PLOT-FIRST WRITERS
On the other hand, maybe you’re a plot-first writer. You never have a problem driving your plot home. In fact, you probably drive over any actual character who dares try to arise from the bubbling asphalt of your story. Plot firsters steamroll their way from plot point to plot point, cloning characters on the copy machine in the sky and cracking the whip to make them do whatever it is the plot needs them to do next.
What do we get when we score an A+ for plot and an F for characters?
We get Cliffhanger and Mission to Mars and The Transporter 2. And we get the character named Levine in Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park sequel, The Lost World.
For pages, this character goes on and on about the sanctity of maintaining a pristine environment in the lost world. And he is a meticulous scientist. For instance, we get this commentary from the narrator:
The truth was that Levine — brilliant and fastidious — was drawn to the past, to the world that no longer existed. And he studied this world with obsessive intensity. He was famous for his photographic memory, his arrogance, his sharp tongue, and the unconcealed pleasure he took in
pointing out the errors of colleagues. As a colleague once said, “Levine never forgets a bone — and he never lets you forget it, either.”
Field researchers disliked Levine, and he returned the sentiment. He was at heart a man of detail, a
cataloguer of animal life, and he was happiest poring over museum collections.
— Michael Crichton, The Lost World
Fastidious. Critical of others for their sloppiness. Okay, that works as a partial character sketch. But ask yourself, would that person do the following:
Thorne shrugged. He still saw nothing. Standing behind him, Levine began to eat a power bar.
Preoccupied with holding the binoculars, he dropped the wrapper on the floor of the hide. Bits of paper fluttered to the ground below.
“How are those things?” Arby said.
“Okay. A little sugary.”
“Got any more?” he said.
Levine rummaged in his pockets and gave him one. Arby broke it in half, and gave half to Kelly.
He began to unwrap his half, carefully folding the paper, putting it neatly in his pocket.”
— Michael Crichton, The Lost World
Levine did what? This wild-eyed scientist/activist, whose only semblance of an actual personality was that he was obsessed with keeping man’s impact on nature to nil, drops a candy wrapper to the ground? It’s incredible. It’s unconscionable. It’s completely wrong for that character.
But, you know, the author needed a reason for the dinos to eat him.
That’s why this is called character-serving plot. It’s such an egregious example of character-serving plot that I use it as my prime example whenever I teach at conferences. Who cares that this character would never do such a thing? The plot must be serviced!
Do all your characters feel pretty much like you? Oh, I know that every character we write is, in a sense, a manifestation of ourselves, but that’s not what I’m talking about. It’s not enough that your characters differ from you in terms of gender or motive or background or race or externals like that. Do you have this sense that your characters are either just like you — in how they talk, think, etc. — or are mere stereotypes?
Here’s a test: If you refer to your characters as “the girl,” “the boss,” “the fat guy,” and “the villain,” you might be a plot firster. If you accidentally switched the names of two of your characters and no one could tell the difference, you might be a plot-first novelist. If you find yourself able to, with little effort, make it Fred who defuses the bomb instead of Mike, you might be a plot firster.
But who cares, right? It’s a great story. People will be entertained. They’ll never guess what’s going to happen, but when they find out they’ll feel like it was the right call. What more can anyone ask? Certainly there are plenty of successful novelists and filmmakers who create stories that are all about plot. First Blood, anyone?
You hear a higher music, though. You’re not content to write cardboard characters or you wouldn’t be reading this book. Though you sense it will be difficult to create characters as wonderful as your plots, you realize your fiction could achieve another level entirely if you did, so you’re willing to give it a try.
