This channel is an absolute gem. Seems like 95% of writing videos are more vague storytelling advice using movies as examples. I like those just fine, but this kind of analysis using actual excerpts from actual novels is what I want when I look up "writing advice".
this Trick is what Dwight V Swain in his Book " Techniques of the bestsellinmg wirter" describesd as Motivation-Reaction-Unit. You not only have a Stimulus and a Response, you look at the timescale of the response. First there is Emotional reaction, then comes physical reaction, then comes thought and then comes Action.
Easily the best new content in writing there is on TH-cam. This channel is not here to be entertain-able. Its here to teach people who want to be traditionally published authors.
@@5Gburn oh, no I shouldn’t have specified traditionally published. I actually want to self publish my first one. I just meant it’s for pretty serious novelists/authors
The one trick that works on me every single time, despite my being aware of it, is to conceal information that will be revealed later. Even if it's done in a hackneyed way, like having no logical reason for the concealment except to hook the reader, i just can't help myself but keep going to the revelation
The art of withholding partial info is a hugely powerful tool. I do it constantly. The trick is to get the timing right-deciding when to reveal the solutions to the little mysteries you create. Generally, the bigger the mystery, the longer the delay in revealing the answer. Brilliant screenwriter and teacher Glenn Gers has a great video about this on his YT site th-cam.com/video/XrnxmrorsPo/w-d-xo.html
Dude this technical instruction is on an entire different level and this is exactly what I need to gain confidence in my writing. Thank you so much for this absolute gold mine for expert advice given to my entry level ass. Your content is amazing and thank you for being here.
WOW. This was so helpful because I've been bombarded with amateurs telling me my protagonist has to have AGENCY! You connected the dots really well: The protagonist is seeking his object of desire, that's his agency, but he is constantly forced to respond to the outside world trying (intentionally or not) to keep him from it. Awesome.
Thank you so very much! I have gone through course after course and NO ONE is direct about teaching the craft like you. I cannot thank you enough for encouraging me to LEARN the craft, which I will certainly do under your instruction. 😄
This was very helpful and inspiring. I never thought about the inciting incident and the climax occurring at the line level - over and over again. Thank you for this advice.
Tim, thank you! A “light bulb” went off for me while watching this video. Your inciting incident/climax on the beat level helped me understand stimulus and response in a way that hadn’t “clicked” for me before.
This is fantastic advice for someone starting out writing and still forming their story, as said in other comments its very clear and precise and easy to grasp, very refreshing to see this with so much bs around , thanks, Im gonna be watching all your videos .
Good video, Tim. Thanx. One question, in the beat from Dragon Tatoo, why is Armansky the protagonist? Certainly, in the story overall, the protagonist is Salander, the Writer, or both of them in a blended character. What am I missing?
This particular lesson in all honesty is not something that I can implement while I’m writing but I will come back to after writing and test my work to see if it’s reaching that inciting incident/climax back and forth style of conflicting dialogue or actions, with the protagonist always being the one on the defensive.
I completely agree. This is great stuff. It's also important to choose your words. If you need an adverb, pick another word. You only get one "suddenly" per novel. If it sounds like writing, get rid of it.
So the hero is constantly getting beat up and responds in some way always trying to get somewhere; like a person swimming upstream in a river trying to reach a goal. I think I got it. There is no rest for our hero, only buffeting onward. Oh thanks for this simple lesson.
Hello, I am writing a novel and the inciting incident is too far in the story, as well, I am not being able to tell the last of the character without resume or just tell instead of showing. Any advice? Do you offer a service of coaching?
