# Do you need conflict?



## Steerpike (Nov 22, 2013)

Is the conflict the story? Do you need a plot?

Some thoughts on those questions, by Ursula K. LeGuin: Ursula K. Le Guin: from Steering the Craft


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## Feo Takahari (Nov 22, 2013)

I started a thread about this once. I was told that I misunderstood what "conflict" meant in a literary sense. I think Le Guin is making the same mistake.

I once read a story about two gardeners, one of whom gardened in the other's place when the other grew ill. The two never directly argued, and there wasn't much of a plot per se. But the focus of the story was the difference in how they gardened, and through that, the difference in how they lived. That dissonance, that contradiction, is what writers call conflict, and I believe it's an essential part of a story's meaning. What value is there in describing an idea in a vacuum? It must be compared to other ideas to illuminate its faults and its virtues.


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## Guy (Nov 22, 2013)

I was always taught there were three types of conflict in a story:  man v man, man v nature, and man v himself. I don't see how you can have a plot and not have at least one of these types of conflict. The article seemed... I don't know... scattered? Unfocused? I'm not really sure what her point is.


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## Ireth (Nov 22, 2013)

Guy said:


> I was always taught there were three types of conflict in a story:  man v man, man v nature, and man v himself. I don't see how you can have a plot and not have at least one of these types of conflict. The article seemed... I don't know... scattered? Unfocused? I'm not really sure what her point is.



There's also man vs. society and man vs. fate, and possibly others.


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## Ankari (Nov 22, 2013)

Those would be rolled into the man vs. nature category.


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## Svrtnsse (Nov 22, 2013)

Aye, that was a rather confusing piece. Admittedly, it's very late and I've had some drink, but it still felt a bit like she was rambling on the components of story rather than trying to make a point. I think what she's trying to say is that a story is more than the plot, but she goes about it in a very roundabout way.

To answer the question "do you need conflict in your story?" I'll answer a hesitant and doubtful no. I'll add the reservation that a lot of it is about how you define conflict.
Conflict requires two sides in some form of opposition. It needn't be very heavy opposition, and the two sides can be pretty much anything so the comment about man vs. world is definitely valid. I still believe that it might be possible to write a story with no conflict whatsoever, but it probably won't be a very good one.


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## Ireth (Nov 22, 2013)

Ankari said:


> Those would be rolled into the man vs. nature category.



I was taught that "man vs. nature" was its own category: the character against the natural world, apart from society; e.g. the movie _Twister_. Man vs. fate could also be called man vs. God, and God/gods are not always part of the created world, but beyond it.


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## buyjupiter (Nov 22, 2013)

Svrtnsse said:


> Aye, that was a rather confusing piece. Admittedly, it's very late and I've had some drink, but it still felt a bit like she was rambling on the components of story rather than trying to make a point. I think what she's trying to say is that a story is more than the plot, but she goes about it in a very roundabout way.



I think the passage is an excerpt from a longer essay in the book pictured above the text. It would have been nice if that was the case to see that made more explicit.


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## Svrtnsse (Nov 22, 2013)

Ireth said:


> I was taught that "man vs. nature" was its own category: the character against the natural world, apart from society; e.g. the movie _Twister_. Man vs. fate could also be called man vs. God, and God/gods are not always part of the created world, but beyond it.



Again, I think this is mainly about definitions. The way I see it you can split it into three main categories:
 - Man vs self (internal conflict)
 - Man vs Man (active conflict)
 - Man vs Circumstance (passive conflict) - this is the "everything else" category, including things like nature, fate, time etc


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## Ankari (Nov 22, 2013)

You can have a story without conflict or plot. Not all genres can do without those two elements. I think romance could work, but fantasy couldn't Not unless you're trying to write a "day in the life of..." story.

Even then, there will be instances of conflict. When the main character stubs their toe, that's conflict. When hunger strikes, that's conflict. Are we talking about major conflict, or all conflicts?


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## BWFoster78 (Nov 23, 2013)

I think that, for a work of fiction to do its job, it has to entertain.  For each scene, something has to drive that entertainment.

By far, the easiest way to engage and entertain a reader is to show conflict (tension).  I don't think it is the only way.  The more an author tries to drive a scene without tension, the more difficult, imo, it is to pull off.  It would then seem to me that the more scenes you try to string together without using tension, the more difficult it would be to keep a reader's attention.  Again, not to say it can't be done, however; I don't think I could do it.

