Archive for the ‘setting’ tag
Prewriting: Setting
This article is a continuation from last week’s article on characterization.
The Importance of Setting
When a setting is successful, the audience comes to understand the story on its own terms and by its rules; the audience doesn’t question that an old hotel can bring ghosts to life in the presence of a powerful psychic; the audience instead fears for the pyschic’s safety while wintering in said malevolent building.
Setting is more important as a tool to help the audience understand the story than it is as a stage upon which the story takes place. Any given story can be placed in more than one setting, depending on which parts of the story the storyteller intends to emphasize, or on the storyteller’s intended audience. In The Lion King a story originally set in Denmark has been relocated to Africa and the human characters replcaed by a cast of animals.
Realizing that any basic story can take place anywhere, how can you be sure you have the right setting?