How Can the Setting Be Used to Communicate the Emotion of a Character?

Although it's easy to become distracted by the challenges of telling a coherent story, it's really the relationship your readers have with your characters that will make or break the tale you tell. Telling the readers what a character feels is boring, and it's not always possible to directly convey character emotions through dialogue or narrative. The setting of your story is fertile ground for conveying a character's feelings without overwhelming your reader.

Convey the Mood

Using the setting of your store to convey the tale's overall tone or a character's emotions works best when a character's mood comports with the setting. For example, in Aldous Huxley's "After Many a Summer Dies the Swan," Joseph Stoyte is terrified of death and this fear dominates his approach to life. He employs researchers to study the secrets of longevity and takes a young lover -- an act that demonstrates his self-consciousness about his mortality. These story elements can help your readers get a fix on what your main character is feeling. Other characters, art, literature, the weather and other elements of the setting can also offer clues.

Show Characters Interacting With Settings

The way a character interacts with the setting provides valuable insight about his mood. Some writers show a glum character getting angry in a utopic setting to demonstrate frustration, while others show characters drawing from their setting and matching their moods to it. Albert Camus' "The Stranger" is an example of the former. The main character, Mersault, becomes embroiled in a murder and trial but remains largely emotionless and stoic throughout the ordeal, despite the stressful and threatening setting. This contrast between the setting and the character helps displays Mersault's detached mental state.

Offer Thoughts on Setting

A character's thoughts on her own setting can provide significant insight into the character's emotions and mood without ever directly stating them. James Joyce's "Ulysses," for example, is built around Leopold Bloom's journeys through Dublin, Ireland. Each character has several lengthy internal monologues about the setting itself and his reaction to it. Through these monologues, Joyce provides information about the characters' emotions, histories and goals.

Rely on Dialogue

Other characters are an indispensable part of your story's setting and can help set the overall tone of the book. Lewis Carroll's "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" is an excellent example of how absurd and intriguing characters can help establish the setting in an unfamiliar land. Alice's conversations with these characters help chronicle her reactions to her new location by displaying confusion, curiosity, fear and a host of other emotions without ever directly mentioning or identifying those emotions.