First of all, research isn’t something you do once for a few days and then get on with the business of writing. It’s an ongoing process with little letup until the novel is finished. When you write, you write "in the moment" and you need all your accumulated knowledge at hand to create the reality, and you don’t need the uncertainty of a poorly researched fictional world. Research and planning allow you to release yourself from holding the world in place, so you can write "in the moment," and allow your characters to surprise you with their inherent spontaneity and inventiveness.

Premise, structure and characterization are the blood, bones and flesh of the novel, and narration is the bolt of lightning that gives it life, as Mary Shelly's Frankenstein gave life to his monster. Research then becomes the nourishment to sustain life. It gives the novel authenticity. It is the food, drink, vitamins, and emotional nourishment that give it strength and health. It may also be the medication to cure all its ills later on.

As this literary being grows from conception through childhood to maturity, it needs nourishment and medication for its ills. It needs encouragement. All that nurturing comes from research. Just as sunshine and rain come from above and give life to all that grows, and the Earth provides nourishment from below to sustain it, so research comes from both above and below.

Research should be targeted at specifics. Know what element of your novel you are researching. But due to serendipity, along the way you may pick up all sorts of interesting tidbits to enhance other aspects. All research is ultimately directed at creating verisimilitude, i.e., having the quality of truth, being probable. The reader can’t suspend disbelief if the world of the novel is not developed so that each element in it appears authentic. But what to research? As with every question concerning your novel, always return to Premise to find the answer.

RESEARCHING PREMISE

Remember that premise may exist on three levels. For example:

1.      Cosmic Premise (good overcomes evil). The novel’s deepest level.

2.     Story Premise (freedom overcomes bondage)

3.       Character Premise (self-reliance overcomes arrogance)

Each of these contains three elements: the two forces opposing each other and the conflict that connects them. You must research the philosophical ideas inherent in each of these. Even a dictionary definition can set you on the right course and provide necessary insight to help construct a storyline or character. The above Premises elements have the following definitions taken directly from a dictionary:

Good: Something conforming to the moral order of the universe. Praiseworthy. Having intrinsic value. Favored or preferred.

Evil: Morally reprehensible, sinful. Causing discomfort or repulsion. Offensive, disagreeable. Something bringing sorrow, distress, or calamity, suffering, misfortune.

Freedom: The absence of necessity, coercion, or constraint in choice or action. Liberation from slavery or restraint or from the power of another. Independence. The power of acting without compulsion. Not being unduly hampered or frustrated.

Bondage: The state of being bound by compulsion. Captivity, serfdom, servitude or subjugation to a controlling person.

Self-reliance: Reliance on one’s own efforts and abilities, powers or judgement.

Arrogance: A feeling of superiority manifested in an overbearing manner or presumptuous claims. Exaggerating or disposed to exaggerate one’s own worth or importance in an overbearing manner. Overly proud.

Even from the ten minutes this took to look up, you can see the list of useful characteristics start to unfold. Further research might include reading mythology and religion to get the cosmic elements, history to get story elements, and biographies to get character elements.

RESEARCHING CONFLICT

Conflict has two basic components: (1) the struggle over the solution to a problem and (2) the egotistical struggle for power. Frequently power issues will overshadow the problem that brings the two characters into conflict. Don’t allow this to happen without being conscious of it. Pure ego struggles have limited insight and become stereotypical easily to dramatize because of the limited anguish of choice.

Conflict based on different philosophies concerning the nature of a problem has a transcendent quality. This occurs when people engage each other in highly-emotional dialogue or negotiation. Neither backs off but engages the opposition in a process of "talking the subject to pieces." The process may, but not necessarily, become violent. The process is then one of consciousness raising although both parties may not see the light. This process throws light into the depths of darkness, but also allows one to experience the most profound insights of which they are capable. It also leads to the anguish of choice.

Some experts claim that the Premise behind all stories can be reduced to: good versus evil. This may be so, and at the cosmic level, this is fine. But carrying that pure element of goodness or evilness into the characters leaves them without any real human depth. This results in stereotypical characters that are uninteresting. Always provide a human depth to your characters, particularly your antagonist. You do this by providing the character with vulnerability. This elevates the story philosophically.

