Mind Maundering

An author who wants to write more from inside a character’s head needs to take into account the difference between plot events and personal thoughts. The distinction can be fuzzy, because so much of what we think is predicated on reacting to what happens to us. Not only that, but many times in fiction the reader wants to know the character’s reaction to a plot event.

For that purpose, the interior approach is fine. A character’s response does shape the reader’s impression of the event. Yet the dictum to tell a story from inside a character’s head can lead to a distantly told narrative. Plot events happen out of the reader’s purview, or they become background stories that are told through the filter of the character’s thinking about them. That robs the events of any immediacy.

This is a difficult matter to define, because the greatest novel writing is highly subjective. If the authors I admire can do it, you may ask, why not me? The balance turns on what is being written about. If you are recalling a company picnic in a journalistic fashion, then you’re better off aiming for the brightness of dialogue, others’ appearances, gossip about their spouses, etc. How much depth can you draw from the hi-how-are-yous at a picnic, anyway?

If the whole point of the picnic, on the other hand, is so the author can convey one further example of the protagonist’s ongoing depression or growing desperation, then you are writing about a way station in a private journey. What happens there is only crowd noise compared to the exploration of character. What dress a person is wearing doesn’t matter as much as how it affects the character’s mood.

The true goal of internally based writing is to capture the character’s thought patterns, which usually are about personal matters that extend far beyond plot events. If you’re constantly relating external matters, you cannot achieve that depth. Events constitute plot, and you are bound to follow your plotting. In that case, put the reader directly into the scene—because that’s what you’re writing about.

Exercise: One guideline for interior monologue is length. A character’s reaction to a plot event tends to be short. Say, Eloise is offended by a slight at the company picnic, and she tells the reader what she thinks of that s.o.b. How long can that rant go on, really? A few sentences? If it goes on at any length, the interior monologue of necessity would need to probe into the character’s psyche. Why does she find the slight so provoking? Do the two have a past history? Is she sensitive to such remarks because of an unhealed wound in her past? Notice that both options will move the narrative well past the remark at the picnic.

“Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is the probable reason so few engage in it.” —Henry Ford

Copyright @ 2025, John Paine