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Q&A How can I make the final realisation less depressing?

A good story creates an experience. The reader draws their own conclusions and has their own emotional reactions to the experience it provided. Some will therefore find your ending more of a downer...

posted 7y ago by Mark Baker‭  ·  last activity 5y ago by System‭

Answer
#4: Attribution notice removed by user avatar System‭ · 2020-01-03T20:41:53Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/27915
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T06:25:44Z (about 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/27915
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T06:25:44Z (about 5 years ago)
A good story creates an experience. The reader draws their own conclusions and has their own emotional reactions to the experience it provided. Some will therefore find your ending more of a downer than others.

What we want from stories is not necessarily uplift. It can be understanding. It can be acceptance. Understanding and acceptance of life's limitations can be far more satisfying than a false or facile hope that we know to be false. Indeed, the facile hope can mock the understanding and undermine the acceptance, making us actually feel worse.

In other words, whatever your subject and your theme is it better to be truthful about them that to be fatuously optimistic. Any good feeling that result from false optimism is brittle, and when it breaks we can plunge into despair.

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2017-05-05T15:45:20Z (over 7 years ago)
Original score: 1