January 14, 2025

Storytelling and Craft with Richard Powers ( Pulitzer Prize-Winning Stanford Professor) #34

21 minutes

Join us for an in-depth conversation with Pulitzer Prize-winning author Richard Powers, as he delves into the art of crafting compelling stories. Discover how character, drama, voice, and dialogue intertwine to breathe life into narratives. Powers reveals the layers of character development, the power of language, and the crucial role of tension in storytelling. From the intricacies of sentence structure to the importance of connecting with the non-human world, this episode offers invaluable insights for writers and readers alike.

Key Ideas:

Character Development: Characters are complex, with hidden motivations. Novelists develop characters using skills similar to those we use in everyday life to understand others. Characters can be analyzed like an onion, with outer traits leading to mannerisms, and then core inner values.

Drama and Conflict: Drama arises from conflict, which can be internal (person vs. themselves), interpersonal (person vs. person), or environmental/metaphysical (person vs. the world). Pushing characters to the wall by creating situations where they have to choose between core values drives interior drama.

The Power of Voice: Voice is driven by word choice, register (formal vs. informal language) and syntax. Word choice is affected by the history of the words, for example, using words of Latin origin can create a higher socioeconomic register. The arrangement of subject, verb, and modifiers in a sentence can create different effects and impact the reader.

Descriptive Writing: Vivid descriptions rely on making each element distinct and using subtle anthropomorphism. The beginning and end of sentences are powerful places to set and then surprise reader expectations. The most important thing is to identify the effect you want to create and then revise so it doesn't seem overdone.

The Role of Emotion: Fiction uses emotion and identification to move people, more than facts and arguments alone. A shift in values often happens through emotional connection rather than intellectual understanding.

Structure and Tension: Tension is a primary variable in stories, rising from low to high, and then resolving. A story's structure involves a hook, exposition, rising action, climax, and resolution.

Dialogue: Realistic dialogue is not empirically accurate but relies on conventions and reader expectations. Dialogue is best created by hearing it aloud, considering its tone, cadence, and register.

The Importance of Solitude and Connection: Moving in and out of solitude is important for creativity. Solitude is used to create rich imagination and then the work must be tested against the world.

Writing as a Process: Writing is a continuous process of revision and discovery. Frustration during writing can be a sign of seeing your desire more clearly. The tools we use to write should be reached for when they are needed, to slow down or speed up the writing process.

Connection to the Non-Human World: Humans are not autonomous, but connected to the world around them. The non-human world can help us understand interior drama. There is great value in combining scientific and intuitive ways of knowing the world.

The Fusion of Approaches: The most successful writing will have all the elements working in harmony. Different elements of writing such as language, character, drama and form should all support each other.

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Original source:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUDlpMN-f5w

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