From my “classic” 1999 video series on story structure:
Part 20: The 8 Archetypes
Author Archives: Melanie Anne Phillips
Is Story Structure Your Enemy?
Structuring before writing or anywhere in the beginning of the process hobbles the Muse and creativity stops and progress bogs down. This can make it appear as if story structure is your enemy.
But, if you apply structure at the right point in the process, story structure can be your greatest ally.
To turn structure from foe to friend, follow these four steps:
First Step
Create your story world: What are all the elements you would like in your story? Don’t force creativity – just make a list of all things you want in your story – the people, events, messages, and moods you’d like to explore.
If you have specific ideas for a battle, a line of dialog, a clever plot twist – anything that you want in your story – jot it down. Then, develop those ideas into the world in which your characters live an in which your plot will take place.
For some tips on how to develop your story world, click here.
Once you feel you have the basic outline of your story in focus, write a synopsis of your story. A synopsis talks about what’s in your story – not so much the order of events. It is intended as a conversational description of what your story is about, as if someone asked you, “I hear you are writing a novel (or screenplay). What’s it about?”
If you answered that question, you wouldn’t answer by telling them the order in which things occur. You would tell them about all the major concepts, interesting moments, and principal characters. You would describe your story world so they get an idea of what the finished story will be like. That, is your synopsis.
Second Step
Create a pathway through those elements – your story’s spine or timeline, including quest, characters and plot.
Your story’s timeline (often though of as your plot-line, though it also includes your character arcs and the development of your story’s message) is like a journey through the story world you created in the first step.
Imagine that your story world is a map of the terrain you wish to cover in your story. Then the timeline is a journey across that terrain – the sequential order in which you visit each of the interesting concepts you’ve developed.
It can be difficult to turn a list of ideas into a pathway, however, but if you run into trouble, click here for a method of generating your timeline from your story world.
One you have your timeline, imagine that the person who asked what your story was about in the first step responded with, “Cool! I like it! How does it unfold?
Your answer would be a conversational recounting of the key events or happenings in your story in sequential order – not too much detail, just the essentials. If you write that down, it becomes what is called a story treatment.”
Essentially, a treatment is a description of how your story will unwind, minus any dialog unless it is absolutely essential to understanding a particular event.
Third Step
Once you have your treatment, add in structural story points. I’m not talking about building your story’s complete narrative structure – not yet. For this step, you just want to make sure all the critical structure story points are all in there, such as Goal, Requirements, thematic conflict, a main character, and whether that main character ends up changing their nature (like Scrooge) or holding on to their point of view (like James Bond).
You see, structure is composed of two parts – the essential story points and the dramatics that hold them together. Every story has the same points, but it is the way they are connected to one another that creates your story’s unique narrative structure.
We’ll worry bout those connections in the next step. Here, just make sure all the most important story points are in your story, and if not, put them in so they fit with what you’ve already developed.
For a list of the twelve most important story points you really need, click here.
Fourth Step
Create a narrative structure for your story. To do this, you will want to look at all your story points and then determine how they hang together. This can be done by intuition and experience, but it is always a little “iffy” if you rely on that alone.
That’s why we created a software program that can do it much more precisely. You can use it for free to work out the narrative structure in your story. But, the software is not the point. The point is to create a template for your story that would show you what a perfect structure would look like.
Now, nobody reads a book or goes to a movie to experience a great structure. Rather, we are drawn to stories to have our passions ignited. Still, there are some essential structural components that can scuttle the best-told and most exciting story every conceived.
So how can you reconcile structure with your Muse? Simple. Don’t try to make your story’s structure perfect, just better. Use your structural template as a guide – like a blueprint.
Writing is a strange endeavor, as it is best done when you build the house first, and then determine the perfect blue print for it later. Then, you lay that template over your story and see where you can bring your story into better alignment with it, without destroying all the design concepts and decorations you already have in place.
In the real world of story development, perfect structure is a myth. Trying to make a story structure perfect will drain the life out of it. And trying to create a structure first and then write from it will create a “paint by numbers” picture.
But if you use structure only at the end (after completing your first draft is ideal), then you can hone your story as closely as possible to the most solid structure, without undermining your passionate expression.
Now I said you could use our story structuring software free, and here’s how. We created a product called Dramatica, based on our concepts of narrative structure. It contains a Story Engine that uses those concepts to help you build a structure that best represents your story. The demo version is fully functional, including the Story Engine! So, you can use it to structure your story and you don’t have to spend a dollar.
You can download the demo version for Windows or for Mac here.
You’ll find the demo has complete instructions and even a path for beginners called the StoryGuide that will walk you through the story structuring process step by step.
What it won’t tell you is how to apply that structure to your story without crushing the creativity.
For that, just keep in mind – the structure that Dramatic generates should be treated as a collection of guidelines, not a list of rules. Use each story point in the structure to gain insight into your story, and then apply it if you can and as best you can to strengthen your structure.
And, of course, your friendly neighborhood story coach is always available, as described below. Plus, you may also with to try my other software, StoryWeaver, to help you with the creative part of the process as well.
