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This week: Writing a Strong Inner Conflict Edited by: Joy  
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“He was troubled; this brain, so limpid in its blindness, had lost its transparency; there was a cloud in this crystal.”
Victor Hugo, Les Misérables
“My only love sprung from my only hate.”
William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet
“Think now and then that there is a man who would give his life, to keep a life you love beside you.”
Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
“The awful thing is that beauty is mysterious as well as terrible. God and the devil are fighting there and the battlefield is the heart of man.”
Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov
Hello, I am Joy , this week's drama editor. This issue is about writing the inner conflict.
Thank you for reading our newsletters and for supplying the editors with feedback and encouragement.
Note: In the editorial, I refer to third person singular as he, to also mean the female gender, because I don't like to use they or he/she. |
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Welcome to the Drama newsletter
Greatest dramas are created through inner conflict, but what is inner conflict?
“Two souls, alas, are housed within my breast,
And each will wrestle for the mastery there.”
This quote from Faust by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe defines the inner conflict perfectly. In a few instances, although rare, inner conflict can also be created with more than two opposing options, ideas, or emotions fighting within the same character with the same intensity and often at the same time.
Yet, for the inner conflict to exert its full influence, each option, each idea and each emotion has to have a great deal of strength. A weak, wishy washy idea, emotion, or thought that the character is obsessed with will surely bore the reader and make him throw the story into the garbage bin. For success, the competing sides in the conflict have to have equal or very close to equal powers. For example, does a child love his mother or his father more? In the case of a divorce, could taking the side of either parent create disaster? If the child feels he’ll lose either way, how is he going to make the choice that he must make?
One way to show inner conflict is through emotions. Putting two or three emotions of the same caliber against each other and at the same moment is the key to this approach. Crisscrossing emotions can create a strong undertow for dramatic scenes. To do this:
 Find a place in your manuscript where the character feels an intense emotion, be it in the planning stage or the first draft.
Think of another emotion just as strong that would be in conflict with that first intense emotion, such as lure of a lover versus the hate of his occupation. Ask yourself where this second emotion is coming from; in your answer will lie the strength or the weakness of that emotion.
Write an exploratory paragraph or page in which the character feels the second emotion in conflict with the first one. Create or provide a physical action that shows this conflict.
Another way is putting the character's inner thoughts in conflict. Is your character going to be loyal to the Emperor who has raised him and endowed him with the best of everything or is he going with what he thinks is right for his people? Yes, think of Moses and Ramses II or think of a middle of the road voter of our time, struggling with the ideas of the opposing parties.
As to writing the inner conflict the best way possible, a writer can get away with telling instead of showing, only if the conflict is a step toward a bigger conflict; however, the more intense the inner conflict, the more the writer needs to show it through actions, dialogue, and anything else he can use. Then, whatever he shows should agree with the character’s psychology. For example, a shy, quiet woman would not throw a chair out of the window in rage, but instead, she may sob and crumble the Kleenex inside her hand. Only when the writer shows the inner conflict strongly and properly, he can evoke emotions in the reader, thus creating a powerful connection between the character and the reader.
Wishing you the best with all your conflicts in your writing life...
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 Enjoy!
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Sometimes survival isn't all it's cracked up to be. 1st Place, "What a Character" contest.
#1866855 by Shannon  |
I plunged my sweaty fists deep into my pockets and tried to smile. I wondered if it looked as disingenuous as it felt.
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I brush back my tears. I'm not supposed to be crying in church. I'm expected to be listening to Reverend Smith, not thinking about things like Joe being dead.
He chewed his lower lip while his hands still gripped the steering wheel. A sad song whispered from the radio's speakers. His mouth hardened, and he snapped it off. He didn't need that kind of thing. Not today, not here.
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I stood, staring after him. Wishing my heart would slow down and my mind would speed up. I resolved to douse my burning desire...
I jerked to my feet, scooted across the room, and my secret blurted out. "I killed a man."
I just posed there, quietly, collecting my thoughts, wondering what good fortune might come my way. O, but I thought of Miranda’s skepticism, too, and I must confess to having shared it. But I ask you--how could I have resisted a Flying Funk!
The girl gave it some serious thought, and she came to realize that no matter how scared she was, Savanna knew she had an important destiny to fulfill. Everyone depended on her, and she was not about to let them down.
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This Issue's Tip: A writer can create strong conflict in dialogue if his characters do not give direct, on-the-nose responses. The conflict-creating response can be evasive, repeating the other character's words verbatim, or re-directing the subject to another edgy subject.
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Osirantinous 
Joy, firstly - thanks for including my story. That stunned me! Secondly, I have to admit that I never really knew what Gothic is/was (aside from Wuthering Heights!) and certainly never would have thought I was writing it - or bits of it. Having read your element-revealing newsletter it turns out quite a lot of my writing has Gothic elements. I'll definitely be taking more notice in future.
Thanks for the response. I suspect there is more Gothic in today's books than in the earlier times, especially after self-publication became the norm. Gothic must be encouraging the imagination, I think.
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Quick-Quill 
I grew up reading Victoria Holt, Phyllis Whitney and Mary Stewart. The great gothic romance writers of their time. These book were full of mystery, suspense and written with in the early victorian and elizabethan eras. Governess' that fell in love with the master of the house only to be thrown into a priest's hole and left to die with the corpse of the long dead wife. Did he do it? or was it someone else. These wonderful stories can be used in reference. I like them better than the Bronte sisters and Dickens who over used description.
Thanks for the input. I think each author has his own way of using the craft and imagination. I can't say one author is better than another because that would be a subjective assessment for me; however, there are just as many or even more numerous Gothic novels today, good or bad, than the earlier times when Gothic began spreading its roots.
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Drama: May 27, 2015 Issue [#7003]
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