Courage
by Randy Ingermanson
Advanced Fiction Writing
What’s the point of Story? Why are people hungry for Story? What can you do to ensure that your stories give people the one thing they so desperately want?
A couple of years ago, when I was writing my book How to Write a Dynamite Scene Using the Snowflake Method, I realized that Story is a community project. The point of Story is to keep the community alive.
The Tale of the Tiger
In that book, I gave as an example a story that must have been told zillions of times by our ancestors—the Tale of the Tiger. It’s a story of how a village deals with a threat to its survival when a marauding tiger targets the village’s herd of goats.
The village fights back, in the Tale of the Tiger, by organizing a tiger hunt. This is a high-stakes battle. A drought has ravaged the village’s farms, and the goats are the village’s last defense against starvation. If the village doesn’t kill the tiger, the village will die. Which means that every villager must be willing to die, if that’s what it takes to kill the tiger.
In the Tale of the Tiger, the viewpoint character is the youngest man in the village, the weakest link that the tiger attacks in the final showdown. Our hero has heard the Tale of the Tiger many times, and the Tale has taught him how to face his fears, face the tiger, and attack when all his instincts tell him to turn and run.
A Hero Is Not Enough
The key insight I had when writing the Tale of the Tiger is that our hero is not solely responsible for killing the tiger. The rest of the village plays a role by driving the tiger out of hiding.
The village story-woman plays a role, by the thousand times she has told the Tale of the Tiger in the past.
In some sense, the Tale of the Tiger itself kills the tiger.
The Powers We Face
It’s rare that any of us ever have to face a literal tiger. And yet we face metaphorical tigers every day. We face:
- Vindictive bullies.
- Well-meaning family or friends.
- Broken relationships or depression or loneliness.
- Governments or corporations or faceless organizations that do us harm.
- Damaging social and cultural and political forces.
- A hostile environment.
- Our own mortality.
- And on and on.
In a word, we face what theologian Walter Wink called the Powers. The Powers are mostly abstract and non-physical, but they’re real all the same.
The two key features of the Powers are these:
- The Powers are stronger than we are.
- The Powers will destroy us unless we find a way to defeat them.
Why Story Matters
The point of Story is to teach us how to defeat the Powers that threaten us, whatever they may be.
The Powers you face on any given day may be different from the ones I face. Therefore, the tactics you use to defeat the Powers may be different from the tactics I use.
But no matter what tactics we use, we all need one thing in order to face the Powers.
We need courage. Courage to face the tiger. Face the bully. Face your family. Face your friends. Face your government or your church or the company you work for. Face whatever Power means you harm.
Without courage, tactics are useless. Without courage, you will fold. Without courage, you will be destroyed by the Powers.
Story and Courage
The reason we desperately need Story is because Story puts us inside the skin of a character who has the courage to face the Powers.
By doing that, Story gets inside our own skin and trains us in the way of courage. Story builds our emotional muscle memory. Story trains us to face down any Power, however strong.
The more I learn about Story, the more I see that it’s all about giving my reader a blood transfusion of courage. And the side benefit is that it gives me a blood transfusion of courage.
Think about the last novel you read or the last movie you watched. Who was the lead character in the story? What Powers did they face? In what way did the Powers threaten to destroy the lead character? How did the lead Character defeat the Powers they faced? (Or how was the lead Character defeated by the Powers?) What role did courage play in the lead character’s victory? (Or what role did a lack of courage play in their defeat?)
Homework
- Who is the lead character in the story you’re writing right now?
- Do they face a Power?
- Does the Power threaten to destroy them?
- Where does your lead character find the courage to fight back?
- Does thinking about the Powers and courage help you clarify your story?
About The Author
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