What Are Tropes and Why Should You Include Them in Your Story?

Every year, we’re lucky to have great sponsors for our nonprofit events. Campfire Technology, a 2022 Camp NaNoWriMo sponsor, creates writing software to help storytellers write better stories faster. NaNoWriMo writers can try out Campfire’s Manuscript Module for free thisNovember! In this post, writer Amanda Jones shares some of the pros of story tropes:

With NaNoWriMo 2022 quickly approaching, writers everywhere are plotting, planning, and exploring ideas for the worlds they intend to visit come November. This, of course, likely includes drafting the elements of your story from literary tropes!

What are tropes, you ask? The definition has changed slightly over time, but we have come to know them as the commonly used building blocks of the stories we read and write. Not only are they just fun to play with in a setting of your own making, but they help us connect over shared experiences, regardless of the places we are from or the time we live in.

As a member of several online writing communities, I’ve often seen anti-trope discourse such as: “If a book contains X trope, I won’t read it,” or “X trope is so overdone, I can’t stand it.” And it worries me to think there is at least one writer out there who will stop writing their story after coming across something like this.

Because tropes exist for a reason. 

You’re probably well acquainted with The Chosen One trope, about the one who came from a place no one has ever heard of. There has likely never been anything particularly special about them until they are called upon to be the hero.

You also know The Evil One and the moment in the story where they raise the stakes by gaining the upper hand—usually in the form of briefly acquiring the one thing you don’t want them to have… Until The Chosen One wins it back by overcoming the odds, that is. 

You know these because tropes are as old as storytelling itself. As the familiar bones that make up our most cherished stories, they make us feel more at ease in unknown worlds. You may be adventuring on a different planet or in a new mystical realm, but hey, you recognize that old wizard there!

So the question isn’t how do you write a story without any tropes, but rather:

How do you make tropes unique to your story? How do tropes take shape and form and establish the setting in your world? How do they create conflict and how do your characters overcome that conflict?

Ask yourself these questions when planning & ultimately writing your story. 

I know there is at least one writer out there telling themselves that their ideas aren’t original, maybe because it’s been done before, maybe for some other reason, whatever it may be. It’s important for writers (myself included) to be reminded that it’s okay if you’re not reinventing the wheel. After all, it is already invented—but that doesn’t mean you still can’t soup that wheel up!

Writing is hard enough as it is, never mind comparing yourself to other writers. So write about the tropiest of tropes that ever did exist if that’s what you want your story to include. All that matters is what you do with it.

Still looking for a place to actually write this trope-heavy masterpiece we are speaking of? Hi, meet Campfire. As a proud partner of NaNoWriMo, we are offering our Manuscript Module for FREE during the month of November to all writers participating in NaNoWriMo 2022. 

You’ll need an account on both Campfire and NaNoWriMo—free to sign up on each—and then you can simply integrate both from your Campfire account settings beginning October 20th, 2022. We’ll automatically track your writing progress, too, so you have one less thing to worry about.

Good luck this year, Wrimos!

Amanda Jones is the Digital Content Coordinator at Campfire Technology where she leads their content marketing initiatives, from managing their social media channels to drafting copy and overseeing Campfire Learn’s SEO strategy. You can follow her on Campfire or connect with her on Campfire’s Discord server. If you’re looking to organize your writing notes better, try out Campfire Write for free!

Top image: The dragon of Moston from Ballads and Legends of Cheshire (1867). Original from the British Library. Source: Rawpixel.