Plotting the Short Story (by Culpeper Chunn - 1922)

PLOT DEVELOPMENT: SIMPLE PLOTS

To develop our germ-idea into a full-fledged plot or skeleton upon which to build our story, we must first analyze it carefully, use a little shrewd deduction, supply parts that are lacking, and then write the scattered parts into a lucid and logical whole. Patience, a careful survey of a story-idea's many possibilities, and a methodical summing up of the conclusions drawn from our analysis will usually bring about the desired result. 

If our mood is right and free rein is given to the imagination, it is seldom difficult to analyze a basic idea, provided it is striking or original enough to stir our sluggish minds to action; but it is sometimes hard to choose from the different fields into which our speculations are wont to lead us. The writer can only rely upon his best judgment in picking a way through the maze of possibilities that opens up before him and be guided by his own individual taste. 

In explaining our manner of analytic procedure, we will confine ourselves at first to simple story-ideas, so the writer can get a firm grasp on the methods employed before he sets out to explore the labyrinths of the complicated plot. By simple story-ideas we mean embryo plots that follow the line of least resistance in unfolding. From these ideas are evolved the plots that form the basis of most short stories less than three thousand words in length. The simple plot is all that the name implies. It is usually direct in movement, and has no complications to harass the writer and distract the reader. Opening with either the inciting motive or the first incident of plot development, it marches forward over a straight road until it reaches its goal, the climax. 

With a copy of the Chart for Plot Construction before us, let us now select a germ-plot and see exactly what we can do with it. We select the following typical plot-germ from one of our note books: 

"Bride and groom leave home in dead of night, bride without wraps, groom without hat or coat. They leave a red light burning at one of the front windows. They never return." 

What does this suggest? When we glance at the Chart there instantly leaps into mind the following: Action — mystery; Setting — city; Atmosphere — gruesome ; Mood — hate. We already have our principal characters — at least, enough for the present. A title also suggests itself: "The Red Flame." 

We now wish to analyze this idea, and, reading it over again, we find that these questions stare out at us:
1. Why did the bride and groom leave home in the dead of night without their wraps?
2. Why did they never return?
3. Why did they leave a RED light burning at one of the front windows?
4. Where did they go?
5. (a) Who saw them leave? (b) Who first saw the red light? (c) Who first entered the house? (d) Who did he or she find?
6. What would be a logical outcome of the affair? 

After considering the matter carefully, we might reply:
1. Because they feared some person or some THING.
2. Same answer.
3. Probably as a signal.
4. To a foreign port, or to their death.
5. (a) Immaterial. (b) Same answer, (c) The man — or woman — for whom the signal was intended, (d) Death.
6. The logical conclusion we draw from the foregoing is that when the man — or woman — who entered the house did not reappear within a reasonable length of time, the police batter down the door and find the entrant lying on the floor dead. 

This being the case, we naturally want to know:
1. Why was the man — if it was a man — killed? and
2. The manner in which he met his death. 

Reading over the analysis again, we would say:
1. Because of the fear the bride and groom had for him, and as they were absent,
2. They must have left some trap for him to walk into. 

Now, before we can draw up a working plot based on this analysis, it will be necessary for us to select from the material offered the four pivots around which a plot revolves — the opening, the crisis, the crucial situation, and the climax. The inciting motive is found in the red light the bride and groom left burning at the window; the crisis would seem to be the appearance of the police on the field of action; the crucial situation when the man — or woman — enters the house; and the climax when the police batter down the door.