"Trope" Isn't a Bad Word

Over the past several years I've met a lot of writers and hopeful writers who have come to me for advice. Sometimes it's because I'm the only professional they know, or they heard me speak on a panel, or they read an article of mine and thought it was really insightful, so they want to get my thoughts on a story or idea of theirs. And there is a recurring theme among these conversations that I wanted to address this week; namely that so many newer writers seem particularly averse to anything considered a "trope" when it comes to their stories.

Bottom line here, you may as well tell me you want to be a mason, but you don't want to use any bricks in your construction. Every story is going to have tropes, because tropes are the mechanisms we use for telling stories.

And without gears, the plot won't turn.

Before we get started, remember to sign up for my weekly newsletter if you want to stay on top of all my latest releases. If you want to help me keep the wheels turning and the lights on, consider becoming a Patreon patron. And lastly, to follow all my followables check out my Linktree!

Now then, let's get to it!

Tropes, And How To Use Them

A trope, according to TV Tropes, is basically a kind of storytelling shorthand. It's a shortcut, a device, or a convention that, by putting it in your story, you can be reasonably sure your audience is going to recognize it. For example, if you're watching an old-timey Western, and a man rides in with a black hat and a black duster, you know he's the bad guy. The fellow in the white hat? That's the good guy. How do you know? Because this became storytelling shorthand, giving birth to the tropes Bad Guys Wear Black (or just Black Hat for short) and Good Guys Wear White (or White Hat).

For more color-coded tropes, see Disney Villain Green.

Now, not all tropes are created equal. There's a lot of tropes we don't use anymore because the sort of stories they're connected with are things we've moved past (or should have moved past) a long time ago. Consider, for example, the trope Mighty Whitey, which refers to a displaced white person who ends up living with native people of another region, and while there becomes their greatest champion, leader, what have you. Your Tarzan, your Phantom, and the list goes on. Or the trope Yellow Peril, used to refer to the xenophobic tendency of turning Asian crime bosses or syndicate leaders into racist caricatures. This is where you get characters like The Mandarin, Fu Manchu, a lot of H.P. Lovecraft villains, etc.

Some tropes are no longer in circulation for a good reason. However, a lot of the time when someone talks about how they want to avoid using tropes, what they actually mean is they want to avoid using cliches. Which is definitely something I can get behind... within reason.

What's The Difference?

A cliché is a phrase, a motif, or even a trope, that has become such a part of a particular genre or story type that its presence is expected. For example, nobody opens a horror story or a mystery with the phrase, "It was a dark and stormy night," anymore unless they're being ironic. Calling your gelatinous monster from beyond the stars indescribable isn't something anyone does legitimately in most stories anymore either.

However, the thing to remember is that even cliches have power. They are a bedrock foundation of understanding. Even if your audience rolls their eyes as soon as they see it, they immediately know what you're trying to communicate to them. And the thing about cliches is that as long as you give them a new coat of paint, or just change the lighting in the room a little bit, they can become instantly new and unique once again.

For those looking for an example...

For example, take the cliché of The Indescribable Horror. This goes back to the early days of cosmic horror where the idea was that because the creatures were so alien that to gaze upon them confused and cracked the mind of those who saw them. They violated natural law, and the number of dimensions they could exist in, leaving onlookers unable to truly describe what they saw.

Unless executed with supreme skill, that is very difficult to pull off these days. However, you could interpret this cliché in a new and unique way, reinvigorating it and putting a new spin on it so that it seems novel once again.

What would that look like? Well, you could have a creature that literally stole words out of people's vocabulary, making them physically unable to describe it; the longer they look, the more words they lose. This creature's bizarre nature might make it impossible for people's memories to store accurate images of it, perhaps going so far as to cause brain damage and memory loss when it's seen. There are all sorts of different ways you could take Howard's refusal to actually tell us what half his bestiary looked like, and twist it into a new, unique, and dreadful form that would actually affect your audience again.

So, while it's all well and good to say you don't want to have any cliches in your work, remember that these are the lingua franca of storytelling even more than the bigger tool chest of tropes. You just need to use a little elbow grease, and spit polish them up a bit so they're fresh and unique for a reader who thinks they've seen it all. You don't have to do that, of course... but just because a trope is well known, or it's become a cliché, that doesn't meant you can no longer get any use out of it.

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my cat noir novel Marked Territory, its sequel Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!