I certainly don't disagree with you on any of this. It's kind of a basic underpinning of how I write (and whether I do that well or not is beside the point). I've never really had to think about that. It's just always been sort of automatic. I write in first person, almost exclusively. One of the unexpected advantages of that, the way I see it, is there never is going to be any confusion about who the protagonist is in a scene. This provides a particular opportunity not often found in third person, which is to have both scene protagonist and antagonist serve the role of inputter and outputter, simultaneously. The antagonist (or any secondary character) thinks it's their story, even if the reader and the author know otherwise. So when the protagonist outputs, that becomes the input for the antagonist. When the antagonist outputs, that becomes the input for the protagonist. Since the reader (SAM) is already convinced who the protagonist is, who they should be rooting for, the input-output balance can be less one-sided. It can be much closer to 50-50 without causing any confusion. In other words, you can write a two person conversation and have it work from two points of view at the very same time, even though in first person, it's quite obvious which character is the one to be followed. The moment of climax for one character becomes the moment of inciting incident for the other, and vice versa, back-and-forth. That can make dialogue pretty interesting. It's two series of beats working double-duty, together all at once. This approach can also help make your characters more three-dimensional, because it allows the reader to see things from both the point of view of the protagonist and the antagonist, allowing a bit of reader empathy even for the antagonist. It also works in a scene where both characters are mostly in agreement with each other, such as in a courtship love story. But it helps show the necessary conflict or challenge in that sort of scene at a deeper level than if it were shown only one-sided. I try to inhabit my characters in order to figure out what they are going to say and do next, and I don't just stay within the first-person protagonist, I tried to switch into the mindset of every character when they have the floor. That's all difficult to do in third person, due to the potential confusion issue you mentioned regarding which character is to be followed by the reader. But I guess it can also kind of work in close third.
Interesting advice for making the protagonist respond most of the time to outside stimulus. I've heard the opposite advice, or what seems to me to be opposite, that you should have your protagonist "protag," or be the driving force that makes things happen. I've read a number of amateur stories where the protagonist just lets the plot happen to them, and it's not good. I'll have to think about how to square these two ideas. Maybe instead of having the protagonist mainly react to outside stimulus, have a balance between protagonist action and reaction.
I think that the answer is: it depends on the actual story. The problem with writing advice - all writing advice - is that it is always skewed by the preferences of the speaker. Even when they're editors with years of experience, they're still human and they have preferences. Never mind amateur stories - is Frodo Baggins an active protagonist? There is not a single event in his storyline where he is really a "driving force". He responds. Sometimes he responds nobly and valiantly, as wehn he decides to take on the Quest. But he is not a driving force in this situation. On the other hand, there is The Partner by Grisham, where you have a situation that is created and manipulated by the protagonist. So, as I said - it depends on the story. And the problem with passive protagonists in amateur stories, in my opinion, is that the writer does not have a good grip on the character and his/her role in the events.
My understanding? The protagonist has a long-term goal. She/he needs to get some results. On the way, difficulties append. These difficulties are caused by the antagonist. The protagonist needs to react if she/he wants to do the things they need to do to reach the long-term goal. (Hope this makes sense. My French is better. :-) )
The "driving force" seems to speak to the idea of having an active protag vs. a passive protag who merely observes what is happening and thinks or comments about it. A passive protagonist is boring. The Protagonist as the responder for most of the scene is still highly active. For example a man trying to break out of a locked room, trying different ingenious methods, one after the other as each one fails, is actively trying to escape, but he is still responding to the outside stimulus of his environment. The protagonist should be active in an engaging story because the story events are externally challenging and psychologically triggering. The protagonist is also a driving force in the story because he chooses what to do at the Climax - where his usual tactics for solving the problem of the Inciting Incident no longer work.
@@advancingmist Oh, that makes sense. I was thinking the video was advocating making the protagonist passive by reacting instead of active by driving the action. But your interpretation makes sense.
I think the idea that the protagonist _has_ to react to the inciting incident, rather than stimulate it is an overly and inaccurately structural approach to storytelling. Think about heist movies, _Don Quixote,_ Dostoevski's _Crime and Punishment,_ Camus' _The Stranger,_ even _Ferris Bueller's Day Off._ There are plenty of stories where the inciting incident is the action of a protagonist motivated by an innate characteristic.
