“If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third chapter it absolutely must go off.” – Anton Chekhov
This rule of story writing, often quoted, is considered elementary. When I learned it in college, it was a revelation. I had always thought the purpose of fiction was to mirror real life in an interesting way. But here is was: the shameless admission from a renowned short story master that art was artificial. Consciously artificial.
Whereas in real life, a gun could hang on a wall as a silent showpiece, in stories they always fired. Had to fire. Unlike real guns, they were not allowed to hang peacefully on a mantle. Stories were not real life; they were tightly constructed, clockwork machines.
In every book or movie I saw after that, whenever I saw a gun, I thought, “Are they going to follow the rule? Is the gun going to go off?”
The gun always went off. The writers were conscientious professionals who could have probably quoted the rule. At first I was amused and intrigued; then disappointed; then bored.
The drama seemed too mechanized. I imagined script doctors shaking their heads as they read the manuscript, saying, “You need to either make this gun go off or you need to take it out.” I had mixed feelings. I could understand wanting to trim the fat from a story, but did the writers have to be so predictable? Did the gun have to go off every time?
My annoyance went beyond mere boredom. Recently I wrote a story in which guns played a large role. The whole time the Chekhov rule hung over me like an angry cloud about to shoot lightening on my scalp if I failed to make all the guns go off.
My discomfort has prompted such questions as, “If you have many guns in a story, must they all go off before the story ends?” Or, “What if the guns have a differentpurpose, such as frightening someone? If a gun scares a cashier into parting with money in a cash register, is not an adequate story purpose for the gun, a figurative way for the gun to “go off?”
Certainly, in real life this happens. Therefore, the Chekhov rule, if literally followed, constrains how much an author can mirror reality, and limits creativity by predetermining part of a story before it is even written.
I wonder what Chekhov intended with his proclamation. I like to think he simply meant that nothing should be introduced in a story without a purpose. After all, when Chekhov made the statement he was talking about an unnecessary block of dialogue in a play he had seen; he was using a gun as a metaphor to illustrate why dialogue should not be shoehorned into a play unnecessarily.
Hoping that Chekhov meant the rule figuratively, I began searching for incidences of movies using guns to fulfill another purpose besides “going off,” certain I would fine one. Every time I saw a cinematic robbery, I would say, “Maybe this will be it.” But after the robbery, the gun still always fired. I could find no exceptions to the Chekhov rule being literally obeyed.
While guns always went off, this was not true of bombs. I saw many shows in which a bomb was set at the beginning of a story, only to be deactivated in a split second before it was timed to go off. The bomb had served its purpose of driving character action, and that was enough.
So why are guns any different? Is it because a gun was the metaphor Chekhov chose to illustrate the necessity of details having purpose?
Groping for a better explanation, I wondered if guns were a special case because guns are only designed to shoot. But when I tried to apply the concept more broadly, I ran into problems. It would mean that everything introduced in a story must fulfill, not just the artistic purpose of the author, but its known function.
In that case, a fireplace in a story must always be lit. A doorbell must always chime. A computer must always compute. A stove must always cook.
Under this interpretation, the rule puts considerable constraints on a writer. It means that a wood-burning stove must never be introduced as a side note to create a homey atmosphere. A car must never be shown in a driveway to show someone is home, unless it is going to be driven.
Creativity is smothered when writing becomes an obsessive compulsive need for the gun to “go off” every time.Writing is not only a craft, but an art that needs the ability to mirror life as it is, or as the artist sees it. There are no “rules” in writing, only tools that serve an artistic or practical purpose. When the tool becomes an end in itself, it is time to re-evaluate.
Whether it follows literary etiquette or not, a story needs to accomplish its own purpose. To have a gun go off every time misses the real point, which is that every detail needs a story reason for being there. If the story purpose of a lamp is to hit a villain over the head, then switching on the bulb is superfluous.
To break the Chekhov rule as literally stated is not a crime, but is at times an artistic imperative. Maybe one day Hollywood will see it that way, too.
I am still waiting.