Time as an antagonist

Having put up a revised version of the beginning of my MS in Critiques, one of the comments was that the opening lacked focus. This got me, well, focused on the book as a whole (thanks @Brian G Turner) and I've realised that there isn't an actual antagonist!

The book is dual time-line and there is an antagonist in the present seam (that does need ramping up) but, although the past has obstacles, the main antagonist is time. As this is passive I'm guessing that this will not be enough. I have had betas read the whole thing and they enjoyed it but I think I will need to add another element to the past side of it.

When I wrote the blurb for it, it seemed like I had all the elements needed:

"Whilst working on a skeleton in St. Albans, contemporary archaeologist, Charlie, is transported to AD60. Marvelling at the scenes around her, she’s enlisted to help native Briton, Isolda, reunite her family. After being used to pay off gambling debts to a loathsome man, Isolda’s vulnerable young niece, Yulla, is in peril. Travelling around late Iron Age Britain, they set out to find Yulla’s parents to help save her, meeting a charming Roman along the way. Boudicca’s rebellion is rumbling in the background, with the looming slaughter of a local Roman municipium imminent. Charlie needs to deal with this as well as with her modern life and relationships. Guilt over her sister’s disability and spirited acts of defiance against her controlling doctor and boyfriend, who believe she is teetering on the brink of madness, may send her over the edge. Can she save Isolda from being caught in the rebels’ wake and keep her sanity?"

There are stakes, ticking time-bombs and danger in both threads but on closer reflection, the past story-line has only passive obstacles. There isn't a 'big bad'.

So, my question is: do all stories need an antagonist?


This is why I love this site so much!!! They make me think of things I wouldn't think of

When I saw the thread title this came to mind.
Sapphire & Steel - Wikipedia

As long as there are real dangers which threaten our heroine and/or those she cares for, plus obstacles which impede/prevent her doing what she wants or needs to do, I don't think you also require a Big Bad who is sitting there plotting Dastardly Doings. I wouldn't say "time" is a passive obstacle, merely because it isn't sentient -- if someone has only minutes to escape before she is killed by a falling cliff or a tidal wave, it's still going to be pretty exciting, even though there's no human agency which has caused the cliff to fall or the wave to surge.

However... what I do think you need to avoid is a kind of "This happened -- ooh danger! -- then they went there, and that happened -- ooh, more danger!" where it's just a procession of incidents and no overall structure to the novel, which is what perhaps can happen in the absence of a sentient/controlling antagonist. You should be OK, since you have a structure based on a quest to reunite Isolde's family, but it's worth bearing in mind.

Having said that, do you think you can introduce an antagonist into the past, too? If you can, then it may well up the stakes. The loathsome man perhaps doesn't give up Yulla as easily as you might have planned, or doesn't die when you thought you'd killed him, so he follows them. Giving one's protagonists more problems is always a good idea!

Lex E. Darion said:

So, my question is: do all stories need an antagonist?

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Short answer. No.

Slightly longer answer. I can think of quite a few novels off the top of my head that don't have antagonists, but generate suspense, action and drama just as well.

Just to add to what TJ says, I think you can easily add characters who, from their viewpoint are doing nothing wrong or bad, but are antagonistic to your protagonists goals.

Timeslips make me think of that film when a modern US aircraft carrier finds itself next to Pearl Harbour on 6th Dec 1941...they decide finally to launch jets at the oncoming Japanese attack, when the 'time warp' opens up again so they are given a dilemma of changing history or getting back home.

You can make the time-line either work for the protagonist or against him. You can even use the time-line as antagonist in the disaster novels. Maybe even in the traditional SF storylines. Thing however is how you use it as it can be either relative simple, or it can be manically difficult to make it to work. Especially if you're using it to finish long works, like for example The Return of the King. Or Matrix 3.

Just don't make it sound like a history book.

The Martian had no antagonist, no bad guys, no-one died, there were no fist-fights...

The antagonist is there to provide tension and stakes. Whether it's time, diminishing resources, or an incipient eruption, the universe as antagonist is a tried-and-true trope.

The problems with writing this type of novel really are no different from writing with a conscious antagonist--each conflict on the way to the climax has to further the plot, either bringing the protagonist closer to success or to failure.

Lex E. Darion said:

do all stories need an antagonist?

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An antagonist is simply what stands in the way of the protagonist achieving their aims. Although it can be a person, it can be anything - a landscape, for example. Whatever it is, though, the protagonist is in a struggle to overcome it.

However, from your description, clearly Isolda has human antagonists and your protagonist will share very real dangers with her. Actually, from reading it, why not simply tell Isolda's story - is there really a need for a time-travelling archaeologist?

As TJ mentioned, not having a dependable conflict (which many times takes the localized form of an antagonist, for simplicity's sake) can make the story a bit unfocused and can fall prey to the dangers of constant diabolus ex machinas, ending up looking like episodic storytelling rather than a coherent plot--a main conflict is the glue that keeps it all from falling apart.

