Mar 02, 2023 | By admin
Today we are going to try and tackle the age-old question of whether character development or plot development is the most important element and whether plot development is more important than character development.
We have heard either of the notions that plot development is more important than character development and that a plot-driven story is more impactful or vice versa.
This also presents the challenge to any new writer whether they should focus their attention on the plot or the character when they start writing and it becomes really challenging and a deciding factor since this question is so out in the mainstream.
There is also the challenge of making sure that either of them does not get ignored which might lead to an underdeveloped plot or character, this is something that should be noted and we are going to follow up on this observation later on in the blog.
In order to understand this we are going to use the analogy of food because it can be relatable and it can be easy for our readers to understand.
Imagine cooking something very balanced and very delicious where you would need vegetables and spices and both are equally important in that situation, if you have too many vegetables compared to spices then the food is going to be bland.
If you have very few vegetables to work on with a lot of spices then it will be uncomfortable to eat and digest and that is exactly the case with plot development and character development.
Think of the plot as the vegetables in the food that you want to cook and the characters as the spice and everything that complete the plot, if you have an imbalance of either of them by which we mean if you have a perfect plot with poor character development or vice versa then you are going to cook up a story that will be not pleasureable to read.
Both of them are equally important if you want to keep the impact at maximum because having either of them will mean that there is a lack of the other thing.
Having said that, you can find a lot of examples of plot-driven narratives and you can find other good examples of character-driven narratives.
So, you must be thinking that they might be very poorly written but that is not the case because we have some of the finest names in literature and writing for either of these two types of categories.
The answer that we have given you about both being important should be given to any beginner writer who wants to understand and improve their writing skills but the actual answer is more nuanced and as you get more into the question you are going to understand that it actually varies upon specialisation.
Let us explain to you why that is the case.
If we go by the same analogy of vegetables and spices then we need to understand it a little bit better from a different perspective.
Imagine you need to create a specific and planned recipe that has been perfected for generations with a lot of gravy and a lot of curry which needs spices but very few vegetables, now think of the case of character-driven narratives, character-driven narratives exist simply because they are meant to be like that and planned like that.
The thing is planned with precision so as to make sure more importance is given to the characters.
Now take the same analogy and turn it upside down where you need a lot of vegetables and very little spice because that is specifically a dish which has been perfected for generations and planned by the chef and you get plot-driven narratives.
The best thing is you do not need to look hard to find out excellent examples of either of these kinds of narrative making from traditional literature to mainstream literature and every other kind of literature.
The answer is no because in literature you cannot compare and apply the concepts of chemistry where certain elements mixed together will create a certain chemical perfectly because in literature sometimes things can work no matter in what combination they are applied and in other cases they might not work even with the most perfect balance of narratives.
It is the job of the writer to understand the story and the world of the story and bring it to life in the form of their writing which is exactly what we do at Get Best Writers.
Whether it is a plot-driven narrative or a character-driven narrative, we will make sure to bring alive any and every story that you wish for at Get Best Writers because we are the finest institution for ghostwriting and content writing and the best ghostwriters-for-hire agency in India.
We have some of the finest ghostwriters in the industry with excellent versatility and industry-wide experience working with nearly every kind of genre of literature.
We welcome you to check out all our services and we would love to write anything and everything for you from traditional literature to online web content and much more.
