Setting the Scene

It seems that so many things go into one small book: characters, conflicts, climax, themes, motifs, &c. All of these have their part in the grand scheme of the story; all are important and should not be left out. Setting is not least of these.


Setting could be defined in short as ‘where and among what surroundings the story takes place.’ That is a simple definition which encompasses most of what we wish to discuss to-day. However, there is much more to setting than a bird singing in a tree and a brook bubbling merrily.


Types of Setting


First of all, we might explain the various types of setting, how they are different, and how they work together. They can easily be divided into two categories:


Over-all:


This would be the setting for the entire story—something that is intrinsic to the story, forms the backdrop, and influences the plot.


Cultural


Cultural Setting would be basically among what sort of people and culture the story is set. For example, Kim, a book about a boy who pretends to be a native in India, would be an entirely different story if it were set among ancient Egyptians. Rudyard Kipling, the author of Kim, takes advantage of his vast knowledge of Indian culture, tradition, and practices to make the story vivid and colourful.


Historical


Historical Setting is a time—either approximate, such as the 16th century, or precise, such as 12 Nov. 1822—when the story is set. This type of setting ties in with Cultural quite a bit, due to the fact that cultures change throughout history. Like cultural setting, historical setting influences the plot and characters hugely. To give an example, the movie Treasure Planet couldn’t possibly compete with Robert L. Stevenson’s exciting adventure story Treasure Island, set in the mid-1700s.


Religious


Religious Setting especially comes into play in stories of missionaries, martyrs, Bible smugglers, and the like, although it is quite as common in other sorts of books, such as Tolstoy’s and Hugo’s. It ties in with History and Culture quite a lot, as one can understand.


Class


Social class affects the story greatly. In Lassie Come-Home, by Eric Knight, Joe Carraclough’s father is a poor man out of a job in a mining area in the north of England. This sets the stage for much of the ensuing adventure. Class setting can be very divers because in the same geographical setting there may be several different classes of people leading very different sorts of lives. A very wealthy landowner, for instance, probably has many servants—two very different social classes. At different periods in history also, each social class had its own form of what was acceptable and decorous.


Political


This is another of the author’s particular favourites. Political Setting affects much of the action, conflict and goals of the story. Generally the setting is a nation (theoretical or not) with a government which is, shall we say, far-from-perfect. Socialism, Communism, and Totalitarianism are favourites. But sometimes a political setting could be political intrigue, two countries fighting each other, or some other such smaller setting.


Scene:


In a story, there are more specific settings for each scene. Think about a play—the backdrop doesn’t stay the same throughout the whole show—at least, not in an exciting show. The scene setting may stay the same for several chapters of a story or it may change multiple times in just one chapter.


Physical


This is the immediate physical surroundings in the story. This is what most people probably think of when they think of setting—trees rustling like fountains, roads stretching across dark purple heaths like a mark of chalk on a slate, &c. Does the hero live in a flat on Baker’s Street with his doctor friend? Or does he live in a hamlet up on a mountain with his granddaughter?


Event


Similar to Historical, Event Setting generally includes a narrower range of time and place. The event might be the Barnum Circus or the Turkish Wars; the day the Queen was crowned or the day Johnny fell downstairs and hurt his head. This could go under either the scene or the over-all heading.


Date/Time


This is an even more specific time frame than event or historical setting. This would be the day a particular part of the story took place, or even the exact time. It may surprise you, but the time setting plays a huge part in the story, whether it be the time of year or the time of day. (For example, every proper murder story is set at night.)


Meteorological


This requires a bit more explanation, but, quite simply, it would be weather. Owing to the fact that most stories encompass a few days at least, (a few weeks or even twenty years are common), weather is generally inconsistent, unless your hero happens to be on a tropical island where the sun always shines. However, Meteorological Setting can be used in different ways. In Bleak House, by Charles Dickens (although we have mentioned it before, it serves as a prime example), the fog repeatedly recurs throughout the story. In some books, a certain type of weather—like a thunderstorm—may symbolise a dark time for the hero, or a scary something about to happen, or an internal conflict.


Geographical


This is, for myself, a very fun setting, and needs little explanation. Whether the hero is climbing over the Alps like the man in John Buchan’s Mr. Standfast, or wiggling his toes in the Mississippi, as might Twain’s Tom Sawyer, the geography has as much bearing on the other types of settings as it has on the story. Many stories, interestingly enough, are not set in specific countries at all. Some are set in fantasy worlds, some are set in theoretical countries, and some are simply set in ‘Ambiguity.’ That is, the author doesn’t care where his hero is, because it doesn’t matter to the story.






It appears, as we look at these types of settings, that they are closely intertwined: the historic era affects the culture, and is in turn affected by the geographical location. Even in the same general area there may be many little physical settings and time frames. That is the result of this wide, diverse world and all the strange, wonderful people who live in it. An author can have more than one type of setting in just one book—for example, an old man lives on a nice street in the capital city of a small nation under a Socialist government in 1950. That is physical, geographical, class, political, and historical setting all at once. If I were to say that the country is in the area of the Black Sea and the Ukraine, that the man was once a doorkeeper at a cathedral, and that he is hiding a wanted man, we see cultural, religious, and event setting. The only type I have failed to use here is meteorological, but one can always say ‘it rained.’






