Arcs

I’m winging it here, so bear with. I got asked about story arcs and it’s not a simple question.

The common definition is that the story arc is the trajectory of the plot. It starts out “low to the ground” at the beginning and rises with every tension-building event until you hit the climax or high point, and then drops back down like unto falling off a cliff. So you get a sort of uneven drawing of a mountain. I say uneven, because the coming down from the climax doesn’t (or shouldn’t) take as long or encompass nearly as many events as it took to get to the peak in the first place. So the initial climb is gradual, but the trip down the far side is precipitous.

That being said, here’s the complicator — stories have more than one arc, because any subplot that results in a resolution has an arc. Characters also have arcs.

Let’s consider a couple of examples. Works that provoke fear are good examples because effective works of horror fiction scare the bejesus out of you, and you vividly feel each ratcheting up of the tension. You know when you’re climbing that arc, emotionally, and you know when you’ve crossed to the other side — because you can suddenly breathe again.

Let’s look at the stereotypical horror story — lonely traveler stranded, goes to eerie house (whose eeriness is obvious to everyone except the hapless hero), (tension rising) gets taken in, hints dropped left and right about the host’s true intentions, (more tension rising) and then comes that long long walk up that dark steep staircase symbolizing the helpless captive’s being removed farther and farther from any hope of escape. By now, even our hapless idiot has begun to cotton onto the fact that something isn’t quite right, and that ratchets our tension up farther. Then come the near misses (more tension) and the inevitable confrontation between hapless hero and evil creature. Now, your imaginary arc line has climbed and climbed and here, it’s at its highest point. Resolution occurs (good wins) and the next scene shows how vastly different — ordinary, even — the scary old place looks in the daylight, with all threat of danger past and calmness reigning supreme. (Here, the story line drops precipitously.)

Now, let’s consider the arcs in something more complicated. How about “To Kill a Mockingbird”?

The story has several arcs, all of which interweave, and several character arcs, likewise. Scout’s and Jem’s arcs — the main story arc — concern growing up and are mostly visible when you contrast their various experiences/opinions of Boo Radley — Boo goes from being a ghostly, mythical, scary figure to being a neighbor: lonely, scared, human, and, ultimately, good. That arc’s climax comes when Boo saves the children from  Bob Ewell.  But you can see other parts of the “growing up” arc elsewhere — in what the children learn about living decent good lives from observing their father, in what they see about walking in other’s shoes when they interact with Mrs. Debose, in Scout’s initial impatience with the Cunninghams and her later reaching out to Mr. Cunningham and defusing a tense moment thereby. Each of these incidents shows progress, leading up to the climax of progress — the transformation of Boo in their eyes. (By the way, I’ve been drawing from the book up to now, but the movie is wonderful too. If you haven’t watched it in awhile, go get it. Boo Radley is Robert Duvall’s first role, and he has no lines whatsoever, and yet he conveys that poor scared man beautifully…)

But there are others. Atticus has a character arc — he is tested when he is challenged to defend Tom Robinson and knows he must do so, even at what turns out to be great risk to himself and his children. He meets this challenge, and follows it through to its tragic conclusion. Tom Robinson has a character arc — a good man, wrongly accused, who loses at trial and is killed trying to escape.

The story of the Robinson trial is a subplot whose arc spins into the children’s larger arc. You think that arc is finished — the trial is over, Tom Robinson is dead — but yet, that subplot becomes the catalyst for the main arc’s climax, when the resentful Bob Ewell tries to harm Scout and Jem, and Boo Radley saves their lives. (Many sources say subplots should be resolved just before the main climax, and here is an example of it being done profoundly well, because it’s not only resolved, it ties in and feeds the main climax.)

Scenes often have arcs, also. Think about Rear Window, for example — in one scene, Grace Kelly goes to Thorwald’s apartment to get evidence. There is tension because the threat of getting caught hangs over her head, and if she does get caught, Jimmy Stewart isn’t going to be able to help her because he’s sitting in a wheelchair with a broken leg. She breaks in, she searches around, she finds something — but Thorwald is coming back. Tension rises. He comes in and confronts her — huge tension, huge danger — and just as it looks like she might be able to talk her way out of it, we see Thorwald noticing the evidence she’s found — his murdered wife’s wedding ring. More tension. He menaces her — poor Jimmy is in absolute panic. Then, at the last possible moment, the cops come in and save her (well, actually, they’re arresting her for burglary, but the result is the same). Climbing, climbing, tension, climax, drop. Time to breathe again.

Another example, this one from Gone with the Wind. Scarlett takes the ill Melanie, her newborn baby, Scarlett’s whiny son Wade and her equally whiny maid Prissy and tries to make her way home through two armies in a wagon pulled by a stolen horse.  All she wants on earth is to get home. She wants her mother. She wants someone else to help her bear some of the burdens that have been dumped on her because she is the strongest person in her circle. The tension mounts throughout the trip — Atlanta burns. They’re in frequent danger of being caught by one or the other of the armies, and the horse confiscated. Melanie is deathly ill. Rhett abandons them. They are getting hungrier and hungrier. Every place they pass on their way home has been burned to the ground, and they have NO reason to think Tara will have been treated otherwise. Then they turn the corner, and, a miracle — Tara still stands. Breeeaaathe. (But it’s a false relief, for Scarlet’s mother lies dead inside, and her life gets anything but easier.)

A writer should be able to plot out, on paper, the rising tension points, the climax, and the precipitous drop, for the story-at-large, and for the subplots. It’s a good way to check to make sure your main story isn’t being overwhelmed by a subplot — sometimes you may discover that what you think is a subplot actually has star billing, and this will cause you to do some rethinking. You should think about your character arcs, also — a character arc is just another way of looking at character development, and if your characters don’t grow and change, your story is missing something essential. And while you’re looking at your subplot arcs, see if you can find ways in which they add to your main story arc — as they did in the TKAM example.

Happy climbing!

~ by seriouswriter on December 3, 2007.