Write Lightning is a blog from writer Deb Thompson.
Everyone is welcome here.
(Some links or topics may not be completely kid-appropriate.)
Everyone is welcome here.
(Some links or topics may not be completely kid-appropriate.)
Fri, Feb 08 2019
A real-life lesson in timing and foreshadowing
I had a mammogram about a week ago. I wouldn't usually share this personal information, but I wanted to talk about timing and foreshadowing. They had the results of my scan within a few hours, which startled me. In the past, it would take a matter of days to be able to read the results. I experienced a bit of alarm, having gotten a boring old printed letter in the past (in an envelope they'd had me address to myself in the imaging center). When the results appeared by that evening, I thought it might be a sign that I needed to pay immediate attention. It turned out that my results were just about as boring as in previous scans. It's just that the tests are so precise now that, in most cases, they can interpret them quickly.
Have you ever been watching a film or TV show and seen a shot of a paper being put into a coat pocket? We've all learned that there is some reason why we're being shown that movement. What happens if they keep showing us the pocket in several scenes and we never see any reason for that pocket being forced into our view? We feel cheated later. Conversely, what heppens if we see a paper and we see a coat pocket, but we never see them together? Don't we keep trying to figure out the reason? Or, if the film doesn't show the paper going into the pocket at all and a big plot twist later reveals the importance of that paper going into the pocket at a specific time, we end up confused. If the tale-teller waits to long to show the paper going into the pocket we feel as though the whole show is oddly paced, as though the story lacks a pacing that we can feel and lean into for a big finish.
Foresahowing is an effective tool when writing a story, but we shouldn't cheat the reader out of the fun of guessing why the clues matter. Nor should we jar the reader out of the world we've given them to move through and enjoy.
posted at: 13:19 | category: /Writing Life | link to this entry
I had a mammogram about a week ago. I wouldn't usually share this personal information, but I wanted to talk about timing and foreshadowing. They had the results of my scan within a few hours, which startled me. In the past, it would take a matter of days to be able to read the results. I experienced a bit of alarm, having gotten a boring old printed letter in the past (in an envelope they'd had me address to myself in the imaging center). When the results appeared by that evening, I thought it might be a sign that I needed to pay immediate attention. It turned out that my results were just about as boring as in previous scans. It's just that the tests are so precise now that, in most cases, they can interpret them quickly.
Have you ever been watching a film or TV show and seen a shot of a paper being put into a coat pocket? We've all learned that there is some reason why we're being shown that movement. What happens if they keep showing us the pocket in several scenes and we never see any reason for that pocket being forced into our view? We feel cheated later. Conversely, what heppens if we see a paper and we see a coat pocket, but we never see them together? Don't we keep trying to figure out the reason? Or, if the film doesn't show the paper going into the pocket at all and a big plot twist later reveals the importance of that paper going into the pocket at a specific time, we end up confused. If the tale-teller waits to long to show the paper going into the pocket we feel as though the whole show is oddly paced, as though the story lacks a pacing that we can feel and lean into for a big finish.
Foresahowing is an effective tool when writing a story, but we shouldn't cheat the reader out of the fun of guessing why the clues matter. Nor should we jar the reader out of the world we've given them to move through and enjoy.
posted at: 13:19 | category: /Writing Life | link to this entry