A plot outline provides a blueprint. It’s safe, known territory. It would seem then that knowing where our story is going before we write should produce our best stories.
But this is far from the truth.
Today, we’re going to talk about why too much focus on plot can make your story dead on arrival. We’ll also talk about the difference between story and plot. Nope, they’re not the same thing. But you cannot have one without the other.
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Big Takeaways
Should You Plot First? [01:13]
We’re often instructed to outline and plot our story before we write our first draft.
An outline provides a blueprint. It’s safe, known territory. It would seem then that knowing where our narrative is going before we write should produce our best stories.
But this is far from the truth
Story Versus Plot [06:33]
There’s a difference between story and plot. And most writers get into trouble because they conflate the two. They focus way too much on plot, and not enough on story, and often to the exclusion of story.
Plot is what happens. Story is the who it all happens to.
Plot gives us the action. Story provides the reaction, the story’s emotion.
What Comes First, Story or Plot? {11:27]
The screenwriter Peter Dunne believes that as long as the story emotions are true, the plot can be anything you like. He says, “The emotional through-line, the emotional structure is the first story to be developed deeply. Only then can the plot be developed to serve it.”
Desire and Resistance Approach to Plot [19:11]
It helps to think of your character as having a desire. Something concrete. By the end, your character either gets what he wants or doesn’t.
If we think in terms of desire and resistance, that each scene, chapter, and so on either takes the character closer to or further away from his desire, that’s basically your plot.
We use plot to help us see patterns in your protagonist’s life, or what “emotional footprints.”