[Writerpreneur OS] Lesson 0208: Choosing The Importances Out of a Story

There is one choice to make as you write - it's continuing, and vital...

Whatever one may be writing, the problem is always one of selection, one of choice. In fact, the job of writing is simply one long series of choices; choices of words, of phrases, of details, of facts, sensations, gestures, and forms. This process of selection is the test of the writer: if he chooses well, he is successful; and the degree to which he can do so, is the measure of his success. What, then, is the basis of choice?

The basis of choice is always SIGNIFICANCE.

Now, the meaning of significance is simply this: the significance of a thing varies with the importance of what depends upon wt. Every choice must be made with that in view. No doubt, at some time, you have seen a series of pictures (taken with a motion picture camera, but presented as stills) of a running horse. If so, you will have noticed that some of these pictures “look like’’ a horse running, whereas others seem to show him frozen stiff in unnatural and motionless poses.

Now, this selection of the suggestive detail (the detail on which the meaning hangs) is what makes the artist and the writer. The intention—to show the horse running—is the important thing; the artist therefore selects from all the poses in Nature those few positions of the horse which suggest running. That is the significance he is looking for.

Art is not Nature. Art is a selection of facts from Nature so arranged as to bring out a chosen meaning.

The same rule applies to every step, every choice, in writing. In narrative, one must choose the significant movement, the significant gesture; in description, one must choose the significant sensation; in exposition, one must choose the significant fact or idea; in dialog, one must choose the significant word; in characterization, one must choose the significant motive. And in each case the significance will depend upon what one’s intention is, what meaning one wishes to bring forward.

The person who confuses Nature and Art is therefore a very naive person. Art brings meaning into Nature, by omitting those things which have no significance with regard to the intention of the artist, and by presenting those things which do have that significance.

The first thing, then, is to be sure what your intention is: to tell a story, to rouse an emotion, to present a character.

With that intention clearly in mind, the choice is made easy. One has then only to use such technical devices as will present the chosen fact, detail, mood, gesture, word, motive, or sensation most effectively. And this is what a writer does, and what he is paid for doing.

The process then is: (1) a clear intention; (2) a wise selection; (3) an effective presentation.

This is true of all writers, no matter what they may attempt. The great writer is simply one with a great intention which compels him to face and solve great problems.

(From the works of Walter S. Campbell)

Table of Contents

Paid subscribers get instant access to complete transcripts (plus additional bonus materials) in ebook format — see below: