Death in writing

Okay, let's look at death in writing.

People have a lot to say on the subject. Things like, it's necessary, it makes more meaning, it motivates a character into action, it wouldn't have been as powerful if so-and-so hadn't died. Blah-blah-blah....

These are true, and so if the scene calls for it, I say enjoy it. Your character isn't actually real.

BUT, is death the end all and be all of a good story? No, it isn't. Are you overusing it? You better put on the brakes and check. Are other writers overusing it? Definitely. Some death scenes are so plot and forced that it's ridiculous.

If writing has no rules, then why is everyone making it a rule to kill off characters? And why do most kill off only one gender: the man? A writer who wants to use death to make it real should know that Death doesn't differentiate between age and gender. It catches children, men and women. It comes for animals all the time, too. It will eventually come for the writer trying to put their own constituencies on it. It'll come for their spoiled dog, too.

Death is a fire that too many writers play with like it's water. They will kill off one thing but give plot armor to another so it doesn't die, but their death quota is filled, along with whatever asinine statement they think Death is actually going to listen to in real life. Is this what writing and stories have become? Statements?

Argue that the story isn't real and they can choose who dies, but then why use it at all if that's the truth? No violence against women? Magazines scream against this, but they don't do anything to actually stop real violence against women. They choose to cover it up. How they must hate Charles Dickens for his reveals! Now there was a man who knew how to use his deaths. He understood it. If you're going to use death, you can't be a bleeding heart.

Don't jump on the bandwagon. Use your deaths tastefully and sparingly, otherwise it's like putting a whole cup of lemon into a recipe that only calls for a teaspoon.

A happy story is turned into a drama as soon as somebody dies. If you want a drama, fine, but if you're making a drama because it's in fashion, then what is the matter with you?

Everybody is murdering off main characters and beloved characters because everybody says you have to. They say it adds depth and motivation.

I've killed off characters in my stories, but I also let others live. A sad ending isn't always the answer. A disappointing one is garbage. Murdering off other characters because you don't know what to do with them is LAZY. Killing off somebody for motivation for another character can actually be lazy, too. There are other ways to motivate a character. There are always other ways. Explore this. You might get a better story out of it.

I once hit a wall in a story. At the time I was on Twitter and made a comment about it. Somebody immediately told me to kill this character. Others agreed. They went on a spiel about death being needed.

Well, I didn't kill this character. One, because it was Twitter, and two, I felt I was missing something and needed to find it. I chose to rend my brain until it bled. Killing the character was the easy way out. Keeping the character alive resulted in an emotional, juicy scene that radiated out to the rest of the story and made the reader cry in a good way. This character was set up for a character arc that will result in a new book.

I spent FOREVER on that scene, massaging it, forming it, smoothing it out, and in the end, it was so worth it.

Now that every writer under the sun is murdering off their character, it's become a trope. Everyone is also trying to avoid tropes, so they kill and kill and kill. Their kills are tropes. Who they kill is a trope. In the end, you are a creator. Who gives a crap what other creators say and do? Someone could even totally ignore me here and then mention me in some derogatory comment somewhere else. While I'd think they were a grade A butthead, they can think and do what they want, and I would still have the right to think they were a butthead.

The Covid-19 has killed a lot of people. Making people upset over what they're reading is not healthy. The writing that is pounded out during an emotional break should stay under the bed. Take a break after this madness. When you're all right again, go back and you just might find the agonies and deaths written on the page can be safely edited out.

Here is a quote which makes a lot of sense, and it can be said for writing as well.

"To my mind a picture should be something pleasant, cheerful and pretty. There are too many unpleasant things in life as it is, without creating still more of them."

― Pierre-Auguste Renoir