Drama for the Drama Intolerant
I’m sort of a low drama kind of girl. I don’t have the time for it and I don’t have the energy for it anymore.
Though I’ve been like that most of my life. I wasn’t the girl who fought with people in public, I hated girly controversy, and my boyfriends usually broke up with me (with one exception) because I didn’t want the leftover guilt of hurting someone else’s feelings. So, even if I knew the relationship wasn’t working or was just plain tanking, I’d find myself waiting it out. Maybe it was optimism (hey it could have gotten better) or maybe it was avoidance, I don’t know.
In some ways, this is a good thing. It’s made me the sort of mom who doesn’t tolerate tantrums. (Scenes from my house: “I know it’s hard being two and it’s hard being you but you need to get over it in one minute or you’re sitting in time-out until you’re done.”) I hate fights with my husband so we’ve come a really long way in compromise and learning appropriate fight tactics (“when you do X, I feel Y” rinse, repeat).
In a bad way, I’ve lost a few friendships when I might have been able to save them if I’d just tackled confronting the other person. However, I think that if a girl friendship regresses too far into competitiveness or pettiness, sometimes the best thing to do is just step away for a while.
But the worst way is that I have a hard time getting my characters to fight. I see it already with my new WIP. I need them to get mean to each other and my stupid internal diplomat is like, “awh, don’t fight guys. Surely we can find some common ground.” It’s like I’ve got Gandhi or Nelson Mandela living in my head. Gah, annoying.
When I write their fight scenes, I’m always trying to insert understanding for the other’s point of view. Like if my hero’s using my heroine, I’m hitting delete over passages where she sympathizes with his motives.
Because when passionate people in good drama are hurt and mad, they don’t sympathize with the other’s motives. At least not right away. They flare up; they say mean things and lash out. They’re not thinking about playing clean-up crew in the middle of it. They’re not trying to be understanding and diffuse the drama, they’re thinking about winning or at least about making the other one hurt as bad as they do.
I’ve found the best way for me to shut Gandhi up in my new story is to try to stay out of it, like I would in real life. I’ve had to physically sit, close my eyes, and watch the scene play out in my head, then just write it down like I’m a spectator. This way, it feeds on my natural desire to not get involved. Granted, I try not to do this when others are around because if my hubby didn’t already think I was nuts nattering on all the time about fake people who don't listen to what I say, I’d imagine he would have me committed if I started meditating over them.
But it’s worked so far in my new story, I think. And it’s given my writing a new vibrancy because I can mess with the senses a little better after the scene is over instead of letting the scene just come off my fingers onto the page.
Are you the sort who takes on drama head first or do you prefer to watch from the sidelines like me? How do you write the high drama scenes in your story? Or at least do you have any suggestions for adding high drama you could give to help a drama intolerant such as myself?
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42 comments:
Cool way to deal with your confrontational handicap. Not a bad idea to already have some built in empathy on the side, ready to come in and re-unite the combatants.
I have my characters say nasty things to each other all the time, scream, the whole nine yards. Because I am totally incapable of the big battle in person. So I do it on paper. Same thing when dealing with my in-laws or other relatives. I battle it out with my characters.
I realized last year I had already dealt with my father's death, on paper, over a year before he died. With my made-up people. Didn't make it easy, but I got a lot of the grief and anger vented appropriately before I was face to face with him at the rosary.
Marn, I think you have what you need and you're dealing with it perfectly! Have a glittery hooha!
Oh, God, you're talking to someone who minored in Drama in college, acted, directed, and stage managed countless plays, and in the Drama Club at former work place. So I love the drama. Bring it on. Bring on the angst. Bring on the fights. The tears. The stipping your characters bare.
But I love exploring the drama in works; when your characters expose their underbellies to you and allow you to cut them at your leisure, well, you learn a whole lot about your writing and your story.
Just let go, that's my advice. Don't think this is you when you're writing; just let your characters speak to you and what happens, happens.
Writing high drama scenes.... insert lots of emotion.
I love writing the different dynamics in a relationship. Including a good spat every now and then. And I think it's all right for characters to sometimes fight with understanding between them.
And Ely's right. Just let go. Otherwise you'll always pull your punches and your readers will know.
Not a fan of drama. High school definitely got that out of my system- in middle school I was quite angsty as well, and channeled my discontent into(get this) wrting country songs.*snort* In high school my best friend and I got in so many arguments that to this day we wonder how we managed to stay friends and be such important fixtures in eachother's lives to this day-we hang out constantly and haven't fought since high school.As for writing high drama? It's all over the place and with my weirdo past(remember the country songs?lol) I have some point of reference.
