SWRT 224 | Antagonistic Forces

October 7, 2021

person typing on MacBook Pro on brown wooden table during daytime photo

This week, Alida, Robert, and Kathryn talk about villains you can’t vanquish: How do you handle a villain that can’t wear a hat, black or otherwise? When your story calls for a force instead of a figure, what does that mean for your plot? For your character? What do you need to be aware of when writing a bad event or circumstance, instead of a bad guy? Are there genre-specific antagonistic forces?

This episode previously aired as 085.

VIDEO

AUDIO

SHOW NOTES

If your story doesn’t have a bad guy, what do you have? How can you use stories about nature or society to craft a non-personified antagonist? Do you have to have characters involved? And are these external, or internal forces? What effect does this have on your story? And how can you keep a reader interested?

What we talked about:

If you don’t have a “bad guy” then what are you left with? (0:25)

How can you use man against nature as an antagonist? (1:09)

Are antagonists genre specific? (2:40)

How do we get the force on the page? (5:15)

Does your antagonist have to have a person involved? (7:50)

Antagonistic Forces are external events, or internal explorations. (9:50)

Make sure you have both external and internal conflict. (11:30)

Have opposition, even if it isn’t evil! (12:20)

How conceptual can you get? (17:05)

How is your character changing as a result of this conflict? (21:08)

LINKS

Get Alida’s Writing Tips here.

Things we mentioned:

The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
George Orwell
Aldous Huxley
Firefly Lane by Kristen Hannah
Lost Moon: The Perilous Voyage of Apollo 13 by Jim Lovell & Jeffrey Kluger
Apollo 13
In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
The Stranger by Albert Camus

Want more about these topics? Check out:

SWRT 023: 3D Villians
SWRT 026: Writing Villians

Have thoughts, questions, other examples? Join the conversation at the Story Works Writers Facebook group.

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About Your Hosts

Alida Winternheimer is an award-winning author with an MFA in writing from Hamline University. She pursues her fervor for all things story as a writing coach, developmental editor, and teacher. Three times nominated for the Pushcart Prize, she is also a notable in Best American Essays and winner of the Page Turner Award. Author of The Story Works Guide to Writing Fiction Series, Alida lives and writes in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She camps, bikes, and kayaks in her free time. Unless it’s winter, in which case she drinks chai by the fire. You can find more at www.alidawinternheimer.com.

Kathryn Arnold writes fantasy and anything else that sparks her creativity from her home in Kingston, Washington. She currently earns her living as an insurance underwriting assistant, where she also creates marketing and web copy. When not writing, she plays (and teaches) piano and keyboard in a band (or two), and is working on starting a ministry team with her husband. You can find Kathryn at www.skyfirewords.com.

Robert Scanlon was born in Australia, but whisked off to England when only a baby. After many years complaining about the weather, he did the sensible thing and moved back to Australia. Despite a career in the music industry, followed by decades teaching public speaking, Robert is an introvert who adores reading. Robert grew up on a diet of sci-fi masters, eventually discovering he had read the library’s entire science fiction section. Now he has to write his own. Robert is the author of Constellation, book one of the Blood Empire space opera series. Find out more at www.RobertScanlon.com