Character driven/plot driven - what is SFF all about?

[BAYLOR]

Why is it that some people can be rude and condescending, but no one seems to notice or care?

Why is it that you feel entitled to attack me? Are your personal attacks privileged in some way?


Post a thread about writing structure and I get accused of all sorts of stuff from the first response on. It is just writing theory stuff, folks.

In my case , Im well aware that there are great many things that I do not know. Im fine with that. I do like to learns things that I previously did not know. Having read your posts, I would say you know a great deal about subject of writing , and the various genres. But , others here know just much if not more then you do and that's something you might try to keep in mind . Whether you believe it or not you've got things to learn. One them , and this is the most important thing , is how talk to people. You have a habit of talking down to people or though them or arguing with them and from the premise of, " I have to be right and they have to be wrong."

 

[Star-child]

In my case , Im well aware that there are great many things that I do not know. Im fine with that. I do like to learns things that I previously did not know. Having read your posts, I would say you know a great deal about subject of writing , and the various genres. But , others here know just much if not more then you do and tha's something you might try to keep in mind . Whether you believe it or not you've got things to learn. One them , and this is the most important thing , is how talk to people. You have a habit of talking down to people or thought them. or arguing with them and from the premise of I have to be right and they have to be wrong.

I think you're turning a huge blind eye to the way long established people and even some moderators on this board speak to people. Including yourself.

And I am not arguing for argument's sake. As Harebrane and Big Peat noted, there is subject matter here worth discussing. The problem is that this subject isn't simple or perfectly clear even in my mind, so the back and forth helps me clarify my thoughts on a subject that I haven't examined before. I'm trying to defend a position mainly to see if it is worth keeping.

 

[Phyrebrat]

I can say with confidence that since I joined here, the use of the term ‘plot-driven’ is most certainly used with a disparaging tone. I know this because I have seen it used in crits and main writing discussions and had never known of the two until I began learning here.

I think the real dichotomy is over the years we’ve heard the bias against plot driven and now quite a few people are saying, ‘no, I think both are important.’

in any case, I love almonds but I hate marzipan.

pH

 

[Stephen Palmer]

This article may be of interest to people reading or posting in this thread.

 

[BAYLOR]

I think you're turning a huge blind eye to the way long established people and even some moderators on this board speak to people. Including yourself.

And I am not arguing for argument's sake. As Harebrane and Big Peat noted, there is subject matter here worth discussing. The problem is that this subject isn't simple or perfectly clear even in my mind, so the back and forth helps me clarify my thoughts on a subject that I haven't examined before. I'm trying to defend a position mainly to see if it is worth keeping.

For the record , Im not attacking you . No malice intended .

ive been here on this site for several years now and , have gotten know the people here. I think the world of them and care about them a great deal. They give advice and help people become writers and that's a good thing.

Perhaps I did misunderstand your intent and point. . My apologies Star Child.

 

[tinkerdan]

A lot depends on whether you refer to the book or the movie or both.

The ordinary/extraordinary thing mainly comes to play when the thoughts being offered are so bizarre that they don't have a function in building reader empathy with the character. When that happens they function more like exposition. I'm thinking mainly of Dune, where everyone is a wizard/ninja.

Herbert wrote those thoughts into his novel. Personally I always felt it was a mistake to do it that way and demonstrated that he couldn't figure out a way to show how duplicitous everyone was in that story.

I didn't think that the thought were the least bit bizarre and most certainly not when you consider the context of the whole story. With that in mind I'm not sure what your point is. The characters in the book did feel more real than those in the movie; because I think that they didn't handle those thoughts or translate them well enough--possibly putting too much emphasis on the bizarre. I just re-read the book last year and the thoughts seemed perfectly natural to that group of paranoid nobles.

 

[The Big Peat]

Can I suggest maybe we all take a wee step back and try and engage with the point of the discussion, and not the tone? And assume that the tone (which is now the tone of many here) is a matter of miscommunication and not deliberate antagonism - and that if we can't believe that, simply quit the field in good grace so those who want a discussion on the matter can do so without a discussion on people's manners?

