: Re: What to do if I end up confused by my own plot because of 'trying to be original' or 'trying to make the story more deep'? Sometimes, I find myself in the dilemma that I come out with

@Alves689

Vote Up Vote Down

Theme development should be natural.
The art of writing fiction is the art of building a world. It may be a very small world, such as a ride up an elevator with a character reflecting on his life. It may be a very large world such as J. R. R. Tolkein created in the Lord of the Rings trilogy and other stories set in Middle Earth. It may be somewhere in between. It is not going to be an original world, but it will be a world through your eyes. Why else do we read but to get the author's window on the world?
Fiction works which set out to prove a point or support a thesis are very rarely well received by modern audiences, who often view them as overly moralistic or trying to bash people over the head with a point. If you do have an idea in mind, such as questioning the sanity of certain types of people, try and build a world in which they will naturally demonstrate the fact that they aren't quite sane as most would describe sanity.
Originality is overrated.
Don't stress about being original. Just don't. First of all, if originality were really a big thing, genre fiction would have died out an age ago. Even in the world of literary fiction there is a lot of hashing and rehashing. Plus if you are confused by your own originality and you are the author, just try and picture a reader who didn't know what you are getting at figuring it all out. Just because Joyce's Ulysses is famous even though it was declared unreadable doesn't mean the rest of us should try and be James Joyce!

(0)

Login to post a comment!