Conflicts and struggles are important parts of stories that allow us to further enjoy and understand the characters of a book. Three examples of books with well-written, in-depth conflicts are Bud, Not Buddy, The School Play, and The Good Deed. In Bud, Not Buddy, the main character is a poor orphan who accidentally falls asleep waiting for the Christmas kitchen to open, and he misses it. But a kind family lets him join them and sneaks him in, and he gets to have a Christmas dinner after all. In The School Play, the main character is Robert Suarez, who is in a play. He has only one line, which is “Nothing’s wrong. I can see.” He practices constantly, until he can say it, and on the night of the school play, he says, “I can see nothing wrong. Wrong is nothing, I can see.” He messes up, but still thinks he did well in the rest of the play. In The Good Deed, a wealthy girl named Heather is earning merit badges for the Girl Scouts, and she has to do a good deed for Ms. Benson to get her next one. A poor girl named Risa is also there with her, and an unlikely friendship develops. Conflicts are an important part of stories, and they develop through interactions with other characters and conversations.
One of the most important ways of how characters change is by how they grow and become more mature. They overcome their defects and defeat obstacles, and they improve. They transform and transcend into a more mature version of themselves. All story foundations are built on character personalities, then as they mature the story is further constructed. In Bud, Not Buddy, the main character wanted to get his Christmas dinner, but he had fallen asleep. When a family tries to help him, he is confused and refuses. But he matures and learns that there are truly good people in the world, and gets his Christmas dinner. In The School Play, Robert learns that you don’t have to do everything perfectly in order to do well, you just have to try your best and practice. In The Good Deed, Heather learns that money isn’t anything, and that she shouldn’t trust first impressions. She makes a new friend and becomes more down to earth and friendly. They all evolve and become better and more mature. Conflicts and obstacles are needed to give experience and wisdom to others, and are a crucial part of story structures. Maturity and growth are important in allowing us to improve and reach our full potential.
The way in which we can measure and track a character’s growth and maturity is by carefully examining their interactions with other characters. Character actions inevitably show traces of character traits, leading to a better understanding of our story. When we attempt to inspect character conversations, we need to listen for keywords that help us determine traits. The structural integrity of a story’s plot depends on having riveting interactions that show traits. In Bud, Not Buddy, we can clearly see how the family is incredibly generous and kind for being willing to help a total stranger and even give them some of their precious brown sugar. Bud, on the other hand, isn’t as understanding and mature as the grown-ups. In The School Play, Robert is really nervous about the play, but what we can find out is that so is Belinda Lopez. Belinda was only bullying Robert to sate her own nerves, and that was her coping method. In The Good Deed, we can see that Risa is a very thoughtful girl, and that Heather started off as a little stuck-up but Risa quickly started correcting her and making her more mature and grown up. They both had their faults, and they tried fixing each other's faults. Character interactions are a huge part of story structures, and character interactions can play a hand in altering personalities, as they often reveal the true nature of a person. We need to thoroughly study character interactions in order to learn the emotional challenges they are going through.
For an author to make their work interesting for a reader, they have to include an element of suspense. Suspense allows the reader to wonder what’s about to happen, to cause them to continue flipping the page, to become lost in the story and escape reality for a few fleeting moments. In Bud, Not Buddy, the author managed to introduce suspense at the start when Bud realized he was late, and missed the deadline for the Christmas dinner. The suspense is resolved once we learn about the kind family who helps him get in and get some oatmeal. In The School Play, the anxiety and suspense is caused by us wondering whether Robert will get beaten up by Belinda, or will he successfully accomplish the magnificent feat of remembering his one line and pronouncing each and every one of its consonants and vowels properly. In The Good Deed, the suspense is when we aren’t sure about Risa, and when we finally learn who Risa is, we wonder what Heather is going to do. Suspense adds a spark of creativity and excitement, and it's incredibly important. It allows readers to enjoy reading stories and focus more. It’s an essential part of a story’s structure that greatly improves the story. Successful authors need to apply their knowledge in creating something worth having suspense for in order to try to capture avid readers.
Conflicts, obstacles, barriers, and struggles are all needed to help give a character’s personality depth and maturity, allowing them to grow and mature. Three stories with a few major conflicts and many minor skirmishes are Bud, Not Buddy, The School Play, and The Good Deed. These stories all have parts where the main character becomes more experienced and mature, and they all include an element of suspense to build up the plot. We can detect this by tracking the character interactions, when another character does an action that directly or indirectly affects another character. Maturity and suspense are two key details that every author must be careful to include. Struggling of characters are important, because they allow us to see the change and subtle nuances in characters.
Comments