Enough with Character-Driven Fiction

There’s more to it than that.

☛ Leo Vaughn writes unusual fantasy for unusual people, rep'd by Lucienne Diver of the Knight Agency. He reflects on faith and the vocation of writing fiction in Resurrecting the Real. His novels are coming soon to a bookstore near you.

I recently wrote about the power of exile to help writers create great characters. But I’m honestly not here for character in an absolute sense. I’ve never thought, “What a unique, likeable character. I’d like to see them fulfill their wish and achieve wholeness.” I have thought, “What an intense and absorbing world this worm of a character is caught in. It feels real. I’d like to see them writhe a little longer.”

Clearly, character is one component of what captures my interest. But I find I love characters the most when they’re more boring than interesting—when they almost turn invisible as they struggle within the rich texture of a wholly realized, gestalt story world.

Indeed, I believe the greatest stories aren’t actually focused on character. Rather, they present a totalizing immersion in another world. I’d like to call the creation of such a universe gestalt worldbuilding.

“Ah yes, worldbuilding!”

Not quite. I’m going to use a far more expansive definition than the one we usually use in the SFF community.

This ain’t your grandma’s worldbuilding.

Done right, gestalt worldbuilding is much more than magic systems or culture or even Tolkien’s idea of sub-creation. In fact, those elements are only dependent pieces of the puzzle, often specific to fantasy. The worldbuilding I want is the seamless experience of a virtual reality. It’s this immersion, not the character’s desire or wish fulfillment or insecurity, that makes a story feel real. And the feeling of deep reality, of a place I can escape to—well, that’s really all I’m looking for.

How does a writer achieve this?

By commanding absolutely every aspect of the narrative such that we experience the woven whole, not the threads, and such that it feels like its own deep reality.

Sounds hard? Oh, it is. The gestalt experience of a fictional reality is a house of cards, and it will fall the moment the writer loses her nerve.

Perhaps you’re scratching your head. Gestalt experience of a fictional reality? Can that really be more important than character?

Yes. But not quite.

Character vs. gestalt world

Writers are told to focus on character. Books on craft, conference sessions, and blog posts all beat it into us. Every character asks big questions, and the writer must answer them.

• What does the protagonist want, whether she’s right or not?

• What’s holding her back?

• What does she really need, if it’s different from what she wants?

• Will she achieve growth across the course of her arc?

Naturally, all this is essential work for any character who’s going to get point-of-view treatment. Even non-point-of-view characters need it if they’re going to influence scene outcomes. But none of it will feel real unless the character lives out these attributes in give-and-take with the rich, evocative texture of a totalized gestalt world not found in any other story.

Think of it this way: There are only so many possible motivations or arc options for a character. Return home. Slay the dragon. Get the girl—or the guy. Save the kingdom. Reclaim your inheritance. Surely these exist in some cosmic library of all possible arcs—and the canon is closed. There’s nothing new under the sun, and there are no new motivations in human history.

Meaning there are no new arcs.

So what breathes life into a non-living arc from the canon?

What makes a character out of an arc?

It’s the gestalt world in which they struggle—the particulars of their impossible situation, the flavor of their mornings, the mood as it’s so often established by music in films. This gestalt world, not character as such, is the key to applying one of those preexisting arcs to a name on the page and producing unforgettable results.

Why does strictly character-driven fiction appeal?

I won’t pretend to diagnose every reader’s motivations here. I can only speak to my own experience. And it seems to me that the more a story focuses on a character’s inward world, the more it achieves that focus at the expense of the creation of the outward world, which is essential to the gestalt whole. The more the author sacrifices the outward for the inward rather than balancing them, the more, perhaps, the gestalt world fails to cohere—and the more the reader is coddled into looking inward.

To put it another way: Strictly character-driven fiction is only possible to the degree that the formation of inward identity dominates a culture’s discourse.

Perhaps strictly character-driven fiction is the curse of our identity-driven age.

