A photograph of the cover of a book titled “Can You Survive the Zombie Apocalypse?”

Source: Conflict Of Interest Austin 2011,
thesnydotcom, Flickr

In only a few lines of text, you learned much about the setting in Chekhov’s “The Boys.” The family is wealthy enough to have a cook, and you can only reach their home by traveling on a sleigh across a frozen terrain. Sleighs have never been a common mode of transportation in Texas, so you likely assumed that the time period for this story was long ago in place that, unlike Texas, has harsh winters.

Volodya is not a common name in our state either, so you may have also guessed that this story takes place in Chekhov’s country of Russia. In nineteenth-century Russia, the name “Volodya” was a popular nickname for Vladymir and would be comparable to calling someone “Chris” for Christopher or “Jake” for Jacob.

You may have also figured out while reading Chekhov’s story that a class system is in place because Volodya is addressed as “master.” These pieces of information are all part of the story’s setting. Setting can be defined as follows:

A writer can use any of these important elements related to setting to help shape the plot, conflict, and characters.

Read the three opening sentences below and think about what you might learn about the plot, conflict, or characters from each writer’s skillful use of details related to setting. For each passage, check the Plot, Conflict, and/or Characters box(es) if you think the passage provides information about these elements. You will check 1, 2, or 3 box(es) for each passage.

We lived on Waverly Place, in a warm, clean, two-bedroom flat that sat above a small Chinese bakery specializing in steamed pastries and dim sum.

— Amy Tan, “Rules of the Game,” The Joy Luck Club

Plot
This helps us begin to think about the details of the story.

Conflict
Try again.

Characters
Try again.


I belong in Cleveland, Ohio. One winter’s night, two years ago, I reached home just after dark, in a driving snowstorm, and the first thing I heard when I entered the house was that my dearest boyhood friend and schoolmate, John B Hackett, had died the day before, and that his last utterance had been a desire that I would take his remains home to his poor old father and mother in Wisconsin.

—Mark Twain, “The Invalid’s Story”

Plot
The first sentence tells us about the character—he “belongs” in Ohio. We know a lot about the plot from this sentence, and because we already know the main character doesn’t like to travel, we know that we are seeing the beginning of the conflict also.


Conflict
The first sentence tells us about the character—he “belongs” in Ohio. We know a lot about the plot from this sentence, and because we already know the main character doesn’t like to travel, we know that we are seeing the beginning of the conflict also.


Characters
The first sentence tells us about the character—he “belongs” in Ohio. We know a lot about the plot from this sentence, and because we already know the main character doesn’t like to travel, we know that we are seeing the beginning of the conflict also.



Once inside the supermarket, her hands firmly around the handle of the cart, she would lapse into a kind of reverie and wheel toward the produce. Like a Tibetan monk in solitary meditation, she calmed to a point of deep, deep happiness; this feeling came to her, reliably, if strangely, only in the supermarket.

—Cynthia Rylant, “Checkouts”

Plot
Try again.

Conflict
Try again.

Characters
We learn several details about the character in these two sentences.

circle with a city fit into it, buildings jutting up disproportionately as if the city is being squeezed from a tube”

Source: Minimundo Zaragoza, chalo84, Flickr






Now, think about the setting for the story you are going to write. Will it advance elements of the plot, help the reader understand the conflict, make the characters more real, or accomplish all three?