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Flashback

The flashback is transition to an earlier event or scene (in literary or theatrical works or films); Also, the stage was thus introduced.

The purpose of the flashback is either to advance the story or to provide information about the character. You can use flashbacks for any reason, but their primary purpose is to bridge time, place, and action to reveal a past emotional event or physical conflict that affected the character.

Flashback is an interruption that writers make to add past events to the current events of a narrative to provide background or context. Using flashbacks, writers allow their readers to gain insight into a character's motivations and provide a background for a current conflict.

Flashback

5 Tips for Writing Effective Flashbacks:

  •      Find a trigger that will fire a flashback. Imagine that you are suddenly drawn into a memory.
  •      Find a trigger to return to the present.
  •      Keep it short.
  •      Make sure the flashback moves the story forward.
  •      Use returns with caution.          

There are two types of flashbacks;

- Those that tell of events that occurred before the story began (external analepsis) and

- The type that takes the reader back to an event that happened before.