Contact me about narrative analysis for fiction and the real world
~AND~
Try my StoryWeaver Software for Step By Step Story Development
Structure Hobbles the Muse
The Muse explodes outward into a world of passion and possibilities.
As a teacher of creative writing for twenty-five years, my experiences with many types of writers tell me that one should never consider structure at all until a first draft is completely written.
Structure gets in the way, it hobbles the muse. We all think in narrative anyway, so whatever we create already has a fuzzy structure in it. The Muse is okay with this. So let her be; let her range free and roam wild. And when she is done, spent, and filled with satisfaction, then you bring in structure as a framework upon which to hang what she has created so that it is displayed in the best light.
Now is the time to break free of bonds. Structure will follow in its own moment in time.
Contact me about narrative analysis for fiction and the real world
~OR~
Try my StoryWeaver Software for Step By Step Story Development
Forget Your Protagonist – Who’s Your Main Character?
For just about any story you read, you get a sense of who it revolves around – who is it really about? Who is the character whose shoes we stand in, through whose eyes and heart do we see and feel the story at the most passionate personal level?
In Gone with the Wind, for example, the two most prominent characters are Rhett and Scarlet. We like Rhett, but it is clearly Scarlet’s story – the whole thing revolves around her, what she thinks, what he feels, the plans she makes, her attitudes, and so on. Rhett, as charismatic as he is, does a lot of things, but he even disappears for quite a while at one point in the picture, but that’s okay because Scarlet is the core of the story. So, she’s the Main Character.
In both the book and movie of To Kill a Mockingbird, Atticus (the Gregory Peck part) is the protagonist. The Story Goal is to try and save the black man wrongly accused of raping a white girl in the 1930s south. By definition, the Protagonist is the one pushing forward the effort to achieve the goal. So, that is clearly Atticus. And his opponent, the Antagonist, is the father of the offended girl who wants the man lynched. That’s the plot and Protagonist and Antagonist fight for it. But, neither of them is the Main Character, and we can tell this because we don’t stand in either of their shoes – we don’t see the story though either of their sets of eyes. Rather the Main Character is Atticus’ young daughter Scout. She is also the narrator of both the book and movie, but that is not what makes her the Main Character. Rather, it is that we see the story through her eyes – a child’s view of prejudice.
And there is one more character – the one I want you to focus on creating next for your story – the Influence Character! In TKAM, it is Boo Radley – the Boogeyman who lives next door. While the logistic argument of the story is between Atticus and Bob Ewell over the trial and the fate of the defendant, the passionate or philosophic argument is all about Scout’s prejudice against Boo without ever having seen him. And in fact, he turns out to be the one who has been protecting her from Bob Ewell all along. In other words, any time we make judgements about someone without knowing them, that’s what prejudice is all about. That’s the message of the story. And that’s why Atticus is NOT the Main Character. If he was, we’d stand in his shoes, be all righteous defending a black man, and nothing would be learned. But by standing in Scout’s innocent shoes and still finding ourselves to be prejudiced (because we buy into her fear of Boo) the message is made.
Try my StoryWeaver Software for Step By Step Story Development
~OR~
Contact me about narrative analysis for fiction and the real world
The Zen of Narrative
Think of the Dramatica theory of story structure as the Zen of narrative. Every new aspect of it that you learn provides a new angle on the issues you face and opens up new avenues of exploration through which to seek a resolution to your inequities. So, each new step is going to be a zen-like lesson the illuminate another side of how both fictional and personal narratives can be controlled and altered.
To begin, consider that stories (in general) are about a single narrative growing from a single inequity. They are closed systems in which only those elements that pertain to that exploration of that particular issue are included. But this differs from real life. In our own lives, we weave scores of narratives and participate as minor characters in many others created not by ourselves.
For example, we may have a narrative about our career, a narrative about our self image, a narrative as a member of our family, a narrative in our department at work and another regarding the entire company at the corporate level. We may participate in a narrative in our church, in a club, with our in-laws or in a class we are taking. In fact, whenever we gather in a group, a narrative will form and we will play a role in it.
And so, when dealing with our issues in the real world, there is not one single silver bullet that will solve everything. Rather, we need to identify each of the principal narratives in which we have dissonance so we can then analyze each one to better understand the dynamics at play, and through them discover the kinds of pressure we must bring to bear to eventually resolve the underlying inequity.
The best way to identify these different narratives in our lives is to see them in terms of our independent areas of relationship. For example, the relationship we have with our boss is not directly connected to the relationship we have with our spouse, though each can affect the other in indirect ways. For example, our spouse may egg us on to ask for a raise we don’t feel comfortable in seeking. But the spouse and boss never are never directly involved with each other, just through us as the hinge, lynch pin, or intermediary.
In the end, we are each the main character in the narratives of our life.
Try my StoryWeaver Software for Step By Step Story Development
~OR~
Contact me about narrative analysis for fiction and the real world
We Think in Narratives
We think in narratives. Narrative is not an artificial construct imposed on fiction nor on the real world, but it is a description of the ways of the mind beneath the level of subject matter. In a sense, narrative describes the operating system of the mind before a program is loaded.
As an example, consider that we all have certain fundamental human qualities such as a sense of Reason, Conscience, and Skepticism to name a few. When faced with problems or inequities in our own lives, we bring all of these qualities to bear in order to seek a solution to the problem and/or see balance to an inequity.
