The One Question You Should Be Asking About Your Scenes

We learn from an early age that stories have an order to them. Beginning, middle, end. But what if this understanding of how stories function has actually betrayed us as writers? As both a writer and an editor, I see this betrayal play out in my own writing and the writing of my clients. We are oftentimes duped into including scenes because they happen to be sequentially next. Instead, we should be asking, is this scene necessary? And while there are many great writing blog posts on cause and effect linking your scenes, this isn’t one of them. This post will give you one question to pose to yourself about every scene you’ve written or are thinking of including. 

The concept of crowding and leaping in writing was born out of Ursula LeGuin’s book Steering the Craft. In essence, we have the power as writers to compress time and make jumps in time, depending on the needs of a story. But how do you know when you need to do this? How do you know what’s worth squeezing or skipping altogether?

For every scene we write, one simple question can earn a scene’s worth… 

What new understanding or emotion does your protagonist glean as a result of what’s happened in this scene?

In any given scene, your protagonist should learn something new about themselves, the world around them, or both. Whatever events have transpired in the scene should bring forth the opportunity for this new understanding. A new emotion. A reveal, if you will. And the new understanding should be meaningful and important.

If you struggle to answer this question about new understandings, the scene may likely need to be revised or even cut altogether. And if the answer your scene yields is the same or very similar to a previously-written scene, it may also need to be revised or cut. Each scene should present a new and different opportunity to reshape your protagonist’s worldview. After all, it’s their story and the whole point is for your external events to yield the internal change they need. You have the power to hand pick what should or should not be included in your story because you, the writer, know exactly what your protagonist needs. 

Happy writing!