Setting

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Setting
Feature Menu
Setting Setting, Mood, and Tone Setting and
Character Setting and Conflict Practice
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Setting
Setting draws us into the world of a story.
Details of setting tell us

• where and when events are happening

• how the situation feels

• who the characters are

• what challenges the characters face

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Setting
Details about a place usually are an essential
part of a story.

• The setting may include peoples customshow they
  live, dress, eat, and behave.

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Setting
Setting also may reveal a time frame.
era
time of day
season
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Setting, Mood, and Tone
Setting can add to a storys emotional effectits
mood or atmosphere.
relaxed, carefree
foreboding, mysterious
lonely, sad
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Setting, Mood, and Tone
Details of setting also help express tonethe
writers attitude toward a subject or character.
Listen to this passage. What is Mark Twains
tone? What details help create that tone?
The furniture of the hut was neither gorgeous nor
much in the way. The rocking-chairs and sofas
were not present, and never had been, but they
were represented by two three-legged stools, a
pine-board bench four feet long, and two empty
candle-boxes. The table was a greasy board on
stilts, and the table-cloth and napkins had not
comeand they were not looking for them, either.
from Roughing It by Mark Twain
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Setting, Mood, and Tone
Quick Check
What details reveal the location?
The water is now just below my windows on the
ninth floor. There is nothing to do but watch.
The water is filthythere had been the six-week
garbage strike, and all the citys garbage is
awashand the seagulls are everywhere,
feasting. from Notes from a Bottle by James
Stevenson
What details reveal the situation? What mood do
they create?
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Setting, Mood, and Tone
Quick Check
What details reveal the location?
The water is now just below my windows on the
ninth floor. There is nothing to do but watch.
The water is filthythere had been the six-week
garbage strike, and all the citys garbage is
awashand the seagulls are everywhere,
feasting. from Notes from a Bottle by James
Stevenson
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Setting, Mood, and Tone
Quick Check
What details reveal the situation? What mood do
they create?
The water is now just below my windows on the
ninth floor. There is nothing to do but watch.
The water is filthythere had been the six-week
garbage strike, and all the citys garbage is
awashand the seagulls are everywhere,
feasting. from Notes from a Bottle by James
Stevenson
Flooded city threatening, chaotic mood
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Setting and Character
Setting also can reveal character.

• What do these details tell you about Meg?

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Setting and Conflict
In some stories, the characters environment

• provides the main conflict

• directly affects the storys meaning

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Practice
Work alone or with a partner to
plan a story in which setting will play a major
role. Use a chart like the one shown here.
Time Late one winter night, early 1950s
Place Run-down mansion in rural Scotland
Details of setting that affect mood or tone Outsidedense fog howling dog Insideticking clock cold, damp rooms
Details of setting that reveal character Bare rooms with few chairs no rugs dim light hundreds of books in piles and bookcases
Details of setting that affect conflict and meaning Isolated mansion doors locked and barred
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The End
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Setting and Conflict
Conflict is the struggle or clash between
opposing characters, forces, or emotions in a
story.

• character vs. character

• character vs. society

• character vs. nature

• character vs. self