Elements of a short story

1. 5 Key Elements of a Short Story
Writers like Anton Chekhov, O. Henry, Alice Munro, and Tobias Wolff are all big names in the
short story genre. How do these writers craft such remarkable stories? They are the true
masters at combining the five elements of a short story: plot, character, setting, conflict, theme.
These five elements make short stories the best starting point for novice writers. They’re short
and fairly simple, so the writer gets a chance to focus on the plot, character, and theme. Short
stories also offer writers the opportunity to see their writing flourish as a piece of fiction— a
great confidence boost!
If you wish to write stories that are worthy of publishing, you must understand the characteristics
of a short story. To help you get there, let’s take a careful look at these five short story
elements.
How do the five elements of a short story work? How can you naturally inculcate them in your
stories, and how can you tie them up to create one coherent whole?
Here are the five key elements of a short story:
1. Plot
2. Character
3. Setting
4. Conflict
5. Theme
Let’s take a closer look at these elements and figure out how you should use them in a short
story.
#1 Plot
A simple way to define plot is to call it a sequence of events in your narrative. It is a
cause-and-effect chain of events that has a beginning point, a climax, and a resolution.
Plot- is a series of events and character actions that relate to the central conflict.
Writers use the plot to map out their story before beginning with their writing process. For fiction
writing, this serves as a creative outline. So, an understanding of the plot is crucial to make your
story impactful and craft a compelling narrative.
The sequence of events in a plot is tied to the central conflict in a story. The plot develops as
the protagonist struggles with their given problem, finds a solution, and eventually accepts the
results.
Six succinct stages of a plot
1. Exposition: An introduction of characters, setting, and the conflict, providing all the
necessary background information.
2. Opening incident: The incident that leads the main character to conflict and begins the plot.
3. Rising action: The conflict develops and takes on newer, more complicated incidents,
leading to the climax.

2. 4. Climax: The conflict reaches a peak, which then leads to a change in the course of events,
giving the reader a new understanding of the story either through an event or an insight.
5. Falling action: The conflict gets resolved and action slows down.
6. Resolution: The conflict ends, leaving the reader fulfilled.
Plot as a short story element
Often, plots in short stories are simple but end up delivering great suspense, followed by a
grand moment of revelation. For this reason alone, plot was once considered the most important
of all the five elements of a short story.
Modern short stories are often focused on the nuances of character and setting, so plot
becomes secondary. However, plot is the spine of any given narrative, so it still features first in
our study of the short story elements!
Every paragraph, every sentence, and every word should lead the reader closer to the climax.
Cut anything that doesn’t serve this purpose. Short stories give you a very small space to work
with, so brevity becomes important.
Some techniques to add more kick to your story are creating suspense, foreshadowing,
flashback, and a short story staple, the surprise ending.
#2 Character
Your characters are the people, animals, or other figures who appear in your stories.
They perform actions and say dialogue to move the story along. Without characters, a
story can’t exist.
Character-is a person or sometimes even an animal, who takes part in the action of a short
story or other literary work.
Depending on how you see it, a character can be classified as either round or flat, dynamic or
static, a protagonist or an antagonist. For a short story, well-rounded and dynamic characters
will be your strength.
The easiest way to write interesting characters is to make sure that they have a flaw. Always
keep in mind that in any story, perfect characters fall flat.
Writing characters for short stories
Be careful that you don’t put too much emphasis on character traits and backstory. Unlike
novels, characters in a short story are only glimpsed at, rather than seen in the round.
You may say that characteristics of a short story are abbreviated versions of the same in novels.
So, short stories will feature only two or three major characters, while novels can boast a dozen!
Short stories can be great character studies, but a good rule of thumb is to focus
on dialogue and action.
#3 Setting
Ever felt transported to another world while reading a short story? That’s the work of a writer
who can imagine and write a whole other world into being.

3. This element of a short story is crucial in making it real to the reader. The setting establishes a
time, place, and environment in which the characters and events of the story are based.
Setting- The setting of the story is the time and place in which it happens. You could use
descriptions of landscape, scenery, buildings, seasons or weather to provide a strong sense of
setting.
Aspects of setting:
1. Time: A story is usually set in a time period. This includes the historical time of the story, its
specific time frame, and even the time of the day when the events take place.
2. Place: Place is the geographical landscape, real or imaginary, where a particular story
unfolds.
3. Environment: The environment of a story can include anything from weather conditions to
the social, cultural, and political backdrop to a given story.
For example, Guy de Maupassant’s short story The Necklace takes place during the 19th
century in the city of Paris, and has the environmental backdrop of class difference in French
society.
Like the main conflict of class difference in The Necklace, all other characteristics of a short
story derive from its setting. When well-designed, this can also help set up the dominant
emotional tone. Of course, it takes a significant amount of research to deliver a setting both
beautifully and believably.
#4 Conflict
Conflict is closely linked to the theme of a narrative, as it motivates the characters and
affects the plot. It usually surfaces when the protagonist (main character) faces an
obstacle or hardship. Conflict forms “the heartbeat of a story”, so your story needs to have a
defining conflict in order to make an impact on the reader’s mind.
Conflict-A struggle between two people or things in a short story. The main character is usually on one
side of the central conflict.
There are two main types of conflict: internal conflict and external conflict.
Types of conflict
1. Internal conflict is a person’s struggle with themselves. It takes place inside the psyche of a
character, such as Hamlet’s conflicted state of mind about how to take revenge for his father’s
murder.
2. External conflict takes place between different people, or groups of people. It is possible to
further divide this type of conflict based on who or what the protagonist(s) are struggling against.
For example, the conflict in A Game of Thrones is between kingdoms, but also between people
and the supernatural elements of the fantasy world.
Regardless of the types of conflict you choose, making it believable will hold the reader’s
attention. Various literary devices like mystery, causality, empathy, surprise, insight, universality,

4. or simply high stakes for the character, all add a different dimension of conflict to the plot.
Conflict drives your story and makes it interesting.
#5 Theme
A theme is what children would call the moral of the story. It can be the subject of the
story, or an idea that runs through it, or simply the message that is conveyed from the
writer to the reader through the short story. The writer can use all the other characteristics of
a short story to best articulate their theme into words.
Theme- Is the central idea or belief in a short story.
A well-told story, the kind which gets published or made into a film, explains itself. For example,
while reading O. Henry’s short story The Gift of the Magi, you can easily understand that the
story is about the value of love and sacrifice. In this way, theme is implied rather than stated
explicitly, and it is up to the writer’s skill to best convey it through their writing.
Now that you know the five elements of a short story, you can go ahead and write your own. We
expect to find your manuscript on a story editor’s desk very soon!