Splicing the strands

This is the last in my series of blogs, offering some thoughts about how drama might
 improve your fiction.

What have James Joyce’s Ulysses and Graham Swift’s novel Last Orders got in common? Not a lot, you might think. But you’d be wrong. The answer is time frame – the action of both is set over a single day.

You may not always want to confine your story to 24 hours, but knowing your time frame is important. This is true whether you’re writing a novel, play or film. Last Orders was adapted for screen, and its storytelling is like that of a film – cramming more into a day than you might think possible.

Films work by cutting from one shot to the next, and from one scene to the next – without explaining the jump. This is variously called montage, cross-cutting or splicing. One of the first films to splice strands in this way was a 1903 docudrama, The Life of an American Fireman. It cuts back and forth between firemen racing to a blaze and a mother and child trapped inside a building. Eventually the two strands of the film meet – the firemen rescue the mother and child.

Concise storytelling

We’re now all accustomed to this concise way of telling a story. It sets up an expectation and tension on the part of the viewer, and it’s a method that can be most effective in novels as well.

In Last Orders, four men go to Margate to spread the ashes of a friend. The novel splices several different perspectives of the day’s events. It also uses another method from film – flashback. Some of the strands reveal the back story, leading up to the day of the novel’s action.

Jane Rogers [link to iTunes podcast] often splices strands in her novels, and a prime example is Mr Wroe’s Virgins. She suggests it’s a technique that has pedigree, and one that is guaranteed to create and sustain suspense.

I set my students an introductory exercise in splicing strands. You might like to try it.

An exercise in splicing strands

Write a brief passage about a single afternoon (this is your time frame) in the life of a particular character who lives on a particular street. Then write about a different character, but set it on the same afternoon and street. The two characters shouldn’t meet. When you’ve finished see if you can cut and splice together sections of the two passages. Then write an end section where the characters do meet – still within the same time frame.

Splicing strands isn’t ideally suited to short stories, but in novels it’s a proven way of grabbing your reader and making them want more.

About Derek: Derek Neale is a fiction writer and dramatist, and is editor and co-author of A Creative Writing Handbook: developing dramatic technique, individual style and voice (A&C Black, 2009). He is Lecturer in Creative Writing at The OU. Some of his conversations with novelists, playwrights and screenwriters are available at interviews with writers (tracks 1-10), or at OU podcasts.

Unfortunately Derek cannot answer individual questions, but you may enjoy his other writing tips and advice: read what he says about Developing Your Style »