You will generally be in tune with one side or the other of a conflict (this prejudice is generally reflected in the Premise), and this prejudice will not permit you to develop either viewpoint thoroughly. To help round out the arguments, you need to research each side. The Library at NMSU-C has a series of books called "Opposing Viewpoints." A list of all the books in this series is available at the front desk. The list is extensive and you might be able to locate one to address some of the issues in your novel. But even if none of them are specifically for you, you should still take a look at them to put you in the frame of mind of treating both sides of an issue thoroughly. See Attachment I.

RESEARCHING STORYLINE

Research can actually be the first step in getting an idea for a novel. If an author wants to write a novel but doesn’t really have an idea, he should follow his interests. If he likes sunsets, he could start by researching sunsets, and then he might settle on an idea for a novel about a photographer who photographs sunsets. Sunsets, the close of day, are symbolic of endings, but also of the denizens of the dark, owls, all things hidden and secretive. The author might wonder what the guy’s secret is and turn to biographies of famous photographers.

If you’re interested in writing a modern rendition of an ancient storyline, an excellent source to consult is Edward Tripp’s The Meridian Handbook of Classical Mythology. He provides not only the storylines but also the sources of the ancient text.

RESEARCHING CHARACTER

Research personalities, human behavior (be careful with this, no psychobabble). Processes, professions, philosophy, dialects. Research your thematic character’s special wisdom. Perhaps he is an astronomer or a hobo, both of which would require extensive research. Use process to expose culture.

Some authors use mythological characters as models. Jean Shinoda Bolen’s Gods in Everyman and Goddesses in Everywoman describe the archetypes of human personality represented by the ancient Greek gods. Bolen provides the following discussion of the Greek fire god, Hephaestus:

The fire associated with Hephaestus is fire under the earth that molten core that rises from the depths as the lava of volcanoes. Subterranean fire is a metaphor for passionate feelings: intense sexual and erotic fire contained within the body until it is expressed, or rage and anger that is held in and dampened down, or a passion for beauty that is stirring and felt in the body (or earth of the person).

These feelings, which lie beneath the surface in a deeply introverted person, may suddenly and unexpectedly erupt. When revealed to another person in a moment of intimate conversation, almost invariably that person is surprised; "I had no idea that you felt this strongly." Page 223.)

But Hephaestus was also deformed at birth, his feet turned front to back which gave a forward rolling motion to his gait. This deformity could also be viewed as an emotional crippling and the god’s abnormal gait would translate into some weird sensitivity. Using this method to

Bolen provides a shopping list of personality traits from which the author can select. Using this type of research to develop characters should never be done arbitrarily but always under the influence of the Premise and only to gain further insight into a developing character or trigger the creative process.

The ancient Greek, Theophrastus (370-287 BC), provided a short set of stereotypes (thirty in all) still helpful today in his book that’s come to be called The Character Sketches. The following excerpts illustrate his keen sensitivity and are a veritable smorgasbord of personal shortcomings.

When the talkative man meets someone who ventures any remark at all, he will reply that it’s not so, and he knows the whole story, and just listen to him if you want to learn something. Then, with the other fellow in the middle of a reply, he presses on: "Don’t forget now, you’ve already had your say," or ….

The excuse that you "really must be going" won’t work, either; you can count on him to follow right along and see you back to your door.

---

The superstitious man guards against pollution by constantly washing his hands and sprinkling himself from a sacred spring, and by chewing leaves of the sacred laurel; these precautions keep him busy the whole day. And should a cat chance to cross his path, he goes not a step further until he has tossed three stones across the road or until somebody else passes by.

An author could do worse than decide to add one of these attributes to a character in her/his novel.

Use physical landscape as a metaphor for internal landscape. Pick up a National Geographic book on one of the national parks, the Grand Canyon for example. Use the photographs not literally but metaphorically. One can well imagine the void left in a man after his wife’s death as the Grand Canyon of the soul, parts of it so deeply cut by pain that the mid summer sun could cast little more than a dark shadow across it. View the physical world as internal landscape, mood.

