The Reason Stories are Written in Past Tense

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One of the first things any decent creative writing class will teach an aspiring author is the importance of maintaining consistency throughout the text, and it’s something I’ve definitely mentioned before on this blog. Although this often refers to the importance of maintaining plot consistencies, grammatical consistencies (and functional consistencies), are equally crucial parts in creating a legible narrative.

Anyone who reads fiction novels regularly will have noticed that the overwhelming majority of these stories are written in past tense; e.g. “It was the best of times…”, “She figured it was all over…”, “He loved her like no other, but also saw no way to show it…” etc. But why is this? What makes a past tense narrative more grammatically correct, then a past or future tense syntax structure? To answer that question, one needs to first dispel the phrasing of it. There is nothing inherently more grammatically correct about using past tense, as opposed to any other tense, as long as the narrative voice remains consistent in its use throughout the story (or there is a damn good reason why it doesn’t need to do so). Hence, the reason past tense is seen as the default has less do to with grammar, and more to do with functionality. It shouldn’t be forgotten that writers by definition are also readers, meaning that they carry with them decades’ worth of literary conditioning, just like the audience they are trying to reach. Most of the books a writer has read will have been written in past tense narrative, and like every other reader, it is understandable if this structure naturally seeps into one’s own writings. Thus, one also shouldn’t underestimate the sheer amount of concentration it will take to catch the potential for inconsistent writings when attempting to do experimental works that run counter to the norm, and how the potential of creating an inconsistent prose goes up substantially when trying do to something out of the ordinary. Therefore, defaulting to the more common past tense narrative is an easy way to ensure consistency throughout one’s plot, since it will feel the most natural; for writers and readers, alike.

Alternatively, rarely do you see whole plot narratives written as future tense; e.g. “I will go see her tomorrow, after which we’ll talk…”, “They are going to take care of it later…” etc. This sort of writing is reserved more for character dialogues, as they are more in line with casual conversations (not to mention people’s internal dialogues) wherein the discourse centers on planned actions (i.e. things yet to be done, spoken about by character’s whose overall knowledge of events is limited). In contrast, narrator voices—whether they are written in first person, or third person; whether they are limited, or omniscient—are instinctively read by the audience in a bird’s eye view perspective, detailing the happenings to them as an observer of events. It wouldn’t be impossible to write a whole narrative in the future tense, but the risk you run is to possibly frustrate your readers because, in many ways, such choice of phrasing stands so deeply in contrast with how most of us are attuned to differentiating between plot narrative and character dialogue that it may have the unfortunate affect of making the story too confusing and tiresome for most to bother following along with to the end. And while challenging readers through provocative prose can be laudable, given them a headache through cumbersome verb usage is anything but useful.

Lastly, there is present tense; e.g. “She creates the world as she sees it…”, “He says what he thinks, and he thinks what he knows…” It’s a very impactful form of narrative, which immediately frames the plot into an action mode—things are happening, and they are happening right freaking now! It’s unique, and in the hands of a skilled writer, has the potential to serve as a creative alternative to its more common past tense counterpart. On the other hand, in unseasoned hands, it has the potentially to also wear out the reader; think sensory overload brought about by too much intensity. There is a reason most stories follow the general set up of: introduction -> rising action -> climax -> falling action -> conclusion/resolution. If the whole story is written in a narrative that denotes action all throughout these distinct steps in the narrative, then the writer will have to work doubly hard to make the impact of the climax (and the rising action that leads up to it) standout to the reader’s attention. I’m not saying that it’s an impossible task to accomplish, but it is harder, and takes considering talent to get it right.

I outlined why looking at the prevalence of past tense narratives in fiction isn’t really an issue of grammar, but an issue of ease of writing and what reader’s are simply accustomed to. In an obvious way, the situation is very much a Catch-22: Readers are used to reading narratives because most authors write in past tense narratives; authors write in past tense narratives because most readers are used to reading in past tense narratives. And a prevailing orthodoxy is therefore sustained. Now, I will never say not to attempt a heterodox approach that deviates from the norm, on the grounds that one never knows for certain what works until it’s tried (every new situation carries with it the prospect for new discovery, and all that). I simply want to make the point that no reader expects you to re-invent the written word to be seen as a great storyteller, and it’s perfectly fine to stick with what has been tried-and-tested to work, and what will make it easier for you to write your story, rather than fret over the structural details when you really don’t have to.