I think the second easiest way to entertain is what I would call "getting inside the character's head."  Perhaps Steerpike would refer to it as voice.  I have read scenes that contain little to no tension but are still entertaining.  These, for the most part first person POV, typically consist of a character sounding like he's talking directly to me.  Again, though, it seems like that's a lot harder to pull off well than to simply add a bit of tension.

Lately, I've really been working hard at combining the two.  I like the results a lot.


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## wordwalker (Nov 23, 2013)

I'd say the root of it is: *uncertainty*. Or even below that, just getting the reader to care enough about what's at stake, so that any uncertainty is enough.


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## Mythopoet (Nov 23, 2013)

I was taught 5 types of conflict in school.

Man vs. Man
Man vs. Himself
Man vs. Society
Man vs. Nature 
Man vs. the Supernatural

Here's the Merriam Webster definition of conflict:

1:  fight, battle, war <an armed conflict>
2a :  competitive or opposing action of incompatibles :  antagonistic state or action (as of divergent ideas, interests, or persons)
b :  mental struggle resulting from incompatible or opposing needs, drives, wishes, or external or internal demands
3:  the opposition of persons or forces that gives rise to the dramatic action in a drama or fiction 

The key seems to be two factors that are incompatible or in active opposition to each other as the root of conflict. I would say that, as such, conflict is definitely not necessary for story. I think there are really only 3 basic necessities for story: plot, character and setting. Something has to happen (plot), it has to happen to someone/thing (character) and it has to happen somewhere (setting). The something that happens does not necessarily have to involve a conflict. Though modern audiences certainly do expect it.


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## Helen (Nov 28, 2013)

Ankari said:


> You can have a story without conflict or plot.



Lets leave conflict aside.

How on Earth are you going to have a story without plot?


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## JCFarnham (Nov 28, 2013)

Perhaps I've misinterpreted this all my life but there is always conflict in a story. It all boils down to decisions, however far down that is buried in the characters head. Doesn't have to be explicit, but whenever something is chosen over something else that's conflict the way I talk about it (a dissonance someone said, but in this case between protagonist and his own discourse (the sum total of his experiences, opinions, etc used to make choices). This is especially the case when something hapoens as a consequence, but not a requirement.

Absence of conflict and plot is character a talking about ... the colour brown... or something. 

Summary: to me conflict means so much more than two or more people/forces fighting, arguing, antagonising.


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## Philip Overby (Nov 29, 2013)

The only way I could see a story not have conflict or plot if it was just two people agreeing about things over and over. Conflict can be any minor thing: a disagreement about coffee, a person lost in an airport, a man deciding if he should buy ice cream.

I don't see how a story can be devoid of this. However, a plot, from my imagining, is a series of conflicts that ultimately result in a resolution of some sort. So maybe if there is only one conflict in a story, you can get away with no plot? 

I don't know. That's just what I'm thinking. I tend to not to try re-invent the wheel too much when it comes to structure, so this isn't an issue I'd considered before.


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## T.Allen.Smith (Nov 29, 2013)

I'm going to agree with JC here.

Story is conflict. I don't see anyway around that while still being able to execute an interesting tale. Why else would I care what happens if there isn't some form of struggle, at any level?


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## Penpilot (Nov 29, 2013)

I'm reminded of a collection of short "stories" by John Berger called Photocopies. The "stories" in the collection really don't have any conflict or plot. They're a collection of captured moments that are written so they are engaging, draw emotion, and bring to life encounters from his life. Going by the definition of how we generally think of stories, this book has no stories in it. But it's interesting how he can draw you into the moment as he writes and keep your attention. He's an award winning author, so I would assume he kind of knows what he's doing. It's literary fiction, so I guess mileage may vary on what is considered interesting and engaging.


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## JCFarnham (Nov 29, 2013)

Penpilot said:


> I'm reminded of a collection of short "stories" by John Berger called Photocopies. The "stories" in the collection really don't have any conflict or plot. They're a collection of captured moments that are written so they are engaging, draw emotion, and bring to life* encounters from his life*.



[Emphasis added to illustrate my point.]

I haven't read this book, but the term "encounters" suggests one or more people meeting and doing something. That in and of itself (while not particularly interesting to me at least) is plot, aka a series of things happening. Just because its a single happening, in isolation, doesn't mean any less that its a plot. Lets assume a piece of writing is "one guy meets another guy and they agree on everything". _That_ is the piece's plot as I've always understood the definition. 

If a piece of writing is devoid of plot (the progression of happenings from one moment to the next throughout time) then that would suggest a individual in a void outside of time and logical progression there in.

