Category: Scene Writing

How to Write a SceneHow to Write a Scene

March 8, 2015March 8, 2015 0 Comments

 

We think in scenes all the time.

Take a moment, remember a childhood memory or last week’s business meeting or playing with your children last night, or the family dinner on Sunday evening. These scenes play out like little movies in your head. There are characters, and in a place, a time, and something is happening, conversations are had. As the writer, you are the director re-creating the moments of your ancestor’s life in words, like a movie, vivid, colourful, playing out for the reader on the page.

All scenes contain various elements that contribute to making the scene alive and vibrant for the reader. Let’s break a scene down to see what makes it so special.

The Elements of a Good Scene

Time – The reader should be thrust into a specific time and day, so the reader is immediately oriented with the time frame of the scene. If you don’t your reader is quickly confused and lost.

Setting – Again, much like time you also want to familiarize your reader quickly into the place of your scene. In order for the reader to see the scene play out they need to understand the surroundings and be able to place your ancestor within their surroundings.

Action – Something happens in the scene that propels the plotline forward. Your scenes must have action; they must bring about conflict.

Dialogue – Someone speaks. Dialogue can reveal plot, the conflicts but also helps us understand our ancestor’s character.

Vivid Description- In order for your reader, to see the scene play out like a movie it must have very specific and detailed description.

Imagery – To bring the scene to life, the writer must use all their senses, touch, taste, sight, smell, and hearing. However, don’t overload your scene. As the writer, you must decide what you want to bring through in your writing. Don’t pile up your writing with description and imagery and let the reader try to figure it out.

POV- The reader needs to have a clear understanding of who is speaking.

Figurative Language- Similes and metaphors are often used to help create visual images for the reader. It helps to create images for the reader, to make your writing more memorable.

Beginning, Middle and End – Just like our story each scene needs a beginning, middle and end. The end needs to propel us on in the story to the next scene. The beginning draws us in, the middle gives us the guts of the scene, the conflict, the end offers a resolution or not but offers up tension that propels the reader on to the next scene.

Purpose – A scene must serve the story. It must somehow be relevant to the goal of your ancestor. If it does not serve the goal of your ancestor, it has no reason to be in the story.

You want your scenes to be entertaining. This is another one of those moments when you will have to tap into the creative side of your brain. You have to breathe some spirit into a scene. How do we do that? Again this comes from practice and time and by reading the works of other great authors and learning from them, recognize how they craft scenes and practice writing scenes of your own.

Writing a Family History Scene    Coming in September!

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Make Your Scenes Pop!Make Your Scenes Pop!

March 8, 2015March 8, 2015 0 Comments

 

Do your stories pop?

Do they engage your reader and give them a vision in their mind through the words you’ve strung together on the page. As writers, our goal is to create clear and detailed images through the use of descriptive language. If you’re not using descriptive writing in your family history stories then you are missing an opportunity to show rather than tell. Descriptive writing adds texture, colour and dimension to our stories. It is how we make reading a sensory experience for our readers.

My favourite quote that helps to illustrate showing in scenes remains:

 “DON’T TELL ME THE MOON IS SHINING; SHOW ME THE GLINT OF LIGHT ON BROKEN GLASS.”

                                                                                                                              ANTON CHEKHOV

As we discussed in How to Write a Scene, detailed description, imagery and figurative language are components of a scene that we heavily rely on to make a scene vivid and in full colour for the reader. Today’s post pulls together a few tips to help you improve your use of description in writing your scenes.

Use all of your senses.

As we mentioned in How to Write a Scene using your senses is an essential ingredient of descriptive writing. Using the senses of touch, taste, hearing, seeing and smelling are all equally important in bringing your ancestor’s experience to life on the page. We often tend only to use sight, but employing a combination of senses gives your reader a much deeper experience.

Avoid Clichés

Clichés are words or expressions that have been overused. They may have been original at one time but through overuse they have become clichés. Be aware of them and find fresh and original ways to describe your story. Some examples of clichés include dead as a doornail, smart as a whip, sweet as sugar. You get the idea.

Use a Thesaurus

Try to avoid using the same words in a sentence, paragraph or, if it is an uncommon word, in the story, unless the word is used for effect. This applies to standard words and less common words. Use a thesaurus to find alternative words that convey the same meaning. (I used the word “word” eight times – did you notice?)

