The Misread Object: Let Characters Project Meaning Onto Neutral Things

This technique draws its power from a psychological principle: humans are meaning-making machines who project narrative onto everything. Your characters should do the same.

In Kazuo Ishiguro's 'The Remains of the Day,' Stevens the butler encounters ordinary objects — a book of romantic verse left by Miss Kenton, flower arrangements — and his interpretations reveal the emotional landscape he refuses to acknowledge. When he finds Miss Kenton's book, he doesn't think 'I have feelings for her.' He thinks about whether the book represents adequate use of staff leisure time. The gap between what the object is and what Stevens makes of it is where the entire tragedy lives.

Practical steps:

1. Choose a neutral object that appears in at least two scenes — a jacket left on a chair, a scratched record, a dog-eared page.
2. Have your POV character interpret it in a way that reveals their dominant fear, desire, or preoccupation. Don't explain why.
3. Later, have another character encounter the same object and read it completely differently.
4. Never reveal which interpretation is 'correct.' The ambiguity is the point.

This is especially powerful in multi-POV narratives, where the same room can feel threatening to one character and comforting to another — without you changing a single physical detail.

Avoid making the object obviously symbolic (a wilting rose, a broken mirror). The more mundane the object, the more authentic the projection feels. A stained coffee mug is better than a cracked photograph. Car keys on a counter are better than a wedding ring left behind.