I think conflict as an idea can be misunderstood. It doesn't mean that you have to have characters fighting (physically or otherwise). But there should be some sort of tension between what a character wants (even if it's to preserve a perfect moment of happiness they've found themselves in) and what they're able to achieve. This tension provokes emotion in the character and interest for the reader.
Conflict
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This is one of those rules that I strongly disagree with.
Conflict and tension create one kind of story rhythm. It's a popular kind, but not the only kind.
What a story needs is a rhythm of events and character development that the reader will enjoy following. Continuous escalation satisfies some readers but not others.
Some of my favorite books (John Crowley's Little, Big for example) have consisted of a series of shorter subplots that have escalation of tension and conflict then resolution, before going on to the next subplot. As each such event happens the characters develop and the world is revealed, leading to a fuller, deeper ending.
Conflict and tension create one kind of story rhythm. It's a popular kind, but not the only kind.
What a story needs is a rhythm of events and character development that the reader will enjoy following. Continuous escalation satisfies some readers but not others.
Some of my favorite books (John Crowley's Little, Big for example) have consisted of a series of shorter subplots that have escalation of tension and conflict then resolution, before going on to the next subplot. As each such event happens the characters develop and the world is revealed, leading to a fuller, deeper ending.
I don't see how this is different from the old adage of conflict driving the plot.
BethS agrees, and she describes what kind of tension re-readers feel.
This is getting close to describing tension so generally that it's meaningless. But if we agree to use a very general definition of tension, we can identify several kinds.
Tension in thrillers is based most on fear for the main character or someone important to them. (There may be other kinds, but that's A biggy if not THE biggest.)
For stories in general one kind of tension is wondering what happens next, and what happens in the end.
For romance stories, where the convention is that a Happily Ever After is guaranteed, there is no tension about WHETHER it will occur but about HOW it will occur.
In detective stories there may or may not be fear-based tension but the main tension is curiosity: who done it, and how the detective(s) will find that, and whether they'll get enough evidence to convict the criminal.
In some sci-fi stories a big source of "tension" is awe at the scope and kind of settings and action.
And so on.
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The only part of that I'd dispute is the detective stories, particularly ones with body counts. The readers can reliably assume there will be a death even if the narrative doesn't indicate that, so the author can sometimes rely on meta knowledge for their tension.
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There can still be internal conflict during those down periods, even if it's subtle A bit of guilt over taking time for oneself, for instance.
But if we are going to define conflict in such broad terms, is it still useful as an element in deconstruction and writing?
Conflict is always a "Yes"/"No" situation. It is rare that I find myself at a chapter where all the characters are in absolute and complete agreement at the beginning of the chapter. Even those chapters which are a resolution to previous chapters. The few times I find those kinds of chapters (no one is disagreeing about anything) I usually wind up rewriting or scrapping them altogether.
Are there examples of stories in which there is relatively little tension? Sure. (Although I can't think of any offhand.) But even very tiny wedges of story-telling and fiction tend to rely on conflict and opposition. (See the traditional haiku. Not only does it fit a structural restraint, but it also contains a final/closing line which reverses or contradicts the preceding two.)
It's one of those rules that exists less because it "has to be" and more because it appeals to readers - whether they know it or not.
Are there examples of stories in which there is relatively little tension? Sure. (Although I can't think of any offhand.) But even very tiny wedges of story-telling and fiction tend to rely on conflict and opposition. (See the traditional haiku. Not only does it fit a structural restraint, but it also contains a final/closing line which reverses or contradicts the preceding two.)
It's one of those rules that exists less because it "has to be" and more because it appeals to readers - whether they know it or not.
Conflict can also be as simple as change. It's okay to have a character enjoying a stroke of good fortune in one scene, although if it's not a resolution, there should be later scenes where the seeming good fortune leads to unforeseen problems. JMO--YMMV. 
If there's consistently no conflict, then I agree there is a problem: it reads like the script of a child's roleplay. Doll does this, doll does that, I make it go here, I make it go there. Everything is effortlessly achieved, a slew of experiences for which the doll has no control. I'm just sceptical about every scene needing it.
Although that said you could probably get a cool experimental book out of that if you were doing it deliberately.
Although that said you could probably get a cool experimental book out of that if you were doing it deliberately.
This is key, I think.
When you think about a single scene in a movie or TV show, no matter if it's a scene between a bunch of people, two people, one person by themselves, or even just a location shot, something always happens. The scene is not the same at the end as when it started. Someone walked into frame. The two people disagree on something. The two people realize they have more in common than they thought. As a writer I'm constantly asking myself, "Why is this scene important? What changes in this scene in particular, and how does this scene affect the whole story?" It must, somehow.