Use Personification, Similes, and Metaphors

Personifications, similes, and metaphors can add sensuous references vividly, explain things, express emotion and entertain your reader. They add richness to your writing and show an image in a vibrant way through example rather than tell directly. They should replace, enhance or define adjectives like, beautiful, sweet, picturesque and others. We’ve all learned about similes and metaphors in school. Perhaps, it’s time for a refresher course, and a little practice to help you see just how important it can be in writing your family history stories.

Let’s take a look at each with examples from the memoir Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls.

Personification

Personification adds human personality traits to inanimate objects.

“Finally, we entered hill country, climbing higher and deeper into the Appalachian Mountains, stopping from time to time to let the Oldsmobile catch its breath.”

Simile

A simile ties two things together using the words ‘as’ or ‘like.’

“ It was like sewing meat. It was sewing meat.”  Mr. Walls gets beat up and asks for Jeannette to sew up a gash on his arm.

Metaphor

Metaphors are figurative comparisons that describe one thing by directly assigning it the traits of another, so one idea is understood in terms of the other.

Rex says Maureen “is a sick puppy, the runt of the litter, who should have been drowned at birth”

This statement expresses how Rex feels Maureen is weak and dependent, and the rest of the family has to provide for her.

 

Don’t Over Do it!

Beginning writers tend to lack confidence in writing description in those early days, but once they gain an understanding of description, they can then go too far and overdo it. As I mentioned in writing a scene, too much detail can completely overtake a story and it bears repeating again. Once we get the handle on description and detail we tend to find a reason to think more is better. It is not. As the artist of this work you must make decisions about which descriptions and details serve the story best, the feeling you want to portray on the page.  Description should enhance your characters and their world, not overwhelm it.

Putting Words in their MouthsPutting Words in their Mouths

March 8, 2015March 8, 2015 0 Comments

We now know that dialogue is an important element to good scene writing.

However, it doesn’t remove our apprehension about using it in our family history stories. It becomes a scary proposition for family historians and often stops many from writing scenes because they don’t want to put words in their ancestor’s mouths.  Instead, they settle for dry narrative summary rather than writing an engaging story built on scene and summary.

Dialogue for family historians falls into two camps, which I will refer to  as recalled conversations and re-created conversations. First let me start by saying, how you handle dialogue in your family history is a personal decision. Some nonfiction writers believe in no fabrication, while others believe you can put words in your character’s mouth within guidelines. There seems to be a broad range of interpretations on the subject.

 

Recalled Conversations

My definition of a recalled conversation is when the person or persons were present for the discussion but do not recall the exact words that were exchanged.  This could be you writing a memoir or interviewing a relative recalling a conversation. Here’s a few guidelines for recalled conversations.

  1. You are not expected to remember verbatim what was said, but instead convey the essence of the discussion. If your grandmother is recalling a conversation to you, it is not expected that she would remember the exact words that transpired. However,  through your interview she would remember the conversation to the best of her knowledge, capturing the tone and essence of the exchange.
  2. If you are privy to a conversation, don’t transcribe the conversations word for word. Separate out the important parts. What part is memorable and reveals character and is relevant to the story?
  3. Conversations do not need to be complete sentences, nor does it need to contain every verbal tic a person might say. You know all those ands, umms and buts, we insert into our vocabulary. The reader does not need to read these.
  4. Also don’t forget to include setting and body language, which help add to the characterizations behind the words.

Re-Created Conversations

My definition of a re-created dialogue applies to those discussions that took place well in the past, and no one who was present is alive to interview. You  may wish to re-create this conversation but here are a few guidelines I follow.

1. Turn to your research to re-create dialogue. I believe you can re-create dialogue that is based on your research and can be summarized and hypothesized base on your ancestor’s actions.  I’ve covered the possible resources for re-creating dialogue in a previous  post, Re-Creating Dialogue and in Authentic Ancestors.

2. Remain faithful to the essence of what the character would have said and the nature of the conversation.

3. Be honest with the readers, acknowledge when you are re-creating dialogue and when you are recalling.

I’ll also include a link here for those of you who are just learning to write dialogue, 7 Tips to Formatting Dialogue.

