Make them suffer: Developing characters under pressure

Lately I have been doing a lot of reading on the craft of writing, as I try to give my clients more specific, helpful feedback. Every day I learn something new. This week I’m focusing on character development and plot. I have been reading John Yorke’s Into the Woods: A Five-Act Journey Into Story. It’s an absolute wealth of knowledge. I latched onto this concept of mini crises and tried applying it to a TV show I was watching. It blew my mind! In this post, I’ll break down the theory, show you how it works in an example and then give you an exercise to try it on your own. How you apply this is up to you. You can do all of it, some of it, or none of it: it’s your choice.

A crisis in every scene.

According to John Yorke, each scene should present the perspective character with a problem, or the opportunity to make a choice. It could be major choices that define the plot of the story, or it could be minor choices. The options may be to act or not to act, to say something or to say nothing, or to show support or rejection; a mini crisis isn’t necessarily emotional or dramatic. In fact, having a major crisis in every scene might lead to disaster!

Learn from the best

When I am struggling with a concept, I like to sneak a peek at books by my favorite authors. I love to poke around in their toolbox to see what they do and how they do it. So, let’s take a look at how Alice is faced with a crisis in the first sentence of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, and the choice that she makes.

Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the bank, and of having nothing to do: once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it, “and what is the use of a book,” thought Alice “without pictures or conversations?”

So she was considering in her own mind (as well as she could, for the hot day made her feel very sleepy and stupid), whether the pleasure of making a daisy-chain would be worth the trouble of getting up and picking the daisies, when suddenly a White Rabbit with pink eyes ran close by her.

There was nothing so very remarkable in that; nor did Alice think it so very much out of the way to hear the Rabbit say to itself, “Oh dear! Oh dear! I shall be late!” (when she thought it over afterwards, it occurred to her that she ought to have wondered at this, but at the time it all seemed quite natural); but when the Rabbit actually took a watch out of its waistcoat-pocket, and looked at it, and then hurried on, Alice started to her feet, for it flashed across her mind that she had never before seen a rabbit with either a waistcoat-pocket, or a watch to take out of it, and burning with curiosity, she ran across the field after it, and fortunately was just in time to see it pop down a large rabbit-hole under the hedge.

In another moment down went Alice after it, never once considering how in the world she was to get out again.

Lewis Carroll

• Alice faces a mini crisis: She’s terribly bored.
• She is trying to make a choice about what to do next. But she doesn’t even have the will to pick daisies.
• Then, something disrupts her expectations and gives her an alternative option: A talking white rabbit runs by.
• Now she must choose: Stay where she is and continue being bored, or indulge her curiosity and follow the rabbit?
• She takes action: She follows the rabbit. She doesn’t even stop to think; it’s a pretty easy choice!
• Result: There’s a little foreshadowing here, establishing the main theme of the book in that last line – “…never once considering how in the world she was to get out again.”

What does this reveal to the reader about her character? In just 274 words, Lewis Carroll establishes that Alice is a child who is not easily entertained by ordinary, routine things, who seeks wonder and novelty, who is impulsive and doesn’t consider the consequences of her actions, and who “burns with curiosity” as her prime motivator. He sets up her main goal (get out again), some tension (the mystery of the rabbit) and establishes the genre as being somewhat fantastical. This helps the reader to know what to expect and to be satisfied later. After all, it’s not every day you see a rabbit in a waistcoat talking to himself about punctuality.

As for the reader, we empathise and identify with Alice – we’ve all been bored – and our own curiosity is ignited. We’re hooked, and this book becomes one of the the most successful stories of all time.

Find it in the wild.

In a novel you like or a TV show you enjoy, stop and examine random scenes. I actually tried this with Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure, my husband’s favorite anime. I’ve also thrown it at M*A*S*H, Star Trek, Harry Potter, The Handmaid’s Tale, Pride and Prejudice, and the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

Isolate the scene, choose the key character (or the perspective character) and try to see if you can identify:

• The crisis (major or mini?)
• The options
• The disruption of expectations
• The choice that is made, or action that is taken (it may be a choice not to act)
• What this reveals about the character

Lather, rinse and repeat. If you do this enough that it becomes automatic for you, you’ll either find yourself enjoying fiction more or having it all ruined for you the same way that knowing the secret ruins a magic trick. Um. Sorry about that.

Apply it to your own writing.

Now that you understand the pieces and how they fit together, write a scene for one of your characters. Allow them to be faced with a mini crisis. What choices do they have to make? Do they make the decision quickly? Do they choose wisely? How does their decision reveal who they are?

See what happens!

This might take your story in a new direction, or it might help you get over a plotty stumbling block. I’d love to know if this helped you.

Further Reading

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