Secrets in Fiction

Secrets propel narrative, reveal character, draw us in. What can LION KING teach us about using secrets to shaping narrative?

Secrets animate us. They fill us with excitement or shame. They give us something to guard and protect or else they become the heavy burdens we carry that we tell no one. And when we do tell someone our secret: isn’t this what brings us closer? A marker of what someone means to you, that you could tell them this?

But for writers, secrets are powerful tools we can use to propel our narrative, reveal character, and draw our readers in.

If you’re learning how to write, or in the middle of your novel or story, considering the secrets in your narrative (what is withheld? by whom and from whom?) can help you work through your story, and can even provide a vague blueprint for your narrative’s structure (what needs to be revealed, and when?)

This post is the first in a two part series that uses The Lion King to illustrate the different types of secrets in narrative. I’ll explore four types total, the first two are here. But my main objective is to help you generate material by providing prompts and questions that can deepen your understanding of your character and their secrets. To get the most out of it, I suggest reading it with your notebook nearby and stopping to free write the moment a question triggers something in you.

Let’s be real. I chose the Lion King simply because I love it. It has remained my all time favorite movie since I first saw it at three years old. I’m writing this assuming we’ve all seen it. And if you haven’t, well. Please don’t read this and watch that classic instead.

xx

Fatima Farheen

SECRETS IN FICTION: The Lion King edition

Note: Think of your character or the fictional world you are developing as we go through each section. Keep your notebook at hand and try to answer some of the questions and prompts posed here.

Questions we will explore:

• What is the function of a secret in narrative?

• What are the different types of secrets, and what effect does each type have on the narrative arc, developing character, and on us as readers?

• What is the relationship between the secret and what we think of as “character” and “plot”?

• What is the emotional cost of keeping the secret? What transformation does a character undergo when the secret is revealed? And how does both the withholding and revelation affect the plot?