Bring on the Bears

          Many years ago, while I was a student at UNC-Wilmington, I had the good fortune of studying under a man named Stanley Colbert. He offered a piece of advice I have never been able to forget: “When telling the story of ‘Goldilocks and the Three Bears,’ bring on the bears.”

          Mr. Colbert had an extensive career in film, television, and publishing. He produced the TV shows “Flipper” and “Fraggle Rock” and served as president of the Canadian division of HaperCollins. He was loud, gruff, and rough around the edges—he was the first (okay, only) professor to tell us we could all go f*** ourselves if we thought we were going to write a best seller right out of college. I’m a small town, small life, Southern girl; he was a big city, big life, New York fella who knew how to shock us all awake, both in class and in our way of thinking. Perhaps that is why this piece of advice has stuck with me all these (many) years later.

          Of course, it makes sense when one thinks about it logically: the highest moment of excitement in the story of Goldilocks is that moment when the bears return home. What will happen when they discover the broken chair and empty bowl? What will they do to the little girl asleep in Baby Bear’s bed? Suspense, tension, apprehension—it’s all there in that short fairy tale. And even though the ending of the story is rather anti-climactic, the point in the advice is clear. After all, it’s that moment of the bears returning home that the reader/listener is most interested in because it is the moment of “what will happen?”.

          As readers, we like conflict. We like those moments when the characters’ lives are spiraling out of control, when the quest hangs upon a precipice, when one wrong move could bring the whole kingdom crashing down or bring the family to ruin. We look for the bears to show up in every story because that is when the story takes off. It’s high excitement, high tension, high suspense—all the ingredients that anchor us to the text because, chances are, we have come to care about the characters on the page and are really rooting for them, one way or the other.

          This is also true for writers, and yet, developing conflict poses various challenges. Timing and pacing are both crucial factors to consider. For example, how much time should elapse before the inciting incident? How quickly should the problem develop? Readers can, and do, get bored if the writer drags out the introduction of the conflict. Goldilocks without the bears just isn’t worth telling. The bears add the drama, so once they leave their little cottage, at what point should they return? When the little girl is asleep and vulnerable is a good time, to be sure, although in reality, three bears against a small child is already a point in the bears’ favor.

          As an English teacher, I have seen the benefit of the bears showing up when my students are given a text to read (reading anything is blah when Netflix is so readily available – whatever). I taught 7^th grade for several years, and two texts we read were The Pearl by John Steinbeck and The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton. Both of these books engaged my students right from the beginning, which is why I had selected them. You could hear a pin drop in my room as they read about the scorpion on the baby’s cradle in Steinbeck’s tale, and, of course, Ponyboy’s assault as he is walking home from the movies had them flipping pages eagerly to find out what was going to happen. Even now in the 11^th grade (I moved up and got the same kids again all these years later), they remember these two stories fondly. That’s because the bears showed up early in both and remained a constant presence throughout. An added bonus is that both Steinbeck’s novella and Hinton’s novel ended on high moments of tension, unlike the fairy tale. The deaths of the baby Coyotito and Dally (like Johnny earlier in Outsiders) resonated with my students. Goldilocks is a naughty little girl who breaks into someone’s house and helps herself. As it is a child’s fairy tale, no maiming and tearing of the limbs happens as she runs away, which makes it a safe story for toddlers but also a bit of a letdown as it is this moment of conflict the reader/listener has been waiting for.

          For me, as a writer, I sometimes struggle with my bears. When I was working on The Swinging Doors, for example, it took nearly a dozen drafts (and 20+ years) to figure out that the life of a 19^th century prostitute couldn’t be “safe” and “nice,” which is where I am most comfortable. I had to be willing to make Ellie’s life dark and dangerous; I had to “bring on the bears.” The published version has the bears in chapter one, which is where they needed to be. The very first scene has Ellie unwillingly taking a customer to bed, and the very first chapter established the misery of her life and that of her siblings. Sometimes the bears should burst onto the scene right from the get-go; yet other times, they should wait in the wings for their cue. Knowing when to bring the conflict into the story takes something of a practiced eye. Introducing it too early can backfire, as the reader hasn’t had time to care about the character(s). Introducing it too late can result in a frustrated reader who puts the book down, never to pick it up again.

          My current WIP presently has no conflict. I know, right? Whatever. Two words—re-vision. I have been so focused on world-building and getting the two protagonists together that it appears I have left out the oh-so-important villain. I have written a scene of conflict; however, it happens much later in the story, and there are currently no breadcrumbs, as we say in my writers’ group, leading to that particular moment. The problem is, despite knowing who and what my bear is supposed to be in the story, I strayed off course and began adding too many “others.” The title of the fairy tale is “Goldilocks and the Three Bears,” and while Mr. Colbert’s advice is sound—bring on the bears—this most recent lesson has taught me the value of control and focus. Keep my eyes on the bears and ignore the witches and wolves circling the story.

          Sadly, Mr. Colbert is no longer with us. He passed away in 2010, and it has been nearly twenty years since I sat in his classroom, learning how a simple fairy tale from my childhood could turn into a philosophy for writers. Thank you, Mr. Colbert, for the lesson. Whether the bears are internal or external or a little bit of both, they are what make stories interesting, for both reader and writer.