A conflict is the central struggle that motivates the characters and leads to a work’s climax. Generally, conflict occurs between the protagonist or hero and the antagonist or villain...but it can also exist between secondary characters, man and nature, social structures, or even between the hero and his own mind.

More importantly, conflict gives a story a purpose and motivates a story’s plot. Put another way, conflict causes the protagonist to act. Sometimes, these conflicts are large in scale, like a war...but they can also be small, like conflict in a relationship between the hero and their parents.

One of the most important things to understand about conflict is it can be both explicit and implicit. Explicit conflict is explained within the text — it is an obvious moment where something goes wrong and characters must fix it. Bram Stoker’s Dracula uses explicit conflict to fuel its plot: a vampire has come to England and the heroes in the story must kill him as soon as possible.

The conflict here is a happy one: the narrator is so much in love that she is struggling with expressing the depth of her emotion.