 

[Jo Zebedee]

This article may be of interest to people reading or posting in this thread.

I read that yesterday and thought it was interesting. The demography within it was interesting too - perhaps if more women are reading (I believe that gap has widened in recent years) it does cause a shift in what is popular, even within individual genres.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Can I suggest maybe we all take a wee step back and try and engage with the point of the discussion, and not the tone? And assume that the tone (which is now the tone of many here) is a matter of miscommunication and not deliberate antagonism - and that if we can't believe that, simply quit the field in good grace so those who want a discussion on the matter can do so without a discussion on people's manners?

Here, here. If I’ve peeved you off, Starchild, my apologies. I thought we were having a conversation (from two ends of it, which is fine) and both robust in our posts. I can be robust when I feel the other person is equally so. If that irked you, it wasn’t my intention.

 

[Star-child]

I didn't think that the thought were the least bit bizarre and most certainly not when you consider the context of the whole story. With that in mind I'm not sure what your point is.

Not bizarre to read, but bizarre for one of us to have similar concerns and insights, since we don't live as power brokers in an age of assassination. The Dune characters think like chess pkayers, not suburbanites with the stresses of work and family

 

[tinkerdan]

Every one of these characters has some human quality within or about them.

And one of the ways I think this comes up is in the depiction of fear and wonder. In (what I have been calling) Character Driven writing, extraordinary circumstances call for some sort emotional reaction, and fear is often used because it can be described viscerally and later referred to again. But what if your character doesn't have the fears or horizons of an ordinary person, and are wired more like an SAS trooper or cosmologist? And that leads us to one of the most famous SF movie lines: "What a piece of junk!". Luke Skywalker is not an ordinary person. Spaceships and armed combat are not unusual circumstances for him, and his sense of wonder and fear are nothing like an insurance salesman's from Milwaukee. Within the story, this is not aberrant behavior - Luke is not from Milwaukee, and Paul Atreides is from even further away. Their inner lives are very different from ours to the point that we don't really share many mental similarities. The poll reflects the fact that I expect the mental landscape of Frodo, Usal, Dave Bowman, Rick Deckard or the Mule to have nothing in common with me - they are effectively aliens that will earn their humanity via their efforts, not by simply sharing my "petty" insecurities.

I definitely do not see this(in the quotes) and it would certainly be a sad disconnect if I couldn't relate to them on some human level.

I still fail to see the point being made.
Sorry
I must have lived a far different life than some.

Expression of thoughts is a POV tool and shouldn't determine between ordinary and extra-ordinary. A close POV allows for expression and to be honest the Omniscient POV's also could take license with inner thoughts. Inner thoughts have nothing to do with character driven stories and work just as well in plot driven stories. Plot driven stories are not limited they can also be Close POV which allows for thoughts and feelings and emotion or lack there of.

The tools are all the same and when it comes to writing well then it won't matter if it is plot driven or character driven and most likely won't be noticed.
When you notice these things there are problems that lie elsewhere.

 

[BAYLOR]

Not bizarre to read, but bizarre for one of us to have similar concerns and insights, since we don't live as power brokers in an age of assassination. The Dune characters think like chess pkayers, not suburbanites with the stresses of work and family

Never thought of the Dune in that context, interesting.

There is a novel that you might want to look at In Conquest Born by C S Friedman. you have two waring races at war both different On the Braxa are master manipulators / strategist. Their who society encourages son to plot against their fathers as way of proving their worth, in some way they resemble the Spartan If thye have any sentiment , they keep it hidden. Azean their opponents , are telepaths and that Is the only thing only think keep them for being defeated by Braxans. you might find the character dynamics in tha book to be of interests.

 

[Star-child]

Every one of these characters has some human quality within or about them.

I definitely do not see what you see and it would certainly be a sad disconnect if I couldn't relate to them on some human level.

I still fail to see the point that you are making.
Sorry.
I must have lived a far different life than you.