Using the characteristics of animals to describe someone also can capture their physical, or even emotional, essence. Consider this description of a woman from James Salter’s highly-acclaimed Light Years:

She is dressed in her oat-colored sweater, slim as a pike, her long hair fastened, the fire crackling. Her real concern is the heart of existence: meals, bed linen, clothing. The rest means nothing; it is managed somehow. She has a wide mouth, the mouth of a actress, thrilling, bright. Dark smudges in her armpits, mint on her breath. Her nature is extravagant. She buys on impulse, she visits Bendel’s as she would a friend’s, collects dirty clothes. She is twenty-eight. Her dreams still cling to her, adorn her; she is confident, composed, she is related to long-necked creatures, ruminants, abandoned saints. She is careful, hard to approach. Her life is concealed. It is through the smoke and conversation of many dinners that one sees her…. (Page 8.)

Her hair is like "fire crackling," and Salter compares her to a pike (a large elongate long-snouted fish valued for food and sport), long-necked creatures (cranes and ostriches come to mind) and then a ruminant (an even-toed hoofed mammal that chews its cud). But the point is that you should research description and pursue every avenue in creating your vision of the character. Pull on every source imaginable to stimulate your imagination so you can stimulate the readers.

When researching character, the author should remember that her/his characters are inexorably attached to premise and that the heart of the characters (along with her/his strength and weakness) is inherent in it.

RESEARCHING THE SENSES

While researching other elements of your novel, research the senses. This is a first priority because the senses center the reader in the fictional world. Concentrate your research on the three “forgotten” ones because they work on the subconscious. (Remember Ray Bradbury’s description of Mars: What is the smell, taste and touch of the time, the place?) Here the writer develops a strategy for using them because they season the narrative as spices do food. You don’t season fried chicken the same as chicken cacciatore. Too much and you’ll overwhelm the reader, but just the right sense at the proper moment catapults the reader to a new level of awareness.

Where do you go to research the senses? The primary source is the real world. Visit the places where your story takes place, or find similar settings. And while there, close your eyes, stick your fingers in your ears and smell, taste and touch your surroundings. Eat in the restaurants. Walk the parks, smell the trees, chew a blade of grass.

Secondary sources include books (cookbooks, flower books, the encyclopaedia will sometimes tell how things smell or feel). Medical books give strange odors that come with disease. Also remember that you don’t have to be literal. Things smell like other things: “Tom’s breath was like a rotting carcass.” You can use smells, tastes and tactile sensations symbolically and metaphorically. You can say things like, “Tom’s personality was so grating that just looking at him felt like sand in the teeth.”

Also remember that you don’t have to be literal. Things smell like other things. You can use smells, tastes and feels symbolically and metaphorically. You can say things like someone’s personality was so grating that just looking at him "felt like sand in the teeth." But the primary thing to do is to remember to look for sense details. We generally overlook them in favor of sights and sounds.

The tactile sense is easy to describe (smooth, rough, soft, etc.), but how do you describe a smell or taste? Generally you’ll have to rely on the reader’s memory. You only have to mention strawberries to get the taste. To get the smell of coffee you can rely on the way the steam wafts up from the cup. In that way, the "action" of a smell can be essential for the reader to experience it. Also look for cross coupling of the senses. You can smell a fish better if you’re reminded of that slimy slickness.

The chief attributes of sensation are quality, intensity, extensity and duration. Identifying more than just the quality of the sense (a sweet taste, a soft sound) gives it the dimension of being active, that it has affected the character. A smell emanates from a room, or a person’s body odor seeps through their clothes and lofts about them as they walk about a room.

Smell doesn’t just exist. In fiction it has an impact on the character who smells. Just describing a smell, taste or feel isn’t enough. It must produce a reaction, a feeling about it or an action. A sharp smell of vomit that turns the stomach is a good example. It’s hard to smell a rose without smiling and a whiff of a decaying carcass will generally produce a reaction described as "turning up the nose." The character will react to one of the attributes of sensation. With a rose it’s probably quality (beautiful, sweet), but with a carcass it’ll probably be quality and intensity (putrid, rippingly sharp).

The senses can also be used to develop character. Being nearsighted or farsighted is rather common. Having no sense of smell when it’s crucial to a character’s survival can have dramatic implications.

Another powerful sense that can really bring fiction to life, is the sixth sense, which manifests itself as a sense of anticipation, as in a sense of foreboding before a catastrophe. This is different than foreshadowing and is directly coupled with a characters ability to assess a situation and intuit a result, anticipate the future.

RESEARCHING SETTING

Using travel guides, nature books to get the flora and fauna.

Using city, state, country histories (you can’t know a place without knowing what it’s been through).