When we come together in groups around a issue of common interest or a common purpose, we quickly self-organize into specialties so that one of use becomes the Voice of Reason for the group, while another becomes the Conscience of the group and yet another emerges at the Resident Skeptic, for example.
This occurs because the group purpose is best served when one person spends all his or her time delving deep into the issue from the viewpoint of Reason while another focuses solely on examining the issue with Skepticism. Then, we come together to report our findings. In this way, the group sees far deeper into the issue that if we all worked as we do on our own problems, as General Practitioners, each trying to do all the same jobs everyone else is doing.
So something wonderful happened when storytellers sought to understand what goes on in our own hearts and minds and what goes on with our collective interactions. Over hundreds of generations, storytellers were able to document the patterns of group thought and individual thought and embed them in the conventions of story structure.
Narrative then, is not a linear path of logic as in Joseph Campbell’s “Hero’s Journey,” but it is fractal in nature. The group mind is identical in components and operation to that of the individual mind, just one fractal dimension larger than that of the individual.
This is why story structure was not previously decipherable – you can’t explain a nonlinear system with a linear paradigm.
The archetypes in stories are derived from these roles we adopt in the group mind which in turn represent our own internal qualities. And so, the group mind provides a visible working model of the mind, just as in my youth the Visible Man model showed our internal organs beneath a transparent plastic “Skin.”
Archetypes, then, represent our fundamental qualities and the group mind is an external fractal projection of the operating system of our own internal minds. The group mind (we call it the Story Mind, hence the name of my web site) is not Jung’s collective unconscious, though it is similar in that it the systemic functioning of our minds that we all shared in identically as human beings. And archetypes are not mythological, as in Campbell, but are personifications of our internal attributes as expressed through the avatar roles we adopt when we organize as specialists within a group.
Suffice it to say that through narrative, we are able to look into the structure and dynamics of the group mind and see those within ourselves. And, as a result, narrative holds the key to understanding why we think and feel as we do, and provides the methods and techniques that can solve both our external problems and internal inequities.
Write a Log Line for Your Story
A log line is just a one sentence description of the core of what your story is about.
You probably have a lot of ideas developed and even a potential structure.
That’s great, but it also can become a bit amorphous – all dealing with the same subject matter but perhaps not fully centered on a single concept.
Writing a log line is like dropping a string in a bowl of sugar water – by morning, there will be sugar crystals on the string. A log line performs the same function for your story concepts: It pulls them out of the subject matter and crystalizes them into characters, plot, theme and genre – the foundational elements of structure. I call it a “narrative attractor.”
So, to help your subject matter congeal around a central core, describe what your story is about in just one sentence!
Learn how to use log lines in my StoryWeaver software that guides you step by step through the entire story development process – from concept to completion.
It’s just $29.95 and you can try it risk free at Storymind.com
Narrative for Movies and Television (Seminar Outline)
As promised to the attendees, here is the outline for the seminar I presented to the Director’s Guild of Canada last Sunday in Vancouver.
It was a spectacular session with a packed house of really eager creative industry people, looking for ways to break through creative block, inject life into their stories, and find and fix elusive narrative problems.
Judging by the response, they found what they were looking for.
Thanks again to the DGC for their invitation, to Roy Hayter who initiated the concept and sheparded it through, and to Barbara Ann Schoemaker (BA) who anticipated and handled every detail to not only make the seminar a huge success, but to make my experience both incredible and indelibly memorable. Good people, one and all!
So, here’s the seminar outline for reference, which of course does not contain any of the graphics, animations, numerous video clips or my rambling commentary.
Narrative for Movies & Television Seminar
Fix it in the Script – NOT in Post!
Welcome!
Introduction
Seminar Overview
Morning Session
Identify common serious narrative flaws
Techniques to repair flawed narratives
Afternoon Session
Story Development Techniques
Application of Structure to the Creative Process
What is Narrative?
Origin of Narrative
Generations of Storytellers
Trial And Error
Conventions of Storytelling
Patterns of Dramatics
The Concept of Narrative
Models of Narrative
Aristotle and the 3 Act structure
Jung and the collective unconscious
Campbell and the Hero’s Journey
Each had exceptions; Each was a formula
Each showed only a glimpse of the elusive structure
A New Model of Narrative
Structure is Non-Linear
The Story Mind
Teaser
“You and I are both alike”
What’s Happening!!!
Narrative is happening
These are the kinds of dramatic elements that make up narrative.
If a narrative doesn’t have all the important elements, it will fail
Let’s learn how to recognize and repair flawed narrative elements…
Narrative Problems with Characters
The most common narrative missteps regarding characters, and how to fix them.
The Main Characterv& Influence Character
The passionate core of your story’s message
Main & Influence Characters
So who ARE these guys?
Main Character represents a paradigm of belief.
Influence Character represents an opposing view.
Between them is your story’s passionate argument.
The result of this argument is your story’s message.