“They might map onto the wrong person. And the last thing you want is for your reader to be mapping on and caring more about your antagonist than your protagonist" If you ask me, I think that's a sign of great character writing. Different readers debating about 'who is the protagonist' and disagreeing about who they were rooting for is a sign of desperately good writing. Whether its Pride and Prejudice or Game of Thrones, treating characters as human beings rather than just plot mechanics. The idea that your reader might read your text 'wrongly' or 'incorrectly' is a really restrictive mindset. If I wrote a book, and I rooted for one character, but a reader empathised with a completely different one, I wouldn't think they'd "read my book wrong", I would love that.
Why would Wesley be the protagonist over Vissini? We don't see any change from him. Nor do we from Vissini, but we see he has the opportunity to and refuses to. Wouldn't that make Vissini the protagonist, despite him being the villain, in those scenes?
This channel is an absolute gem. Seems like 95% of writing videos are more vague storytelling advice using movies as examples. I like those just fine, but this kind of analysis using actual excerpts from actual novels is what I want when I look up "writing advice".
this Trick is what Dwight V Swain in his Book " Techniques of the bestsellinmg wirter" describesd as Motivation-Reaction-Unit. You not only have a Stimulus and a Response, you look at the timescale of the response. First there is Emotional reaction, then comes physical reaction, then comes thought and then comes Action.
Easily the best new content in writing there is on TH-cam. This channel is not here to be entertain-able. Its here to teach people who want to be traditionally published authors.
Why wouldn't this content be here only to teach non-traditionally published authors?
@@5Gburn sorry haha pardon?
@@5Gburn oh, no I shouldn’t have specified traditionally published. I actually want to self publish my first one. I just meant it’s for pretty serious novelists/authors
The one trick that works on me every single time, despite my being aware of it, is to conceal information that will be revealed later. Even if it's done in a hackneyed way, like having no logical reason for the concealment except to hook the reader, i just can't help myself but keep going to the revelation
The art of withholding partial info is a hugely powerful tool. I do it constantly. The trick is to get the timing right-deciding when to reveal the solutions to the little mysteries you create. Generally, the bigger the mystery, the longer the delay in revealing the answer.
Brilliant screenwriter and teacher Glenn Gers has a great video about this on his YT site th-cam.com/video/XrnxmrorsPo/w-d-xo.html
Oh man, I was just struggling with a scene I was writing and this video popped up. What a lifesaver! This is so helpful and clearly defined. 💜
Dude this technical instruction is on an entire different level and this is exactly what I need to gain confidence in my writing. Thank you so much for this absolute gold mine for expert advice given to my entry level ass. Your content is amazing and thank you for being here.
WOW. This was so helpful because I've been bombarded with amateurs telling me my protagonist has to have AGENCY! You connected the dots really well: The protagonist is seeking his object of desire, that's his agency, but he is constantly forced to respond to the outside world trying (intentionally or not) to keep him from it. Awesome.
Thank you so very much! I have gone through course after course and NO ONE is direct about teaching the craft like you. I cannot thank you enough for encouraging me to LEARN the craft, which I will certainly do under your instruction. 😄
Thanks for this elaborate explanation on scene writing; it needs a lot of practice to put the five commitments into each scene
This was very helpful and inspiring. I never thought about the inciting incident and the climax occurring at the line level - over and over again. Thank you for this advice.
Tim, thank you! A “light bulb” went off for me while watching this video. Your inciting incident/climax on the beat level helped me understand stimulus and response in a way that hadn’t “clicked” for me before.
This is fantastic advice for someone starting out writing and still forming their story, as said in other comments its very clear and precise and easy to grasp, very refreshing to see this with so much bs around , thanks, Im gonna be watching all your videos .
Stimulus
A great book that goes into detail on this subject is Scene & Structure by Jack Bickham.
Good video, Tim. Thanx.
One question, in the beat from Dragon Tatoo, why is Armansky the protagonist? Certainly, in the story overall, the protagonist is Salander, the Writer, or both of them in a blended character. What am I missing?