Character Backgrounds: The Dilemma of Sharing Too Little, or Too Much

When writing a story, there exists a natural disconnect between how the author interprets the plot, and how the audience reads it. The obvious reason for this being that the author has the (mis)fortune of knowing the intended background details of the events and characters before they ever makes their way onto the page, in ways that are not readily available to the reader. The task for any decent writer is to convey these details in a way that makes for a compelling narrative that will be neither overbearing for the reader, nor leave them stranded in the dark regarding important plot/character developments.

Spotting moments when an author is being too reserved with details is fairly easy. Anytime you’ve come across a part of a story or book that left you wondering, “Wait, who is this, and why are they suddenly in the middle of everything? Where they hell did they come from?” you were essentially exposed to underdeveloped writing. Be sure not to misunderstand what I’m saying, though. Introducing new characters, and strategically withholding information about them, can be an effective writing technique to invigorate interest back into the plot, as a little mystery can go a long way in building much needed suspense in an otherwise stale plot.

As an example, imagine a love story between two characters named Tom and Jill. For over a hundred pages, you followed along as Tom sees Jill, falls in love with her, and tries desperately to impress her. Jill was originally aloof regarding Tom’s advances, but slowly she starts to feel flattered by his affection for her, and agrees to give him a chance. Things are going great for the two love birds for several more pages, then—just as the plot can’t bear the weight of anymore Hallmark moment clichés—a sudden wrench is thrown into the mix:

Nothing could tear Tom’s gaze away from Jill’s eyes. The shape of them, their softness as she smiled, even the wrinkles that formed at the corners of her eyelids as she laughed, all worked to keep him in a hypnotic trance from which he could not—would not—escape. Or so he thought. Because the moment Susan Gallaghan walked by them, he felt his eyes wander from his beloved Jill’s enchanting eyes, to the rhythmic steps that paced along in front of him.

Let’s assume this is the first time this Susan character is ever mentioned in the plot. The first thoughts any reader is going to have will be along the lines of: “Who the hell is this Susan person?”, “Is she someone new to Tom?”, “Is she an old flame?”, “Is she a girl from his youth that he secretly pined after?”, “Is Tom actually a serial killer, and Susan his next victim?” At this point, we, the audience, have no clue. The fact that we have no clue is what makes it a brilliant writer’s trick, because now you are invested in the dilemma and subsequent resolution that is sure to follow.

But what if the drama never really follows the way you expect it to? While the sudden introduction of this new character works to spark the reader’s interest in the development of the story, it can only carry the audience’s engagement so far. If Susan keeps popping up in the same way, with the same vague acknowledgment from the established characters, the reader’s interest will quickly turn to frustration, and ultimately to disinterest. You have to give the audience a reason as to why the things that are happening on the page are worth being mentioned to begin with, and in the case of character development, this means divulging at the very least some connection between secondary plot-devise characters (like Susan above) and the main protagonists.

Divulging a character’s background effectively in a narrative is not as easy as it may sound. A lot of times it can come across bloated, and a poor attempt to force feed too much information into the plot, just for the sake of having the reader know why this person exists in the story.

Imagine if the mysterious introduction of Susan above followed up with:

Tom immediately recognized Susan as his high school sweetheart, to whom he had lost his virginity to on prom night. The two of them went their separate ways soon after graduation, but Tom never quite got over his love for Susan. Susan, for her part, had little trouble moving on from Tom. So much so, that she moved away to study and travel abroad. As she traveled the world, she gained an appreciation for herself, and how she didn’t need to define her identity by any one person that happened to be in her life. Unlike Tom, Susan wasn’t validated by whether someone loved her; she felt complete knowing that she loved herself. Even now as she walked past him with all the confidence of a young woman who intended to live her life to the fullest, Tom’s heart throbbed once again for the one that got away. Though Susan didn’t recognize Tom, the two of them would be seeing a lot more of each other from her on out, since she was set to begin a new position in the very firm Tom worked at.

