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The last thing you want to do is construct an ending or dénouement that struggles in it is conclusions. Ultimately, a story’s ending will have to conclude the story’s plot and theme satisfactorily to the reader. According to Ansen Dibell, author of Elements of Fiction Writing: Plot, successful endings come in two basic shapes: 1) circular and 2) linear. In a writing workshop I lately participated in, Patrick Rothfuss, author of The Name of the Wind, demonstrated two kinds of endings using his hands: for the firstborn kind he clenched his fists in front of him; for the second kind, he opened his hands airily toward his audience. The kind of ending you choose for your story will depend on the kind of story you are telling: one that rises to a climax or one that returns home. Circular Endings Beginning and ending connect in a circular story. In such a story, the end and the beginning are much more similar than they are to the middle. This is because the end reflects the promise of the beginning. Framed stories use the same technique, except the beginning and end “frame” are more like bookends, supporting the story from the outside and made of a visibly dissimilar structure (e.g., many times portrayed in prologue and epilogue fashion and ofttimes in dissimilar POV, tense, style, etc.). Circular endings, and their circular stories, are many times the shape that quest-adventure stories take on. The main reputation sets out on a quest to find or learn or accomplish something, passes through trials, and ultimately succeeds in his mission and returns home with his prize to percentage (often clear or deep perception or wisdom). Ultimately, the protagonist grows/changes/achieves then brings that wealth back home to alter his pre-existing every day life. Full circle. Beginning and end mirror and contrast one another. Circular endings will have to do the occupation of showing the hero’s “homecoming”, how she is changed through the turning point in the middle of the story, and what she has brought to the general world to alter it. Linear Endings Linear stories and their endings run more like a marathon up a hill, with slides, diversions and hard climbs, until they reach the summit and climax (the most eminent point of conflict-and resolution). Once the result of the conflict is achieved, the story is at an end. Most straight adventure stories are of this type. Reflective vs. Narrative Ending Roy Peter Clark, author of Writing Tools: 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer, reflects that “great endings fetch back the whole story.” He cites the “reflective ending” of The Great Gatsby, in which the narrator reflects back, pulling together the essential narrative threads like a master weaver, to make significant conclusions. “A powerful alternative,” adds Clark, “is the ‘narrative ending’, a final scene that crowns the action.” Both types of ending work when masterfully handled. The former is fundamentally “telling” and the latter is fundamentally “showing”. You choose. Both work. |