They are called movies, after all; something moves.
It may be pretty subtle. Even in a shot of someone speaking the camera may slowly move in or out of close up on the speaker. Sometimes this is a lame way to put action into a scene which has none. But it can be done well, to show the speaker is more emotional than the words might suggest. Or conversely to distance the viewer from the emotion being displayed.
Conflict is only one kind of change in a scene, but there needs to be some change.
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"Change" (like "conflict" or "tension") seems to me to be way too general a word to be very useful to a writer trying to understand how and why to write scenes. What could we do to be more specific (without being TOO specific)?
One solution is to divide change up into change in one or more of the three basic parts of a story: character, setting, and plot.
Characters can change in a variety of ways, for instance. They can go from healthy to sick, or vice versa. From poor to rich, or vice versa. Content with their lot to discontented, or vice versa. Or something more complex such as rise and fall and rise again - or vice versa! In YA a character often becomes more mature, or wise, or gains or loses a friend or lover. In a romance two people go from alone to married. Or in a lot of women's fiction lose a husband (often to a younger woman) and have to relearn how to live alone.
One solution is to divide change up into change in one or more of the three basic parts of a story: character, setting, and plot.
Characters can change in a variety of ways, for instance. They can go from healthy to sick, or vice versa. From poor to rich, or vice versa. Content with their lot to discontented, or vice versa. Or something more complex such as rise and fall and rise again - or vice versa! In YA a character often becomes more mature, or wise, or gains or loses a friend or lover. In a romance two people go from alone to married. Or in a lot of women's fiction lose a husband (often to a younger woman) and have to relearn how to live alone.
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I think of OBSTACLES rather than conflict when I plot a story. Conflict is a by-product of obstacles, generated when the main character(s) strive to deal with blocks to their achieving their goal. It is a secondary element of stories, not a primary one.
I lay out a story like this: CHARacter - OBstacle 1 - OBstacle 2 ... OBstacle n - GOAL.
If there's a subplot I lay it out like this: C2 - O11 - O12 ... Om - G2.
Works for me. Maybe not for anyone else.
I lay out a story like this: CHARacter - OBstacle 1 - OBstacle 2 ... OBstacle n - GOAL.
If there's a subplot I lay it out like this: C2 - O11 - O12 ... Om - G2.
Works for me. Maybe not for anyone else.
someone up-thread suggested you mention a chapter in a book you've read which is devoid of conflict. You have not done that (maybe you missed the prompt or whatever) but it might be a useful exercise for you.
To me, I don't give a fuck about conflict per se, but I give a great many (like I have to buy my fucks at Costco, in bulk, to be able to adequately dispense them) with regard to the general theory that you cut anything that doesn't actually move the story forward. That's why my characters never take a shit or shave or the like, unless there's a very specific reason to mention them doing so--you and I do a million things every day that are just housekeeping, which you wouldn't put in a story because they're just "shit that happened."
A scene without any real conflict would be, to my mind, just that. I don't care if you ate asparagus. I don't care if you rode a trolley all up and down San Francisco one sunday and saw this, that, and some other thing.
I DO care if you ate asparagus afraid the whole night that your date might later smell your pee, because you were stressed the fuck out about making things perfect with this girl. And I DO care if you rode that trolley all over while debating in your head if you should tell your wife you date a girl who has never sniffed your asparagus-pee, but there's the thing: if there's some level of conflict, it is something worth being in the story. If not, it is laundry list stuff, like taking a morning shit, that doesn't go in a story because unless there's some specific additional reason, it doesn't have enough relevance to be there.
Costco sell fucks in bulk?! Dang, brb!
I'd put an exception forward, if I might, quicklime. Third person/first person present tends towards the immediate and the minutiae due to the nature of the POV (as does all that stream of consciousness stuff). It is usually accompanied by endless reflection, but still.
Edit: oh hey, my 1000th post!
I'd put an exception forward, if I might, quicklime. Third person/first person present tends towards the immediate and the minutiae due to the nature of the POV (as does all that stream of consciousness stuff). It is usually accompanied by endless reflection, but still.
Edit: oh hey, my 1000th post!
ummm......I only write first and close third.
My characters still never shit, and I do almost every day.
Not because they have no buttholes, but because the conflictless minutae isn't something I feel has any real place in the novel.
Again, I tend towards the leaner side, but there's just tons of shit that goes down in a day. And even in a slow romance or whatever, if you went to the botanical gardens and just sat there, and then came home, I don't care.
