I love survival stories. Ernest Shackleton in Antarctica, Uruguayan soccer players in the Andes, plane crash survivors in New Guinea—I’ve read and loved them all. (The books about those stories are Alfred Lansing’s Endurance, Alive, by Piers Paul Read, and Lost in Shangri-La, by Mitchell Zuckoff.) Aside from the fact that survival stories are the best possible thing to read when you’re sick (so you have a cold? It’s not scurvy! And you’re not trapped inside a tent in gale force winds where it’s 30 below and there’s nothing to eat but seal blubber!), they’re also a wonderful window into character and how people respond in extreme circumstances. And since the best novels are about ordinary characters running up against unexpected obstacles, be they icebergs or aliens or a husband’s surprise announcement that he wants a divorce, survival stories are a good road map for how to draw believable characters.
What I learned:
Human nature is full of surprises. Ernest Shackleton was a bull of a man with a quick temper and little patience for fools. Yet he had a gift for managing people—something that proved invaluable when he and his men were marooned in Antarctica after fierce ice crushed their ship in the Weddell Sea. During the 15-plus months they were stranded, Shackleton did everything he could to keep his men united. He did his share of every chore, no matter how menial, and insisted everyone get the same rations and do the same work, no matter their class or rank. He held poker games and played phonograph music to alleviate boredom, and even shared his tent with the three most troublesome personalities on the expedition so he could keep them in check. He finally sailed a lifeboat more than 1,000 miles to get help. Every single man survived.
When faced with what seems like an insurmountable obstacle, how will your characters react? What unexpected things will they do?
Putting people in strange settings gives them a chance to grow. When a bunch of 19-year-old soccer players found themselves alone in the Andes with little food, shelter, or means to melt snow for water, some curled up and waited to die and some immediately started searching for ways to get help. And the “natural leaders” weren’t necessarily the ones who took charge in this bizarre and unexpected setting. What will your characters do if they find themselves in a different world?
People form unusual alliances under duress. Look at the friendship that develops between Gimli the dwarf and Legolas the elf in Lord of the Rings, for example. Which of your characters might be drawn closer together in tough times? Why? What conditions or circumstances might blow them apart?
I’m pondering all of these as I navigate my early way through my work-in-progress. Because after all, isn’t writing a novel a survival story of its own?
Have observations on survival stories? What are your favorites, and what do you take from them?
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About Kathleen McCleary
Kathleen McCleary is the author of three novels—House and Home, A Simple Thing, and Leaving Haven—and has worked as a bookseller, bartender, and barista (all great jobs for gathering material for fiction). A Simple Thing (HarperCollins 2012) was nominated for the Library of Virginia Literary Awards. She was a journalist for many years before turning to fiction, and her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Good Housekeeping, Ladies Home Journal, and USA Weekend, as well as HGTV.com, where she was a regular columnist. She taught writing as an adjunct professor at American University in Washington, D.C., and teaches creative writing to kids ages 8-18 as an instructor with Writopia Labs, a non-profit. She also offers college essay coaching (http://thenobleapp.com), because she believes that life is stressful enough and telling stories of any kind should be exciting and fun. When she's not writing or coaching writing, she looks for any excuse to get out into the woods or mountains or onto a lake. She lives in northern Virginia with her husband and two daughters and Jinx the cat.
“Because after all, isn’t writing a novel a survival story of its own?”
That line is going on a sticky note.
Thank you Kathleen for this post. My current WIP is a survival story too, so this is timely. Except in the story Alive, I’ve always enjoyed reading the ingenuity of characters in survival situations. What they come up with to keep going always sticks with me due to the slim chance that I might end up in a simular situation. Need to start a fire? Look for a bird’s nest since they make great kindling. Need a compass but don’t have one? Rub a needle against silk to magnetize it, then put it on a leaf floating in a puddle. Will I ever use this knowledge? Probably not, but I won’t forget it and that’s the power of these stories.
There’s a book I wish would get an english translation called ‘Un tocard sur let toit du monde’ (An idiot on the mountain) by Nadir Dendoune. He was the first French-Algerian to climb Everest and did it with no previous climbing experience.
Glad the post resonated with you, James. I’m gonna keep looking for an English translation of that Dendoune book. Happy writing!
Thank you, Kathleen. I, too, love the survival stories (have read all the ones you mentioned) and love watching documentaries about ships caught in the ice and how the crew perished or survived – yeah, I know, I’m a true geek. I hadn’t connected it to writing, but you are sooooo right. Giving your characters a chance to grow allows the avatar/reader an insight into human nature. And as James mentioned above, writing itself is a test of survival.
I thought you might enjoy reading this article by the great David Grann. Talk about survival!! Try crossing Antartica by yourself – hope you enjoy.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/02/12/the-white-darkness
Hi, Lorraine. I READ that incredible story last week and it was part of what inspired my post. Terrific narrative. Glad the connection between the survival stories we both love and our writing struck a chord for you.
Hi, Kathleen:
Wonderful post. I particularly found insightful the remark that people form unusual alliances under duress. This is so important. Too often we as writers tend to imagine our characters in isolation, especially in moments of extreme struggle. The importance of secondary characters is precisely the degree to which they echo and summon forth various aspects of the main character’s psychological and emotional makeup — especially unconscious ones.
Thanks for the rmeinder.
P.S. On the subject of “survival” stories: I recently read W.B. Sledge’s “With The Old Breed,” which was the basis of the HBO series “The Pacific.” One of the insights I found fascinating, beyond the fact that few things were cherished more than a dry pair of socks during the battle of Okinawa, was how many marines re-enlisted after rotating stateside. When they returned to duty, their stunned squad-mates would ask why the hell they came back to the hell of combat. They’d reply that not only did they no longer fit in back home, they were disgusted by what they saw. “You wouldn’t believe what people complain about.”
This is another excellent point, about the return to ordinary life after living through extraordinary circumstances. That’s something our characters sometimes have to face, too, and it’s worth thinking through even if it’s not a part of the story that gets written. Thanks for your comments!
Yes! The return is the part of the story I’m most fascinated by these days.
Very thought-provoking post.
Aren’t all good stories survival stories? Not always physical survival of course, but things at least or even more important that that? A love one, a relationship, a reputation, a legacy. An MC’s perception of themselves, their worldview, their faith.
And in all good stories, isn’t there always something that does not survive? Perhaps the MC themselves, because their own survival isn’t the most important thing. Perhaps their innocence. Or perhaps their world-view or their faith.
So something is always saved, and something is always lost. And it now occurs to me that the most important agency the MC can have, the ultimate expression of their unique character, is choosing what.
Thanks, Kathleeen, that hadn’t occurred to me before.
I love this insight, PCGE. Thanks for sharing it with all of us. It’s very, very true that something is always saved, and something is lost. Nicely put.
I love survival stories and it’s really when you throw someone into the crucible that they are tested and we discover what they’re really made of. As PCGE says, all good stories are ultimately survival stories. Thanks for a great post.
Thanks for the comment, Vijaya! Hope your writing is going well.
Thanks for this post, Kathleen! During a challenging time in my life I read lots of what I called explorer books: books about Shackleton and Robert Falcon Scott; Saint-Exupery and Beryl Markham’s books about the early days of aviation; books about Gertrude Bell, Freya Stark and Martha Gellhorn. As with your survival stories, what I took from them was what comes out when you put people in strange circumstances. Also something David Corbett mentioned on Vaughn Roycroft’s excellent post a couple of days ago about what moves us: their “bravery in the face of heartbreak, defeat, or sacrifice”.