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Aspects of Short Story Writing
A short story is a work of short, descriptive prose that mostly focuses on one single event. Short story writing has various aspects of coming up with the development, including the structure, style, plot and conflict, characterization, and point of view (Ibnian et al., 183). For example, in this case, when it comes to short story writing, the two stories that are Dependents and Backa Bourke, the narrators use these aspects differently to narrate their stories. The two stories, that is, Dependents and Backa Bourke, have similarities and differences in how they use different story writing elements. In the discussion below, the main focus is on how the two stories compare and contrast in terms of plot and conflict, and point of view.
Plot and Conflict
A plot refers to the flow of events or happenings that make up a story in a narrative or a short description. More specifically, it is how a story develops, unwinds, and moves in time. Plots are made up of five main elements, which include:
Exposition where the characters, setting, and the central conflict are introduced at the beginning of a story.
Rising action where a story becomes more complicated because the main character is facing a crisis, and the events that lead to the conflict begin to unfold.
The climax where there is a significant event at the story’s peak and the main character is facing a challenge or fear.
Falling action where the story slows down and is approaching towards its end.
Resolution where the story ends in a conclusion.
On the other hand, a conflict in a story is a struggle between differing forces. Conflicts can be either external or internal where external conflicts refer to the challenges a character encounters in the external world while internal conflicts refer to emotional or internal challenges faced by a character (Noermanzah et al., 35)
The two stories, that is, Dependents and Backa Bourke, differ in terms of how the plots of the stories are developed. In the Dependent’s story, the exposition introduces the reader to the main character and narrator of the story, his wife Janet, and their baby John. The conflict arose when they had started feeling evaporated in mommy and daddyness. The rising action consists of both the narrator and his wife Janet accepting an invitation to a party because, as he says, he had disappeared for many months and had peaked from around the globe occasionally. They had been invited to the barbeque because they had had a baby and everyone in the barbeque had a baby. It was a way of relieving themselves and experiencing togetherness with others. According to the story, they were first-time parents, and Janet even said she hadn’t done anything like that before. The narrator adds and says that they hadn’t planned for the baby and had the baby neither planned for them. The story’s climax is when the narrator is torn in between calling the cops on the blanket-man at the party. He claimed that the people at the party had kidnapped him a week ago and told the narrator that he needed to get out of that place. The narrator had to ask Janet when they went back to the house of whether he should call the cops or not. The falling action occurs when Janet convinces his husband that if he got the cops, everyone at the party, including the guy claiming to be kidnapped, would all end up in jail because there were a lot of drugs in the house.
The narrator is convinced and even says that the guy is just on drugs with his friend s and he n was being silly. The story slows down and they both focus on taking care of their baby, telling him he was theirs until the baby calmed down. On the contrary, Backa and Bourke’s story is somehow different in terms of how the plot developed. In this story, the reader is first introduced to the conflict of the characters being caught up fourteen kilometers out of Wilcannia and how they are struggling with their bikes in the mud. Although the reader is introduced to Mick and other characters of the story, Jacky, the main character, is introduced when the story is almost ending. The story’s events unfold at the end of the story when the reader learns that Jacky and Mick were actually on their way to a funeral. How the events turned out is unexpected because, in the end, Jacky set off to Bourke alone, and the reader is left in suspense of why the events turned the way they did.
There is a similarity between the Dependent’s story and the Backa Bourke story when it comes to conflict. In both stories, the reader finds out how different characters in both stories face external and internal challenges and even conflicts between the characters. In Dependent’s story, Janet and the narrator feel evaporated in parenthood, and it’s draining them, so they had to attend the party and experience something different. There’s also a conflict between the narrator and Janet that arises when he says that he didn’t like the people and the kids at the party. In Backa Bourke’s story, Mick experiences emotional challenges. Whenever he hears anything to do with Curt’s funeral, he has to walk out rather than get involved in the conversation. He lays in bed, thinking about what he might say at the funeral.
Point of View
Point of view in story refers to whom the perspective of a story is being told from. The person telling the story can be a character of the story or the author himself. The two types of view commonly used in stories are the first person point of view, where the narration uses first-person pronouns such as ‘I’ and ‘we’ and the third person point of view. The third-person point of view narration uses third-person pronouns such as ‘he’ or ‘she.’ Third person point of view can be limited or omniscient where in third person limited, the narrator focuses on one character. In contrast, in third person omniscient, the narrator is aware of every character’s feelings and actions (Pardede et al., 20). In both Dependents and Backa Bourke stories, the narrator uses both first-person and third-person points of view. In both stories, the narrator uses first person pronouns, such as ‘I’ and ‘we.’ For example, in the Dependents story, the narrator tells the story in the first-person point of view “I had disappeared many months before, like a small moon eclipsed by the majestic planet of Janet’s pregnant belly” and also uses the third person point of view when he says, “she had her moments of majestic beauty and great monstrosity during her pregnancy.’ This also happens in the Backa and Bourke story as the story starts with a first-person point of view that is, “we were fourteen kilometers out of Wilcannia when the rain pulled us up.” There’s also the use of a third-person point of view, for example, the part where the narrator says, “He hoped off lightly into the mud.” In both stories, the use of third-person omniscient is evident as both stories’ narrators are aware of all characters’ feelings and actions. In Dependent’s story, the narrator is aware of Janet’s feelings and activities and those of other characters, including John (their son), the kids at the party among others. In the Backa and Bourke story, the narrator is aware of the characters’ feelings and actions, such as Marta, his dad, and Aunt Karen.
In conclusion, from the discussion above, the Dependent’s story and the Backa Bourke story have some differences and similarities in terms of plot and conflict, and point of view, respectively. The two accounts differ in plotting where the sequence of events in the Dependents story is clear from exposition where the reader is introduced to the main character who is also the narrator of the story, his wife Janet and their son John to falling of action where the narrator decides to not focus on calling the cops for the “kidnapped guy” and rather worry about other things like how they were going to take their son through college. The series of events in Dependent’s story is portrayed clearly while in Backa Bourke’s story, the events’ sequence is a little bit twisted, where the reader even comes to learn later in the story that the narrator (Jacky) and Mick were actually on their way to a funeral. The plot in Backa Bourke’s story is not clearly defined leaving the reader with a lot of suspense. The narrators of the stories used both first-person point of view where they tell the story in first person pronouns, that is, ‘I’ and ‘We’ and third-person point of view (third-person omniscient), making the two stories similar in this aspect of short story writing.
Work Cited
Ibnian, et al., “The Effect of Using the Story-Mapping Technique on Developing Tenth Grade Students’ Short Story Writing Skills in EFL.” English Language Teaching 3.4 (2010): 181-194.
Noermanzah, et al., “Plot in a Collection of Short Stories “Sakinah Bersamamu” Works of Asma Nadia with Feminimism Analysis.” Humanus: Jurnal Ilmiah Ilmu-ilmu Humaniora 16.1 (2017): 27-40.
Pardede, et al., “Using short stories to teach language skills.” JET (Journal of English Teaching) 1.1 (2011): 14-27.