I’ve grabbed a couple of books from by bookshelf to offer examples of how other authors have handled the situation.

For example in the memoir , The StovePipe by Bonnie Virag, in her author’s notes she addresses the topic:

I set forth each incident as I remember it, occasionally relying on my sisters to fill in some of the gaps – bearing in mind that each of us saw through a different set of eyes and may have perceived things differently. Some of the dialogue I remember clearly and recount verbatim. Where memory fails me, I created dialogue based on the way my sisters expressed themselves. The rest is as accurate as I can make it. It is the story of my life, and I have tried to be true to my thoughts and memories.

Another example,

Jeannette Walls, Author of Half-Broke Horses

In telling my grandmother’s story, I never aspired to that sort of historical accuracy. I saw the book more in the vein of oral history, a retelling of stories handed down by my family through the years, and undertaken with the storyteller’s traditional liberties. ….she goes on to say

I don’t have the words from Lily herself, and since I have also drawn on my imagination to fill in details that are hazy or missing- and I ‘ve changed a few names to protect people’s privacy – the only honest thing to do is call the book a novel.

Regardless of whether you are recalling dialogue or recreating dialogue the important thing to remember is to  be honest with the reader.

Lee Gutkind, creative nonfiction teacher and author of You Can’t Make This Stuff Up, expresses his thoughts and I’ll end with his words

“The idea is to replicate the conversation vividly and to mirror memory and speculation with trust and good judgement.”

 

Window to the Physical WorldWindow to the Physical World

March 8, 2015March 8, 2015 0 Comments

Writing the physical world of our ancestors may seem impossible at times. We face two concerns, how do we know what it looked like and how do we bring that world to life on the page.

Replicating that world will once again rely heavily on your family history research along with social history research. I encourage you, where possible to visit the ancestral hometowns of your ancestors.  Walk the streets, visit the local historical societies and learn everything you can about their surroundings, from the house they lived in, to the street they lived on. Absorb the town that was a part of their daily life. If you can’t go in person visit through the magic of Google Earth. Reproduce your ancestor’s setting down to the most minute detail.

Once you have your research, you now must turn to painting a picture of the landscape with words so the reader can visualize being there. We want them to feel as if they are standing beside their ancestor, seeing what they are seeing.

As we have previously discussed with regards to scenes; we will rely on our senses, all of them, specific details, and figurative language to make this happen. However, before writing physical description of your ancestor’s world let’s discuss the importance setting plays in your family history story.

You learned in previous posts, setting is a component of scene, without a setting to anchor your reader, they are lost.

However, I see writers  not doing justice to setting.  They may include a year, maybe a town name or a place like a the kitchen, but that’s where the description often stops.  More detail, particular detail is needed. When I say more, I don’t mean describe the entire house, or the whole town.  Give the reader intimate details of the immediate setting. For example, if we’re in the kitchen then give the reader the colour of the tablecloth, the smell of the stew cooking on the stove, the creak of the chair and the burnt out lightbulb dangling above.

A setting can also set tone, a feeling and it can be a character in of itself.  For example, the supportive small town or the thick forest holding back progress or a chaotic city that overwhelms a new resident can play a pivotal role in a story. The setting can offer far more complications or support in your story than just a pretty backdrop in which to tell your story. Keep in mind that what you choose to share in terms of details are the very tools you will use to create tone and evoke feeling. Is the kitchen warm and cozy, or cold and desolate? The description you share should be hand-picked and carefully worded to evoke the feelings you want to bring forward to the reader.

Setting can also take on a character type role.  Many of you writing memoir might find this to be true when writing about a childhood home, or a grandparent’s house,  a setting that conjures up immense emotion.

Consider how the environment plays into your ancestor’s emotions. Take out something you’ve written so far this month. Read it. Is the location clear? The physical setting established? Are there details, or is it very general in nature? Does it reflect a feeling an emotion, could it?

On the other side, setting shouldn’t take over your writing. Long narratives describing a family home or locations pull the reader away from the action and the story.  Describing setting within a scene requires a delicate balance, just enough to to feel like we are there, not to much that it pulls us out of the story.

You, the family history writer control the window to your ancestor’s physical world, think cautiously about how you wish to portray that world to your reader and what feeling and emotion it could bring to the story.