Merci pour votre cours, qui en instant à mis en lumière des choses simples mais efficaces.
This particular lesson in all honesty is not something that I can implement while I’m writing but I will come back to after writing and test my work to see if it’s reaching that inciting incident/climax back and forth style of conflicting dialogue or actions, with the protagonist always being the one on the defensive.
That's how I work, too.
Thank you! I’ve never heard this explained so clearly.
This is awesome. 🎉 I need to rewatch this.
I completely agree. This is great stuff. It's also important to choose your words. If you need an adverb, pick another word. You only get one "suddenly" per novel. If it sounds like writing, get rid of it.
Actual breakdowns and clear examples... your content is helping me so much in my journey
Thank you so so much ❤
So the hero is constantly getting beat up and responds in some way always trying to get somewhere; like a person swimming upstream in a river trying to reach a goal. I think I got it. There is no rest for our hero, only buffeting onward. Oh thanks for this simple lesson.
Awesome content! Thank you!
Good episode.
Super easy, barely an inconvenience. Ryan George.
Thanks for the gold, when the money reach my pockets I'll be keen to show my gratitude to you, Shawn and the rest of the team.
you are really really good. Excellent presentation
Stimulas?? Lolz - all good. And good video.
Thank you
A videos that I watched and actually learned something? well that's rare.
Well done.
Great video - this explains a lot for me! 🙂 But please note that the links to the excerpts don’t seem to be working.
Ah! Should be fixed now! - Tim
@@StoryGrid Excellent; thanks! That's a great resource! 👍
Hello, I am writing a novel and the inciting incident is too far in the story, as well, I am not being able to tell the last of the character without resume or just tell instead of showing. Any advice? Do you offer a service of coaching?
Many thanks. Could it also be called or used as a form of cause and effect?
I certainly don't disagree with you on any of this. It's kind of a basic underpinning of how I write (and whether I do that well or not is beside the point). I've never really had to think about that. It's just always been sort of automatic.
I write in first person, almost exclusively. One of the unexpected advantages of that, the way I see it, is there never is going to be any confusion about who the protagonist is in a scene. This provides a particular opportunity not often found in third person, which is to have both scene protagonist and antagonist serve the role of inputter and outputter, simultaneously.
The antagonist (or any secondary character) thinks it's their story, even if the reader and the author know otherwise. So when the protagonist outputs, that becomes the input for the antagonist. When the antagonist outputs, that becomes the input for the protagonist. Since the reader (SAM) is already convinced who the protagonist is, who they should be rooting for, the input-output balance can be less one-sided. It can be much closer to 50-50 without causing any confusion.
In other words, you can write a two person conversation and have it work from two points of view at the very same time, even though in first person, it's quite obvious which character is the one to be followed. The moment of climax for one character becomes the moment of inciting incident for the other, and vice versa, back-and-forth. That can make dialogue pretty interesting. It's two series of beats working double-duty, together all at once.
This approach can also help make your characters more three-dimensional, because it allows the reader to see things from both the point of view of the protagonist and the antagonist, allowing a bit of reader empathy even for the antagonist. It also works in a scene where both characters are mostly in agreement with each other, such as in a courtship love story. But it helps show the necessary conflict or challenge in that sort of scene at a deeper level than if it were shown only one-sided.
I try to inhabit my characters in order to figure out what they are going to say and do next, and I don't just stay within the first-person protagonist, I tried to switch into the mindset of every character when they have the floor.
That's all difficult to do in third person, due to the potential confusion issue you mentioned regarding which character is to be followed by the reader. But I guess it can also kind of work in close third.
Interesting advice for making the protagonist respond most of the time to outside stimulus. I've heard the opposite advice, or what seems to me to be opposite, that you should have your protagonist "protag," or be the driving force that makes things happen. I've read a number of amateur stories where the protagonist just lets the plot happen to them, and it's not good. I'll have to think about how to square these two ideas. Maybe instead of having the protagonist mainly react to outside stimulus, have a balance between protagonist action and reaction.