To Kill A Mockingbird
4 Principal Characters
Main Character
First Person Experience for Audience
Influence Character
An alternative life view
Protagonist
Prime mover of the effort to achieve the goal
Antagonist
Diametrically opposed to Protagonist achieving the goal
Head Line & Heart Line
Heroes and Villains
The Hero
Protagonist
Main Character
Central Character
Good Guy
The Villain
Antagonist
Influence Character
Second Most Central Character
Bad Guy
Hero and Villain Swap
Anti-Heroes
Anti-Villains
Melodrama
Head line AND heart line between same characters
Power of storytelling masks gaps in arguments
Arguments are incomplete
Conclusions not supported
The Dramatic Triangle
Can fully separate as in To Kill A Mockingbird
Can hinge on one character and split the lines
Most common variation (the love interest)
Other variations
The Heart Line
Main Character Resolve
The Main Character doesn’t have to change to grow
He or she can grow in their resolve
The influence character pressure the MC to change
Key establishing points to reference later.
Change Characters
Establish a belief system
Establish illustrations of belief
Announce resolve
Verify resolve
Steadfast Characters
Establish belief system
Establish illustrations of belief
Announce resolve
Verify resolve
One Must Change
Main or Influence will convince the other to change
Change occurs at character climax
Success in logistic goal hinges on who changes
Message determined by results of change
A Changing Influence Character
Character Arc
Character Arc 101
The Steady Freddy
The Griever
The Weaver
The Waffler
The Exception Maker
The Backslider
How Change Happens
The Head Line
Archetypes
Origins of Archetypes
Each of us has the same complement of basic traits
We use them to solve our personal problems
When we join in a group, we quickly self-organize
As specialists, the group gains depth and focus
The 8 Archetypes
Protagonist
Initiative
Antagonist
Reticence
Reason
Intellect
Emotion
Passion
Guardian
Prudence
Contagonist
Expediency
Sidekick
Confidence
Skeptic
Doubt
External / Internal
Protagonist
Pursuit/Consider
Antagonist
Prevent/Reconsider
Reason
Logic/Control
Emotion
Feeling/Uncontrolled
Guardian
Help/Conscience
Contagonist
Hinder/Temptation
Sidekick
Support/Faith
Skeptic
Oppose/Disbelief
Star Wars Archetypes
Protagonist
Luke Skywalker
Antagonist
The Empire
Reason
Princess Leia
Emotion
Chewbacca
Guardian
Obi Wan Kenobi
Contagonist
Darth Vader
Sidekick
R2D2 & C3PO
Skeptic
Han Solo
Oz Archetypes
Protagonist
Dorothy
Antagonist
Wicked Witch
Reason
Scarecrow
Emotion
Tin Man
Guardian
Glinda
Contagonist
Wizard
Sidekick
Toto
Skeptic
Lion
Oz vs. Star Wars
Leia- Reason
Logic
Control
Scarecrow- Reason
Logic
Uncontrolled
Oz vs. Star Wars
Chewbacca- Emotion
Feeling
Uncontrolled
Tin Man- Emotion
Feeling
Controlled
Oz Element Swap
Scarecrow (Reason?)
Logic
Uncontrolled
Tin Man (Emotion?)
Feeling
Controlled
Complex Characters & Relationships
Complex Characters
Structural Relationships
Character Relationships
Four-Dimensional Characters
Motivations
Methodologies
Purposes
Evaluations
Summing Up Characters
Head Line characters involved in the goal
Heart Line characters involved in the message
Head Line determines if your story will make sense
Heart Line determines if your story will have meaning
Intermission
Narrative Problems with Plot
What Is Plot?
Definitions of Plot
What happens in a story
Storytelling vs. Story Structure
The order of story-affecting events
Exposition Order vs. Narrative Order (Flashbacks)
Any sequential narrative elements
Characters, theme, and Genre
The logistics of the narrative
Plot Points (Goal, etc.)
Plot Progression (Acts, etc.)
Plot Points
Goal
The Single Goal
The Collective Goal
The Hidden Goal
Clearly Define!
Consequences
What happens if the goal fails
What already exists that remains if goal fails
Situation or Condition
Specific or General, but clearly defined
Requirements
Conditions that must be met for goal to be achieved
Shopping List Requirements
Sequential Requirements
Substitutes
Forewarnings
Indicators the Consequence is closing in
Forewarnings of Degree
Forewarnings of Steps
Critical Mass clearly stated
Four Modifiers
Dividends
Costs
Prerequisites
Preconditions
Additional Plot Points
Catalyst
Inhibitor
Benchmark
Plot Progression
Hero’s Journey
It works! (But is only one path)
It is a formula for a particular kind of story
Many different formulas
Seeking form without formula
Wheels Within Wheels
Acts
Sequences
Scenes
Beats
Acts
Dramatica Matrix
Dramatica Matrix
Four Signposts – IC
Influence Character Signposts
Signposts & Journeys
Four Throughlines
Main Character (I)
Influence Character (You)
Passionate Story (We)
Logistic Story (They)
Four Throughlines
Act Structure
Act Structure
Sequences
Scenes
Beats
Narrative Problems with Theme
What Is Theme?
