Setting in your writing
When writing it can be easy to forget that the setting is a character in itself. If you are writing a historical, futuristic or current piece you need to be aware of the role setting plays regardless of what the genre in which you are working.
Let's take for example a romance - does it take place in a worn torn country, on a family farm or in the heart of a major city? Each situation offers vastly different environments even though they are still about a romance between two people. Keeping with those concepts does our couple meet while fighting on opposite sides, while trying to save a family farm or to take it away for development or while each having drinks with someone else in a chic Manhattan hot spot?
The next concept to consider in setting is what does it reflect about your characters? Take for example the Manhattan location - does one of the characters thrive while the other pulls at his collar uncomfortably? What would that setting tell you about each person? In the bar, does one drink the bar specialty of an exotic cocktail while the other person sips at a domestic beer? Are the servers dressed in a provocative fashion and if so, why did both of the characters decide to have a drink there? Is there music and if so, is it so loud the characters can't hear each other speak or is it soft and jazzy? Everything about the setting tells us a little bit more about the two people who are there.
Setting can be a powerful tool and as a writer you should take great care to examine it and utilize it as fully as you can. There is so much to discuss regarding setting that I'll bring this up again in a later blog.
Leslie
Let's take for example a romance - does it take place in a worn torn country, on a family farm or in the heart of a major city? Each situation offers vastly different environments even though they are still about a romance between two people. Keeping with those concepts does our couple meet while fighting on opposite sides, while trying to save a family farm or to take it away for development or while each having drinks with someone else in a chic Manhattan hot spot?
The next concept to consider in setting is what does it reflect about your characters? Take for example the Manhattan location - does one of the characters thrive while the other pulls at his collar uncomfortably? What would that setting tell you about each person? In the bar, does one drink the bar specialty of an exotic cocktail while the other person sips at a domestic beer? Are the servers dressed in a provocative fashion and if so, why did both of the characters decide to have a drink there? Is there music and if so, is it so loud the characters can't hear each other speak or is it soft and jazzy? Everything about the setting tells us a little bit more about the two people who are there.
Setting can be a powerful tool and as a writer you should take great care to examine it and utilize it as fully as you can. There is so much to discuss regarding setting that I'll bring this up again in a later blog.
Leslie
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