I believe what you mean to say is that the book has no *over arching *story. That I can agree with. Story is something that happens as a sum total of plot (as discussed here), character and setting over time. Snapshot writing probably cannot have this. That is true. 



> Going by the definition of how we generally think of stories, this book has no stories in it. But it's interesting how he can draw you into the moment as he writes and keep your attention. He's an award winning author, so I would assume he kind of knows what he's doing. It's literary fiction, so I guess mileage may vary on what is considered interesting and engaging.



You're not wrong there on the interesting and engaging part. Snapshots don't usually interest me unless there's a reason for their existance (to highlight a thing being advocated, for example, or perhaps give an overview of a setting.)


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## Ophiucha (Nov 29, 2013)

A story can certainly be told without an over-arching conflict, and I think it can be told without _explicit _minor conflicts as well. I don't know that a story could be told with no minor conflicts without the readers clinging to every dichotomy and finding a conflict in it, even if none is presented by the author. One storytelling technique that is used a lot in non-Western literature is obfuscation, keeping the reader in the dark on the situation. In these stories, there is no conflict for the _characters_ but the book itself is in something of a conflict with the reader, never revealing the whole situation until the 'climax' of sorts. For a rather simple example, here's a comic.

As for plot, I would tend to agree with JC. I define a plot as a series of things happening, so even without a conflict any sequential events are a 'plot'. I could argue that thematically arranged snapshots still count as a plot, in a way, if it serves even the loosest purpose. A series of complete non-sequitors with no relation to one another, I suppose, would be plotless, but as JC says if any of those non-sequitors were as long as a sentence, they could each have individual plots. Certainly, plot needn't be defined by the Freytag pyramid, there are hundreds of different plot _structures_, and many stories thrive with flimsy 'excuse' plots, but _no_ plot... at best, you'd accomplish it only to have the readers make one up. They'd find a reason for each event to be related, make two characters the same through symbolic justification.


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## Helen (Dec 4, 2013)

Ophiucha said:


> For a rather simple example, here's a comic.



It has a place in a debate about scene conflict, whether every action, event or scene needs conflict. But it's not a story in the sense everyone means - a novel or film.


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## Ophiucha (Dec 5, 2013)

As I said, a rather simple example.

I have read short stories, at least, that managed that same structure quite effectively for ten to twenty pages. I don't think it is easy, perhaps even possible, to write a story where no conflict could be concocted by the reader, filling in blanks that the writer never meant to leave on the page. And certainly a novel-length work without even the rarest, minor conflict of 'getting cut in line at the grocer's' or something equally mundane would be a challenge I'd leave to the lit fic writers.

But I don't think it is impossible. Particularly if you structure the novel in a way that obscures truths from the reader. For an idea of a fantasy novel, one could tell the story without revealing aspects of the worldbuilding that are essential to understanding the situation. A story with some mystery to it that only comes together once you tell the readers, at the 'climax', "as you know, in Galitorna all dogs can read minds if they drink their owner's blood" and it just makes everything that came before it make sense. Maybe not telepathic vampire canines, specifically, but you get my drift.


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## Feo Takahari (Dec 9, 2013)

I've been thinking some more about what people actually mean when they ask this question, and I'd like to reverse course a bit.

On another writing site, an author posted that if your character's afraid of dogs, you can't just have the conflict be that she's dating a guy who owns a dog; she needs to face down an attack dog. According to her, conflicts need to be tense and in-your-face. I commented that I prefer subtle, understated conflicts, and she replied that, while there's nothing inherently wrong with subtletly, stories without an obviously tense hook aren't marketable in today's short-attention-span society.

It's not just that I think this idea is misguided. I think this idea is actively harmful.

The author outlined her attack dog idea in detail, talking all about how she would build tension before allowing the protagonist to triumph, but it just didn't seem like a story that _said_ much. It was pure sound and fury, with no deeper concept behind it. I wouldn't go so far as to say that a meaningful story needs to be low-tension, but I think the scenes that create meaning for the characters' goals tend to be lower-tension than the scenes that test the characters in their progression towards their goals. If you try to make your story all tension all the time, people will read through it in a rush, then forget about it five minutes later, and I don't think that's what art is really about.

I think that's why people keep asking this question of "Do you need conflict?" What they really mean is "Do you need attack dogs? Or is a boyfriend with a dog a big enough conflict for a story?"


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## Svrtnsse (Dec 9, 2013)

Okay, so if I get you right, what you want to ask is really "how much conflict do you need?"

