![\"dramatic-techniques-jules-horne\"](\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/WritingTutors\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/dramatic-techniques-jules-horne-300x251.jpg\")
<\/a>Dramatic Techniques for Creative Writers<\/a> <\/strong>covers the ground I wish I\u2019d known about when starting out as a playwright. It\u2019s an eclectic mix of techniques to power up your writing and make your storytelling bolder, more engaging, and more compelling.<\/p>\nWhy are dramatic techniques so powerful? Because they\u2019ve been test-driven for centuries in front of unforgiving live audiences. They\u2019ve passed many other filters, too, before a word you\u2019ve written reaches an audience \u2013 actors, director, producer and your own experience of living, breathing language in the amplifying echo chamber of the rehearsal room. So as a playwright, you undergo (in some case, endure!) full-on, experiential, fast-track learning about flow, rhythm, engagement, and so much else.<\/p>\n
Here are a few of the dramatic storytelling tools I\u2019ve drawn on in my fiction:<\/p>\n
Spatial thinking<\/h3>\n
How do you establish your written world? Is it inside or outside your narrator\u2019s head, or somewhere between? What broad brush-strokes are needed to make the context clear?<\/p>\n
Transformations and reversals<\/h3>\n
In a story, something changes. On stage, that change is made visible. From\u2026 to\u2026 creates a strong narrative shape. How can you use transformation to create a bold story?<\/p>\n
Powerful images<\/h3>\n
The central images in some of Shakespeare\u2019s plays \u2013 Juliet \/ balcony, Hamlet\/ skull, Bottom\/ ass\u2019s head \u2013 are so clear and simple that they translate into any culture, yet resonate with great complexity. Is your core visual image just as clear?<\/p>\n
Performance as metaphor<\/h3>\n
Erving Goffman\u2019s work shows how an audience makes people behave differently, responding to status, complex social roles, forming tribes, and so on. How can this be used to add layers and tension to your writing?<\/p>\n
Dramatic actions<\/h3>\n
Characters with burning desires that are thwarted create knotty emotional complexity and strong stories. How can you use Stanislavski\u2019s ideas on impulses and motivation to give your characters momentum?<\/p>\n
Aside: it\u2019s true that not all fiction writers need or want to use these techniques. Fiction can live in different and subtle spaces of the mind, and has its own concepts and creative vocabulary. But dramatic techniques read at a distance, and I find them a great help with bold writing decisions, especially when structuring a scene or mapping a story.<\/p>\n
Jules Horne teaches on A363 and the Open University MA course and lives in Scotland. <\/em> One especially rewarding aspect of the Open University MA course in Creative Writing is the chance to make a sideways swerve into another writing form. So, for example, poets can try their hands at fiction for a term, and non-fiction … Continue reading
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