The Underlying Story: How to Master Subtext in Writing
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 27 ก.ค. 2024
- Dive into the art of subtext in storytelling. In this video, we explore how to convey hidden meanings through dialogue, actions, and settings, enriching your narrative with depth and intrigue. Perfect for writers and storytelling enthusiasts looking to add more emotional substance to their work.
Check out my video on "Character Resurrections" for further exploration into storytelling techniques: • Character Resurrection...
#Subtext #Storytelling #WritingTips #FantasyWriting
00:00 What Is Subtext
00:16 Foundation Of Subtext
01:41 Subtext Through Dialogue
03:38 Subtext Through Actions
05:28 Subtext Through Settings
06:59 Integrating The 3 Pillars
08:16 Literacy Devices For Subtext
09:23 Risks And Rewards
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Excellent intro to subtext. This really helped make it gel for me. One of your final statements sums it up in a single line: It is all about seeding clues into the narrative, so that readers can piece it together for themselves.
Glad to hear that it was helpful, thank you for taking the time to leave the comment :)
Another very good video and interesting topic. I'm already looking forward to the next one.
Thank you, I'm glad that at least one person already found it useful. Wasn't sure if this topic will get any traction at all but felt it deserved a video of its own :)
Loved the video! Great quality and lovely illustration! I really like getting other peoples opinion on these topics
Thank you, I really appreciate all the kind comments so far already. Glad that people can find some kind of value in the videos :)
I think this might be a big part of storytelling in games. Games are very low on the words-per-hour metric compared to other media. A huge part of a game's story is done via what's known in the field as "environmental storytelling". What kind of items are lying around the place? What do they look like? A clock that has a minimalist design is going to say something quite different from a more ornate one. If that design is uncommon, it'll say something about the owner, while if it's a common one, it'll say something about the setting. Same thing applies to sound as well. An alarm that rings a bell is very different from a buzzer or an electronic warble. Stumble across some damage to a building and you can take a guess at what might have happened, even if you don't find any journals or audio logs lying around to spell it out.
Speaking of audio logs, they're a common way to flesh out secondary details of the story the player is participating in. Other characters will have done their own things and recorded logs for themselves or other characters they know, and by listening to those, the player can pick up those details without having to stop to read things (though this does obviously mean more work for the game's voice actors and more disk space used on the player's computer, whereas written logs are easy to make, and take next to no space). They won't contain anything plot-critical, as doing so would result in the player ending up lost if they missed one, but they do play a significant role in fleshing out events surrounding the main story.
To put things another way:
Primary details: crucial to the story the player is participating in. Usually come in the form of conversations with NPCs or radio transmissions to the player.
Secondary details: fleshing out events surrounding the main story. Usually delivered in in-universe, broadcasts, articles, journals and logs (frequently post-mortem).
Tertiary details: providing hints about the setting or characters without words. Comes via various forms of design, like character outfits, voice actor choice, and environmental storytelling.
This is an amazing comment, and I really appreciate that - thank you. It is correct that games, in their own way, often excell in the Art of Subtext due to the added options of conveying a message (compared to written text only for example).
Some games at times are even better than many movies in my opinion. For example, Dragon Age: Origins is a great example where the magnitude of the threat the world is facing can be felt through the environment, the music and much more. Cataclysmic threats are obviously not rare in games, but not every game manages to really make you feel it in that way.