Remember that setting is also a reflection of character internal landscape. Once you determine the literal part of the setting, take it that step further and "color" it with the character’s mood.

RESEARCHING SCENE

As described in the chapter on "Chapters", a scene has to do with a dramatized action, and will ALWAYS involve conflict on some level. Sometimes you’ll know precisely how to dramatize a scene, but when intuition fails, go to other authors you admire to see how they do it.

RESEARCHING PROCESSES

Interview professionals: lawyers, policemen, forensic experts, bakers, clergy, etc. But also don’t forget housewives, mothers, fathers, CEO’s, ditch diggers, gravediggers, etc. Even kids have a particular slant on the world that might be crucial in some novels.

In Carlsbad, the potash mines are an exotic setting that could be used in a novel and the mining process would be a fascinating backdrop. The Caverns have a metaphoric appeal that could be exploited.

A story about a seagull would require that the author research flying. Richard Bach (Jonathan Livingston Seagull) was a pilot.

BRINGING THE STRANGE HOME

The world of the novel and the real world are different places. Dialogue sounds different, descriptions fall flat, and the lives of characters demand a sense of story. But still yet, no fiction can ever match the strangeness of real life. Take this opportunity to add the life-like quality that comes with the surreal. Projecting a sense of realism can be the kiss of death, and what you are actually looking for is a sense of the unreal. It has been said that fiction has to conform to what is possible, real life doesn’t. This is the constraint the storyteller is always working against. In Groundhog Day, we find a story where the impossible works perfectly, a single day repeating thousands of times.

We think of the world as commonplace. It is anything but. Before 9/11 no one would have thought that they’d wake up one morning and the World Trade Center would be on fire, but even less would have believed that two hours later both towers would be rubble. It’s commonly said that fiction has to present what is possible but the real world doesn’t.

The author must always look for the strange element in his novel. You can’t make it strange enough. Your characters can’t be off-the-wall enough. As another example, who would believe that a seventeen-year-old peasant girl could take over as commander in chief of a country’s army? And that she would win a war in two years that had been going on for 100. But Joan of Arc did it for France. And when the English captured her, the French wouldn’t negotiate her return and allowed the English to burn her at the stake.

KEEPING AT IT 

The author should also never assume that once they describe a character, either internally or externally, or a setting, that the job is complete. Every time the reader comes into contact with the character or place, they should be subjected to an ever deepening, evolving personality and presence. The author continues to research his characters and setting to develop new ideas about these people and places he supposedly already knows so well.

THE MULTI-MIND PRINCIPLE

James Cameron has said that the reason movies are such a powerful medium is because they are by their very nature collaborative. By extensive, even exhaustive, research a writer can also bring other minds to bear on his work. This will give it that "three-dimensional" feel achieved by collaboration.

Don’t forget to research the recesses of your own mind. Write down your own thoughts. Keep a notebook beside your bed for late-night or early-morning inspiration. Work early in the morning when possible to milk your mind of the more deep-rooted material. This seems to be particularly important. You have access to your own internal creative process more easily in the morning before you load your mind with things from the external world. You can also use this technique to get over writer’s block. If you have the good fortune to have insomnia (as I do) you can work for an hour or so every night while your mind is still close to the dream state.

RESEARCH RESOURCES

·        Visit the sites where the scenes in your novel take place.

·        Local libraries. Not only books but also videos and tapes

·        The Internet. Amazon.com. Amazon claims to be the largest bookstore in the world. It contains over three million titles.

·        The Advanced Book Exchange, abe.com. The world’s largest source for out-of-print books.

THE RESEARCH PLAN

The Research Plan contains sources for researching the following:

• Premise

  • The Nature of Conflict

  • Character

  • The Underside of Your Characters

  • Strengths and Weaknesses

• Narration

  • POV

  • Voice

  • Tense

• Chapters

  • Transitions

  • First and Last Chapters

• Creating scenes

  • Processes

  • Setting

• Language

  • Narrative voice

  • Speech (dialogue)

• The Senses

  • Taste

  • Touch

  • Smell

  • Sound

  • Sight

ASSIGNMENT

Write a Research Plan. Provide a list of sources you plan to consult to research the novel, where you plan to go and what you expect to get from each. Perform the initial research on the premise and write one page expounding on it.