I'm not saying they aren't human, I'm saying that the thoughts shared are largely strategic and revelatory, to the point that the thoughts alone don't function to show common perspective with the reader, but instead illustrate the advanced level the characters are operating at. Other parts of the text is what I think makes them relatable.

 

[The Big Peat]

in a situation where a king or space emperor can start wars as he wants, the character and the plot are surely much the same thing. Not only are the two hard to separate, I don’t really see what would be gained in trying to separate them.

But that doesn't mean you're focusing on each the same way. And I think that in terms of writing a book, knowing where you've put your focus - what you're actually doing - is useful. A story about a Monarch who fights who they want when they want is going to look very different depending on whether the focus is on the enemies that causes them to start wars when they want, or the inner turmoil that causes them to start wars when they want, or a mix.

And knowing if you're likely to trend in either of those directions is a good start to knowing you need to bolster the other part of the story. Stories that focus more or less on one or the other are currently unpopular because we have a lot of authors who balance well - I think it is increasingly the norm - but you can't balance if you don't know where you are on the tightrope.

And that got me thinking about showing vs. telling. Illustrating character's through their plot choices is showing, mind reading is telling. That seemed worth discussing.

Leaving aside that I think too much shade is thrown at telling - a character's internal thoughts might be telling about what the character is thinking, but it is often showing at the same time a great deal about cultures and setting and other characters and sometimes the plot. I think in that respect, character-driven often does a job at depicting certain fantastical ideas, because it is a better viewing ground for showing what it's all about.

I guess I would mostly disagree. SFF protagonists are rarely ordinary, and by virtue of the fantastical circumstances of their mise en scene, are starting out as uniquely unordinary people. Common SFF characters are messiahs, kings, wizards, geniuses, space captains, elite warriors, cyborgs, immortals, AIs, hackers, spies and con men. Anymen are few and far between, because those kind of people just aren't very useful when the Borg are attacking or you're invited to play Azad.

And one of the ways I think this comes up is in the depiction of fear and wonder. In (what I have been calling) Character Driven writing, extraordinary circumstances call for some sort emotional reaction, and fear is often used because it can be described viscerally and later referred to again. But what if your character doesn't have the fears or horizons of an ordinary person, and are wired more like an SAS trooper or cosmologist? And that leads us to one of the most famous SF movie lines: "What a piece of junk!". Luke Skywalker is not an ordinary person. Spaceships and armed combat are not unusual circumstances for him, and his sense of wonder and fear are nothing like an insurance salesman's from Milwaukee. Within the story, this is not aberrant behavior - Luke is not from Milwaukee, and Paul Atreides is from even further away. Their inner lives are very different from ours to the point that we don't really share many mental similarities. The poll reflects the fact that I expect the mental landscape of Frodo, Usal, Dave Bowman, Rick Deckard or the Mule to have nothing in common with me - they are effectively aliens that will earn their humanity via their efforts, not by simply sharing my "petty" insecurities.

This I can't agree with. As far as I'm concerned, even extraordinary people have far more in common with your everyday joes than they have different. They are still relatable and I don't need them to be closely similar to me to do so. Tbh, this idea of them having nothing in common with me is so alien that I think it accounts for why its taken me so long to really get what you're getting at.

Although maybe to a certain extent, this is why a lot of authors - particularly fantasy - like to start characters as 'ordinary' people, with very reduced levels of wonder and knowledge and let them become more and more powerful and knowing as the story goes on.

edit: Having seen what you've said about them being chess masters - that still seems relatable to me. And no, that's not because I've got a super cool job that I can't tell people about unless I kill them first. Maybe it's because I can imagine myself in a similar position, taking similar decisions.

 

[tinkerdan]

Actually I always felt they were working on a sub-par level...

I'm not saying they aren't human, I'm saying that the thoughts shared are largely strategic and revelatory, to the point that the thoughts alone don't function to show common perspective with the reader, but instead illustrate the advanced level the characters are operating at. Other parts of the text is what I think makes them relatable.