The problem here isn’t that this information is being revealed within the plot; it’s that there is no reason to have it laid out all at once, let alone right after the mysteriousness regarding Susan’s presence was so brilliantly executed. All of this can be revealed through the course of several pages, if not several chapters. Again, by all means give the necessary background to establish a character, but there is no need to lump it all together in one spot, because then your narrative will inevitably end up repeating itself again and again, every single time the information needs to be revisited. Eventually, Tom and Susan will have a confrontation, where hints can be dropped regarding their past intimacy. Rather than state that Susan is a confident and independent person, why not show it by the way she behaves and interacts with her surroundings and the other characters? Pretty much everything stated in that one paragraph can be dispersed throughout the story by piecemeal, without having to kill the suspense of revealing it all in one big swoop (especially right after the mystery character is introduced).

For a real literary example of where an author does a superb job of balancing the enigma of his characters with their subtle background revelations throughout the plot, I would point to the characters of Mr. Croup and Mr. Vandemar in Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere. Even before the book’s otherworldly narrative is revealed, these two characters’ peculiar manner of dress and manner of speaking foreshadows a fantastical nature to their persons (and, by extension, the plot itself). All of which is subtly explored in what essentially amounts to breadcrumbs worth of information through the course of a 300+ page story. And in the end of it all, the mystery behind who/what Mr. Croup and Mr. Vandemar really are is never fully revealed, precisely because there is no reason for the story to do so.

Ultimately, it’s up to every writer to decide how much is too much background exhibition for her/his characters, and how much is just enough to not stifle character and plot development. That happy balance will largely depend on the sort of story you are trying to tell, and it may take several revisions to get it within the range you are aiming for. But, while it’s not always straightforward in either case, being able to spot the problem in other written works means you are more than capable of applying that critical eye to your own. Like a lot of writing advice, it simply starts with reading your writings not as an author, but as a reader, first and foremost.

The Muse, She Calls at Night

How Big Bend Ranch State Park Earned Its Dark Sky Designation – Texas Monthly

Depending on whom you ask, the severity of what it means to have writer’s block ranges from a minor annoyance to an anxiety inducing migraine. Everyone experiences a bit of writer’s block now and again. Often it takes the form of not knowing how to verbalize going from Point A to Point P in a prose; or, at least, not knowing how to write it seamlessly enough that it would count as decent writing. In these cases, it can be something as simple as the ideal word or phrase that turns it all around to unclog the ol’ writer’s pipelines. Other times, just the act of persistent writing (followed by heavy editing) is enough to help get the creative juices flowing back onto the page.

As is to be expected, the people who feel the most emotionally committed to what they are trying to write tend to feel the most distraught when their creativity is experiencing a slowdown, or has reached a complete halt altogether. If you find yourself in a situation like this, then you are fortunate enough that there is plenty of advice out there for you. Reading more (both related and unrelated works) to inspire your own writing, is one of them. As is the aforementioned idea to persevere through the block through sheer willpower and keep typing away until something halfway decent starts manifesting itself. Exercise, eating a well-balanced meal, and getting enough sleep are probably somewhere on the list, too. Someone once told me that it’s also worthwhile to try stepping away from one’s writing entirely to cure writer’s block. Although I’m sure this might work for some, I’ve also seen it have the opposite effect of causing writer’s to lose the motivation to go back to an unfinished work the more time they spend away from it.

In this sea of helpful remedies to cure writer’s block, I would like to take a moment to share what helps me personally ward off this dreaded ailment. It’s more of a writing guideline–or routine–I have found to be the most conducive to getting me where I need to be when confronted with the heavy hurdle of staring at a blank page. And it can be plainly stated as:

Write at night, and edit by day.

For me, there’s just something about writing in those last few hours before bedtime that gets my creativity firing at its full capacity. Maybe it’s the fatigue of the day, where my mind had already spent several hours going through a few rough drafts long before I ever started to write a word down. Or perhaps it’s a combination of the still of the night, and the dreamlike state of slumber already taking a hold of my senses to steer my imagination where it needs to go. I don’t really know what it is, but for me the writing muse comes at night.