I can see where the argument about low key conflict not being marketable comes from. I don't like it, but I can see where it's coming from. 

Almost all books I've read in recent years have had some kind of spectacular action as part of the conflict (Harry Dresden riding an animated T-Rex skeleton through downtown Chicago comes to mind). I think that as far as marketing goes that may be what's needed.
The one book I did read that did not have spectacular action (attack dogs) was one I'd never have bought on my own. My sister sent it in the mail for some reason and asked me to read it:
It was a nice and pleasant little story about two sisters going to a wedding and picking up their brother and his annoying wife. They then proceeded to convince the brother to run off with them (just for the weekend) and go see a favorite old uncle or something. There was no action whatsoever, but it was still a pleasant read with appealing characters and a friendly feel. I liked it a lot.

Trouble is: I have no idea how anyone would market a book like that to someone like me.

EDIT: It was this book.
http://www.amazon.com/Breaking-Away...8&qid=1386624078&sr=8-9&keywords=Anna+Gavalda


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## GeekDavid (Dec 9, 2013)

Svrtnsse said:


> I can see where the argument about low key conflict not being marketable comes from. I don't like it, but I can see where it's coming from.



For what it's worth, one of my favorite sci-fi series has very low conflict in most of the books.

The "Trader's Tales from the Golden Age of the Solar Clipper" is a series of six books that follow a young man through the world of interstellar shipping. There are no space battles (large or small), no weapons are mentioned that I recall, and in most of the books, not even a fistfight.

Yet this coming-of-age tale has (as of this time) 220 five-star reviews for the first book, Quarter Share. While there are those who've said things like:



> I finally gave up reading it, awaiting something to happen, anything the least bit interesting, with 20-30 pages left in the book.



...you also have reviews like:



> It was a strange transition for me--having come to expect conflict and danger and "bigger than life" for the majority of my sci-fi "hero" characters I normally get into--to suddenly be draw so completely into a story about the simple, average, and often repetitive everyday struggles of a common person. By the end of the story, I was more invested emotionally and more interested in the small victories that these common characters were able to accomplish throughout the story than I honestly expected I'd be... in fact, I find that the characters in this story have resonated and stuck in my mind more than most of the other sci-fi books I have read (and I've read hundreds of sci-fi books over the last 25 years). Don't get me wrong, I love a good action oriented hero story set in the sci-fi genre as much as anyone else... it's just that this one is so unlike those other storytelling methods that I thoroughly enjoyed Nathan's Quarter Share as much, if not more, than those mainstream offerings... just in a very different, more meaningful manner.



In other words, low-conflict stories can be worthwhile and successful, though like most things not everyone will like them.

However, I hasten to point out that *low* conflict is not the same as *no* conflict.


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## Snowpoint (Dec 9, 2013)

I think we are talking about dozens of different genres, each with different needs.

Literature can go to a museum, look at paintings, feel sad, and call that conflict. And while that is a legitimate thing in Literature, it would be cut from the theatrical cut of Lethal Weapon 2. Because LW2 has a different genre, different audience, different goals.

Now, I write fantasy stories with magic protagonists. I also read books in that narrow field. Going to a museum to look at paintings is not something I would keep in the final draft. Accidentally setting fire to the museum WOULD be interesting -especially if the character DID go to the museum to look at paintings. Accidentally destroying the things you love is a great conflict for a book.


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## Benjamin Clayborne (Dec 9, 2013)

I think it's possible to have a story about someone simply changing as they get older, without encountering any particular form of conflict, aside from those ordinary types we encounter on a daily basis. I just don't usually find such stories particularly interesting. Occasionally such stories can contain pearls of wisdom, or some insight that I find meaningful, but they aren't what I want to fill my days with.

As LeGuin puts it:



> A strong, shapely plot is a pleasure in itself. It can be reused generation after generation. It provides an armature for narrative that beginning writers may find invaluable.



Stories with abstract, arcane plots, or musings on the meaning of life, are probably not what beginning writers should be attempting to master. Start with the easy stuff first. You wouldn't expect a novice architect to design a skyscraper. Write a one-room building before you start writing a skyscraper.