Big Bads aren't as important as conflict. It drives scenes, motivates characters, and raises stakes, which are the main things. If the conflict isn't clear-cut, the writing can get a bit purposeless. In The Martian, as mentioned above, the conflict is "staying alive with limited resources in subpar conditions". The hostile environment is sort of the "antagonist" despite not boasting any agency. The story sticks to the main conflict from beginning to end, and this consistency makes the story.

You guys are amazing! Thank you, thank you, thank you for all your comments! I'd got myself in a right tizz about it all. I knew there must be stories without a physical antagonist, but could I think of any?! Not on my nelly!

Vladd67 said:

When I saw the thread title this came to mind.
Sapphire & Steel - Wikipedia

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I'd heard of this series but never watched it - I'm surprised it was SF! I thought it was a cop show! Haha.

Brian G Turner said:

However, from your description, clearly Isolda has human antagonists and your protagonist will share very real dangers with her. Actually, from reading it, why not simply tell Isolda's story - is there really a need for a time-travelling archaeologist?

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I have thought about this myself, especially when I first started out - I'd written nearly a whole chapter without mentioning Charlie once! I don't know why I need the present aspect...maybe it has a element of a Mary-Sue? It would certainly clear up my first chapter problems! Not sure there's enough there without the other part though. Definitely something to think about.

The Judge said:

Having said that, do you think you can introduce an antagonist into the past, too? If you can, then it may well up the stakes. The loathsome man perhaps doesn't give up Yulla as easily as you might have planned, or doesn't die when you thought you'd killed him, so he follows them. Giving one's protagonists more problems is always a good idea!

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I've spent all day trying to think if I could introduce one but nothing has sprung so far. I think I need to have a good read through, it's been over a year since I've read it all.

Sort of agree with @Venusian Broon. The short answer is no. Or, to be more specific, yes and no. Or is that less specific?

In a story with multiple POVs it's quite possible for each character to be the antagonist for another character. That's how I try to set my stories up, so that the whole tapestry acquires a moral shade of grey, rather than black and white. If I have, say, two characters, both of whom could be "rooted for" by the reader, yet one's ambition is in diametric opposition to the other's, that's where really interesting conflict can be drawn.

Dennis E. Taylor said:

The Martian had no antagonist, no bad guys, no-one died, there were no fist-fights...

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You could argue that the antagonist is Mars itself, perhaps?

ETA: oops, just realised that @Ihe already said the same thing. Yeah, what he said.

Actually, it's one of the classic plots: a race against time. And it is one that will always interest readers because, one way or another, in big ways or small ones, we've all faced that same challenge many times in our lives, and can identify with the protagonist and feel the tension as the seconds go past.

It's true that adding in a human (or at least sentient) antagonist to throw obstacles in the protagonist's way can add additional interest, but equally true that if the circumstances themselves offer enough plausible obstacles to overcome the plot can be equally gripping.

Sometimes even more so, because while a contest with another individual, no matter how powerful, will be comparatively equal, time can be the more formidable antagonist, because it is inexorable.

Time is everyone's ultimate enemy, which is why it drives so much fiction. Readers are instantly on board. All a writer needs to do is use it effectively to their advantage.

If only it was that easy...

As valid as environment and time can be for conflict, I think having a sentient antagonist is still superior at the story level. It gives depth and nuance, and has more potential for twists and interpersonal engagement and drama. It also gives the reader another point of emotional contact with the story. No one roots for the slow wear of the rolling decades, no one empathises with the rumbling volcano, and no one cares to explore the complex motivations of a hungry shark or the dark secrets of a rabid dog. Sentient antagonists can be two-way streets in the conflict department and you can explore a greater variety of angles, whereas time/environment conflicts rely more heavily on the MC's reactions than anything else. There isn't as much to play off of. IMO, if you can add a sentient antagonist without significantly derailing your story's planned plot/message/theme/character development, by all means, do. It can only enrich the story.

A more important question might be what is the conflict.
You can have many sources of conflict and often the most used is the antagonist.
However it is not always expedient to start the story with the antagonist so it devolves to choosing a conflict that is real and present, although it doesn't hurt if it ends up being tied into the antagonist or perhaps some other over riding conflict in the story.
In All the Wind Wracked Stars by Elizabeth Bear
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B003KN3WS6/?tag=id2100-20

It starts with several scenes that stretch out over a battlefield, and two survivors. In a way they will be one and they are the protagonist, however the reader gets a description of the blood drenched snow-scaped battlefield while they search--each for a different thing; destined to eventually come together and it takes quite a while to unravel the conflict.

It's a story of revenge and redemption, but more evident a story of the protagonists conflict with both surviving and their own sense of inadequacy that gives them a sense of powerlessness and defines to them why they survived when they know they should have died with the rest.

It takes a long time to get there, but it catches the reader in the world and keeps them there while everything slowly unveils before them.