Gah, this blog makes me so glad high school is over. Also, reading dramatic stories is a huge help. Can't wait to see how you execute it in your book!:)
Elyssa, I also did the whole Drama thing and was in the Thespian Society- I was nominated for best supporting actress my senior year out of the entire school-yup, bragging.*g* I also did the mock trial team-now that's some freaking drama.
Drama seems to be my middle name though I can't stand it. I'm a more confrontational person and just like to get everything aired out before it becomes drama; but then again, this style seems to make more drama because obviously I have no feelings if I can just say whatever I want.
I open my mouth and whatever I think comes out. That's how I've always been and even though I've learned to control my "greater urge to just spew" I take time to think if I should say it at all.
However, I do love to write a good fight scene. Bring on a car chase! Bring on a torture scene! Even sex is fun to write. It's all about emotion and how you portray it through your characters actions. LOVE drama in a book and I love to write it too.
Great blog babe!
In RL I tend to be the smoother and the soother---I hate to lose control, but when I do, watch out. Mouth like a truck driver and caustic criticism, sometimes funny, but still evil. I have on more than one occasion said something so outrageous my husband stops being mad at me for a minute and just marvels at my wit, LOL.
I think from watching all the banter in B&W movies, I tend to write more 'playful' fights than big knockdown drag-outs. There's usually some big external thing in my books that provides enough drama. In the current wip my h/h are complete opposites, but even their fighting winds up funny/sad rather than mad.
I love that picture of Sin & the Captain. LOL! A little too much glitter that night. Ah...good times.
I'm not a drama creator, but I don't run from it if someone brings it my way. I'm a "bring it on if you want your ass handed to you" kind of person. I grew up fighting constantly with my older sister. And then with my ex. I'm pretty sure I got it out of my system since I rarely fight with anyone these day. That or I'm just too tired to care. LOL!
I love writing the raw "on the edge of something" emotional scenes. Whether it's fighting or just the characters at their most vulnerable. When people have those fights where they say things that really hurt the other person, the truth is usually found in what they DON'T say. They say things they don't mean to hurt the other, as someone mentioned, because they are hurting. It's human nature to lash out and regret later.
Sounds like you've found a good approach, Marn. Taking yourself out of the action and just being the typist of someone else's story could work.
Yeah, that's what happens when I get all hyped up on Mountain Dew and mosh with the band. *grin*
Chance - that whole using your fake people to deal with RL issues thing doesn't seem to work out for me. Though I'm so glad it's easy therapy for everyone else. It's much cheaper. :) I'm so sorry about your father, though again, it's great that your writing helps you with that stuff.
Ely - ah, drama gals. :) A lot of my friends in college were drama or fine art majors. I loved being around the energy of it. But, again, I'm more of a watcher than a participator when it comes to that stuff. Just let go is great advice. I think that's why I'm trying to just watch it. The two characters are so strong in my head. I'm just trying not to get in their way. LOL!
Tiff - I think fighting with understanding is the worst kind of fighting, honestly. (I mean in a good way, the best kind of drama I guess). When two people understand the other's perspective and still disagree, it gives it that desperation, the hopelessness of an issue that can't be resolved. Unless something comes along to change someone's mind. :)
Kells - country songs? Awesome! Did you sing? I am so glad HS is over as well. I really started thinking that when I started teaching HS. I taught sophomores and I swear that a day didn't go by where some girl wasn't crying in my class. (*sniff sniff* "He's dating her?! He texted me all night! She's ugly, he should be with me! *sniff sniff* as I hand over the pass to the sympathetic friend escorting the distraught girl to the bathroom)
Mags - I love B&W movie fight scenes, but you're right, there's something comical about them. LOL!! I love reading stuff like that (I know I'm going to love your stuff) but I write more dire fight scenes. Maybe because by the time I force them out, they feel raw to me. Even if there are comic elements, I like to think they juxtapose the anxiety. (Though I could absolutely be wrong).
Sin - you are a queen of drama and angst. You push ever limit and laugh while you do it. I bow to you. And I love that you just say what you think. I wish I was like that sometimes.
No you don't Marn. You're as sweet as peach pie in the summer. I love you just how you are. That's why you must have friends like me because it allows you to be who you are without getting uncomfortable with all the drama.
Ter - you like the pic? I had to dig through the rubble to find this particular one. Sin sent in her ninja monkeys a while back to confiscate incriminating evidence but this one was buried deep. LOL!
And that's me, just the messenger. :)
You said: "When people have those fights where they say things that really hurt the other person, the truth is usually found in what they DON’T say" This is absolutely true! I loved the way you said this.
