Too depressing to be written, what to do?

[Amanita]

As it says in the title, I have my story idea, I have the storyline figured out completely which I rarely manage to do and yet I can't bring myself to sit down and write the story because it's so depressing. I know of course, that Silaris (my world) is going to see better days again but the characters aren't really going to.

The story is set in a time of profound change which makes the beliefs and morals the people used to believe in crumble but do not yet offer anything instead. The same goes for the dreams they used to have. The characters realise that many of the old things are wrong or not applicable to their current situation anymore but they don't know what is right in this new situation yet.
There's plenty of poverty, oppression and a profound lack of respect for the life of other people, especially those of lower social standing. And the "good" characters are feeling suicidal, if I'm going that route or not, I'm not entirely sure yet.

As I've mentioned above, I have a story line which I think isn't too bad but I still have trouble to bring myself to sit down and spent hours in this world, writing the story. (And I'm not sure if anyone would want to read it either.)
Do you have any advice for this situation?

 

[Nick]

I kinda know the feeling you're describing. I had to write out a scene where my main character had no choice but to kill his estranged father and then immediately the uncle who'd raised him all his life. I knew exactly how and when and where and why everything had to happen but the scene itself was difficult to get through in one sitting. It shouldn't've taken me more than a couple of hours to write it but it ended up taking me a little more than a weak because I ended up writing a little at a time until it was done.

So my advice is just to push through it and write. Don't worry if its wrong or right, just do it anyway and fix it later if it's wrong.

 

[Cinnea]

Is there ANY way at all you could come up with something that would make at least one of your characters not lose hope entirely?

I'm sure I'd read a depressing story if I only got some hint that everything is not lost and those "better days" you're talking about will come ... but I really really would need an ending that is at least hopeful. It doesn't have to be a "live happily ever after" kind of endings (I don't like them at all), but ... I think you understand what I'm trying to say.
A depressing story, opression, sucidal characters - that's ok if I despite that get the feeling that it will be OK at the end. For at least some (one) of them. You know, a happy ending doesn't have to include new (better) set of firm beliefs and morals. Perhaps all a character needs is a reason to go on and fight for what s/he believes will matter in the future. Give them some hope, and you'll hope too.

 

[Kelise]

I write one bad scene, then one nice scene. I always finish on a nice scene. It may be something not included in the story (set before it all, on side characters or totally out of it, or even in another novel). Otherwise I get all mopey and pathetic at my partner and I think he's getting sick of it.

 

[BeigePalladin]

I think this is one of the few times you need to detach yourself from the characters - if they're going to loose hope, then you don't want to be too atatched at that moment.

and don;t worry about people being put off, this sounds like something very engaging, rather than a turn-off

also, Starconstant's advice is quite good, as it helps relieve you of some of the depressingness

 

[Dante Sawyer]

Personally, when I have to write an overly depressing scene, I turn on some really sad music. It helps get me through the section I'm writing, and the music seems to inspire me to capture its somber tone.

 

[Telcontar]

To some extent, you need thicker skin... if you can't write emotional stuff, then you'll have a hard time getting out an interesting story!

As to ways to handle it... sometimes it helps to try and revel in the scene. Wallow in the sadness of it all. I sometimes do this with really sad, depressing, or otherwise disturbing scenes. I know the effect I want to have, which is basically to make the reader feel miserable. So if it makes me feel miserable, its working, which produces a sort of latent happiness that I keep in the back of my head till I'm done with the scene. The more it makes me want to bawl my eyes out, the happier I get. If that makes any sense at all...

 

[Map the Dragon]

I say just go with it...as simple as that advice might be. Don't let the overbearing nature of the moment toy with your willingness to be honest with the work. When you're done, you can always go back and add or subtract anything you think appropriate. But give it time and give it to a few readers. Then revise.

 

[Digital_Fey]

Heh, I've been through this feeling several times - knowing that there's no other direction the plot can go in, but not relishing the idea of sitting down and writing something so dark. As others have mentioned, sometimes the only thing to do is push through it. Look for a way in which you can find satisfaction from writing the darker stuff - whether it's the opportunity to go into long, poetically depressing descriptions or do some soul-wrenching character development. Also, throwing in some lighter moments or even black humor to ease the tension might make it easier as well as preventing everything from seeming exaggeratedly hopeless. Write in short spurts if it helps, and in between focus on activities that take your mind entirely away from what you're writing.

 

[sashamerideth]

I have just killed (in a second story) the spouse of my protagonist, her lifeline, in a world with a lot of sadness where nothing goes right. Readers need to have hope, even if they are dashed on the rocks of tragedy when looking up.

One of the hardest things we do as authors is punish our creations, but it's our job.

 

[CicadaGrrl]

It's important to be able to do mean things to are characters, I agree. We are their writers, not their BFFs. That said, while I can do some horrific SECTIONS of a book (and I wasn't clear whether you were saying this was part of a story, a serial story, or a novel--there seemed to be some sort of bleed through), I would never do a completely bummer of a book. Why? A. If you are going to be unrelentingly depressing, you had better be an unrelenting genius, because I, at least, will read amusing shit but it had better be kick ass writing, craft, message etc. for me to get through unrelentingly depressing.

To some extent I agree with people that if you just have this partly storyboarded out so far and are looking at at first draft, my advice would be what it is to all first drafts: Just pound through it and never look back.

