Writing scenes

Scenes are the smallest unit of meaningful writing, whether it is fiction or non-fiction. A six-word micro-fiction piece (like the famous ‘For sale: baby shoes, never worn.’) has only one scene; a ten-page short story will have anywhere between two to ten scenes; and a 900-page whopper like War and Peace will have hundreds. The only exception to scenes is some poetry, although not all (one of the most beautiful scenes I’ve ever encountered is in Frost’s poem ‘Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening’).

There are whole courses discussing, evaluating and teaching the writing of scenes. This is only meant as a general overview to help you make some decisions and hopefully clarify some issues you may have encountered (as I have).

A scene can be described as a continuous flow of moments happening to a character in one span of time without interruptions (except for flashbacks). For it to be a meaningful scene, it needs to either move the story forward or show character transformation. At the least, it needs to have some emotional shift, however subtle.

For everything else, there is summarising and exposition. The biggest decision a writer needs to make is to decide what to develop into a scene, what to skip and what to summarise – the classic ‘show, don’t tell’ is here at play. The test here is fairly clear. Ask these three questions:

1. Is there internal or external conflict represented that moves the story forward?

2. Does the scene show character transformation in real time?

3. Is there any emotional shift?

If you did not answer at least one of the questions with ‘yes,’ than this is not a scene and you need to put this into exposition.

One of the key aspects to take into account is the vividness of the scene. Will the reader be able to ‘be present’ in the scene, experience it the same way the protagonist does. John Gardner emphasizes that, to truly engage the reader, the writer must render the moment with concrete detail, sensory specificity, and a clear sense of spatial and emotional presence. The two main faults that lead to the downfall of a scene, he argues, are insufficient detail and abstraction (one of my key problems). This is very similar to what others have called ‘be universal by being specific.’ Ensure the reader can see, taste, feel, smell what is happening.

For example: Don’t write ‘quiet village’ but ‘the village had one traffic light that didn’t work.’ Don’t write ‘old woman’ but ‘her spine was curved like a question mark.’

The structure of every scene is very much like the structure of a story: there is a beginning, a middle and an end. If the scene is at the beginning of the story, it needs more exposition and scene setting. If it occurs later, then one or two words/sentences should suffice to help the reader be grounded.

Transitions between scenes can be done with space breaks, headings, short phrases (like ‘the next day…’ or ‘a few hours later…’) or one (but not too many) can begin ‘in medias res’ – in the middle of the action.

Transitions within one scene, when there is some exposition, a flashback or a change in POV, can be indicated by using italics, space breaks or a change in verb tense.

When revising your scenes, Molly McCowan suggests the following process:

1. Put away your story for at least a week.

2. From memory, write key information of each scene on an index card.

3. Apply the test of whether the scene moves story forward, shows character transformation or some emotional shift.

4. Check if the protagonist is pro-active.

5. Delete or re-write any scenes where the answer was ‘no’ to the two questions above.

6. Organise scenes into chapters.

7. Look at first and final scenes. If they are not polar opposites, review.

While I don’t think that I’m a brilliant scene writer now, these pieces of advice have helped me a lot.

Useful resources:

John Gardner: The Art of Fiction

Molly McGowan: Effective Editing