By Pamela Freeman, Director of Creative Writing, Australian Writers’ Centre
Most advice on fugal structure in fiction focuses on the mechanics: repeating motifs, alternating voices, mirrored patterns. But as Pamela Freeman, Director of Creative Writing at the Australian Writers' Centre, explains, that formula misses the element that actually makes it work.
My novel writing students have asked me, from time to time, about alternatives to the three-act structure. I’ve given them some information on fugal structures, but I wanted to share an additional insight.
A fugal structure is, well, like a fugue. A fugue has repeating motifs coming from different voices – that is, the same pattern of notes but not the same sound. There are distinct rules about how many voices, how they reflect each other, etc. But when you start to apply this to fiction, it all feels very formulaic and dry.
And it wasn’t until tonight, when I was sitting in St Nicholas’ Church in Prague, listening to a Bach fugue being played on a baroque organ, that I realised that the formula approach to fugal structure in fiction feels dry because it doesn’t take tone into account.
As the motif passed from ‘voice’ to ‘voice’ (literally – that’s what different combinations of stops on an organ are called), it changed not only in pitch (e.g. being an octave higher), but also in tone and timbre. Sometimes dark and deep and full of foreboding; sometimes light and airy; sometimes melodic and sweet.
This is important in the effective use of fugal structure in writing fiction too. The way the author keeps the reader interested in a fugal structure, when you don’t have the big turning points of a three-act structure, is by using the variety of voices, a variety of tones and timbres, of feelings and atmospheres, so that the repetition of the motif is far less obvious, and strikes the reader as a resonance rather than a repetition.
These shifts in tone and timbre, in atmosphere and feeling, in the end all come back to character experience and perception. So we return, as always, to point of view, the heart of fiction.
If you’re considering a fugul structure in your story – as opposed to a traditional three-act structure – understanding this could be the very technique that makes your book cohesive and compelling and unforgettable.
Pamela Freeman is the Director of Creative Writing at the Australian Writers' Centre and author of more than 50 books.