Aspects of Theme
Topic
Message
Premise
Lajos Egri
Premise
Greed leads to self-destruction
Great for classifying a story’s message
Lousy as a starting point for writing
Fraught with narrative problems
Thematic Conflict
Greed leads to self-destruction
Greed
Greed vs. Generosity
Scenes featuring Greed, Scenes featuring Generosity
Thematic Argument
Leads to…
Relative value – levels of degree
Once per act
Never compare directly
Thematic Conclusion
Total of all relative values
Author’s Confirmation
Less of two evils
Greater of two goods
Equal
Narrative Problems with Genre
What Is Genre?
Genre and Structure
Genre is most broad stroke structural aspect
Genre structure sets perspective for story
Positions your audience in their experience
Attaches point of view to structural elements
Dramatica Chart
Dramatica Chart
Dramatica Chart
Classes – Internal/External
Classes
Points of View
Main Character (I)
Influence Character (You)
Subjective Story (We)
Objective Story (They)
Situation in 4 Domains
Narrative Problems with Story Dynamics
The 8 Essential Questions
Main Character Resolve
Change or Steadfast?
Shift one’s viewpoint or stay the course
Leap of Faith or Creep of Faith
Influence character will do the opposite
Main Character Resolve
Main Character Growth
Start or Stop?
Hole in Heart / Chip on Shoulder
Grow into something or out of something
Waiting for something to start or stop
Main Character Growth
Main Character Approach
Do-er or Be-er?
Preference, not an absolute
Go with the flow
Fish out of water
Main Character Approach
MC Problem Solving Technique
Linear or Holistic?
Basic level below conscious consideration
Don’t shift techniques!
Appropriate behavior
Main Character Problem Solving
Story Limit
Time Lock or Action Lock?
State it when the quest begins.
Don’t violate the lock!
Can have smaller locks within overall story.
Story Limit
Story Driver
Action Drive or Decision Driven
Causal Relationship
Independent of amount of action or decision
Book Ends
Story Driver
Story Outcome
Was the goal achieved or not?
Independent of emotional conclusion
Independent of outcome for protagonist
Can have degrees of accomplishment
Story Judgment
Is the mood of the story better or worse?
Independent of success or failure
Transmitted particularly through Main Character
Can have degrees of positive or negative flavor
Story Outcome and Judgment
Morning Session Wrap Up
Intermission
Afternoon Session
Story Development Techniques
Teaser
Story Structure vs. Storytelling
Storytelling vs. Story Structure
The Creative Process and Narrative Structure
Muse vs. Structure
People think in narrative but think about topics
Not all topic concepts can fit in the same narrative
Starting with structure hobbles the Muse
The Master Storyteller Method
4 Stages of Story Development
Story World
Story Line
Story Points
Story Form
Building Your Story World
Story World Construction Steps
What’s the Big Idea?
Create a Log Line
Asking Questions
A Thumbnail Sketch
The Creativity Two-Step Demo
Creativity Two-Step Technique
Take any sentence in your story development
Ask questions like an audience might
Let your Muse go and provide multiple answers
Ask questions about each answer
Rinse and repeat
Character Tips
Creating Characters from a Log Line
Character Swap Meet
Character Personal Goals
Writing from a Character’s Point of View
Have Characters Write Their Own Life Stories
More Character Tips
Characters vs. Players
“Things” as Characters
Group Characters
The Attributes of Age, Gender
Character Sub-Plots
Plot Tips
Use Signposts and Journeys as a guide
Outline of each of the four throughlines
Look for gaps and missteps, fill and fix
What happens in Act 2?
Theme Tips
A different theme for each throughline!
Illustrated through proper point of view
Main and Influence Main Message
Don’t forget the topic!
Genre Tips
A Mixed Bag
Select genres you like
Choose elements that reflect your story’s personality
Alter the traditional references
Your Story Synopsis
A map of your story’s terrain
Characters, relationships, potentials
Plot, processes, events
Theme, topics, messages
Genre, elements, moods
Building Your Story Line
From Map to Path
One story or many?
Choosing a course through your story world
Narrative Order or Exposition Order
Sequential Outline
Include all four throughlines
Character Tips
The Rule of Threes
First Impressions
Dismissals
Character Hand-Offs
Varied Structural Relationships
Structural, Logistical, Emotional Relationships
Plot Tips
Acts, Sequences, Scenes and Beats
The 28 Magic Scenes
Multi-Appreciation Moments (MAM)
Constructing Scenes from Beats (PRCP-1234)
Theme Tips
Main / Influence Thematic Argument, Act by Act
Four Throughlines thematic conflict moments
Pacing of Topic references
Individual character themes
Genre Tips
Genre Situation
Genre Attitude
Genre Manipulation
Your Story Treatment
Write a separate timeline for your characters, plot, theme, and genre
Look for gaps and fill them, pacing and adjust it
Weave all four timelines together
Alter the timeline with exposition order
Building Your Story Points
Introduction
Linchpins or anchor points of your narrative
Like Cornerstones and Keystones
If some are missing, whole structure can collapse
Some are more crucial than others.
