What matters more in a story: plot or character? You need both. But character matters more. When we think about the stories that stay with us, we do not remember a tidy list of events. We remember people. In The Sopranos, we remember Tony Soprano. In Star Wars, we remember Darth Vader. In A Christmas Carol, we remember Ebenezer Scrooge. The characters are what stick. There is a simple reason for this. Human beings evolved to pay close attention to other human beings. One leading idea in evolutionary psychology is that language grew out of gossip. Our ancestors survived by sharing information about each other. Who can you trust? Who cheats? Who helps? Who harms? Gossip may sound trivial. It is not. It is a tool for survival. In small groups, you had to know who was loyal and who was dangerous. Getting that wrong could cost you food, status, or even your life. So our minds became very good at judging character. We track motives. We watch for patterns. We ask, again and again: What kind of person is this? That is what stories do. At their core, they ask the same question: Who is this person, really? Plot matters because it creates pressure. It puts the character in hard situations. It forces choices. But the plot is not the point. It is a test. The best stories use events to reveal character. The action strips away the mask. Under stress, we see what someone is made of. From a recent livestream with @wstorr