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## Feo Takahari (Dec 9, 2013)

Snowpoint said:


> I think we are talking about dozens of different genres, each with different needs.
> 
> Literature can go to a museum, look at paintings, feel sad, and call that conflict. And while that is a legitimate thing in Literature, it would be cut from the theatrical cut of Lethal Weapon 2. Because LW2 has a different genre, different audience, different goals.
> 
> Now, I write fantasy stories with magic protagonists. I also read books in that narrow field. Going to a museum to look at paintings is not something I would keep in the final draft. Accidentally setting fire to the museum WOULD be interesting -especially if the character DID go to the museum to look at paintings. Accidentally destroying the things you love is a great conflict for a book.



Then maybe I'm not writing in the same genre?

I guess I have to get personal for this one. My book _Kids These Days_ has a fairly straightforward division between raids against monsters (which advance the plot) and strategy meetings (which are more about character-building.) There's certainly plenty of death-defying action in the raids, but the strategy meetings felt more interesting to write. Three personalities bouncing off each other, arguing and pranking each other and slowly developing a mutual understanding, felt more like something people would want to read than just scenes of killing monsters. In fact, even in the monster-killing scenes, the parts I most enjoyed writing were the parts that reminded me of the strategy meetings.

Maybe no one else is interested in this book--after all, I haven't been able to publish it yet. But I don't feel like I would have made it more interesting if I'd amped up the tension and cut out the strategy meetings.



Benjamin Clayborne said:


> Stories with abstract, arcane plots, or musings on the meaning of life, are probably not what beginning writers should be attempting to master. Start with the easy stuff first. You wouldn't expect a novice architect to design a skyscraper. Write a one-room building before you start writing a skyscraper.



This might be a stupid question, but wouldn't epic fantasy be the skyscraper? I've never fought in a battle for the fate of the world, and I don't really know how to create meaning or interest on that scale. It feels so much easier to me to write on a micro level, dealing with the passions of mostly normal people who've been pushed into slightly abnormal lives. (A bit like me, although my tensions are more along the lines of "I have a hard time thinking like a normal person" than "I've suddenly sprouted wings.")


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## Svrtnsse (Dec 9, 2013)

Feo Takahari said:


> Then maybe I'm not writing in the same genre?



Maybe there's such a thing as grass root fantasy? 

Jokes aside. There might be.
My WIP, is far from what you'd call action packed. Admittedly, I struggle a lot with the tension as I have/had a limited grasp on it, but whether I'm succeeding or not isn't the main thing. The main thing is that I'm trying to create a pleasant and laid-back, escapist reading experience without involving grandiose schemes or spectacular heroic deeds.
It's still a fantasy story. It's taking place in a fantasy world with elves and magic and mysterious dancing monks, but the story isn't about that; it's about a guy who goes on vacation and who eventually meets a girl. I'm trying to bring the world to life by showing it through the eyes of one of its regular inhabitants. 
There's conflict and there's tension (or at least there's meant to be once it's actually done), but Enar is more worried about the locals making fun of him than about the witch turning him into a goat.

I don't know who will want to read this book and I'm not sure I'll be able to sell it to more than friends and family (yeah, I'll probably give them free copies), but I'm quite convinced that there are people out there who would enjoy it if they just got started on it.


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## Helen (Dec 9, 2013)

Benjamin Clayborne said:


> I think it's possible to have a story about someone simply changing as they get older, without encountering any particular form of conflict.



Conflict is a function of change.

Look at ANNIE HALL. There are no attack dogs. It's about her changing. And the story is riddled with conflict.

To say that a story has no conflict is to imply that there is no change, no escalation, no stakes, no difference of beliefs, no obstacle, no problem, no resistance, no opposition, no meaningful goal, no arc, and so much more.


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## AnneL (Dec 9, 2013)

The way I've always taken Le Guin on conflict is that the conflict can be quiet, not bombastic Hollywood style explosions.  Her book Tehanu is a good example of quiet conflict, where a lot of the story is women doing domestic things (e.g. cooking, caring for children) instead of warriors cutting off heads. I think a lot of her thoughts on story and conflict are based on her sense that women's actions are not valorized the way men's are, and that thinking differently about conflict opens up a space for a different story that is not MAN vs. Something.  That doesn't mean it has no tension.


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## Snowpoint (Dec 9, 2013)

Feo Takahari said:


> I guess I have to get personal for this one. My book _Kids These Days_ has a fairly straightforward division between raids against monsters (which advance the plot) and strategy meetings (which are more about character-building.) There's certainly plenty of death-defying action in the raids, but the strategy meetings felt more interesting to write. Three personalities bouncing off each other, arguing and pranking each other and slowly developing a mutual understanding, felt more like something people would want to read than just scenes of killing monsters. In fact, even in the monster-killing scenes, the parts I most enjoyed writing were the parts that reminded me of the strategy meetings.



