If you have ever read Ethan Frome and shivered at the icy loneliness of a Starkfield winter, or read The Heart of Darkness and felt the dark foreboding of the foggy Congo, then you understand the power of setting in a text. Setting is often relegated to the position of the uglier step-sister of the elements of fiction…something that exists merely to make the really beautiful things like character and plot able to fully develop and mature, but not something all that important or interesting or attractive in its own right. However, this is a completely wrong viewpoint. I don’t know if setting is considered ‘sexy’, but maybe it should be…ok, maybe ‘sexy’ is over-stating it a bit. (Actually, as an aside, I absolutely despise it when people use the word ‘sexy’ to catch the reader’s attention when that isn’t really what the author means at all…but that is a subject for another blog post…maybe one about vocabulary…) Let’s try this from another angle: Consider this…your character and plot must be plausible in the location and time period in which your story is taking place. If they aren’t, it doesn’t matter how good the plot is or how endearing your protagonist is, because they won’t ring true if the setting does not support them. How often have you been relaying the plot of a recent novel you read and your friend stops you to clarify, asking, “Oh, where (or when) does the story take place?” Clearly, place matters. Setting matters. I was thinking about this idea of setting just days ago, as I sat quietly on a stone bench on the edge of the Grand Canyon. I had never been there before, and like countless others before me, I was struck silent by the reality of place—the sights, sounds, smells, the feeling of the sun on my face and the wind blowing an icy chill right through me. I was amazed by how incredibly real and simultaneously somehow unreal and ethereal the place felt. I found myself keenly aware of where I was, of when I was, and of all the other times this place had been witness to. The canyon had not changed, but the buildings had, the ambiance had. I began to wonder what sensory images would be different if I were sitting on that stone bench 50 or 100 years in the past. The sun and wind wouldn’t have changed, but would I experience them differently because my clothing and hairstyle were different? Instead of the wind whipping my hair in angry swirls around my shoulders, would it instead tease whispy tendrils from my Gibson Girl up-do? Would I have a coat or just a knitted shawl? What about the smell of the grilling BBQ and strawberry soft-serve ice cream? What food smells of a bygone era might replace those—freshly baking bread perhaps? My characters cannot function if I don’t clearly place them in a world that is accurate and makes sense. And this place…this place is majestic and ripe with possibility. But is this the only kind of setting that matters? The larger than life ones? Are they the only kind to watch for, to imagine your stories unfolding in? I say no. I have also felt as profoundly drawn to an empty construction site. It was night—dark, quiet, shadowed. The hulking forms of Caterpillar machinery sat motionless in the vacant expanse of strewn timbers, meandering trenches, cables, pipes, and debris. It was elegant in its chaos. In my mind remnants of plywood and scraps of metal flashing could be seen, felt, and brought into reality. A story began to unfold. A body would be found in the detritus…murdered…I could almost hear the sirens in the distance. See what I mean? By now, perhaps, the idea is taking root, beginning to germinate in your mind. Setting can’t be over-looked or relegated to afterthought. It is real, powerful, an equal partner in the success of the story. And sometimes, if it is really well done, setting can become almost a character in and of itself. But that, perhaps, is a subject for another day.
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Wendy Picard GorhamWendy lives and works in the midst of words everyday--English teacher by profession, and writer by passion! Archives
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