Writing Emotion: Whose Emotion Is Most Important?

In the Writing Emotion series, I dissect some of the moving parts in a given scene that make it emotionally engaging.

The problem is that several emotions are going on in any given scene, in any given moment, and in any given character. To complicate it even further, most scenes include more than one character.

Even more, there’s another important player that cannot be overlooked: the reader.

So when I discuss writing emotion, exactly whose emotion am I talking about?

To put it simply, I like to try and include the greatest intersecting emotion.

This basically means I give priority to the most primary, universally commanding emotion felt by the most amount of people—including the reader.

BUT, if I do have to default, I will always choose to focus on the reader’s emotion. 

The reason for this is simple. If our main job as writers is to make readers feel, then their feelings have to be the most important.

Dissecting single emotions in a single scene within a single story is slippery. I admit it. Every scene I break down has more than one emotion at play. That’s why I place as much emphasis as possible on the underlying forces in a story that are making a given scene work and that are giving more potency to all of the emotions.

What does this mean for you as the writer?

In my opinion, although I love to look at singular emotions, the question should never be, How can I write heartbreak?

Instead, the question should be: How can I engage the reader emotionally in this scene?

We can’t really know what emotion a reader is going to feel at any given time, because we can’t predict exactly what in our stories is resonating with them. This is because we have no idea what perspectives on the world/past experiences/likes and dislikes/current struggles/etc. each individual is currently going through. 

And all of these things contribute to how we feel.

So. The best we can do is try and create an authentic human experience in our stories by giving our characters and their journeys depth, relatability, and genuine reactions and interactions.

This is what I explore in all of the writing emotion posts.

And hopefully by studying the ways in which the most successful and emotionally powerful stories do this, we can begin to understand how to write emotionally compelling stories of our own.