Consider This: Moments in My Writing Life After Which Everything Was Different

by Chuck Palahniuk

So direct and misdirect your reader, but don’t tell her the meaning of anything. Not until she gets it wrong in her head.

Always, always, if you were my student, I’d tell you to allow the epiphany to occur in the reader’s mind before it’s stated on the page.

“I wanted you to see how terrible a book could be and still get published.”

If you were my student I’d tell you to read the story collection Campfires of the Dead by Peter Christopher. It was Peter who taught me about submerging the “I.”

The fix is to use first person, Peter taught me, but to submerge the I. Always keep your camera pointed elsewhere, describing other characters. Strictly limit a narrator’s reference to self.

In addition, don’t screen the world through your narrator’s senses. Instead of writing, “I heard the bells ring,” write just, “The bells rang,” or, “The bells began to ring.” Avoid, “I saw Ellen,” in favor of, “Ellen stepped from the crowd. She squared her shoulders and began to walk, each step bringing her closer.”

And how your character describes the world doesn’t have to be based on anything factual. Actually, it’s more interesting if a character views the world through a mistake.

Most of my own books are about characters who’ve reached the limits of

one, early form of power. They’ve been the good, obedient boy (Fight Club) or the stunningly attractive girl (Invisible Monsters) and they’ve reached the point where they must find a new form of power. Or to continue, in bad faith, to live according to the old, failing pattern.

So choosing a character’s body of knowledge isn’t merely about how their past and their priorities color their view of everything. It’s also about the pattern for success that they’ve chosen as children.

I’d ask you: What strategy has your character chosen for success in life? What education or experiences does he or she bring? What priorities? Will they be able to adopt a new dream and a new strategy? Every detail they notice in the world will depend on your answers to the above questions.

Stories that do elicit a physical reaction—horror, pornography—are seen as low culture. But if you were my student I’d ask, Why can’t a high-culture story engage the mind, the heart, and the body?

Tom Spanbauer would call this “going on the body.” By this he meant focusing on physical sensation within a

character. As in, “This would be a good place to go on the body…”

Just shift from describing the exterior scene to depicting the interior of a character. As the writer Matthew Stadler advises, “When you don’t know what comes next, d...

So if you were my student, I’d tell you to listen to your body as you write. Take note how your hand knows how much coffee is left by the weight of the cup. Tell your stories not simply through your readers’ eyes and minds, but through their skin, their noses, their guts, the bottoms of their feet.

The lesson is: if you can identify the archetype your story depicts, you can more effectively fulfill the unconscious expectations of the reader.

To my way of thinking, there are two forms of authority. The first I call “head authority,” where the writer demonstrates a wisdom or knowledge beyond the reader’s.

The second type of authority is “heart authority,” gained when a character tells an emotional truth or commits an act that shows great vulnerability. The character shows an emotional wisdom and bravery despite enormous pain.

We know the writer isn’t afraid to tell an awful truth. The writer might not be smarter than us. But the writer is braver and more honest. That’s “heart authority.”

Another way to create heart authority is to depict a character talking about herself in the third person.

So if you were my student, I’d tell you to establish emotional authority by depicting an imperfect character making a mistake.

Tom Spanbauer used to say, “The longer you can

be with the unresolved thing, the more beautifully it will resolve itself.”

The horizontal refers to the sequence of plot points:

The vertical refers to the increase in emotional, physical, and psychological tension over the course of the story. As the plot progresses so should the tension ramp up.

So if you were my student I’d tell you to limit your elements and make certain each represents one of the horses your story is about. Find a hundred ways to say the same thing.

I’d ask you, “What’s your clock?” And, “Where’s your gun?”

In fiction the clock I’m talking about is

anything that limits the story’s length by forcing it to end at a designated time.

Billy Idol gave an interview wherein he commented on why so much punk music sounded the same. The typical punk song started at full throttle, ran for two and one-half minutes, and stopped abruptly. Only when I heard that did I realize how much the punk aesthetic had influenced my writing.

A good clock limits time, thus heightening tension. And it tells us what to expect, thus freeing our minds to indulge in the emotion of the story.

a gun can be pulled out at any moment to bring the

story to a climax.

A classic example is the faulty furnace in The Shining. We’re told early on that it will explode. The story might stagger on until springtime, but for the fact that…the furnace explodes.

Whereas a clock is something obvious and constantly brought to mind, a gun is something you introduce and hide, early, and hope your audience will forget. When you finally reveal it, you want the gun to feel both surprising and inevitable. Like death, or the orgasm at the end of sex.

the Second Act Sacrifice is a form of gun. It’s the inevitable death of a lesser character that signals the move from comedy to drama.

Consider how an excited child tells a story. The sentences just cascade, one after another with few clear breaks. Such momentum! Almost like music, very much like music, like a song. You can mimic this enthusiasm by using unconventional conjunctions to link together run-on sentences.

Every story is an experiment.

So if you were my student, I’d urge you to cut your narrative like a film editor cuts film. To do this, you can use a repeating chorus: “The first rule of fight club is you don’t talk about…” Or, “Sorry, Mom. Sorry, God.” Thus cuing the reader with a sort-of touchstone that indicates: We’re about to jump to something different.

If you were my student, I’d tell you to recycle your objects. This means introducing and concealing the same object throughout the story. Each time it reappears, the object carries a new, stronger meaning. Each reappearance marks an evolution in the characters.

if you were my student I’d tell you to never resolve an issue until you introduce a bigger one.

use evasive dialogue or miscommunications to always increase the tension. Avoid volleys of dialogue that resolve tension too quickly.

It sounds harsh, but I forbid you from furthering your plot with dialogue. To do so is cheap and lazy.

Tom admired him for having the courage to write the tough stuff. And to read it. And if you were my student I’d tell you that that is your job. To quote Joy Williams, “You don’t write to make friends.”

Consider that each sentence should raise a small question. As the smaller questions are resolved, they should raise ever-larger questions.

An opening creates a question and promises it will be answered, but not too quickly.

I’m telling you what I was taught: no dreams.

With that in mind, I’d tell you to avoid “is” and “has” in any form. And avoid abstract verbs in favor of creating the circumstances that allow your reader to do the remembering, the believing, and the loving. You may not dictate emotion. Your job is to create the situation that generates the desired emotion in your reader.

Once you’ve exhausted your standard settings, consider gathering your characters and sending them into the great outside world for some fresh perspective.