The Story Points
Revised Story Treatment
Look for each story point in your treatment
Consider whether each point is crucial or optional
Incorporate all crucial story points
Incorporate as many optional story points as you can
Building Your Story Form
Introduction
Perfect Story Structure is a Myth
Like a Blueprint for your Story
Includes both story points and story dynamics
Ensures all story points work together
Bring your story closer to a stronger structure
Storyforming Demonstration
Dramatica At Work
Narrative for Movies & Television
~ Fin ~
What Is Truth? (The Character’s Dilemma)
Characters reflect real people in a purified or idealized state. And so, we can see in them qualities and traits that are hard to see within ourselves. One of the most difficult challenges we face every day are exemplified by characters in virtually every story – the inability to confidently understand “what is truth?”
In this article, excerpted from the Dramatica Narrative Theory Book I wrote with Chris Huntley, the elusive and changing nature of truth is explored for the benefit of your characters and yourself.
What Is Truth?
We cannot move to resolve a problem until we recognize the problem. Even if we feel the inequity, until we can pinpoint it or understand what creates it, we can neither arrive at an appropriate response or act to nip it at its source.
If we had to evaluate each inequity that we encounter with an absolutely open mind, we could not learn from experience. Even if we had seen the same thing one hundred times before, we would not look to our memories to see what had turned out to be the source or what appropriate measures had been employed. We would be forced to consider every little friction that rubbed us the wrong way as if we have never encountered it. Certainly, this is another form of inefficiency, as “those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
In such a scenario, we would not learn from our mistakes, much less our successes. But is that inefficiency? What if we encounter an exception to the rules we have come to live by? If we rely completely on our life experience, when we encounter a new context in life, our whole paradigm may be inappropriate.
You Idiom!
We all know the truisms, “where there’s smoke, there’s fire,” “guilt by association,” “one bad apple spoils the bunch,” “the only good (fill in the blank) is a dead (fill in the blank).” In each of these cases we assume a different kind of causal relationship than is generally scrutinized in our culture. Each of these phrases asserts that when you see one thing, another thing will either be there also, or will certainly follow. Why do we make these assumptions? Because, in context, they are often true. But as soon as we apply them out of context they are just as likely false.
Associations in Space and Time
When we see something occur enough times without exception, our mind accepts it as an absolute. After all, we have never seen it fail! This is like saying that every time you put a piece of paper on hot metal it will burn. Fine, but not in a vacuum! You need oxygen as well to create the reaction you anticipate.
In fact, every time we believe THIS leads to THAT or whenever we see THIS, THAT will also be present, we are making assumptions with a flagrant disregard for context. And that is where characters get into trouble. A character makes associations in their backstory. Because of the context in which they gather their experiences, these associations always hold true. But then the situation (context) changes, or they move into new areas in their lives. Suddenly some of these assumptions are absolutely untrue!
Hold on to Your Givens!
Why doesn’t a character (or person) simply give up the old view for the new? There are two reasons why one will hold on to an outmoded, inappropriate understanding of the relationships between things. We’ll outline them one at a time.
First, there is the notion of how many times a character has seen things go one way, compared to the number of times they’ve gone another. If a character builds up years of experience with something being true and then encounters one time it is not true, they will tend to treat that single false time as an exception to the rule. It would take as many false responses as there had been true ones to counter the balance.
Context is a Sneaky Thing
Of course, one is more sensitive to the most recent patterns, so an equal number of false items (or alternative truths) is not really required when one is aware he has entered a new situation. However, situations often change slowly and even in ways we are not aware. So context is in a constant state of flux. If something has always proven true in all contexts up to this point then one is not conscious of entering a whole new context. Rather, as we move in and out of contexts, a truism that was ALWAYS true may now be true sometimes and not true at other times. It may have an increasing or decreasing frequency of proving true or may tend toward being false for a while, only to tend toward being true again later. This kind of dynamic context requires that something be seen as false as often as it has been seen as true in order to arrive even at a neutral point where one perspective is not held more strongly than the other.
*******
Let me now add a short conclusion to this excerpt from the Dramatica Book….
Truth is a process, not a conclusion. If you have ever dipped into Zen, you realize that you cannot fully understand what something is unless you become it, and yet if you do, you lose the awareness of what it is as seen from the outside.
Capital “T” truth is perpetually elusive, as described in the saying, “The Tao that can be spoken is not the Eternal Tao.” Or, in less cryptic terms, if you define something, you have missed the point because nothing stands alone from the rest of the universe and cannot be fully defined apart from it.
The key to open-mindedness and problem solving is to decalcify your mind, to make it limber enough to perceive and explore alternative points of view without immediately abandoning the point of view you currently hold.
That is the nature of stories – when a main character’s belief system is challenged by an influence character who represents an alternative truth. The entire passionate “heart line” of a story exists to examine the relative value of each perspective, and the message of a story is the author’s statement that, based on the author’s own experience or special knowledge, in this particular instance, one view is better than the other for solving this particular problem.
There is no right or wrong inherently. It all depends upon the context, which is never constant. The philosopher David Hume believed that truth was transient: as long as something worked, it was true, and when it failed to work it was no longer true.
And so, the answer to the question posed at the beginning of this article, “What is truth?” can only be “truth is our best understanding of the moment.”
For a tangential topic, you may with to read my article, “The False Narrative,” in which I explore how to recognize, dismantle and/or create false narratives in fiction and in the real world.