Now, I also added the bit about editing by day, which shouldn’t be ignored. While I might feel most inspired to write at night, I’m also more prone to make avoidable grammatical errors when I’m already drifting off to sleep. This is why, after I hit save and turn in for the night, I’ll spend the next day (or two) going through what I had written to fix any spelling mistakes, cluttered diction, or to revise anything that might have looked decent when first written, but in the light of day reads like it’s been overworked, or is off in some other way.

Is this an obsessive compulsive routine that needs to be followed to the letter for me to be able to write anything? Of course not! Plenty of things get written and edited by day, too, within a few short hours, with no creative hindrance whatsoever. Just like there are nights when the muse decides to turn in early and doesn’t bother to come at all for one project, and barely manages to phone it in for another. However, outliers shouldn’t be used to negate a general trend.

I will freely admit, though, that I have always been somewhat of a night owl, laced with infrequent bouts of insomnia. Hence, it’s possible that I just happen to be the personality type for whom a habit of nightly writing comes the easiest, and you might not be. But, if you are struggling with writer’s block, and none of the other remedies have offered you much relief in the matter, do feel welcome to try my personal guideline out for yourself. Take the last two hours or so before your normal bedtime (no need to force wakefulness past your usual comfort level), and see if it helps unclog that cerebral blockage. Just be prepared to possibly have to edit and revise a few things the next day, like a motherfucker!

Forcing the Narrative

Forces - Lessons - Tes Teach

So you’ve decided to write a story. Before you begin, you put together a pretty coherent outline. You have your protagonists and antagonists all clearly panned out. You might not know exactly how long it will be, or all the minor details that will pull the whole plot together, but if there’s one thing you do know it’s exactly how the major parts of this story will progress from beginning, to climax, to finish. There’s just one itsy-bitsy problem–your characters aren’t behaving like they should.

It’s hard to pinpoint what it is, really. The dialogue is crisp and clean; without too many overly excessive and cumbersome adjectives repetitively cluttering up the prose. All the different personalities are well laid out, and totally not cliche or one-dimensional. There’s a deep subtext noticeable throughout the work, though not of the rambling variant [yeah, suck on that, David Foster Wallace]. But there’s something that just is not working, and it’s driving you crazy trying to figure out why your narrative is not behaving as it should–as you have so clearly planned it out from beginning, to middle, to end.

What the hell is going on?!

Well, you’re in luck, because I may just have the solution to your problem. The problem probably isn’t that the story you’ve set out to write is unmanageable, or that the characters you’re eager to create aren’t as capable of being the greatest heroes and villains in fiction as you’ve imagined them to be. More than likely, the problem is you. By which I mean, the problem is that rather than letting your story unfold, and your characters respond and adapt to their surroundings, you have allowed yourself to get stuck in one of the easiest pitfalls for an author to find her or himself in: you have forced the narrative.

Forcing the narrative can happen in many different ways, but the most common occurs when authors stubbornly refuse to follow the natural progression of the story they have set out to create, for no other reason than that doing so may deviate from the original blueprint they have arbitrarily committed themselves to in their minds. And, of course, stagnant character progression is often the first victim to suffer as a result of this stubbornness.

Say, for example, that you’re writing a story that has two characters that you know you intent to have fall in love halfway through the plot. You introduce them separately to the reader, so each can have distinct personalities that your potential audience will relate to. They spent all these pages developing identities that are unique and self-sustaining (as they very well should be), but the moment you finally have them interact with each other–the moment the entirety of your whole plot hitherto was supposed to be leading up to–and…there’s nothing.

Where you thought the dialogue would flow smoothly between these two people you crafted to be perfect for one another, all their exchanges instead sound too contrived to be authentic. You can force them to say all the things you think are necessary to convey the message that they are love-bound soulmates, but every time you do just that everything that comes out of their mouths starts to read like a rejected script for a corny made-for-TV movie of the week.

So what gives? Are you such a lousy writer you can’t even get a genuine romance plot right? Maybe…or maybe you’re working to hard to wedge a square peg trope into a heart-shaped prose. By which I mean, maybe the characters that seemed perfect for each other before you put pen to paper…err…I mean, fingertip to keyboard?… whatever, the point I’m making is that a plot idea can seem perfect before you set out to write it, but once you get going it can become downright impossible to stay true to said idea without sacrificing the integrity of the narrative you have created up to that point.