Myself, I value identity—but not as an absolute. I also tend to believe an identity is only meaningful if given to us by others, as I explained in the Resurrecting the Real Manifesto. But even meaningful identity, when elevated to primary status, has the power to turn us away from the outward world all around us, thus preventing our gestalt experience of deep reality from cohering.

There it is. There, perhaps, is the reason strictly character-driven fiction appeals in our age.

And there, perhaps, is the reason we need powerful, gestalt story worlds that overwhelm our characters’ and our readers’ attempts to achieve identities.

I’ll get in trouble for this, but I’ll just say it. I frequently don’t find that overwhelming, gestalt story world in recently published fiction. It just doesn’t come together.

When the gestalt world doesn’t come together

I read pretty widely, and not just in SFF. In many books, I sense the character reaching off the page and grabbing my throat, but I feel somewhat abused. The story is so about them, so darn character-driven, they start to feel like a narcissist. Or perhaps the author is a narcissist and has employed them in service of a cultural polemic. That’s a popular mode these days. Neither one satisfies me much.

I can’t even remember all these books—because they’re forgettable. The throat-grab works for a time, and I think I’m reading something powerful. Then the read sours. I’ll finish it just because I want to know how it ends, but that’s not much of a reason to read. That’s a choice. An immersive virtual reality gives you no choice. It compels reading to the last page. And it never feels like work.

These forgettable books are character-driven in spades. The protagonist is often brash, offensive, living large, all voice-y, as if a yelling personality were the best way to grab the reader’s heart. The sound and the fury command attention until they end. Then the thing goes back in the library book drop. Big deal. Title forgotten, author forgotten, protagonist forgotten. Only vague impressions remain.

Is that what you want to write?

I sure don’t. The stories in me are so big, they’re unforgettable. It’s my duty to make sure you don’t forget them.

Great examples of immersive, gestalt worldbuilding

Honestly, it’s rare that I love a novel. I am the most demanding reader I know. But here are some novels (and films) that have lodged in my heart due to their phenomenal gestalt worlds.

Witch Wood by John Buchan

If the words “Puritan thriller” make the hairs stand up on your neck, then this one’s for you. The protagonist is chill and optimistic, very much a zero on the page, at least at first. He has no wound or exile to speak of. It’s the brutality of the story world that creates his motivations, brings definition to his formless clay, and makes him who he becomes.

The Snow Queen by Joan D. Vinge

The protagonist is a simple, likeable type, without cunning or much preexisting motivation. It’s the vastness of the story world that elevates her arc to epic status. Without the world, the protagonist would be nothing.

The Sharing Knife by Lois McMaster Bujold

Lois is the best. Seriously. If you want to study character and deep point of view, read Lois. This particular book has simple, pleasantly boring protagonists who enter the story without much in terms of preexisting motivations other than those driven by the particulars of their desperate condition. The protagonists remain somewhat transparent, living lives that are fully integrated into a fascinating story world.

Grey’s Anatomy

Few TV shows make such effective use of a gestalt story world. The mood never relents. The music choices integrate perfectly into moments of massive drama. Each member of the ensemble cast is basically a flawed egoist fleshed out by the story world as it frustrates their motivations, and by other characters’ actions.

Interstellar

Let’s just say it. This is one of the greatest movies ever made. The emotional canvas is vast. Nolan achieves a gestalt story world by careful control of every single element. We never once remember we’re watching a movie. We are there. Each character is not so much a universe of will unto herself, but a locus of will swirling in a maelstrom of chaos.

How do we master this gestalt worldbuilding?

I wish I knew. I think it just comes down to reading the very best books you can—and taking notes. Read only that which deeply moves you. Discard anything that isn’t working by page ten. Honestly, you’ll know by page two if it’s working. You don’t want to accustom yourself to reading something that doesn’t speak to you, because then you’re more likely to write something that doesn’t speak to you. It’s that passion, maybe, that pulls all story elements together into a gestalt whole. It happens when the story world before you is so incredible, you just have to share it. That’s what I’m trying to do. I hope you’ll join me.