The Role of Setting

We may move on to uses of setting and what it does for the story. As mentioned before, setting greatly influences the plot, themes, characters, mood, and conflicts of a story. For instance, it can:


Decide what sort of people characters will be


This is of course only to a certain extent. Some modern philosophies will have you believe that a criminal is bad because he was made so by his environment and this is not true, for every man has freedom of choice and a responsibility for his own actions. However, what type of setting he is drawn from will still decide to a certain extent what sort of person he is—meaning, for example, that you wouldn’t generally find a Hindu Brahmin on a barge on the Rhine. In another sense, a person’s surroundings can also affect his personality and habits. Mr. Chips, from James Hilton’s fine book, is a kindly teacher from a boys’ school who likes boys and is a little shy of women.


Figure as a character itself


This is slightly more rare, but it does happen. In the Wind in the Willows, by Kenneth Graham, the river is a friendly, safe place, almost like a real person. It has its own personality and its own language.


Decide what genre of story it will be


My previous allusion to Treasure Island serves well for this. A ship searching for treasure on the high seas and finding a mysterious island—what else could it be but an adventure story? (Especially when there are pirates aboard ship.)


Create mood


Setting is a key player in creating mood, especially with lots of good description. The types of settings that are generally used are physical, meteorological, class, and historical. I have always loved Alfred Noyes’s opening lines to his famous poem, “The Highwayman;” ‘The wind was a torrent of darkness, among the gusty trees, The moon was a ghostly galleon, tossed upon cloudy seas; The road was a ribbon of moonlight, over the purple moor, When the highway man came riding...’ (More on that later.)


Emphasize certain ideas


Having several different class settings in a story, for example, often serves to emphasize things the author considers problematic in his society. Or, he may use a certain historical or political setting to propound his own views of the world.


Instruct audience


In some stories, such as Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, or The Swiss Family Robinson, the setting serves as a classroom in which the author hopes to teach his audience something about geography, for instance, or how to sew clothes using porcupine quills.


Make it fun/ interesting


Everybody wants to enjoy a book. Of course we all have our preferences as to what we like to read about, whether it be cowboys in Montana or aliens on a different planet, but I think we can all enjoy variations. Who doesn’t like Dr. Seuss’s silly colourful worlds where any animal you can think up exists?


Create story


Sometimes setting plays a very important rôle in the plot, not only driving the hero to do something, but keeping him at it, and sometimes even causing trouble for him. I can think, for example, of the story about the hole in the dyke, where the boy must keep his finger in the hole or the town will be flooded by the sea that bounds it.


Set limits and boundaries


These limits could be physical, such as the walls of a prison or the sea around Crusoe’s island, or they could be class barriers or cultural demarcations: if you are a Hindu, you cannot marry or even eat with someone outside your caste.

Painting the Backdrop
 I find that I can’t write an article about setting without adding a note on description. Description, a great author’s tool, is as easy to overuse as it is to underuse. Description is hard for most of us, and requires more than just a good imagination. It requires a wide vocabulary of adjectives, the ability to be clear and concise, and a good knowledge of one’s audience.


A description must be colourful and creative, but not too much of either. You want to paint a picture in the reader’s mind, and that is hard to do if you use ‘creative’ words such as, ‘the verdigris chromisms fragmentalised the terrestrial orb with their fulgent viridity.’ You would not be painting a picture in anyone’s mind (unless it was a picture of an alien attack) but would be sending him running for the dictionary. Remember always to keep your audience in mind, especially in your use of vocabulary.


Too much description, especially of a place, is only useful to someone who wants to dramatise your work. Your reader may want to know that the study is brightly lit and cosy, but he won’t want to know that there is a desk left, a door centre, a table centre left, etc. Description, especially of things the author is fond of, can become far too long and boring. And, truthfully, the reader often likes picturing things for himself. (If the reader chooses to picture the cliffs of Dover as black, your calling them white won’t matter much. It is too much trouble for him to change his mental image.) This does not mean you should not describe! It simply means prudence is necessary.


Some people are very good at description, but it is not just because they use good adjectives. It is because they know their audience and use allusions that the audience understands. To say that the world smelt fresh and new (a common cliché) is one thing; to say that it smelt ‘of the dirt you dig up in the garden after it has rained, of wet leaves dripping dew &c’ is another. This takes practise! It is a writer’s duty and privilege to use words to create a new world—it’s just very hard to make your readers see, hear, smell, and feel exactly what you do.


I mentioned before the opening lines of Alfred Noyes’s poem "The Highwayman." I mention it here again because I think it is a perfect example of what I have been talking about concerning description. His choice of words is especially excellent—expressions like ‘torrent of darkness’ (exactly what a strong wind sounds like), ‘ghostly galleon’ and ‘ribbon of moonlight’. The reader is immediately on that dusty road with the thunder of the highwayman’s hooves pounding in his ears and the shine of the jewelled pistols glinting in the moonlight. And it only took Noyes three lines to do it.


Creating a setting is an opportunity for the author to create his own world for his story to happen in. Communicating that setting to his readers requires a good choice of elements and originality of description. Setting takes part in the story in the same way that characters do. It creates conflicts, illustrates themes, sways plot, and becomes an inseparable part of the book itself. It can be the only difference between a boring story and an exciting one. It can open a new world to the reader.


-R.E.P.