I am not a yes or no girl. When someone presents only two options, my mind immediately leaps to “what if?” scenarios that fall somewhere in between. It’s how I’m wired.
This resistance doesn’t come from a rebellious nature (though I’m not ruling that out), but from recognizing the vast world of variables that change the perception of things. Those variables are where stories hide.
Our world isn’t black or white. Life exists in the grey bits in between. (Is anyone else hearing Live’s song, “The Beauty of Gray” right now?)
Context matters. It’s where the story lies.
Context is what creates character and story arcs.
It’s Jean Valjean being given hard labor for stealing a loaf of bread. That act sets his character and trajectory in Les Misérables. His situation doesn’t match the stark letter of the law for thieves, and it’s that variable that provides context. It also fosters empathy for his plight. Javert, on the other side, sees only right and wrong. He serves to constrain the context.
If you’re writing a story (of any kind or form) without context, you are losing an opportunity to create tension and elicit empathy. Show why your characters, subject, or clients struggled within an existing dichotomy. Give enough backstory to anchor your reader in the story, then hit them with context to frame your point.
I wrote about grounding your reader a couple of weeks ago. Context plays a part in that grounding. Your readers need to know what is happening and why the story proceeds the way it does. Context drives story logic—the reasons and motivations behind actions and story progression.
Context can take many forms.
I’ve written about it before:
Using Context and Complication to Strengthen Your Story
Five Ways to Establish Context in Your Story
Context and the Brain
Context lets the brain pull separate details together to create a meaningful story. Without that context, readers only see the facts, but miss the pattern that makes them feel true or have meaning. In writing, it’s context that tells the brain what to expect, what matters, and how one moment connects to the next—all crucial steps in storytelling.
When we read, our brains create mental models that help us understand what is happening on the page. When context is absent, our brains can’t tell what has happened, when it happened, or what will come next. Emotional stakes disappear. Empathy has no foothold. And readers don’t know who the subject is or why they matter. It’s context that holds together the elements of story.
Even small contextual clues can change how we understand an event. This is known as framing, which is as important in fiction as it is in nonfiction or business writing. We need to know where we stand and why it matters to care—and, ultimately, our main goal is to make our readers care about what’s on the page.
How the Brain Reads
The brain doesn’t read sentence by sentence in isolation. It actively integrates incoming information with memory, expectations, and emotions. Research on narrative processing suggests regions in the brain’s default-mode network help make sense of stories. It pairs contextually relevant data with what is currently happening on the page. In other words, our brains compile everything together to make sense of our words.
It’s a beautiful thing when it all comes together. Context acts as the glue.
Stories rely on both attention and emotion, which makes them stick in the memory better. When a story makes your reader feel, wonder, or understand, that’s when narrative transport happens.
Context makes your reader’s brain constantly ask: “What does this mean in light of what I already know?” It’s part of that compiling process and what allows us to hold an entire novel in our head, no matter how that novel is structured.
When Context Is Missing
When the writer provides no context, the reader’s brain has to work harder to fill in the gaps. And they will fill in the gaps. Our brains hate a void and will fill it with whatever makes sense given what they know. They fill in any gaps within the story with personal knowledge and experience. That’s when the problems happen. The chances your readers will fill it with what you intended are miniscule.
Instead, readers infer motives, assume cause and effect, and use prior experience to fill in the blanks. Their brains will do what they can to impose order that it can’t find within the writing itself. If the writer provided enough clues, the reader might experience a productive gap that works (i.e., get close to what you intended). If the writer doesn’t provide enough, the reader experiences disorientation instead.
It’s About Feelings
Without enough context, your reader has no way of knowing how to feel about what they are reading. It’s just facts and figures. Motion on the page. There’s no meaning to be had.
Research shows that a lack of context also reduces memory and emotional impact. This makes stories feel flat, confusing, and emotionally distant. Nothing you want as a writer.
Context plays a part with tension too. A reader leans forward because the brain wants resolution, pattern, and meaning. Context is the mechanism that provides these patterns. Without patterns, there is no tension because there is no anticipation.
What You Need to Know
Story comes to life in the context, because context separates a character (or subject) from the neutral background and turns details into meaning. It’s what gives momentum and motivation to the character. It drives action and reaction. It makes readers care.
The brain responds most strongly when context creates expectations, contrast, emotional relevance, and unanswered questions.
Not adding in enough context isn’t an informational issue; it’s a cognitive one.
The brain doesn’t experience story as raw detail. It experiences story as detail interpreted through context.
So next time you sit down to write, make sure you ground your reader and let them know enough context to be anchored to the character and story without drowning them in detail.
Want to know more? Great. Stay tuned. Next week, we’ll tackle the common pitfalls when it comes to adding context to your stories.