Strategy meetings are conflict. Look at Game of Thrones. 70% of the series is Political Science. People planning to do terrible things, then doing them. Ideas and plans are being weighed against each other. Hard choices are being made.

The problem is when a book reads like a diary. It is just a history of things that never happened.


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## Feo Takahari (Dec 9, 2013)

AnneL said:


> The way I've always taken Le Guin on conflict is that the conflict can be quiet, not bombastic Hollywood style explosions.  Her book Tehanu is a good example of quiet conflict, where a lot of the story is women doing domestic things (e.g. cooking, caring for children) instead of warriors cutting off heads. I think a lot of her thoughts on story and conflict are based on her sense that women's actions are not valorized the way men's are, and that thinking differently about conflict opens up a space for a different story that is not MAN vs. Something.  That doesn't mean it has no tension.



I guess I shouldn't be picking a fight with someone who mostly agrees with me, but I'm not sure I'm entirely comfortable with the gendering of that argument. I mean, it's not like nonviolent conflict is off limits for male characters.


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## Svrtnsse (Dec 9, 2013)

Feo Takahari said:


> I guess I shouldn't be picking a fight with someone who mostly agrees with me, but I'm not sure I'm entirely comfortable with the gendering of that argument. I mean, it's not like nonviolent conflict is off limits for male characters.



You're right of course. Men too are capable of non-violent conflict. I think it's more of an exaggerated argument to make a point.


Edit: let's try not to put too much emphasis on the gender/diversity side of things. It'd be real easy for the thread to derail into something else from that.


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## Jabrosky (Dec 9, 2013)

I plead guilty that the conflicts that come most naturally to me are blatantly external, especially the kind of violent and physical confrontations that you expect from an action movie. Anything subtle, psychological, or internal just doesn't have that gut appeal to me. My best guess is that this is because physical conflicts are easier for me to visualize than internal, psychological ones since I have a hard time reading and understanding other people's thoughts anyway.


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## AnneL (Dec 9, 2013)

Svrtnsse said:


> You're right of course. Men too are capable of non-violent conflict. I think it's more of an exaggerated argument to make a point.
> 
> 
> Edit: let's try not to put too much emphasis on the gender/diversity side of things. It'd be real easy for the thread to derail into something else from that.



Not saying I agree with the gendering, but that's where I see Le Guin coming from. I agree it's not necessary or desireable for this particular thread to go down that path.


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## wordwalker (Dec 9, 2013)

*Everything* is conflict.

"Smaller" stories just try to focus in tighter, but "can he get used to retirement?" is as valid a form of conflict as "can he save the world?" The only stories with no conflict are the ones with nothing at all to care about or no uncertainty about how it'll come out-- or the ones that have them but muddle them.

The only problem here is that Lady LeGuin is the latest person to talk about her taste in writing terms as if certain things were separate, not different points on an organic continuum. 

"I define plot as a form of story which uses..." *--no. Just no.* In fact, even among the many people who always find ways to denigrate plot, that's more idiosyncratic than most. I'm all in favor of fine subtleties in stories (especially people who write ones like Tehanu), but I wish she wouldn't go into Humpty Dumpty territory and say "a word means what I say it means." Not when it directly contradicts how the rest of us use it, and not when there are real writers all too willing to believe there can be a qualitative, not just a quantitative, split between these styles.

Recently I advised a friend that his gentle tale of a family coping with loss had left its plot a bit unclear, and he came back with "But it's _not_ about the war they died in, it's about the family." Of course that tale was about the family, but if we--as communicators--don't keep in mind how much "plot" and "conflict" really have room to include, how are we supposed to connect them together right in a story, let alone talk about them?

End rant.


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## Benjamin Clayborne (Dec 14, 2013)

I don't know if there's any particular use in separating story and plot into two different things. People seem to use them interchangeably. You can find articles that define story one way and plot another, and other articles which give the same definitions but swap the terms. I think from now on I'm only going to refer to story and just ignore the word "plot" altogether, or maybe just use them as completely interchangeable synonyms.

I'm not going to bind conflict to story, even though almost all stories I enjoy have intense (usually violent) conflict in them. You could have a story about a woman who goes swimming at the beach and enjoys herself, then goes to the store, then goes home and makes dinner. It's not a very interesting story, but it's a series of events, which (to me) is all that's fundamentally necessary for a story.

