Don’t Shoot: Why I Don’t Believe in Chekhov’s Gun

Dear Writer,

If there’s a gun in act one, you don’t have to fire it by act three. In fact, all-powerful writer, I dare you not to fire the gun! Who is going to make you shoot it? I’ll go further: You can even introduce a detail in act three that you have not previously cleverly foreshadowed in acts one or two! Hear me out: This is your call to get weirder. If anybody questions you on this, feel free to let them know I have granted you permission.

(Literary Scavenger Hunts.)

In the same way modern writers are taught to ruthlessly slash unnecessary words (especially those pesky, horrendously useless adjectives and adverbs) in favor of the cleanest, sparest prose we can muster, a common story telling principle is to be “straightforward” with your reader. We are taught to ruthlessly excise unnecessary details that do not move our stories forward. We are also taught that we must resolve all loose ends, lest they become dreaded plot holes that frustrate the reader. Don’t be coy with the reader! Don’t make them guess! But while well intentioned, this advice, much like the strictest interpretations of what “clean writing” means, runs the risk of making our stories boring.

A contributor to this notion is the writing principle of Chekhov’s Gun—at least the dogmatic interpretation of it. Yes, I am being a bit hyperbolic when I say I don’t believe in it all. Chekhov’s Gun acknowledges there’s real value in thinking through plot, story momentum, of considering the reader’s experience. There’s something very satisfying, as a reader, about noticing a detail early on, thinking through its meaning, and then seeing it resolve later. A better way of phrasing it: I don’t think the strictest interpretation of the rule applies to all stories, all introduced elements, or all styles of storytelling.

But let’s take a look at what the man actually said. Anton Chekhov (1860-1904) was a Russian playwright and short story writer. There are a few versions of his maxim:

Remove everything that has no relevance to the story. If you say in the first act that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third act it absolutely must go off. If it’s not going to be fired, it shouldn’t be hanging there. (Sergius Shchukin’s 1911 Memoirs)

Another time, Chekhov wrote:

It’s wrong to make promises you don’t mean to keep. (letter to Aleksandr Lazerav, 1 November 1889).

In contextualizing Chekhov’s thinking, it’s often said that he was talking about the gritty realism style of the Russian stage of his day. I think that’s too simplistic. As scholars have pointed out, there are short stories in which Chekhov himself did not adhere to the rule. Clearly the story in question, and perhaps the medium, mattered to Chekhov. It may be more accurate to consider Chekhov’s Gun the way we think of any writing “rule” given beginning writers: Here is a potential pitfall to avoid if you don’t know what you’re doing.

Think about other rules we offer new writers: Don’t include dream sequences, don’t describe a character by having them look at themselves in a mirror, don’t use flashbacks too early in a story. All of these “rules” you can find broken in both classic literature and great contemporary fiction. You might ask: If a rule doesn’t have to be followed, then why does it exist? The rules are there because these are ways a new writer can derail their stories and lose the reader. But if you practice your craft and read widely, I argue you can break any rule, including Chekhov’s Gun.

If we look at reading, like all art, as a call and response between the audience and artist, we’ll expect the reader to come to the page bringing their own sensibilities, tastes, and dare I say it: Creative instincts. Art exists, to me, at that juncture where the work and audience interact. It is a kind of alchemy, this relationship, and it’s the reason why we bother to write the next sentence in this age of AI slop and general existential dread. If we consider the reader an active participant in the creative process, we can let go of our need for control and trust the reader to do some of the work.

Of course, what works in story for one reader may not work for another, that is okay. As a student of surrealism and horror, my taste favors the uncanny. I want elements that make me guess. I don’t mind unclear endings nor unresolved details. As a reader, I like being empowered to make my own interpretations. For me, predictability is the ultimate sin.

If we read contemporaneous reviews of David Lynch’s films we find viewers frustrated by unresolved details and apparent non sequiturs in his work. Objects and images often serve symbolic purposes rather than plot-driven ones, the meanings of which are debated furiously. Who can definitively say what the ceiling fan images mean in Twin Peaks? What is the purpose of the man behind the diner in Mulholland Drive? The better question may be not what they mean, but do they work to create an emotional response? In Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House, do we know, definitively, how much of Eleanor’s experience is based on her own psychological state versus the supernatural occurrences in the house? Jackson allows us, the reader, to decide, and that is her genius.

The magical realism of Haruki Murakami leaves much up to the reader. In Killing Commendatore, Murakami introduces a mysterious bell that rings in the woods behind the main character’s residence. While a bell is eventually discovered, we are never told who rang the bell nor why. Ambiguity exists even for writers who are considered realists, like Cormac McCarthy. Not knowing the purpose of every element (the unnamed catastrophe, the marching soldiers, etc.) introduced in The Road amplifies the sense of unease. The not knowing is a feature, not a bug.

I’m always surprised when I see a book review that expresses frustration that a character is introduced and then never mentioned again. Isn’t that like real life? I’ve met many people in my life that I thought might be more important to my story than they’ve turned out to be. Life is not logical or sequential. I don’t think all stories should be. To be clear, the permission I granted you to not fire the gun is not a call to introduce randomness for its own sake. Strangeness can be useful in story, but like anything else it can be overdone. I’d also argue that in the work of the writers I’ve mentioned, every image has been deeply considered, every element and character examined though the writing, revision, and editing processes. I don’t believe any of it is truly random.

So then, my theory of Chekhov’s Gun would work something like this: All elements in narrative do not have to connect directly to the plot but they do need a purpose. If they have purpose, the reader will trust you and keep turning the page, even if their interpretation of the element’s purpose is different from your own.

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