Lately I've been mulling over how inactive a character can be and still a) drive a story and b) be interesting enough for an audience to want to spend time with them. Say you wrote a story where your main character was Aristotle, I imagine he would have spent a lot of time doing nothing other than thinking, his story is not what he did or does but what he has to say. I'm beginning to think that at some point, if your characters opinions are and point of view is more interesting than what they do, then you're kind of better off writing their thoughts rather than what they get up to. Other examples would be well behaved poets, private geniuses, etc. Would you agree that the typical three act structure/story form requires your protagonist to be engaged in activity/enterprise above some threshold i.e. not just thinking, not just coping, not just hanging by a thread, not just scraping by, not just minding their own business, etc. Does anyone know of any works where the form of the work serves to spotlight the characters inner more than their outer (without it being someones journal or manifesto or memoir or poetry etc.) David Foster Wallaces Brief Interviews with Hideous Men does it but it's kind of the only one I know of and it feels like plagiarism copying that form. Thanks in advance.
No. I wouldn't agree. Are you talking about a story where a character's internal struggle, rather than the external conflict is what drives a story? If so, it sounds like you're talking about character driven stories. They're very common, especially in contemporary fiction. They may not all be typical three act structure, but there are definitely quite a bit of stories that do this. You might also look into stream of consciousness. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7437.Naked_Lunch
What I have is a collection of observational type passages I've accumulated, perhaps they're opinion pieces or lazy beginnings of essays or similar, I want to compile them somehow. My thought so far has been to use them as things characters say in a story but this would mean bending a plot so that what I want the characters to say is not way out of left field and somehow relates to what they are doing. A lot of the writings are kind of private/intimate/deep and not the kind of stuff people would say outside of a diary/therapy/etc. so creating moments for these things to be said is proving difficult. Perhaps approaching it this way needs review, plot is arbitrary from this perspective as my main interest is the musings I want the characters to have and not conflict and it's resolution. I'll look into your recommendations when I get a chance, thanks heaps for your replies.
Does it have to be that way though? Maybe a story is not the best way to compile what I want to compile? Some other possibilities I've ruminated on include a fictional characters diary, a written account of a documentary makers attempts at making a documentary, a day in the life of a therapist or a written episode of 60 minutes. I haven't come across anything like this before (limited exposure/not widely read) and have perhaps a naive understanding that only "stories" get published.
Yes, stories get published, and they can take on many forms. I don't really understand your quotes around the word story. If you really want to give writing a go, start reading like crazy. It does wonders. I do find it a bit strange when people say they want to write but don't really read. Changing that behavior is probably the best thing you can do for yourself as a writer or potential writer.
What does an inactive character drive? They aren’t driving the plot. They could drive reader interest thought. Story 1: Bland Betty the audience insert shows up at a new school where two guys fight over and protect her while a bunch of wonky stuff happens. Sounds popular. Story 2: Voicey eye witness relates how he reacted to each incident that happened to him during a war while the team he was with matched across the country. Sounds pretty popular as well. Neither character has too make anything happen. Maybe they end up at the right place at the right time to do the thing we all hope we would do. The end.
Agreed, those kinds of strategies works if there's an interesting enough "out-there" happening or an "out-there" with activity above a certain threshold. To use my Aristotle analogy again telling his story doesn't really showcase what to me is the best part of him i.e. the ideas he formulated, the way he saw things, etc. There would be minimal drama/comedy in much of the life of someone like that thus his best parts are more interesting/entertaining presented or compiled in another form of writing. I guess I'm kind of exploring how much deep analysis/wisdom/insight can be present before narrative becomes rhetoric and or boring. Kind of like how much of the wise-man archetype/master can be present and still have enough drama/mishap/false-moves/etc to make the ride enjoyable. I guess I'm also making the argument that above a certain threshold of wisdom/insight/mastery of life drama inciting activity ceases - how to write from the point of view of people like this is another thing I'm exploring here. It's kind of like how the wise old owl usually tells the stories but hardly participates in them, what would the owls story be if it was told, would it be poetry? Would it be essays? Would it be a self-help book? Would it be anecdotes from the days when he was unwise as an owl?
I'm reading "Thus spoke Zarathustra" at the moment and that's been entirely his thoughts and beliefs and what not. It's just portrayed as him teaching groups of people.
Good point, I read that years ago and am pretty vague in my memories of it, I do recall it being like you say though.
