not<\/em> being evil? We get into predestination and free will. This is deep!<\/p>\nWe can decide one way for a certain story and another way for another. In one, our villain\u2019s motive can rise out of his compulsions. She doesn\u2019t feel safe unless she\u2019s in control, so she\u2019s controlling. Another can feel dead inside. He needs to inflict pain in order to come to life. Eek! With this kind of reason for villainy, we don\u2019t need much more in the way of motive. Just pity the poor person who crosses this villain\u2019s path at the wrong moment.<\/p>\n
We don\u2019t have to go far from here to the question of evil. Terrible things happen to people in fiction and real life. Is there evil? What\u2019s its nature? How does it operate in our story? In our villain?<\/p>\n
Writing Ballerina liked Viola03’s impostor suggestion because it helped her plotting. So we can think about the kind of villain who will send our plot zooming in the right direction. In the fairy tale \u201cRapunzel,\u201d for example, we need a witch who wants a child and then, later, wants to imprison her in a tower. In the fairy tale, her actions are unmotivated. She just does what she does. But for the story to work in a longer adaptation, her motives are key to everything. Who would want a child and than want to jail her? We don’t necessarily need a back story. Basic character will do. She may love babies and hate children, for example.<\/p>\n
In my loosely related version, Lady Klausine takes Perry because she wants a child, but she isn\u2019t the one to shut Perry up in the tower. That\u2019s her husband, Lord Tove, whose motive is extreme prejudice. So I divided the two villainous acts (and the reader comes to sympathize, if not excuse, Lady Klausine).<\/p>\n
In Donna Jo Napoli\u2019s Zel, the witch\u2019s motives are entirely different-fascinating and unexpected.<\/p>\n
So a single fairy tale plot can support multiple motives. To come to the one that we want to work with, we can consider the world of our story and the values of the people in it. We can think about the challenges this villain with his motive will present for our MC. We can make a list! Like this:<\/p>\n
Smart villain
\nBumbling villain
\nResentful
\nWorld view that makes him act as he does<\/p>\n
And so on. We can elaborate on the ones that appeal to us and see how they will affect our plot.<\/p>\n
Fun can come into it. What kind of villain with what kind of motives will we enjoy writing? Because villains are often a delight to write. More than any other character, our villains give us permission to write over the top. They are generally an extreme, so we can be wild writing about them.<\/p>\n
Here are three prompts:<\/p>\n
\u2219 The parents in \u201cHansel and Gretel\u201d abandon their children in the forest. The reader is told that this is because the family doesn\u2019t have enough food, and that the mom is more willing than her husband to leave them. But the witch is cast as the major villain. Come on! Who would abandon children in a forest or anywhere else? Who would go along with such a plan? The parents are villains! What\u2019s their motive? Write a scene or the whole story, revealing the real motive.<\/p>\n
\u2219 Your world is a dystopian bureaucracy with a jillion departments . Your villain is the Minister of the Department of Transportation, whatever kind of transportation is used in this world. And he, deviously, makes transportation a misery for everyone. Goods are late getting where they\u2019re going. People\u2019s commute quadruples in length. The tiniest aspect of everyone\u2019s life in this world is disrupted. Write a scene in which you show the reader how he operates, and why.<\/p>\n
\u2219 The sirens of Greek mythology sing sailors to their death. Pick one and make her the villain of your story. Invent her motive and write a scene or the whole story.<\/p>\n
Have fun, and save what you write!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Two events to tell you about before the post: On Saturday, May 18th, from 12:00 until 4:00, I\u2019ll be signing books at the Millbrook Literary Festival, held at the Millbrook Public Library, 3 Friendly Lane, Millbrook, NY. From 1:30 to 2:30, I\u2019ll be on a panel about novelizing fairy tales. This is a time change: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[35],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1052"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1058,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052\/revisions\/1058"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}