal is to find a place where she belongs, somewhere she thinks is “over the rainbow.” She learns they are the same place, but she doesn’t make this revelation until the very end.
There are two levels of GMCDs. Scene-level GMCDs are the baby steps the character must take on their way to achieving the story level GMCD. For example, in order for Dorothy to get home, she tackles several smaller scene goals before she can achieve her story goal. First, she makes allies. They, in turn, recommend she see the Wizard - he can solve her problem. Off to the Emerald City they go. And so on.
Dorothy takes her new friends along, but she must earn their respect first. When she agrees the Emerald City is the right course of action, she must overcome a spell the wicked witch casts or she can’t cross the poppy field. She gets her audience with the Wizard, but he will only help if Dorothy brings him the broom of the wicked witch.
The closer the hero gets to their goal, the bigger the barriers become. In the end, the goal may or may not be reached, but the character always learns a valuable lesson that makes him stronger than when he started. This requires an adjustment to the character’s personal baggage. Or, more simply put, growth.
The self-titled, “Halloween”, episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a showcase of self-esteem issues, one of many internal conflicts that plague the slayer. At the heart of the show is Buffy’s longing to be normal, a thread that is sewn into the fabric of the entire series. But each episode has its own lesson, not only for the slayer, but often for her loyal troupe of friends as well.
In the next installment, The Set Up, I’ll begin destructing this episode in terms of GMCD. Several characters have a clear GMCD in the course of the story, including the villain, and it’s helpful to see how these arcs collide and affect one another. Until tomorrow.
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