Sin - though I'm not sure I'm that sweet (I love me some peach pie in the summer... yum) I'm glad I have friends like you. It keeps me real. :)
Marn - The great thing about you is you're the profound one on this ship. You may not spew shit out there like the rest of us, but when you do talk, it's always so smart and worth paying attention.
Seriously though.... *big sloppy hugs*
Awh, Ter, that's a huge compliment. I obviously have you all fooled. *laughing maniacally*
Um, yes, I sang.lol. Doesn't mean I was good at it. And I burned all of those old songs I wrote- okay, not burned, but trashed. They were so BAD.lol.
I took singing lessons years later and I guess I did all right. I wouldn't ever sing in public, though. I'd hate to hurt people's ears.*g*
Kel, I wish I could sing. My son even makes fun of my singing, that's how bad. He makes squealing noises when I sing stuff, mimicking me. Sad.
Drama, whether I like it or not, always seems to find me. I'm a quiet type, until you really piss me off then my Irish/Scots blood kicks in.
I tend to write a little over dramatic. I think it's because that's what I wish I would have done, or should have done to someone in real life. Not that I'm a violent person, but there are some people in this world that need a serious ass kicking.
Back to the drama of my life. I've got a paper to write already. Grrrrr, why did I think it was a good idea to take on semester?
See ya,
Renee
Renee - I think some time periods call for higher drama and medieval is definitely one of them. And I'm with you on the homework. I still have three chapters to read and 15 questions to answer for my business writing class. Is it June yet?
Marn - If you have us fooled, you're a better actress than you give yourself credit for. LOL!
Kel - I've written country music before. I love to do, actually. I hope you kept something from the stuff you wrote.
I love drama, but I hate conflict. I too spend a lot of my time trying to figure why the other person is being a putz to me so I don't react as harshly to it. (And considering I react to just about everything around me, this little tidbit is bound to make people who know me laugh...but it should make you go, "Oh, God" because I could be flaring up and freaking out on an even more frequent basis than I do.)
I'm totally an avoider. I operate on the basis of: It's my problem; I just need to put up with it and get over it. Which works until I start yelling at someone else completely for cutting me off in traffic or taking the stapler off my desk. And yes, a lot of my characters are avoiders like me. I should vary up my characters a bit, since there are a lot of people who are quite comfortable about nipping things in the bud right off the bat with a voice-raising fight. (The thought exhausts me.)
I don't necessarily have to have a whole lot of yelling scenes. But I am good at making my characters pig-headed in their belief that their POV is the right one. (Write what you know, and all that.) But the thing is: both of them are right. You just have to get the characters to come to an understanding that they can both be right but not agree with each other. Which is a contradiction in terms and rather abstract, which is weird...but there you go.
I've never had any problem saying what I feel so not being able to write it is a foreign concept to me. Interesting battle Marnee.
I've been in a lot of situations where it wasn't appropriate to spout off, so I've used those instances to fuel a few scenes. I try to empathize with the characters. I visualize a scene in my head and emerse myself in the emotion of the scene. I have to contemplate the conflict and consequences of the scene before I can write the dialogue and action. One has to direct the other for me to get it right.
I work around a lot of females younger than I am. I call our operating room Drama Central. It's as bad as Grey's Anatomy. I'm used to watching drama, I always steer clear of the drama queens. The only drama I unleash is when the Diet Coke machine is empty:)
Yeah, writing is cheaper than therapy... I think the biggest difficulty in writing drama is not letting it stray into farce. So many 'been there, done that' fights just don't ring true after you're read it again and again.
If they're gonna fight, make it worth while, or let it sputter out with the realization that this is silly...
And oh, yes. I agree. It's what isn't said in a fight that is usually the crux of the problem.
Renee - I agree with Ter; some time periods just call for a little extra drama. The ones where people are wearing entirely too many clothes, well, I think that's them. I mean, I'd be a little extra irritable/dramatic if I were decked out in all that hard-to-maneuver cloth. :) Good luck with all your work, babe.
Hells - I think I hadn't thought about how conflict and drama are different. I think you're right though. You can have one without the other, I think.
You say: "You just have to get the characters to come to an understanding that they can both be right but not agree with each other." Um, yeah, I think I need to work on this one too.
Lis, I think that drama is definitely more rampant among the young. And I think you're advice about immersing into the emotion is a great tactic. I think that's what I'm trying to do with my meditative missions. You just said it better than me. LOL!
Chance, I think you're right too about not wanting it to stray into farce. One thing I want to avoid is having my characters feel like caricatures.
I'm with Chance. Sometimes I will get into my fight scenes--it's hard, but I can sometimes manage it--and it just seems so Over-the-Top and makes me inclined to laugh just reading it again. *LOL*
Sorta like orgasming simultaneously. Those scenes always make me snort.
