CPM - Characters and Plot Mapping (Module Overview)

Characters and Plot Mapping

Introduction

As we discussed in module three the Aristotelian elements of tragedy can serve as an excellent categorization of the aspects of an effective story. The first two elements of tragedy in Aristotle’s Poetics are plot and character. He places each in separate categories and even goes so far as to suggest that one, plot, is superior to the other, character.

"Tragedy is essentially an imitation not of persons but of action and life, of happiness and misery. All human happiness or misery takes the form of action; the end for which we live is a certain kind of activity, not a quality. Character gives us qualities, but it is in our actions--what we do--that we are happy or the reverse--a tragedy is impossible without action, but there may be one without Character." -Aristotle, The Poetics

This superiority of plot over character has sparked debate about the nature of effective storytelling for centuries. While these categories are great for the audience to define, observe, and analyze for the purpose of story criticism, the rigid separation of these elements viewed in isolation of one another may prove to be problematic for the writer.

Fredrich Nietzsche takes up this topic in his 1872 work on dramatic theory, The Birth of Tragedy from the Spirit of Music. In this work he looks at the nature of both the audience’s and the playwright’s experience of the Greek tragedy.

“The character is not for him (the poet) an aggregate composed of a studied collection of particular traits, but an irrepressibly live person appearing before his eyes, and differing only from the corresponding vision of the painter by its ever continued life and action.”

Neitzsche seems to suggest that the most effective way to assess or experience character is in combination with the action. He goes on to point out that even the later ancient Greek playwrights seemed to understand that the audience’s experience of the character going through the action is more important to the experience than the events themselves.

“The Euripidian prologue may serve us as an example of the productivity of this, rationalistic method. Nothing could be more opposed to the technique of our stage than the prologue in the drama of Euripides. For a single person to appear at the outset of the play telling us who he is, what precedes the action, what has happened thus far, yea, what will happen in the course of the play, would be designated by a modern playwright as a wanton and unpardonable abandonment of the effect of suspense. Everything that is about to happen is known beforehand; who then cares to wait for it actually to happen?
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Euripides speculated quite differently. The effect of tragedy never depended on epic suspense, on the fascinating uncertainty as to what is to happen now and afterwards: but rather on the great rhetoro-lyric scenes in which the passion and dialectics of the chief hero swelled to a broad and mighty stream. Everything was arranged for pathos, not for action: and whatever was not arranged for pathos was regarded as objectionable. But what interferes most with the hearer's pleasurable satisfaction in such scenes is a missing link, a gap in the texture of the previous history. So long as the spectator has to divine the meaning of this or that person, or the presuppositions of this or that conflict of inclinations and intentions, his complete absorption in the doings and sufferings of the chief persons is impossible,
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Euripides thought he observed that during these first scenes the spectator was in a strange state of anxiety to make out the problem of the previous history, so that the poetic beauties and pathos of the exposition were lost to him. Accordingly he placed the prologue even before the exposition, and put it in the mouth of a person who could be trusted: some deity had often as it were to guarantee the particulars of the tragedy to the public and remove every doubt as to the reality of the myth”

Henry James considers the relationship between incident and character in novel writing in 1885 in his critical essay, The Art of Fiction

“There are bad novels and good novels, as there are bad pictures and good pictures; but that is the only distinction in which I see any meaning, and I can as little imagine speaking of a novel of character as I can imagine speaking of a picture of character. When one says picture, one says of character, when one says novel, one says of incident, and the terms may be transposed. What is character but the determination of incident? What is incident but the illustration of character? What is a picture or a novel that is not of character? What else do we seek in it and find in it? It is an incident for a woman to stand up with her hand resting on a table and look out at you in a certain way; or if it be not an incident, I think it will be hard to say what it is. At the same time it is an expression of character. …When a young man makes up his mind that he has not faith enough, after all, to enter the Church, as he intended, that is an incident, though you may not hurry to the end of the chapter to see whether perhaps he doesn't change once more. I do not say that these are extraordinary or startling incidents. I do not pretend to estimate the degree of interest proceeding from them, for this will depend upon the skill of the painter.”- Henry James, “The Art of Fiction,” 1884

Despite the distinct differences between plot (events over time) and character (the people and personalities in the story), it is clear that for the audience to fully engage, experience and enjoy the story; there must be an appreciation of the interconnectedness of both plot and character on the part of the storyteller. Events and characters cannot be understood or appreciated without each other. It is necessary by definition to understand an incident by placing an event in context with other knowledge.

In this module, you will explore the development of character and events for the purpose of crafting your story so that it results in the effective and engaging transformation of your characters.

Module Lessons Preview

In this module, we will study the following topics:

Characters: In this lesson, you will learn how to expand the backstories of the characters necessary for the story of your logline, for the purpose of fully understanding who your characters are.

Plot Mapping: In this lesson, you will learn how to use appropriate plot mapping strategies to develop events and incidents that will further reveal character, leading to a character transformation that will likely prove cathartic for the audience.