How long should I mention an injured character’s pain?
My main character gets shot and survives. One thing that bothers me is a character who is injured and keeps going like the energizer bunny.
I try to set up for a rapid recovery, mentioning training that instilled stoicism, etc, but there are times and situations when he will be in pain and show it.
I add some realism by mentioning changing dressings and have him try to patch himself up a bit before limping off etc.
I want to be reasonable in this situation, but a point comes when someone might say ‘enough already he’s hurt, get on with it’.
Should I just wait until I reach that point?
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It's a fine balance you're trying to strike, between "unrealistically resistant to pain", and "we get it, get on with the story".
I'd say, try to use the reminders that "character is in pain" to propel the story forwards, rather than have them stall everything.
For example, in The Three Musketeers, when Athos is introduced, he is gravely wounded, and in fact collapses right in Treville's office. The scene illustrates the character's stoicism. Further on, the same wound serves as an excuse to set up a dramatic duel, and as means to make that duel scene more interesting and challenging. It is mentioned yet again when it serves to create a situation where d'Artagnan is separated from his new friends and lands in yet another duel, and once more quite some time later, when it is the excuse d'Artagnan & Co. get to leave Paris and go on the diamond studs quest. Athos is not superhuman - it takes his wound several months to fully heal, and at first it is a serious impediment. But each time it is mentioned, the story gains more than "he is in pain".
A different example: The Lord of the Rings. When Frodo is wounded with the Morgul Blade, his situation becomes the focus of the story. Each time his pain is mentioned, it serves to increase the tension - will he reach Rivendel in time? When Frodo is wounded again, in Moria, it is a setup to show Aragorn's imperfection as a leader. Wounded again by Shelob - it leads to major character moments for Sam (he takes the Ring, and does all kinds of stuff by himself). Yet another mention of all the past wounds, upon the return journey - this time we're talking about PTSD. This example is different in that Frodo is far from being a stoic warrior. Yet here too, each time pain is mentioned, it propels the story forwards.
For your story, how to apply the aforementioned theory: your character is in pain - what does it affect? How does it serve the story? What situations are made available by the fact that he is in pain?
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Galastel gave an already excellent answer about using the pain to propel the story forward.
I'll add my two cents:
What you want to avoid is showing the pain for the sake of it. As you said, you don't want your character to be immune to pain, and adding details such as changing dressings and dealing with a wound will add realism to the story. You should, however, indulge in those themes; since the readers can tell if you're overdoing it (to the point of misery porn, maybe).
Now it's a fine line between doing it properly and doing it too much. Since you want your character able to act after the wound (as opposed to being incapacitated by it) you need to keep the pain at a manageable level. For the sake of simplicity, I'm assuming that the bullet has exited the body and there is no major internal damage.
The point is mentioning the pain when it makes sense doing so: for example, if it's a gut shot, it may be worth making the character grit his teeth when he needs to bend over, putting weight on the wound.
But when does it make sense? I'm going for a metaphor, so follow me. It'sa bit like describing the character's appearance: it makes sense doing it at the start of the novel. If your protagonist has some striking physical feature, it's only natural that you'll want to describe it in detail. But it's usually a bad decision to go over the same information, at the same level of detail, twice: you would not be giving new data to the audience, nor you will be progressing the plot.
In short, even if your character has the most beautiful blue eyes, you don't want to fill paragraphs about them halfway trough the novel. You're still allowed to remember the audience that - mentioning them as the character does other things - but you can't linger.
Describing pain should work similarly. There is a initial peak - were the character feels the most pain and you can go over it in detail as much as you want, and it will be allright, since it would be a "new" experience that both character and audience need to go through. After the peak, the pain intensity should gradually lower - and so your descriptions should shorten. You're still allowed to describe it when it's relevant and when something new happens: how does the wound "reacts" when the character walks? How when he changes dressings?
But you don't want to go over the same description everytime the wounded character takes a step. After all, if the pain is so unbearable, he shouldn't walk after all!
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I'd say mention it whenever it affects the character's thoughts or behavior, or the outcome of plot elements. If the injury has no affects on the choices of characters or on the plot, then you can just say "It hurt, but it got better".
"The group started talking about changing the plan to a long hike tomorrow, and our hero put down his food. Our hero had lost his appetite thinking about making that journey on his wounded leg."
"Our hero clutched his wound as he walked and stumbled from chair to chair, and was unusually grumpy to his friends."
"Our hero took much longer to get ready to go, and avoided eye contact with Our Allied Antagonist, hoping to avoid ridicule."
How a person deals with an injury says a lot about them. Who do they share their pain with and who do they hide it from? Are they dejected or determined about the healing process? Do they stubbornly refuse to acknowledge how badly they are really hurt, or do they assess their limitations realistically and strive to nurture themselves back to health? Do they become grumpy, sleepy? Do they project their frustration or pain onto other story elements? Sometimes a traumatic injury can cause significant social tension only because the injured is looking for any excuse to vent anger and frustration, or because the injured is grumpy or needy and someone else gets easily offended.
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/39726. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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