And finally, you may wish to support this poor philosopher and teacher of narrative by trying my Dramatica Story Structuring Software risk-free for 90 days, or my StoryWeaver Step By Step Story Development Software, also risk-free.
Jurassic Park: Building A Better Dinosaur!
Here’s a flashback article from the early days of the Dramatica theory of narrative structure back in the mid 1990s. It is the first article I wrote in a series of “Constructive Criticisms” in which I showed how Dramatica could have improved highly successful movies and books, not just ones that were obviously flawed.
We knew Dramatica was a powerful new way to look at structure. And to convey this to others, we figured that while anybody might show how to make a bad story better, we had the method to show how to make a great story superlative.
So, here’s the original article as it appeared in the first edition of our Storyforming Newsletter…
Jurassic Park: Building A Better Dinosaur!
Jurassic Park is wonderfully entertaining. The concepts are intriguing, the visuals stunning. Everything it does, it does well. Unfortunately, it doesn’t do enough. There are parts missing, little bits of story DNA that are needed to complete the chain. To be fair, these problems largely result from the mostly faithful adherence to the dramatic structure and dynamics of the book upon which the movie is based.
Storyform, the structure and dynamics of a story, is not medium dependent. What works in one medium will work in all others. Storytelling, however, must vary significantly to take advantage of the strengths and avoid the weaknesses inherent in any format. Jurassic Park makes this storytelling translation very well, but the flawed dramatics were nearly lifted intact, shackling the movie just like the book with a Pterodactyl hanging `round its neck.
Yet criticisms are a dime a dozen. Suggestions for improvement are much more rare. Fortunately that is the strong suit of the Dramatica theory. Here is one plan for building a better dinosaur.
Dramatica Background
As a starting point, Dramatica denotes a difference between a Tale and a Story. A Tale describes a series of events that lead to success or failure. It carries the message that a particular way of going about solving the problem is or is not a good one. But a Story is an argument that there is only one right way to solve a problem. It is a much more potent form that seeks to have the audience accept the author’s conclusions.
To gain an audience’s acceptance, an argument (Story) must appeal to both logic and feeling. To make the logical part of this argument, all the inappropriate ways a problem might be approached need to be addressed and shown to fail. Each one must be given its due and shown not to work except the one touted by the author. This is accomplished by looking at the characters and the plot objectively, much like a general on a hill watching a battle down below. The big picture is very clear and the scope and ramifications of the individual soldiers can be seen in relationship to the entire field.
However, to make the emotional part of the argument, the audience must become involved in the story at a personal level. To this end, they are afforded a Subjective view of the story through the eyes of the Main Character. Here they get to participate in the battle as if they were actually one of the soldiers in the trenches. It is the differential between the Subjective view of the Main Character and the Objective view of the whole battle that generates dramatic tension from which the message of the story is created.
By comparing the two views, the argument is made to the audience that the Main Character must change to accommodate the big picture, or that the Main Character is on the right track and must hold on to their resolve if they hope to succeed. Of course, the Main Character cannot see the big picture, so they must make a leap of faith near the end of the story, deciding if they want to stick it out or change.
Now this relationship between the Main Character and the Objective story makes them a very special character. In fact, they hold the key to the whole battle. They are the crucial element in the dramatic web who (through action or inaction) can wrap the whole thing up or cause it to fall apart. As a result, the personal problems they face reflect the nature of the Objective problem of the story at large.
To the audience there are two problems in a story. One is the Objective problem that everyone is concerned with; the other is the Subjective problem that the Main Character is personally concerned with. Although the problems may be greatly different in the way they are manifest, they both hinge on the crucial element in the Main Character as their common root. So, to be a complete argument a story must explore an Objective AND a Subjective problem, and show how they are both related to the same source.
Jurassic Park Analysis:
Jurassic Park attempts to be a story (not a tale) but does not make it because its exploration of the Subjective problem is lacking.
The Objective problem is clearly shown to be caused by the relationship of Order to Chaos. The message of the logical side of the argument is that the more you try to control something, the more you actually open yourself up to the effects of chaos. As Princess Leia put it to the Gran Mof Tarkin in Star Wars, “The more you tighten your grip, the more star systems will slip through your fingers.”
Since Order is actually the problem, the Chaos must be the solution. This is vaguely alluded to in Jurassic Park when the Tyrannosaurus wipes out the Raptors, unknowingly saving the humans. Although the point is not strongly stated, it is sort of there. We will come back to this point later to show how it should have been a much more dramatically integral event than it was. The important concept at the moment is that as far as it goes, the Objective Storyline is fairly close to what it should be, which is true of most action-oriented stories.
It is the Subjective Storyline that fails to fulfill its dramatic mandate in Jurassic Park. To see how we must go back to the very beginning of the film, to our Main Character, Dr. Alan Grant. Since Dr. Grant contains the crucial element, we would expect him to intersect the Objective Story’s problem by representing Order or Chaos. Clearly the author intended him to represent Order. This means that he contains the Problem element (the inappropriate attitude or approach that is the underlying source of the Story’s troubles), rather than the Solution Element, and as such must Change in order to succeed.