I don't know, many people go over the top when they are really mad. Though I guess those kinds of fights don't typically get written into Romance. LOL!
The best part about writing fight dialogue is that you can take all the time you want to come up with the perfect come back. It's something we all wish we could do, have that perfect come back right when we need it. LOL! Not three days later.
Yes, but to be more real...the comeback doesn't appear until a few hours later! ;) Like how it works in real life!
I've actually had my H/H in the midst of a huge fight, then just collapse at how silly it is, much to the relief of spectators. Though money is usually lost. They are pirates, after all!
What's a simultaneous orgasm? :)
Chance - A myth.
I have a little bickering scene where the heroine finishes with a great comeback and the hero is left feeling like a moron. He gives a comeback, but by then she's too far away to hear it. LOL!
Marnee, I think you are I are quite alike on this score. I'm not a great lover of drama so it's really hard for me to create it. I do the same thing with my characters that you do - try to tame down the conflict. I'm not a big fan of conflict either. If a fight breaks out in public I'm the one urging the DH to just ignore it and let's get going. He, on the other hand, wants to get in there and find out what all the commotion is about.
I'm starting to wonder if I wouldn't be better at short stories instead of full blown books because I can't keep the H/H apart that long! LOL
You now, Ter, that is one great thing about writing fight scenes - letting my heroine get the last word and making it a good one! I can always think of what I should have said about a day or two later! Very aggravating!
Marnee, I know that you write mainly for a feminine audience and so worry about your technique accordingly.
To me, a conciliatory approach with sensitivity and consequently vulnerability is a most endearing feminine trait and much to be encouraged in writing.....but I'm only a minority here.
I am about half way through reading Anna Campbell's 'claiming the courtesan', and am in the section where the Duke of Kylemore abducts his ex-mistress to a lodge in the wildest of Scottish mountains where he repeatedly forces her to submit to his will despite angry protest. This part of the book has rather spoilt it for me, though I still have a morbid fascination to see how it turns out. And there are hints that the mood will soon lighten.
I think that sexual tension and conflict is necessary and very entertaining, but is best treated in such a way that that the woman holds the ultimate censure of behaviour.
It sounds to me as though you're doing OK.
Just my minority opinion. *grin*
PS
Simultaneous orgasm a myth? :lol:
Irish - it's so funny you talk about fights in public because my DH, though the quieter, shy one out of the two of us, is like that too. I'm like, let's just get out of here (like if we're at sporting events and stuff. I live near Philly, I have seen people fight in the stands at sporting events). Or at bars when alcohol is making people tougher than they are. DH is all into rubber-necking at fights. I don't see the fascination. LOL!!
Q - I'm in the minority here in that I haven't read "Claiming the Courtesan." Though I have heard good things, so I know I need to get to it. I've been avoiding historicals these days, not sure why. But I'm sure I'll get back soon....
You said, "To me, a conciliatory approach with sensitivity and consequently vulnerability is a most endearing feminine trait and much to be encouraged in writing…..but I’m only a minority here." and I thank you. LOL! We'll see how it all works out. One can only fight their natural inclinations to a point, you know. I'm sure there's something scientific to that. :)
That second paragraph was like reading a biography of my relationship life! I don't like to be the one to break things off and I tend to wait things out...they still always end and it's still a painful process!
I'm relatively low drama-ish. Well, I enjoy hearing about drama and watching drama but I don't like being part of it. However, I do get caught up in it sometimes and it takes me a few days to realize I'm over it. My method for handling drama? I used to write "hate" letters to whomever was making me mad and then delete the whole thing. It was very cathartic.
I like your methods with your characters tho...I'm stealing it! The idea of watching a scene play out in your head and writing it exactly that way seems like it would really work.
Steph, I love the write a hate letter and delete it method. I've done that after breakups before. LOL!! Very cathartic is right. :)
And I don't have a lot of tricks, so if something I do helps, please, steal away. LOL!
We be pirates, we don't steal...we liberate! No, that would be patriots, wouldn't it? Pirates! We redistribute the wealth...no that be bandits in the forests... Darn! What is we do?
I'm with Q (regarding his PS). And now that I said that I will duck and cover.
Braggart!
Hmmmm...Steph, I've done the hate letter before, and I intended to delete it-I REALLY did!- but,um, it got sent in an e-mail by my brother. Gah, I wish he'd never found it!! But he did and he's my older brother(read:tormentor),so he sent it. And he thought it was great...and I...Okay, I laughed. I'm not such a nice person after all.lol. The person didn't get mad,though. He actually was a lot nicer from that point on.*shrugs*
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