Because they weren't communicating with each other-Biggest trope ever-everything that goes wrong is because two people can't sit down and discuss things. I know lots of people who do this. And having managed a number of businesses, I actually do find myself thinking on their level every day was like a big chessboard with hundreds of chess pieces.

 

[The Big Peat]

Thinking a little about some of my favourite/most recently read books and where they fall on this and how it affects their "SFF"ness...

The City Watch sub-series of the Discworld are undoubtedly all plot-driven as individual books. The whodunnit is the driving force. But the sub plots - as is often the case with crime novels - is often personal and character-driven. And in terms of the series, the unifying arc is actually character-driven, because few plots linger from book to book but the personal sub-plots do. I think one could argue for long series often trending in this direction actually.

As for how this effects the SFFness? Arguably, the Watch books are light SFF. There's a decent amount of fantasy elements(varying from book to book) but they're mainly used to make points about the real world; its less about how humans react to the extraordinary as using the extraordinary to show how humans react to the ordinary, so it's not a big issue.

But the Witches sub-series is a lot more Fantasy-based (albeit with the same general structure of plot-driven stories, character-driven series) and I don't think it interferes. Partly that's because Pratchett juggles his cast well and writes extraordinary characters very well; Granny Weatherwax has all the same human foibles as everyone else, just buried a thousand miles deep under her pride and ambition and sense of duty. Nanny Ogg is incredibly human, but there's an iron resolve and lack of fear and power neatly packed away there for when she needs it. They compliment each other, they bring out aspects of each other's characters well. And I think the SFFness of it - the "What would you do if the nightmares and horror stories were true and you stood on the edge keeping ungrateful gits safe" - still comes through.

But let's pick a few things truly totally of the stuff of fantasy.

I'd say Mythago Wood is character driven. There's long passages dedicated to Stephen Huxley's internal reactions, his rationalisations, his decision making. He's very ordinary. And I can't think of a better way to demonstrate the strangeness and wonders of place that stands in reality and bleeds into myth than through the character-driven decisions of an ordinary person. I could have used A Wizard of Earthsea or Tehanu just as easily imo. In fact, to me this is the true face of truly fantastical fantasy, as it has least layers between me and sheer strangeness.

Neverwhere - at least the graphic novel version - is plot-driven though. We see him and his companions change through their actions. And the world is very fantastical. Do the characters come across less for it? I don't think so, although they're not compelling. Is the story better for it? I have to admit, I do think comics - where Gaiman's characters are forced to show their actions, rather than monologue them, and where I can see the strangeness - is Gaiman's best medium.

Max Gladstone's The Craft Sequence might be the best example of very fantasy-rich plot-driven - almost all murder mysteries, often with some very cool concepts. His characters are interesting, but we see them reacting mostly to the plot, and tbh there's none of them I'd list as a favourite character. But the way the characters interact with the world does work at revealing the Fantasy concept; because they force others to act, and we see their limitations. Maybe plot-driven is the best way to show Fantasy where the Fantastical is the nature of people, and character-driven when the Fantastical is the nature of places and the world? A balancing act?


I think in terms of showing someone who's very "strange" from the outset, the Dresden Files is my best bet (Fantasy has these sort of protagonists very rarely). And they're plot-driven. But... because its all 1st PoV, the level of internal monologue is by nature quite high. I think the Dresden Files has the best of both worlds - and I'd notice that Butcher's Scene-Sequel format is by its very nature a constant switch between plot-driven and character-driven.

Hmm. Eddings' Elenium and some of Gemmell's books would also be good examples of differently wired heroes. In Eddings' style, it is very down to earth and humanistic, so there's less of a sense of it. But Gemmell? Yes, guys like Druss and Waylander make decisions I wouldn't make - and while we have the odd monologue, it's the vegetable side dish to the big slab of protein-action. But... the novels aren't hugely fantastic. Dark Moon and Echoes of the Great Song do have very good "How would you react to this supernatural" thing and... they're interesting, but maybe don't work as well. They feel thin, like they're trying to do too much.