Since you asked for more than my all purpose first draft answer, I'll give you two thoughts. This appears to be a bridging piece. These characters won't make it out of this time period, but someone else will make it to better times in this world. In that case, in order to have continuity if nothing else, I would suggest at least one character who is a visionary. They see that, perhaps not for their generation, but ones to come, these problems are surmountable, and the world will get better. If nothing else it would be a good offset to your other characters, who would be driven mad by this chica, and may even kill her for it (strains of *cough Christ cough*). The more important factor I've used in terms of long sections of unrelenting depressingness in my work are those transcendent moments of beauty. The arc of pollution clouded skies hits dawn just right and the pollution goes iridescent. A bright blue beetle walks by. That kid laughs as she stomps in puddles. Just for one moment, something is beautiful, and just for that moment, things might be going to be okay. A character might even carry this random moment of the senses around their whole lives in their hearts, and let it let them believe something. Me, it was cicadas.

All that said, and standing on one of my own pet peeves so be aware of that, be careful with the suicidal. For one, a large number of people in pretty damn hopeless situations don't become suicidal. it's a very specific symptomology attached to one or more disorders that manifests itself in both an overwhelmingly broad but overwhelmingly specific set of emotions, cognitions, and physical movements and facial expressions. To say in short, when I burned somebody alive, I researched it (gross. I know.) If you are going to play with suicide, step up and do it right. If you don't, people like me, anyway (who I admit may be aberrant), will stop reading your book cold.

 

[Caged Maiden]

Um.. this may sound sick, (and perhaps I am suffering from some sort of illness that has gone undiagnosed) but, I kinda like to do horrible things to my characters. Oh sure, it turns out okay later on, I mean, I'm not completely mad, but I have tortured, raped, murdered, and disfigured my characters. I have built them up and torn them down. I have left them alone in the world, isolated within themselves; unable to experience life as normal people do.......
But, it was all for good reason. I literally cry during editing sometimes, though I know what's going to happen to my characters, just because it seems so unfair (but relatable) what they are going through.
My suggestion to you would be to ask yourself if it is plausible. Is how your character feels and reacts and acts plausible? I agree with Cinnea... if there is NO hope at all, that might be a hard sell to a reader; but if there is some small glimmer; a person who is different, an event which gives some people hope, whatever it is, it might make the writing easier on you, and the reading easier for everyone else.
My life has been sort of tragic, and I actually enjoy abusing my characters. I think it makes for good reading, but I also feel sort of entitled to write my characters into these situations because I've lived them myself. It's probably vain of me to give my characters my own strife and flaws, but..... I think it makes the characters more interesting, and their struggle wholly believable.

 

[Caged Maiden]

Right on Cicadagrrl, That last bit was what I was getting at.
I read something once about a character who was a cutter, and the whole thing was so transparently written by someone who doesn't know a thing about self-mutilation and did no research......
Suicide is just as tough.... If you can do it well, it will be powerful, but if not, it will look transparent, or worse... lazy.
Suicidal people don't always kill themselves.... sometimes they take risks until it proves fatal (that may be a great way to make sure the character doesn't survive, without actually making him blow his own brains out), or they simply don't have the guts to follow through.
You'd have to consider how the situation will resonate with a reader. For many, suicide is a moral issue as well.

 

[Amanita]

Thank you very much. I knew I’d get plenty of helpful anwers from you.

Usually, I don’t have any problems with making characters suffer in a story. In this case, the main problem isn’t the characters‘ own suffering but the suffering they’re causing to other people. And the general hopelessness of the setting. The characters aren’t fighting for „good“ or to keep something worse from happening (even though some of them believe they do), they’re fighting for their respective country’s power in the world which doesn’t really justify the amount of death and destruction they cause for it in my own eyes and presumably neither in the eyes of the reader.
Of course, plenty of people here on this forum keep saying they’d like to see stories without clear boundaries of good and evil but I’m having trouble with it.

If you are going to play with suicide, step up and do it right.

Don’t worry, I hate badly used “issues” in stories as much as you do, or at least I think so. If I use the suicide plotline, I’ll definitely do even more research for this than I’ve done by know when editing the story.
At the moment, this is mainly in there because that’s what the historical figure she’s been inspired by, did. And I know quite well why in her case.
For the fictional character, this is one of the problems I’m having with this story as well, however. For me, and probably for the readers as well once again, it will be hard to understand why she kills herself rather than doing anything active and potentially helpful to others. I’m quite sure it wouldn’t exactly make her sympathetic to many. Having her not do it would require plenty of chang for her character or someone helping her in time, which is unlikely however.
The situation of my female characters in this story are a problem as well. One of them might commit suicide, while the other is a bit of the kind of visionary figure you, CicadaGrrl mentioned and will get killed (or captured and tortured, I haven’t finally decided which) by one of the other main characters.

As I might have mentioned in my first post, all of this started out as historical information, the characters in the story set later learn about. All the drama works quite well in this situation, but it’s getting difficult when I actually want to tell these people’s stories.

 

[Chinaren]

The problem with depressing scenarios is that they're... depressing.

I just read a short by a well known published author about the world being invaded by aliens and taken over. I kept expecting the humans to rise up and throw them off in some way (as they do), but in fact they didn't, and the planet remained under the yolk at the end too.

I appreciated the 'realism' of the story, but it was kind of a downer. I tend to want an ending that gives 'closure' and satisfaction. No problem with torture and so on though.