As already mentioned, this dilemma can show itself in the most basic of details. Including the very issue of whose story it’s going to be. You might have a main character in mind from the start, but the more time you spend with him the more you start feeling like writing intriguing dialogue for him is a strenuous task taking up way too much of your creative concentration than it should. Perhaps you even find yourself preferring to spend time with secondary characters that have taken on more interesting lives compared to your once-great-now-bland protagonist.

“Well, what’s to be done in this case?” Good question, hypothetical reader! When you are in the thick of this frustrating bit of a writer’s conundrum, it’s easy to miss the simplest of solutions staring back right in your sleep-deprived, bloodshot eyes. That is to say: Screw your preliminary outline. Tear up your rough draft notes (it’s called a rough draft for a reason, after all). Go with what your instincts tell you as a reader first, and ignore the self-righteous indignation of your inner-writer unwilling to deviate from an unworkable premise.

Are two characters not hitting it off as well as you thought they would? Fine, try having them hate each other instead. Or even try pairing them up with side characters that showed more prospect in the plot, and see where that goes. Is your main character too wooden to lead the story the way you hoped? Then why not sideline him, and shift the perspective onto a different character whose personality and dialogue carries your narrative forward with so much more ease than you ever thought possible?

All these options are readily available to you, because, no matter what, it is your world–it can only exist as you wish it to. But you need to trust your instincts, not just as a writer, but also as a reader on what makes for compelling storytelling. And you are allowed to change your mind about the details of the happenings in your fictional world, if these changes help bring about the greater narrative you set out to breathe life into. Treat the initial bits of ideas that inspired you to start on your journey as just that–a cursory launching point to something better. Nothing you write down–be it at the beginning, the middle, or the end–is sacred scripture. It is not absolute, or inadaptable to subsequent burst of creativity that may strike you once you have already begun to feverishly churn out the bulk of your prose.

It’s important to be aware that if something doesn’t feel right about your story to you as you are barely writing it, it will definitely not seem right to your readers as they are reading it. Even if they might not know how to articulate what’s so off-putting about it when they notice a belabored prose, the audience can definitely sense when something isn’t working as well as it could be. And forcing a narrative, in an otherwise great story, is a perfect way to ensure that it won’t be working for anyone; neither you, nor your characters–but, above all else, not the reading public.

The Power of Names

Shakespeare invited us to consider, “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose, by any other word would smell as sweet.” The Bard’s musings on the subject notwithstanding, the truth is that names do hold a fair bit of power in forging our perception of other people, as well as ourselves.

If you are a foreign-born individual who goes about in your adopted land of residence with a first name that points clearly to your nation of origin, you immediately know how vital a role a name can play when trying to integrate yourself with the local population (so much so that many foreigners will give in, and change their foreign-sounding names to something more palatable to the culture they aim to assimilate in). Although few of us will readily admit to it, we are all susceptible to making generalizations about people we come across in our daily life based on superficial features. Names are definitely one such feature. That is not to say that every assumption made about someone based on such features is either wrong, or malicious. It’s not wrong (factually or morally) to deduce that a person with an obviously Asian sounding name is in some way culturally connected to Asia. Same with a man named Hans Gunterkind most likely being of some kind of Germanic heritage, Jean-Pierre Neauvoix being French. So on and so forth.

(It goes without saying that the contemptible part in forging a preconception about someone isn’t the initial preconception itself, it’s what you do with it from there on forward. If on recognizing you’re about to speak with Chen Huiyin leads you to assume she is probably Asian before seeing her, no sensible person will raise an eyebrow for that assumption. If, however, you further take your preconception to assume she is in some way personally inferior to someone who isn’t Asian, that’s where we run into issues of bigotry that will rightly be condemned by much of the public at large.)

