Fight scene help

I seem to have trouble illustrating emotion in fight scenes. I know emotions that you'd be feeling; shock, pain, fear, etc. But I can't really think of a good ways to put that stuff in without the cliche "fear sliced through him". It's not much of a problem in the later stages of my story since most fighting there is done by two characters who are good at fighting (and thus fear isn't much of an issue for them), but there are scenes where the fights are done by kids with no experience whatsoever with their weapons.

Merenor wrote:I’m the one who watched you fight, Xavier. You might as well just be wielding a giant grain of rice than that sword. At least you can eat rice.”

Any tips? Ideas?

Merlin34 wrote:I seem to have trouble illustrating emotion in fight scenes. I know emotions that you'd be feeling; shock, pain, fear, etc. But I can't really think of a good ways to put that stuff in without the cliche "fear sliced through him". It's not much of a problem in the later stages of my story since most fighting there is done by two characters who are good at fighting (and thus fear isn't much of an issue for them), but there are scenes where the fights are done by kids with no experience whatsoever with their weapons.

I'm actually a fan of the whole "fear sliced through him" thing, assuming that it feels authentic and it's not repetitive, but here's another suggestion - showing emotion through physiological reactions.

When you get into a fight:

* Adrenalin kicks in.
* Your heartrate speeds up.
* You focus in very tightly on what's going on.
* Your hands might shake.
* You could get butterflies/a churning feeling in your stomach.
* Your reactions are quick and instinctive.
* You don't feel pain so much.

It's the classic fight-or-flight reaction. I think it quite nicely illustrates emotion. When you panic your heart stutters, you drop things and scrabble around. It's also very tangible and easy for the reader to imagine, since everyone's experienced this fight-or-flight response.

Other suggestions:

1. Sentence structure can be useful. Short sentences are punchy. Active. But stuttery runaway sentences are panic reactions.

2. You can also use punctuation: dashes -- break up a sentence -- creates a breathless feeling.

3. Impact words suggest, well, impact. For example: jolt, hit, smash, crash, punch.

4. Don't be afraid to convey what the narrator is thinking, as long as it doesn't bog down the fight scene into too much internalisation. It makes a big difference if the narrator wants to run, than if he wants to fight back and hurt and kill.

Just a few thoughts. I'll keep an eye on this thread.

Another good way to capture emotion is a lot of glorious bloody description of the battle itself. Just don't go overboard. Enough to keep the audience tense and a bit shocked perhaps, but not enough to disgust them so much they put down the book. This way, you don't always have to describe directly the fear and shock the characters are experiencing. You can show it just as clearly by immersing the reader himself in the thrill of the fight.

Writers are always told to appeal to the senses. In battle, this becomes even more important. Describe exactly what the characters are seeing/hearing/feeling/smelling/tasting during the fight.

Ditto to what Karsten said about the sentence structure. There's also this wonderful thing called line breaks. Sentences isolated on one line are powerful.

Hope that helps!

I agree with Karsten ^^ Those are very helpful ways to describe a fight scene with young kids.

Remember that when you're young, you're still afraid. There's still a battle inside yourself trying to decide whether to fight or runaway. You wonder if it's alright to kill someone and you don't think about the outcome.

It's usually a sudden rush of your blood, a sudden urge. You feel your blood pulse through your veins and your hearbeat start running wild. You think about your foe. Is this person an enemy? A friend?

If it's someone you hate, revenge will consume your body, and you'll do all that you can to wipe your enemy off the face of the earth. Of course later you'll realize what you've done, and feel awful (most of the time).

Your hands might get sweaty, and your knees might start to shake. If it's in first person you can describe how the character tries to keep strong and steady even though it seems like the world is quaking beneath his feet.

Breaths are also a sign of fear, or panic. Your heartbeat may increase, but your breathing will probably slow down until you start jumping around and tossing the sword. If they're inexperienced, you can use a simile comparing the sword fight to when the character was playing fight with breadsticks.

You're body would also feel heavy if you think about what you're going to do too much. Once you get over that, you start moving by impulse and reactions. Then you're feet feel light and adrenaline kicks in. Instincts kick in. Now you're fighting for you life.

Hope that was helpful ^^
-Shina