Today we’d like to discuss an interesting topic for writers. There are different aspects to consider when writing a story and they all have an impact on the storyline.
The author will have to make decisions to make the plot cohesive, credible, and gripping. This article shows you the types of scenarios that you can choose to write your story.
Main aspects of storytelling
There is no magic formula as to how to write the perfect story. Yet, certain aspects might be helpful. By considering these, authors can have a better perspective of their work. This not only helps to organize ideas but to generate new ones too.
Making some decisions at the beginning of the creative process reduces the chances to make mistakes along the way. If you outline your character’s personality before writing the first word, you’ll know how he/she will act under certain circumstances.
Also, choosing the right voice for a character can help readers relate to the story. Will the story be in the first or the third person? What kind of narrator will it have? What will be the characters’ voices and surroundings? This leads us directly to choosing our story’s background.
Things to consider before writing a story:
- Character personality
- Type of narrator
- What is the conflict you want to develop
- Character surroundings
- Story background
Types of story backgrounds
What do we mean by story background? In general, this is a description that helps visualize where the action takes place. It’s a key element of storytelling that provides context, meaning, and sense to a story. Here are different types of backgrounds you can choose to outline your plot.
Localized background
This is a type of background that helps design the characters. It’s formed by customs or landscapes that provide context. The reader understands the way these characters live, think, and act, and this supports their actions. The characters can blend or stand out from this background which are two different strategies.
Essential background
In this case, the storyline depends on the location or the time where the action takes place. Readers can’t imagine this story developing from a different background.
Descriptive background
This is described by the author and can be done once throughout the story or as the action takes place.
Dialogue background
In this case, the background is described through the characters’ dialogue. This lets us dive into the story more closely and relate better to the characters. If they speak a dialect, for example, it conveys a clear picture of the plot’s cultural background.
Historic background
This background is based on a particular moment in history. The author will describe it through the habits, customs, clothes, and culture of the characters. If you make this choice, you’ll need to spend some time researching to create an environment that’s cohesive with its time.
Symbolic background
The author’s description of the scenery helps us give meaning to the story. It contains certain keys for the writer to understand the plot.
Psychological background
In this scenario, the character’s state of mind is crucial for the storyline. The author needs to convey how his or her psychology works and make him/her act accordingly.
Choosing the right story background
The background you choose depends on many things. These are the message you want to convey, the center of your plot, the type of action, and the amount of tension you want to handle. The backgrounds can be combined to achieve the desired effect. Here are some examples from the classics.
Anna Karenina – Lev Tolstoy
In this great novel by Lev Tolstoy, we can see a perfect combination of localized and essential backgrounds. When Anna decided to leave her husband for handsome Alexei Kirillovich Vronsky it caused a scandal in Saint Petersburg’s high society. This wouldn’t have been so if the plot was to be developed in our days, where the concepts of marriage and family are completely different.
Also, Tolstoy achieves an exquisite level of localized background. He shows us the Czarist Russia in all its glory and shamefulness. It describes the customs and the lives of people both in the countryside and the capital.
Tell-Tale heart – Edgar Allan Poe
In this masterpiece, Poe manages to describe the psychological suffering of a man who murders an older fellow. The readers don’t know much about the characters but are led down a spiral from which they cannot escape. The tension increases as the main character has the body hidden under the floorboards. Finally, his guilt is such that he thinks he hears the dead man’s heart beating under the floor. This is the perfect combination of descriptive and psychological backgrounds.
The Garden of Forking Paths – Jorge Luis Borges
The genius of Borges takes us to the Second World War where a German Spy is trying to send a message to his boss whom he calls ‘the Chief’. The historic background is combined with dialogue, symbolic, and descriptive backgrounds. The characters engage in a conversation in which they discover the labyrinth of one of their ancestors, Ts’ui Pen, to be his novel.
The novel symbolizes the labyrinth of creation, in which, as we make a decision, we create an infinite number of parallel worlds and possibilities. In this particular story, the outcome is one of the characters being murdered by his interlocutor.
Final thoughts on storyline backgrounds
This article shows how you can use the story background in your favor. This is not supposed to be a mere description but a part of your story. By combining any of these options you can create the perfect environment for your literary work.