Plot and Character more Important than Prose?

I'm the type of writer, who I'm sure is like most, that frets over using the right word, right sentence structure, right exact perfect mechanics of prose to get across what I want to communicate in my stories. But does that really matter? Does prose actually have that much of a bearing on how it comes off to the reader as we think it does?

The other night as I was driving along the highways for work late at night, I popped in the audio book of "Epic of Gilgamesh" which is considered by a lot of people to be the oldest story in history. (Written around the 18th century BC. on the clay tablets pictured above.) Suffice to say, the word choice and sentence structure is not very advanced. There are many parts that repeat itself verbatim many many times to the point where I was chanting along with the narrator by the middle of the book in some parts. Overall, the work is very basic and has about the same sophistication I would expect out of a 10 year old.

But still, this story drew me in and kept me awake so I didn't crash my car. (yay!) And I began to wonder why that was, since it was so basic. And the reason is that the plot and characters are well developed. In reality, this is all that The Epic of Gilgamesh has going for it, and it has survived for almost 4000 years!

This brought me to another train of thought then. A lot of the classics that we know and love are indeed translations from the original work. And the format they were originally written in is usually not how we experience them in present day. For instance, just about everybody knows and likes the Iliad and Odyssey, however I don't know many people who have read it in the epic poem format. It's usually the modern spin offs that they have seen. But the power of the characters and plot has allowed this story to survive and still impact people after many years.

Shakespeare wrote plays, but still, people pick up those plays and read them as if they were a book, still getting enjoyment out of them. There is virtually no description, and all we have is dialogue that many of us struggle to comprehend without putting on our thinking caps. And still, he's widely read by people far and wide, even after they graduate. What keeps drawing people to these works, again, is the power of the characters and plot.

Even more modern works that end up getting translated loose a lot of the feel of the author, no matter how good the translation. But still, there are great pieces of literature that survive this process to still touch our hearts. Because the only thing that really can be translated across language and time barriers is in my opinion, character and plot.

I'm not saying that you should be writing your work at that 10 year old level, but perhaps a lot of the agony we spend trying to come up with the perfect word could be better spent on making sure we have an overall story that connects with the reader.

Why you should transcribe masters...by hand

When you go art museums, chances are you'll see somebody like the woman on the left copying a masterpiece. She's not expecting to make a name for herself by doing this. Sure she might sell it as a copy...who knows...but that's not the reason she invests all this time into her task. She's spending days in this museum with her paints and easel to get inside the master's mind and figure out exactly how they created the illusions that made that painting great.


She's hoping that once she gains these insights, she will have the skills necessary to eventually create beautiful art of her own. She hopes to become a master herself.


Other arts such as music or literature don't have such public exposure to artists copying the masters, as they can be done in the privacy of their own home, but it's something we shouldn't neglect to do ourselves.


We read the masters as writers and we learn stuff from them. They teach us how to tell a story and what you can do with the language. But how much can we really absorb by just reading them once, twice, even ten times? The answer is not as nearly as much is if you sit down and actually transcribe their words on paper by hand.


When you slow things down and copy down each word, each letter, and each punctuation mark, you are effectively dissecting the work. You figure out what the author is doing and you gain insight in to why. You essentially take a microscope to the work, and just like the painter, you inspect each brush stroke, each color is scrutinized, and more often than not, you end up with an ah-ha moment that leaves you a stronger writer.


While most of the masters are famous for their novels, it would be preferable to select some of their more acclaimed short stories. They are short enough where it will only take a couple hours to transcribe an entire story by hand (Yes I know this is a long time, but it's worth it) You will then see how these authors open the story, carry it through the middle, and wrap it up in the end. Novels...well those would take weeks of constant transcription and an wrist of steel to do.


Novels though can contain very good passages that would have some benefit as well, and while copying the whole thing might not be practical, doing the first and last chapter will give you insights into the two most important chapters in a novel, if writing those things are your thing.


Now I also mentioned that you should do this by hand. Why is that? Well for one is slows you down just a little bit more. It's easy on a keyboard to type fast and recklessly because it's easy to delete and use spellcheck. This will not only diminish the effect of transcription, but you will loose one of the other benefits that will really help you out...HANDWRITING. As I'm writing this post, @sirra_girl just mentioned how she can't read her own edits sometimes, just like me. Well one way to improve this aspect is to write by hand and write slowly. Again, greatly beneficial.


The last thing I want to mention is that you also want to make sure you do some transcribing of the modern masters as well. While the old guys like Shakespeare, Dickens, Poe, etc. have lots to learn from, the modern masters (especially ones published in the last year or two) will help you keep your writing current. If you're not plugged into who they are, just look at award winners for instance.


Is this something you've done before? If yes, did it work for you? If no, will you be trying this?