I think we all agree at this point that "conflict" can mean any time someone is prevented from getting what they want, even if that's relatively quiet and low-key (a man who can never quite get over having gone to business school instead of art school, like he really wanted) or violent and bombastic (mutant space lizards invade Lunar Base Alpha).



			
				Feo Takahari said:
			
		

> This might be a stupid question, but wouldn't epic fantasy be the skyscraper? I've never fought in a battle for the fate of the world, and I don't really know how to create meaning or interest on that scale. It feels so much easier to me to write on a micro level, dealing with the passions of mostly normal people who've been pushed into slightly abnormal lives. (A bit like me, although my tensions are more along the lines of "I have a hard time thinking like a normal person" than "I've suddenly sprouted wings.")


Epic fantasy is difficult only because of the scale and the amount of detail involved. Epic fantasy stories tend to be about pretty straightforward conflicts (evil overlord wants to rule, heroes want to stop him), although they don't have to be. I agree with GRRM that "epic fantasy" is more about the window dressing than the actual story itself. What's the fundamental difference between A Song of Ice and Fire and any other large-scale story of political intrigue and war?

Also, I think that Spielberg nailed the basic kinds of stories:


man vs. man
man vs. nature
nature vs. nature
dog vs. vampire


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## wordwalker (Dec 15, 2013)

You know, I take the opposite approach about the words "story" and "plot." To me, plot is still the general course of whatever happens, but "story"... that's the word everyone uses so differently, I've decided it means "the whole shebang, and therefore it just means Something In The Story Worked (or didn't), but he just isn't clarifying what until he's ready to." Everyone does have their own idea for what the word is and what it's contrasted to, but as long as they spell those out, it's no problem. If they don't say it, I figure it means the plot.

It's too easy to say "story" and never get around to which level we have in mind, so I hope we're careful there.


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## Steerpike (Dec 15, 2013)

E.M. Forster famously opined:

_Story_ is “the king died and then the queen died.” _Plot_ is “the king died and then the queen died of grief.”

By that view, the story is merely a sequence of events, where the plot ties those events together causally and gives meaning to them. 

I don't entirely agree, but it's a well-known example and one that I see a lot of writers subscribe to.


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## Benjamin Clayborne (Dec 15, 2013)

Steerpike said:


> E.M. Forster famously opined:
> 
> _Story_ is “the king died and then the queen died.” _Plot_ is “the king died and then the queen died of grief.”
> 
> ...



I don't understand the point of that distinction. When you're writing something, why would you ever even think about *just* the series of events that occur, without the causal relationships?


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## ThinkerX (Dec 15, 2013)

I've come across a number of short stories, mostly SF, that had no conflict, and yet were interesting.

The one that sticks in mind (unfortunately title and author both escape me anymore) involved an old asteriod miner who'd struck it rich and built himself a sort of asteroid 'homestead'.  Story opens after the construction is done, and most of it involves him puttering about talking to his robot servant.  Then he dies (peacably, in his sleep), and the last few lines have the robot servant reciting the Lords Prayer.  

Another approach, something I've seen done only a couple times, is the 'something wondrous' tale, where the MC, possibly despondent, meets somebody or does something positive, which in turn leads to positive things happening to him, eventually changing his whole lifes outlook.


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## wordwalker (Dec 16, 2013)

ThinkerX said:


> I've come across a number of short stories, mostly SF, that had no conflict, and yet were interesting.
> 
> The one that sticks in mind (unfortunately title and author both escape me anymore) involved an old asteriod miner who'd struck it rich and built himself a sort of asteroid 'homestead'.  Story opens after the construction is done, and most of it involves him puttering about talking to his robot servant.  Then he dies (peacably, in his sleep), and the last few lines have the robot servant reciting the Lords Prayer.
> 
> Another approach, something I've seen done only a couple times, is the 'something wondrous' tale, where the MC, possibly despondent, meets somebody or does something positive, which in turn leads to positive things happening to him, eventually changing his whole lifes outlook.



You're going to think I'm cheating, but I expect those stories have plenty of conflict-- in redirected, subtle forms.


The miner's tale probably makes the contrast between what the miner's struggled through and what he's achieved, or other ways his life contrasts with what he thought might happen. An ordinary story would follow through that and build suspense as it went; even in retrospect, I'm sure the tales had a sense that they must have been fascinating at the time, and so the man who went through them is worth meeting even after the fact.
The "wondrous" tales are the conflict between despondancy and how the wonders open his eyes. We watch Scrooge go from denial and excuses to learning his lesson, and we almost think (okay, briefly) that he might succeed in resisting.