If anybody is still reading this, I'm not sure what conclusions I've got. In the spirit of trying:

a) I prefer books about humans, and who they're both extraordinary and ordinary, and it's slightly exasperating that other genres don't really offer me that in the way Fantasy does - and that's mainly why I read Fantasy, ordinary people with Mythic proportions, not the Fantastic in and of itself.

b) I find character-driven to have the thinnest layer between the reader and fantastic places, and plot-driven to have the thinnest layer between the reader and fantastic people.

c) The Fantasy genre seems to mostly steer clear of showing MCs who are fantastic from the get go, and the Farmboys of Doom and the Watsons are the norm.

d) I'm still convinced that a fairly even mix of character-driven and plot-driven is the best way forwards - or at least it's what I see in most of my favourite books.


In terms of applying it to my own books... I come up with questions about a character, try to turn it into a plot-driven book, then write it as a character-driven. Maybe I need to be more plot orientated.

 

[Ursa major]

I'm not sure what conclusions I've got.

I thought the conclusion you reached -- though perhaps you don't consider it a conclusion -- was where you wrote:

I think the Dresden Files has the best of both worlds

Yes: the best of both worlds, i.e. not the best of one world instead of the best of the other. (Other degrees of achievement are available, and are perhaps more achievable to us mere mortals than for the greatest of writers.)

Why wouldn't the reader want the best of both worlds? Why not let the plot-driven aspects of a story deliver what they're best at delivering and the character-driven aspects of a story deliver what they are best at delivering?

I suppose the icing on the cake would be where the two aspects are properly -- seamlessly -- interwoven, so that one or other only emerges to do its job before recombining with the other until the next point in the story where one or other of them can do what it does best for achieving the required outcome.

 

[tinkerdan]

The story is an engine driven by character and plot--best if they pace each other. Otherwise, the whole thing tends to veer all over the road to end up in the ditch.

Plot and character are married.
The characters are chosen to fit the plot and if you kill them all off on the fist page the plot gets pretty cold quick.
If the characters want to head of into a new plot; well, you have the great divorce and possibly a novel entitled Number of the Beast.

Really though, you can do it whatever way you want. Sometimes you just want to experiment.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

It seems to me that the definitions of a lot of things have changed and grown more confusing over the past several years, thanks to social media. Where the explanations for things like plot-driven vs character-driven used to be written down in relatively few books on writing, most or all of which took their information from the same sources, now everyone can discuss them and weigh in with their opinions, and pretty soon everyone is going off a different definition they read/heard somewhere.

Now I can remember a time when it seemed like everyone could agree that plot-driven meant that people got swept up in events. Given few choices they made few actual decisions but reacted in the moment to the press of circumstances. Character-driven, on the other hand, meant that the characters in the story made the events happen. It was their choices that drove the story.

Either of these could allow for introspection on the part of the characters, or for simply observing how they behaved. Either one could result in a fine piece of writing or in a disastrous flop. It would depend on the skill of the writer and on the choices they made. Each one had its own particular set of pitfalls.

Plot-driven tended toward stories where the author decided on the events and character reactions in advance—the major pitfall, then, being that if in the writing of the story the characters showed a disinclination to cooperate with the author's plans the writer forced them to do so anyway, resulting in poor characterization and poor plotting.

Character-driven tended toward stories where the characters were put into a particular situation and the author allowed the story to develop based on what the characters proceeded to do (often unanticipated by the writer, who grew to know them better as they story progressed)—the major pitfall, then, being the possibility of a story without structure, with a plot that ambled on for a while and then fizzled out before actually arriving anywhere.

Of course in the hands of a skilled and thoughtful writer either sort of story could avoid the pitfalls and play to the strengths of the chosen form. (Plot-driven: probably more action, better pacing. Character-driven: deeper identification with the characters, who acted in unpredictable yet completely believable ways.)

But now there are so many possible definitions for each term, I wonder how useful they are anymore.

 

[sknox]

>I just don't think these terms exist to describe purely qualitative differences and exist for more useful reasons.

OK, so what are those more useful reasons? I'm looking for things in this discussion that might help me write gooder.