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| The Iceberg Theory |
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| Months ago an editor phoned me regarding one of my stories, which was on its way to publication. She and the other editors had a question about the first line. Part of it had read, "�my mother had been gone for two years." She asked for clarification. "Did she die?"
"No," I said. "She just up and left." The editor suggested the opening sentence be written to clarify that the mother had left, not died. I told her I wanted the sentence to be left alone. I knew what happened, and how she left was not important to the rest of the story. What was important was that the mother was gone. I said I wanted the reader to gather her own impressions. Then I described the iceberg theory of writing, not very successfully, because she didn't seem to understand. She kept insisting that the how and why had to be explained. Eventually she said she would leave it alone. Then she brought up another thing. "How many sisters or brothers did the girl have? Were they older or younger?" "She had one sister, younger but--" The editor interrupted, "But it doesn't have anything to do with the rest of the story." Right. In the story I was focusing on one particular moment. The other extraneous details didn't matter. What was important was that the girl's mother was gone, and the girl went home to an empty house. I knew the details, but I wanted the reader to fill those in, experience the story as their own. Hemingway was the first to coin the iceberg theory in writing, that one-eighth of the story is showing, or "above water." He said, "Remove all but the most essential details and only suggest, rather than spell out the conflicts that lay beneath the scene. A writer shows only the tip of what may be a huge conflict." For instance Hemingway revised the opening scene of the then in progress THE SUN ALSO RISES from 109 to 34 words. He wanted to "relate both the love and pain that existed between Jake and Brett, underscoring the point that emotionally they did love each other." The "restraint of language" he used echoed the restraint of the characters and their inability to consummate their relationship. In another scene, Hemingway reduced a bull-fighting scene. Instead of showing every detail of the bull-fight he wrote, "It was not brilliant bull-fighting. It was perfect bull-fighting." Some writers make the mistake of overwriting or over explaining everything. Not every detail needs to be shown. The reader doesn't need to be spoon fed their impressions. Let the reader come away with his own experience or impressions. That is different from saying not to write your story well, to deliberately leave holes. Choose your details--the right details--so your reader can experience the story. In a Paris Review interview, Hemingway said, "If it is any use to know, I always try to write on the principle of the iceberg. There is 7/8 of it under water for every part that shows. Anything you know you can sliminate it and it only strengthens your iceberg. It is the part that doesn't show. If the writer omits something because he does not know it then there is a hole in the story." In summary, when you revise your stories, focus on what is essential to each scene. What is extraneous, leave out. Allow the reader to figure it out, to experience it as his own. Copyright 2003-2007 Rita Marie Keller Cacoethes-Scribendi Creative Writing Workshop |
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