Issues of what might be called ethnic names aside (are not all names relatively ethnic to different cultures, one might be inclined to ask here?), there are naming norms within American culture that occasionally shape our interactions with each other. When you’re in the middle of everyday America and come across the name Kevin, it is unavoidable that you will imagine a man. Unless you just happen to know a woman named Kevin, but even then you are likely to ascribe it to a rare anomaly. What if over the course of the next three decades a swarm of new parents decide that Kevin makes for a great name for their baby girls, and the social paradigm shifts so that suddenly you run into more female Kevins than male ones? Would you easily adjust to the new cultural trend, or still stick to the norm you had been accustomed to of Kevin being a predominantly male name? If this sounds like an unlikely scenario to happen, think about how the name Ashley in America at the start of the 20th Century changed from mostly male to predominantly female by the start of the 21st Century.

Not to belabor a point past my humble reader’s generous patience, but it would feel disingenuous not to touch on my personal experience here. Growing up in continental Europe as a boy named Sascha/Sasha the social assumption about it was that my parents must be bland, unimaginative, and possibly even a tad bit conservative in their leanings, precisely because boys named Sascha/Sasha are so common to come across there. At the time, it formed a personal impression of myself being just another average lad going about my business, similarly to how I imagine an American youth named Michael or David would feel on the matter in contemporary American culture. When I moved to the U.S. in my early teens I came to find out that my name was somewhat of a peculiarity to my peers; one that definitely demanded further explanation on my part. Suddenly, I was no longer merely a random guy with an average-to-boring name, I was a random guy whose androgynous-to-feminine name invited further conversation (occasionally schoolyard taunts, too, but I’m pretty good at deflecting unkind commentary and rolling with the punches, so I bear no negative grudges from it).

I would argue that your name is the most basic qualifier of your identity, and people’s reactions to it forms a great deal of your learned behavior when interacting with others. I can honestly say that the change in perception in how people reacted to my name on moving to the U.S.–as opposed to the reaction I received for it back in Europe–did affect how I carry myself and interact with others to some non-trivial extent. At least in that I know when I introduce myself to others, I can be sure of two things: 1. I will be pegged as foreign regardless of my citizenship status, 2. I may be asked an awkward follow-up question regarding my name (to which, when I’m feeling lazy, my typical response will be either “My parents were really hoping for a girl, and were surprised when I popped out, dick-swinging and all,” or “I wanted to be able to better relate to women, but Nancy Sunflowerseed sounded too butch, so Sascha had to do”).

Believe it or not, the purpose of this post was not to regale anyone with anecdotes about naming cultures, as a clever ruse to sneak in a dick-swinging joke. It’s to touch on a greater point about forging better writing habits and being mindful of one’s intended audience’s social palate. Sooner or later, just about all writers find themselves fretting over picking out the perfect name to convey their characters’ personalities and backgrounds effortlessly to the reader. And there are definitely right and wrong names one can decide on, for the roundabout reasons stated above.

If you’re writing a story about a street-wise, inner-city black kid, born and bred in the Bronx, but is named Hans Jorgenson Gunterkind, well you better be ready to explain how the hell that came to be. Same if you’re writing a story about a 15th Century Samurai named Steven. While clever names can add exotic intrigue to characters, and piece together unspoken–unwritten?–context about their personal interactions with their environments, it can also needlessly distract the reader if it’s not really meant to be a focal point of the narrative.

It’s perfectly fine to be bold and go for something unconventional when you’re crafting your written world, but don’t bend over backwards to convey uniqueness unnecessarily, to the point that it hinders the readers ability to become immersed within the narrative. A story that has five characters named Mike to show the absurd commonality of the name can be witty and fun, or it can end up confusing and frustrating to the reader. Take a moment to consider how the greater world you have created interacts with this dynamic, and whether it helps or hurts the story you’re setting out to tell. Reading practicality should not be dispensed for the sake of creativity; they should operate together to form a coherent story that can be enjoyably read.

You can’t please everyone, and someone will hate your work no matter what or how you write. Which is why the starting point for all my writing advice is to always start with being honest with every story’s first reader: its author. And if, as you put pen to paper (or, more realistically, fingers to keyboard), what seemed like a great name in the first outline is becoming harder to work with as the story progresses, rather than forcing the narrative to conform, there is no shame in revising the basics–character names included.

Suck on that, Shakespeare, is what I’m really trying to say here.