Landmark is an American term. Landmarks are the most significant dramatic events in a novel. They stand head and shoulders above the dramatic events in other chapters. They are the key events that keep the plot and storyline as straight and as clear as you can make it. There is usually a minimum of 5 or 6 essential Landmarks spread throughout the chapters of award winning contemporary novels.
American literary professionals stress the importance of Landmarks in the novel. They suggest writers list the most important events in their novel, before they start writing. Space the Landmark working chapter titles out according the plot and storyline. Then fill in the other working chapter titles around them.
I believe this is an excellent way to construct a novel.
David,there is nothing wrong identifying Landmarks in retrospect. They are vital to the editing process. They shape the final product.
Many people who post on this site admit to not having a beginning, middle and end to their novels. They do not plan. They start with an idea and then then work backwards or forwards. I believe that many first time novelists do this. Knowing how to structure a novel saves time. It is how successful authors produce a novel each year.
I am no expert. My first draft was riddled with errors. I probably made the same mistakes as most want-to-be authors, and a few more. I wasted two years, before I decided to research the aspects of the novel. I am glad that I did.
If want-to-be authors like myself can outline the key events, then I hope that it would be easier to build a story around them.
My post is intended as a tool for those who struggle to plan a novel.
I'm always amazed when writers seem to think they need to have such a hold on their story. I've read some very well-crafted books with an almost surgical approach to plot and while I appreciate the strangle-hold the author has, and how every word is important, I also wonder if I'm allowed to breathe. It gives a very institutionalised feel to the work. I much prefer a book which allows my imagination to feel as if it is running around on mountains doing cartwheels, or that it could without being barked at by a teacher/commanding officer. Do you see what I mean? People are likely to be reading your work in their leisure time and meandering of the imagination is good for the soul. I'm not saying there shouldn't be any discipline in your writing, but I do think it's easy to use too much.
Adrian... You are planning and mapping (having researched and analysed) as usual.
As usual I am going to have a different perspective. :-)
Just in case no-one has noticed - I take an organic approach to writing - my work "grows".
I don't think that either of us is "right". Different approaches - and there are any number between what might be seen as our extremes - work for different people.
I have an advantage of nearly sixty years of reading just about anything from "penny dreadfuls" to the classics. (A lot of the work I have done has required me to be there ready to do something - filling in the time in betweenn is, in my opinion, a skill). I am certain that simply having read such a vast amount helps me to write.
I am not saying that what I write is wonderful - but then a huge amount I have read has not been wonderful. I don't know whether I could have withstood reading that much "wonderful". A huge amount of reading is simply for entertainment isn't it?
Clearly a twenty or thirty year old cannot have read as much - however not just quantity but variety is a good thing. Even reading bad literature is useful - it illustrates mistakes to avoid :-) but a thing to recall is - that it still sells - to its market.
Having said all that I am going to agree with you. :-O
"Landmarks" are useful and important.
I wouldn't and probably couldn't plan them in any more than I could map out the whole form my writing a particular piece will take... BUT - as I progress there will be landmarks in the story: landmark events, places and characters - at the least.
It really helps me when I recognise these as I progress! I usually do - but, sometimes, I only identify them in retrospect. At some later point in the story I will find myself refering back to one landmark or another - and some of these will be ones that I didn't recognise when they first appeared. Is that not just like life though? We may have a life-plan but it doesn't always work out that way. Isn't good writing lifelike?
I have, however, cheated a bit there... I should really say something like "aren't good products of the writing-effort lifelike?"
I think that there is potentially a difference between writing "good writing" and writing that produces something good.
This is where I prefer my organic approach. I might (if I could) plan a perfect novel - but would the final story be any good? (There is, of course, nothing to say that my ramblings will be any good either).
I am not an "literary professional" - I am a writer - it is possible that one day that will make me some money. I do not "construct a novel"... But I do think that the concept of landmarks is both important and useful.
Perhaps I am looking at the same things but doing so differently.
I think that landmarks end up in a story however one approaches the writing. It is useful to identify them. They can be extremely useful for maintaining continuity, marking progression and turning points and they facilitate bioth revision and editing.
You, Adrian, have a method that plans ahead that can pre-determine these things. I work the other way round - I let the things generate themselves and then work with them. I suspect that there are as many ways in between these "extremes" as there are writers. It is surely possible to mix both strict planning and entirely organic methods.