A Quick Start Guide To Foreshadowing

In this post, we define foreshadowing in fiction – with examples. We’ve created a quick start guide to foreshadowing to help you when you’re writing.

Read the other posts in our Quick Start series:

1. A Quick Start Guide To Creating Characters
2. A Quick Start Guide To Writing Fantasy
3. A Quick Start Guide For Beating Writer’s Block
4. A Quick Start Guide To Writing For Children
5. A Quick Start Guide To Writing YA Fiction
6. A Quick Start Guide To Writing A Memoir
7. A Quick Start Guide To Writing Descriptions
8. A Quick Start Guide To Writing Romance
9. A Quick Start Guide To Writing Science Fiction
10. A Quick Start Guide To Foreshadowing
11. A Quick Start Guide To Writing An Inciting Incident
12. A Quick Start Guide To Writing Dialogue
13. A Quick Start Guide To Writing Crime Fiction
14. A Quick Start Guide To Writing Emotions
15. A Quick Start Guide To Writing Revenge
16. A Quick Start Guide To Writing First & Last Lines

A Quick Start Guide To Foreshadowing

Define Foreshadowing

In literature, authors use foreshadowing as a literary device in a plot. It is a way to predict the future. They present a series of events with hints about what will happen later in a story. These clues build tension and create suspense. The clues can be subtle or specific.

How To Create Foreshadowing

You can use actions, abilities, setting – how does it affect the characters and what do they feel about it?, motifs, dialogue, tone, weather – an atmosphere is created just by using it as a backdrop or describing a change in it , viewpoint – including unreliable narrators, sounds, smells, and tastes to foreshadow.

Use Tone To Create The Mood In Foreshadowing

How do you want the reader to feel? Authors use tone to create a mood. Tone is the author’s attitude towards a piece of work. It is how the author writes. Mood is the reader’s reaction to the way the tone is used. In What Is Mood? we say, ‘While tone is often said to be what the author feels, what the reader or viewer feels is known as the mood. This mood affects readers psychologically and emotionally.’ You can use tone to create foreshadowing.

Must-Read: What Is Tone? and What Is Mood?

Why Use Foreshadowing

We use foreshadowing to ‘make stories more interesting and emotionally powerful. Without foreshadowing, major plot twists might feel random or confusing. With it, twists feel earned, like puzzle pieces snapping into place.’

This does not mean that foreshadowing ruins the ending. Rather, it allows glints of light to grow brighter until they turn into major plot points. Readers enjoy looking back at the patterns and predictions that peppered the story.

Examples Of Foreshadowing

1. In Romeo and Juliet, Romeo says he prefers to die sooner than live without Juliet’s love.
2. In The Hunger Games, Katniss’s ability with a bow and arrow is established early. It becomes crucial for her survival later.
3. In Wuthering Heights, the gloomy, turbulent setting of the moors match the emotional landscape of the characters.
4. In Macbeth, the witches are seen and heard to be directly foreshadowing Macbeth’s rise to power and ultimate downfall.
5. In Fatal Attraction, Glenn Close’s character says, ‘Just bring the dog over. I’m great with animals and I love to cook.’ This foreshadows her killing the rabbit by cooking it.
6. In Great Expectations, the man in the pub who gives money to Pip foreshadows that he will later receive a fortune from Magwitch.
7. In To Kill a Mockingbird, Atticus foreshadows his own future actions when he says, ‘It’s when you know you’re licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what.’ He later takes Tom’s court case because it is the correct and courageous thing to do.
8. In Gone Girl, the unreliable narrator viewpoint leads readers toward surprising twists and turns.
9. In Death of a Salesman, the sound of a flute is a recurrent, nostalgic motif conveying rural, idyllic notions. ‘A melody is heard, played upon the flute. It is small and fine, telling of grass, and trees and the horizon.’
10. In Jaws, there is always menacing music to foreshadow the shark’s arrival.
11. In Perfume, the protagonist’s obsession with a specific scent foreshadows his obsession with a girl.
12. In The Birds, we have unnerving signs associated with the birds: ‘The birds had been more restless than ever this fall of the year. Their agitation more remarked because the days were still.’

The Last Word

I hope this quick start guide to foreshadowing in fiction helps you when you’re writing your books. Use it. It’s a great device for writers.

If you want more examples, click here: examples of foreshadowing.
Additional reading: 7 Awesome Foreshadowing Tips For Fiction Writers

Happy Foreshadowing!

Source for image

by Amanda Patterson
© Amanda Patterson

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