Plot grows out of character?

Or character grows out of plot?

I would have said the latter.

You start with some kind of outline, some kind of story.

And somewhere, you begin to add people to it.

For instance, maybe you want a story about a man trying to defuse a bomb. He couldn’t defuse the last bomb and, maybe, his best friend died. Now his wife is in harm’s way and he has to do the same thing to save her life. What happens?

From there, you develop the characters.

Right?

Anne Lamott disagrees.

Of course, I have no idea what I am doing.

“Plot grows out of character. If you focus on who the people in your story are, if you sit and write about two people you know and are getting to know better day by day, something is bound to happen.”

–Anne Lamott, Bird By Bird

She continues the same thought:

“I say don’t worry about plot. Worry about the characters. Let what they say or do reveal who they are, and be involved in their lives, and keep asking yourself, Now what happens?”