Are you a Pantser or Plotter?
Do you thrive in Organised Chaos when preparing your story?
How important is it to outline your novel?
by John Gerard Fagan
So you have an idea for a novel but don’t know if you should just go ahead and write and see what comes out or make a detailed outline before you start. It’s not an easy decision and many successful writers have thought about this too – and there’s a divide between what they think works best.
The first group are called pantsers and they don’t make any outline, while the others are called plotters and they do the opposite. Both sides are very vocal about what’s the best way to write. We’ll have a look at each side to give you a better idea before you decide.
What is a Pantser?
A pantser is someone who, “flies by the seat of their pants,” meaning they don't plan out anything, or plan very little. Some people, like me, call themselves “plantsers,” which means they're in a little of both. In reality, most people are plantsers, but some tend to lean heavily to one side.
Pantsers – no outline
Famous pantsers include Harper Lee, George R.R. Martin, Margaret Atwood, Stephen King, Ray Bradbury, Cormac McCarthy, Anne Lamott, and Haruki Murakami. Pantsers don’t know where their story is going to go – their story tells itself, so it will bring them surprises. Their story can end up being a little disorganised in their early drafts. However, they get to know their characters really well, which means they’ll usually have strong, well written characters.
“I am a hopeless pantser, so I don't do much outlining. A thought will occur to me, and I'll just throw it into the story. I tell myself I'll worry about untangling it later. I'm glad no one sees my first drafts except for my poor editor and agent.” - Marie Lu
Plotters – outline
On the other side, famous plotters include J. K. Rowling, Sylvia Plath, John Irving, Charles Dickens, Edgar Allan Poe, Terry Brooks, and Orson Scott Card. Plotters have a detailed outline and know where their stories are headed, so their stories are much less disorganised from the first draft. They tend to have a strong ending that makes sense from the very beginning, but they can have weaker characters as there is no room for the characters to develop within a set-in-stone outline.
“I’m not a plotter or a schemer. I’m a guy that looks at problems and tries to solve them, which I have done all of my career.” — John Kasich
Should you outline or not then?
Well, there’s no right or wrong answer here – it just depends what suits your writing style and what feels more comfortable. Harry Potter worked best being outlined for Rowling, while The Handmaid’s Tale suited Atwood being unshackled. It’s not the case that all outlined novels are better or vice-versa – both ways can produce great novels. You can experiment and see what you feel more comfortable doing.
You might find yourself falling into a hybrid group that’s sometimes called pantsers. These are the ones who do a bit of outlining but are not committed to it when they get around to the actual writing and will change the path of the story at any time if called for. Successful writers like Donna Tartt and Dan Brown fall into this category.
Short story writing for practise
Writing short stories is a great way of seeing what method works best for you without spending too much time. You can try out the exercise below and be a plotter for scenario one and a pantser for scenario two.
Scenario one: a girl finds a secret door in her grandmother’s house.
Before you start writing, make some notes on the girl’s name, age, appearance, her personality, family history, where the story is set, what time of year it is, any other characters that will feature in the story, the place where the story will begin, what she will find behind the door, and finally how it will end. Once you have all of this, begin to write your story.
Scenario two: a boy sees a new girl moving into the haunted house next door.
No planning here – just start writing and see where the story leads.
Decision time on outlining
From these simple scenarios, you’ll be able to discover what feels more natural and what gave you the best results so you can follow that method in the future. So should you outline your story? That question is one that only you can answer. Experiment, try out the different methods or even combine them, and see what you can come up with.
Come and Meet John Gerard Fagan
A Scottish writer and Creative Writing Assistant Professor. He writes in both English and Scots and in a number of genres, including Japanese historical fiction and crime noir. He moved back to Scotland in late 2019 after being in Japan for the last decade.
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