I think that the answer is: it depends on the actual story. The problem with writing advice - all writing advice - is that it is always skewed by the preferences of the speaker. Even when they're editors with years of experience, they're still human and they have preferences. Never mind amateur stories - is Frodo Baggins an active protagonist? There is not a single event in his storyline where he is really a "driving force". He responds. Sometimes he responds nobly and valiantly, as wehn he decides to take on the Quest. But he is not a driving force in this situation. On the other hand, there is The Partner by Grisham, where you have a situation that is created and manipulated by the protagonist. So, as I said - it depends on the story. And the problem with passive protagonists in amateur stories, in my opinion, is that the writer does not have a good grip on the character and his/her role in the events.
I think he's talking specifically about the inciting incident, which should be mostly out of their control
My understanding? The protagonist has a long-term goal. She/he needs to get some results. On the way, difficulties append. These difficulties are caused by the antagonist. The protagonist needs to react if she/he wants to do the things they need to do to reach the long-term goal.
(Hope this makes sense. My French is better. :-) )
The "driving force" seems to speak to the idea of having an active protag vs. a passive protag who merely observes what is happening and thinks or comments about it. A passive protagonist is boring.
The Protagonist as the responder for most of the scene is still highly active. For example a man trying to break out of a locked room, trying different ingenious methods, one after the other as each one fails, is actively trying to escape, but he is still responding to the outside stimulus of his environment.
The protagonist should be active in an engaging story because the story events are externally challenging and psychologically triggering.
The protagonist is also a driving force in the story because he chooses what to do at the Climax - where his usual tactics for solving the problem of the Inciting Incident no longer work.
@@advancingmist Oh, that makes sense. I was thinking the video was advocating making the protagonist passive by reacting instead of active by driving the action. But your interpretation makes sense.
4:46 *Stimulus
I think the idea that the protagonist _has_ to react to the inciting incident, rather than stimulate it is an overly and inaccurately structural approach to storytelling. Think about heist movies, _Don Quixote,_ Dostoevski's _Crime and Punishment,_ Camus' _The Stranger,_ even _Ferris Bueller's Day Off._ There are plenty of stories where the inciting incident is the action of a protagonist motivated by an innate characteristic.
“They might map onto the wrong person. And the last thing you want is for your reader to be mapping on and caring more about your antagonist than your protagonist"
If you ask me, I think that's a sign of great character writing. Different readers debating about 'who is the protagonist' and disagreeing about who they were rooting for is a sign of desperately good writing. Whether its Pride and Prejudice or Game of Thrones, treating characters as human beings rather than just plot mechanics.
The idea that your reader might read your text 'wrongly' or 'incorrectly' is a really restrictive mindset. If I wrote a book, and I rooted for one character, but a reader empathised with a completely different one, I wouldn't think they'd "read my book wrong", I would love that.
@@Fredreegz You're incorrect. If your readers are more interested in the antagonist than the protagonist, then it is poor writing.
@@encouraginglyauthentic43I disagree
sounds like Swaine's method
Quick edit suggestion: "Stimulus"
Helpful info, but Lizbeth (the protagonist) in that scene is not the responder, as you noted. So it seems like that example disproves your point. ??
Lisbeth is not the protagonist of that scene. Armansky is. - Tim
Congrats on breaking 10k!
Im pretty sure there are stories about hubris where the protag cause the inciting incident. Like Epic Mickey?
Why would Wesley be the protagonist over Vissini? We don't see any change from him. Nor do we from Vissini, but we see he has the opportunity to and refuses to. Wouldn't that make Vissini the protagonist, despite him being the villain, in those scenes?
Not trying to be a Karen but…stimulus. Good video though.
The fact that you used a SHE character representation is a rare thing to see 🎉
#feminism
It isn't, like at all. Just some positive advice, be mindful whether or not you are making things up so you can play the victim.
Nice way to reveal to all you’re envious, neurotic, and untalented.