Short Story Focusing on Setting

1. Read Kennedy, Intro to Fiction Chap. 1 (Reading a Story), Chap. 2 (Point of View), Chap. 3 (Character), Chap. 4 (Setting), and Chap. 6 (Theme).

2. Write a short story (4+ pages) emphasizing the role of setting in fiction.

a) The setting should be detailed in the first page, serving to establish clearly the place where the story takes place with specifics activating more than one sense.

b) Some elements of the setting should feature in the plot. The playwrigth Chekov went so far as to contend that if you have a gun over the mantel in the first act, by the last act that gun should have been taken down and used in the plot. For example, in James Dickey’s novel Deliverance, the fact that the story takes place on a river at the bottom of a canyon with high, steep walls means that the characters cannot easily leave the wilderness and return to civilization.

c) Some elements of the setting should also serve to reinforce a theme or themes of the story. For example, in Deliverance, the main character (protagonist) is a middle-aged man who has yet to grow up and take charge of his life. The whitewater rapids and out-of-control journey down the river reinforce this and make clear the point at which he ceases to be a passenger and begins to become an adult.

3. Accompany the story with a paragraph explaining (a) how the setting has been established, (b) how the established setting contributes to the plot, and (c) how the established setting might help to symbolize some important theme or concept from the story.

4. Post a draft in the Forums for your classmates and professor to review by Week 7. The final version will be due at the end of the semester.

5. The story will be worth 20 points plus 5 points for the explanations (25 points total).