The City as CharacterMaking Setting Breathe

The City as Character: Making Setting Breathe

What is the first thing that comes to mind when I ask you to speak about the city in a work of fiction?

A chance to show off our descriptive abilities

The world of the story

The place where the story happens

The City as Character: Making Setting Breathe

What makes a setting believable?

Description

Again we fall into the trap of defining setting as description

Steps to Creating the City Character

1. Name your setting. Setting A

Okay but doesn’t tell us anything about the setting

Iago

Norman

Cheech

The point is that the name sets the tone for the setting.

Steps to Creating the City Character

Think About the world of your novel

What sort of things are happening?

Is there love?

Hate?

Deceit?

What is the main thrust of your story?

Qualities of Setting

Under this heading I want you to think about and list some aspects of your novel’s setting that are important to the story.

How is the setting written? Flowery, stark, bright, dark, or is it

something else?

Why does it exist? What function does it serve?

Could I take my protagonist out of this setting and put them into another? Would they function there?

The Senses and Setting

Think about the world of your novel as it is written.

What can I touch in this world? How will it feel? Hot, cold, sharp. Are there trails of razor sharp bushes that lunge out and slash at me?

What do I see? Birds, fish, buildings.

How about smells? Sweet roses, cooking steaks, Garbage.

What About Taste?

And sounds?

Breathing Life Into the Setting

What do all of the things we have discussed all have in common?

They happen.

When something happens in the real world it has an effect on the people and things that populate it.

What Happens when:

What Happens When?

I cut my finger on a broken piece of glass?

How about when I prick my finger on the thorn of a rose?

What about if one of those slashing bushes gets me?

What Happens When

I cut myself on a rusty nail sticking out from a garbage heap?

Clouds raced across the evening sky. Thick and grey, they made twilight seem like night. Earlier, a steady rain had soaked the area. Turning the ground, where Billy and Tony were hiding into a small swamp of cedar mulch and mud. With every movement the ground liquefied more.

Developing the Character “World”

Much the same as we improve our characters we need to improve our worlds.

Give the world a back story

How did it get to be the way it is?

What are its strengths, weaknesses?

How does it change in your story? (change isn’t mandatory)

How do the interactions between the world and characters affect the world?

The characters?

Billy stood under the awning of a cornerfruit stand as rain fell on the street in frontof him. He had ducked under its shelter justat the right time. The large drops, whichnow were falling, formed little explosions asthey hit the concrete sidewalk. In the dustthey raised, city odors were thrust up to hisnose. He always hated the smell of the citywhen the first raindrops fell. Its mustyscent would sometimes cause a coughingspasm to begin. It would take a whilebefore the water would finish its job ofwashing the stench of urine and garbageinto the sewers. Until then, to avoid acoughing fit, he would breathe through hismouth.

Cause and Effect

As I promised earlier I would go into more detail on this topic.

What is cause and effect?

It is basically a sequence of events that take place after an inciting incident.

Like in the rusty nail scenario from earlier.

The cause is the cut an event that happens in the world. The Effect on the characters of the world is the infection that spreads.

Billy stood under the awning of a corner fruit stand as rain fell on the street in front of him. He had ducked under its shelter just at the right time. The large drops, which now were falling, formed little explosions as they hit the concrete sidewalk. In the dust they raised, city odors were thrust up to his nose. He always hated the smell of the city when the first raindrops fell. Its musty scent would sometimes cause a coughing spasm to begin. It would take a while before the water would finish its job of washing the stench of urine and garbage into the sewers. Until then, to avoid a coughing fit, he would breathe through his mouth.

Billy is waiting out a rain shower.

large drops of rain are falling and forming little explosions when they hit the ground.

These explosions raise city odors to Billy’s nose.

He knows from experience that these smells cause him to have a fit.

The rain will take a while to do its of cleaning the dirty streets

Billy’s reaction: breathe through his mouth.

Combining All of Our Steps

Name our setting

Look at the qualities of setting

Look at the senses and the setting

Develop the character “World”

Make sure that we have cause and effect working to make it live.