Once a novel gets going and I know it is viable, I don't then worry about plot or themes. These things will come in almost automatically because the characters are now pulling the story.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes that once the characters are developed, the plot and themes naturally unfold through their actions and interactions.
Chinua Achebe suggests that the essence of storytelling lies not in meticulously planning the plot or themes in advance but in crafting compelling characters that drive the narrative. When characters are fully realized, they inherently influence the direction of the story, allowing plot and themes to emerge organically as the narrative progresses.
In practice
This quote can be shared in a creative writing workshop to inspire budding authors.
In fact, I thought that Christianity was very a good and a very valuable thing for us. But after a while, I began to feel that the story that I was told about this religion wasn't perhaps completely whole, that something was left out.
Writers don't give prescriptions. They give headaches!
Mr. Brown had thought of nothing but numbers. He should have known that the kingdom of God did not depend on large crowds. Our Lord Himself stressed the importance of fewness. Narrow is the way and few the number. To fill the Lord's holy temple with an idolatrous crowd clamoring for signs was a folly of everlasting consequence. Our Lord used the whip only once in His life - to drive the crowd away from His church.
It is the storyteller who makes us what we are, who creates history. The storyteller creates the memory that the survivors must have - otherwise their surviving would have no meaning.
Writing has always been a serious business for me. I felt it was a moral obligation. A major concern of the time was the absence of the African voice. Being part of that dialogue meant not only sitting at the table but effectively telling the African story from an African perspective - in full earshot of the world.
An angry man is always a stupid man.
Every authentic poem contributes to the labor of poetry... to bring together what life has separated or violence has torn apart... Poetry can repair no loss, but it defies the space which separates. And it does this by its continual labor of reassembling what has been scattered.
It still amazes and fascinates me that women of color have kept my work alive for these many generations.
Animation can explain whatever the mind of man can conceive. This facility makes it the most versatile and explicit means of communication yet devised for quick mass appreciation.
The state of female artists is very good. But the very definition of art has been biased in that 'art' was what men did in a European tradition and 'crafts' were what women and natives did. But it's actually all the same.
Freaks was a thing I photographed a lot. It was one of the first things I photographed and it had a terrific kind of excitement for me. I just used to adore them. I still do adore some of them. I don't quite mean they're my best friends but they made me feel a mixture of shame and awe.
Writing is an act of faith, not a trick of grammar.
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