Worldbuilding
Make a setting choice matter in a scene
An optional craft exercise with an invented example.
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A setting detail can be vivid without giving a character anything to do. If your notes are full of interesting customs but the scene feels detached from them, try tracing one detail into a practical choice. You can keep the detail decorative if that is what the scene needs; this is simply a way to explore another use for it.
Shariann Lewitt’s MIT fantasy workshop notes contrast using real history, with its supplied details and restrictions, against inventing a setting. The Session 9 notes are brief prompts, not a complete theory of worldbuilding. They provide the starting distinction here; the example and procedure that follow are original editorial work. Source: MIT OpenCourseWare, Session 9, Fall 2016.
Follow the detail to a person
Imagine a fictional hill town where every public doorway faces uphill. That is an image. Now give it a local consequence: deliveries must approach from the steep side of the street. A furniture maker, Sera, has promised to bring a table to the community kitchen before supper.
At first, you might write:
Sera hauled the table through the town’s narrow streets. All the doors faced uphill, their painted lintels bright in the rain.
The detail helps us picture the place. To explore its effect on action, try:
Sera stopped below the kitchen with the table strapped to her cart. The door was one level higher, around the long bend. Above her, a cook opened a window. “We can take the legs off,” he called. She had glued them that morning.
Now the arrangement of the street bears on Sera’s immediate problem. She might ask for help carrying the table, delay the delivery, or admit that she measured the kitchen but never checked the approach. You have several possible continuations. You do not need to make the architecture symbolize everything the town believes.
Decide what else follows—and what does not
Would a rule about uphill doors apply to every building, only public buildings, or only older ones? The answer can change the scene. A newer kitchen might have a loading entrance. An old rule might survive in ceremonies but no longer in construction.
Choose the scope deliberately. Then look back at your wording. If you describe every doorway as identical, readers have less reason to expect an exception than if you describe a local pattern Sera has noticed.
You need not invent a single cause for every custom. The town may have competing explanations. If a character repeats one, the story can present it as that person’s belief rather than verified history.
Try one changed condition
Pick a setting detail from your notes. Give a character an ordinary task affected by it: carrying something, meeting someone, getting warm, finding a quiet place, or returning home.
Write a short attempt at the task. Then change one condition. Does the custom apply at night? Does a newcomer know it? Does someone have an exception? Write the next attempt and compare the choices now available.
Keep a version if it gives you something you want to explore. If it complicates the scene without helping it, return to the simpler version. A setting is allowed to contain ordinary, unremarked details.
If you are using real history
Separate the historical claim from the invented change. In your notes, state what you have checked, what you changed, and what you have not established. Do not use this fictional hill town as evidence about an actual place or culture. A researched historical scene needs sources appropriate to its specific claims.
Source and limits
The MIT notes support the distinction between supplied historical constraints and invented choices. They do not supply the doorway example, endorse this exercise, or demonstrate a reader benefit. No course image, literary excerpt, or worksheet is reproduced. The source belongs to a larger course whose unread sessions are not being represented here. Primary Session 9 text checked September 20, 2026.
Sources
- Source: MIT OpenCourseWare, Session 9, Fall 2016 — See the scope and limitations in the guide.