Yes, "conflict" isn't the best word for that essence in these cases, but they all use the same stuff. No matter how muted it is or what perspective it's presented from, the story gains power from some sense that what's happening has enough uncertainty to sort of make us wonder what'll happen-- or that it's about coolness that *has* had that uncertainty anyway, and which is stamped into what it's become now.

And I think seeing these as redirected conflict helps us see what makes that work, even in the gentlest forms.


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## Shockley (Dec 17, 2013)

There are some very interesting stories where the conflict is actually the lack of conflict in the person's life. Letters from the Underground, Death of a Salesman, etc.


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## wordwalker (Dec 18, 2013)

Same principle, I'd say. _Salesman_ explores what kind of person Willie is, what he's done right and wrong, and if he ever had a chance-- a retrospective of conflict that would normally be shown as it happened, plus the conflict now of whether he can cope with it.


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## Mythopoet (Dec 18, 2013)

Steerpike said:


> E.M. Forster famously opined:
> 
> _Story_ is “the king died and then the queen died.” _Plot_ is “the king died and then the queen died of grief.”
> 
> ...



That makes absolutely no sense to me. The reality seems to be the opposite. Plot is the sequence of event and along with character, setting, and theme is just one aspect of Story, which is the whole which is greater than the sum of its parts.


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## wordwalker (Dec 18, 2013)

I don't know Forster's whole system for breaking it down, but it fits with my own:

"Story" means everything all at once-- and so it means _nothing_ specific, until someone narrows it down. "Plot" is the events, and so it can't skip over how they're connected.


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## technopony13 (Jun 6, 2014)

I myself don't always use conflicts or plots, and if I do I normally wouldn't have planned it out.


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## Svrtnsse (Sep 8, 2014)

Sorry for necroposting a bit, but I figured I could just use this old thread instead of starting a new one on the same subject.

I just got linked this article: 
The significance of plot without conflict - still eating oranges

It's about the differences between the western three act structure based around conflict and the eastern four act structure based around exposition and contrast. It also includes two short cartoons to illustrate the concepts in practice. I found the article quite interesting, even though it did get a little too philosophical for me towards the end.


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## Architect_of_Aurah (Sep 10, 2014)

I've seen that too.  The consequences of failure, apparently, have to be disastrous for the hero in a good story.


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## Architect_of_Aurah (Sep 10, 2014)

A book I recently read on the art of writing stories did say _every_ story needs a conflict and d"isastrous consequences if failure occurs".  That, I suppose, is the heart of every story, even one like _Ferris Bueller's Day Off,_ what with the truancy, stealing the car, evading Mr Rooney and all that.

Protagonist and antagonist; good words to remember, for it's not just hero and villain, but perhaps hero and shark, hero and volcano, even hero and love rival.

MacGuffin; a trite but important term, for it's the term for the object around which a story revolves.  It might be the Golden Fleece, the magic porridge pot, the Holy Grail, the One Ring, the Allspark... the list goes on.  Think about whether your story needs one and what its role is in relation to the conflict.


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## SeverinR (Sep 17, 2014)

Ankari said:


> You can have a story without conflict or plot. Not all genres can do without those two elements. I think romance could work, but fantasy couldn't Not unless you're trying to write a "day in the life of..." story.
> 
> Even then, there will be instances of conflict. When the main character stubs their toe, that's conflict. When hunger strikes, that's conflict. Are we talking about major conflict, or all conflicts?


I cannot think of a romance that doesn't have conflict.
You man versus self-trying to change themselves to attract the love object, build up the courage to talk to her,courage to challenge the rival for the loved ones attention.
Man versus man: trying to win the love of the target. Trying to defeat the person standing in the way(another lover, the parents, a third person trying to prevent the relationship)
Man vs nature: save the woman he loves from a natural disaster, perform a heroic save from animal to earn the love. Girl is dying of some incurable disease, 

I can't see a romance without conflict in the story. Boy meets girl, boy and girl fall in love with no problems, boy and girl go off into the sunset without incident, doesn't sound like a good story.  There has to be some reason to tell the story. No one likes the perfect story, there has to be something gained or lost, some triumph over adversity.

I was thinking maybe erotica, but even that has some conflict, some reason to do what is done in those stories. Most often it is betrayal or promiscuity.  The conflict here is secondary to the genre requirements, but even then there is still some conflict.  (wow, kept it pg, while talking about erotica-Scored...no wait not that kind of scored. I mean win.:nerd


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