If you went there and looked at the roses and tried to stop thinking of the smell of hospice rooms, and what your daughter looks like without any hair, and if you were going to be able to hold onto the house just a few months longer because she doesn't have much time, and if you can just balance bills a little bit longer, she doesn't have to know what trying to cure her has done to your entire financial state, and she doesn't deserve to feel like she took daddy's house while she's slowly dying, then hell yes, I want to hear about the gardens. Because they mean something.
My characters still never shit, and I do almost every day.
Not because they have no buttholes, but because the conflictless minutae isn't something I feel has any real place in the novel.
Again, I tend towards the leaner side, but there's just tons of shit that goes down in a day. And even in a slow romance or whatever, if you went to the botanical gardens and just sat there, and then came home, I don't care.
If you went there and looked at the roses and tried to stop thinking of the smell of hospice rooms, and what your daughter looks like without any hair, and if you were going to be able to hold onto the house just a few months longer because she doesn't have much time, and if you can just balance bills a little bit longer, she doesn't have to know what trying to cure her has done to your entire financial state, and she doesn't deserve to feel like she took daddy's house while she's slowly dying, then hell yes, I want to hear about the gardens. Because they mean something.
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both past and present. But even if I am writing present, I (or you, or anyone) skip stuff.....otherwise I'd be at like a thousand pages per single day. So would you. Conservatively, we have a few dozen thoughts per minute in a day. You scratch your face several dozen times in an hour, look at and/or hear a dozen things in any given minute. You skip things in the writing.,,.
So what do you skip?
I skip the things that don't move the actual story in some way, and I'm not sure there's many conflict-less things that also move the story forward.
So what do you skip?
I skip the things that don't move the actual story in some way, and I'm not sure there's many conflict-less things that also move the story forward.
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Yes, I do skip those things, but I also don't read the vast majority of stream of consciousness type books--Mrs Dalloway I could just about manage--or present tense novels, for the same reason. So in other words I tend to skip the actual books.
It's supposed to give immediacy but loses out on effective time manipulation, making transitions and time jumps harder (imo). Ergo a lot of detail seems to crop up which can be happily dispensed with in more distant, less immediate POVs.
In general though I broadly agreed with you.
It's supposed to give immediacy but loses out on effective time manipulation, making transitions and time jumps harder (imo). Ergo a lot of detail seems to crop up which can be happily dispensed with in more distant, less immediate POVs.
In general though I broadly agreed with you.
I guess to me, this isn't true though, it is someone trying to lay out absolutes in the same vein as "Having more than one POV is confusing and ill-advised." (another thread right now talking about that)
that's a statement so strong it isn't just not always accurate, I would argue it is RARELY accurate, not because beginning writers don't make a mess out of 2 or 3 POV at times, but because it is their underlying weakness in the mechanics of writing.
There are basically 2 present-tense constructs I've seen, those which cover a few seconds to minutes and so they include everything (and they tend to be a device specifically to showcase conflict) and those that cover broader scenarios, but they still don't cover a full day, or full hours....they are a series of present-tense vignettes making up a day. And between each one? Those dead spots where folks are pooping, or doing something else devoid of conflict.
note none of the above says you can't do the writing without conflict, but if you do you will tend to lose writers.
Again I don't care if you shave; I do it all the time.
If you're thinking about all the gray in your stubble and I'm getting a sense of your struggle with your own aging (conflict) I am interested.
If you're doing it while trying to listen, to hear if your wife who was supposed to be asleep yet, is creeping around the bedroom looking for her phone, and who the fuck would she be texting the minute you leave the room, and at 5 in the morning, and after she was pretending to be sound asleep (conflict), I'm interested.
If you're doing it while you replay how you are going to finally tell your boss you deserve a raise, or while you wonder how you're going to pay for college, or if your kid is ever going to be smart enough to even GET to college, and maybe not wind up like you did (conflict, conflict, and conflict) then I'm interested...
Then yes, we're in agreement more or less. Everything should pull double duty in a MS, but some actions are better suited to that than others, either by nature or narrative circumstance.
This is all incredibly good advice and thought-provoking. An agent who reviewed one of my novels responded with comments like "slow narrative", and similar. I had no idea what he meant since he provided no examples. After reading this thread on Conflict, I think I understand.
I liked Devil Ledbetter's phrase, " . . . bake that shit in and the conflict will write itself into every scene." It really brought home to me that conflict can be built in small, easy ways without needing a lot of backstory or navel-gazing.
Very helpful! Thank you all!
I liked Devil Ledbetter's phrase, " . . . bake that shit in and the conflict will write itself into every scene." It really brought home to me that conflict can be built in small, easy ways without needing a lot of backstory or navel-gazing.
Very helpful! Thank you all!