The entire first scene with Grant at the dig should have illustrated his love of Order. All the elements were there: a disruptive boy, a randomly sensitive computer, a helicopter that comes out of nowhere and ruins the dig. All of these things could have illustrated Grant’s hatred of Chaos and his quest for Order. Using the same events and incidents the point might have been made in any number of ways, the easiest being a simple comment by Dr. Grant himself.
Unfortunately without any direct allusion to Order being his primary concern, Dr. Grant comes off simply as finding disruptions inconvenient, faulty equipment annoying, and kids as both.
Why is it so important to set up the nature of the problem so early? Well, one of the major problems with the Jurassic Park storyform is that we really don’t know what the problem is until near the end of the first act. Certainly almost every movie goer must have been aware that this was a picture about an island where they cloned dinosaurs back to life, and they run amok wreaking havoc – that’s all storytelling. But that doesn’t say why. The “Why” is the storyform: the excuse, if you will, for having a story to tell. If the point of contention had been established up front, the whole thrust of the picture would have been given direction from scene one.
Just stating that Dr. Grant shares the problem with the story is obviously not enough. The relationship between his view of the problem and the Objective view of the problem is what explores the concept, makes the argument, and allows the Main Character to grow. Ultimately, it is the differential between the two that brings a Changing (versus Steadfast) Main Character to suspect the error of their ways and make a positive leap of faith. They see the problem outside themselves, then find it inside themselves. They change the inside, and the outside follows suit.
What does this mean for Jurassic Park? As it is, Doctor Grant’s attitude toward John Hammond’s ability to control the dinosaurs is one of skepticism, but not because of Order, because of Chaos. Grant simply agrees with Ian Malcolm, the mathematician. This makes the same point from two directions. But Grant’s function is not to tout Chaos, but to favor Order. Only this point of view would be consistent with his feelings toward the children.
As illustrated in the table scene with Hammond, Ian, and Elissa, Grant jumps from representing his original approach to representing the opposite, neutralizing his effectiveness as owner of the crucial element and taking the wind out of the dramatic sails.
This problem could have been easily avoided and strong drama created by having Dr. Grant continue to believe that the park is unsafe, but for different reasons.
(Note: The following proposed scene is designed to illustrate how Grant’s and Ian’s positions on what is needed for the park to be safe is different. The storytelling is minimal so as not to distract from the storyforming argument.
GRANT
How can you be sure your creations won’t escape?
HAMMOND
Each compound is completely encircled with electric fences.
GRANT
How many fences?
HAMMOND
Just one, but it is 10,000 volts.
GRANT
That’s not enough….
HAMMOND
I assure you, even a T-Rex respects 10,000 volts!
GRANT
No, I mean not enough fences. It’s been my experience that Dr. Malcom is right. You can’t count on things going the way you expect them. You need back-ups to your back-ups. Leave a soft spot and Chaos will find it. Put three fences around each compound, each with a separate power source and then you can bring people in here.
MALCOLM
That’s not the point at all! Chaos will happen no matter how much you prepare. In fact, the more you try to control a situation, the greater the potential that chaos will bring the whole thing down.
In the above scene, Grant stresses the need for even MORE control than Hammond used. This clearly establishes his aversion to giving in to chaos. But Ian illustrates the difference in their points of view by stating that the greater the control you exercise, the more you tighten the spring of chaos.
What would this mean for the middle of the story? Plenty. Once Grant and the children are lost in the open with the thunder lizards, he might learn gradually that one must allow Chaos to reach an equilibrium with Order. Several close encounters with the dinos might result in minor successes and failures determined by applying Order or allowing Chaos.
As it stands, Dr. Grant simply learns to care about the children. But what has really changed in him? What did he learn? Would it not have been more dramatically pleasing to have the children teach him how chaos is not just a disruptive element, but sometimes an essential component of life? And would it not make sense for someone who has spent his whole life imagining the way dinosaurs lived to be surprised by the truth when he sees them in person? What a wonderful opportunity to show how the Orderly interactions he had imagined for his beloved beasts are anything but orderly in the real world. So many opportunities to teach him the value of Chaos, yet all we get is “They DO travel in herds… I was right!” Well, that line is a nice place to start, especially if you spend the rest of the story showing how wrong he was about everything else. Truly a good place to start growing from.
Perhaps the most disappointing aspect of the Subjective Storyline is the manner in which they escape in the end. Grant and the kids are sealed in the control room, but the Raptors are right outside. The girl struggles to get the computer up so they can get the door locked. This of course, merely delays the Raptors until the helpless humans can escape into another Raptor attack. Then out of nowhere, T-Rex conveniently barges in, kills the Raptors and allows the humans to escape? Why? Why then? Was T-Rex just waiting in the wings for his cue?
Let’s describe one possible ending that would’ve tied in Chaos, Dr. Grant’s personal problem of order in the Subjective storyline, his growth as a character and eventual change, AND have all this force a successful outcome to the Objective storyline.
Imagine that earlier in the story, when the power went down it only affected some of the compounds, not all. So only some of the areas were open to the roving dinos. Rather than having Elissa get the power back on for the fences, she merely powers up the computer system, but then no one can boot it up.
Dr. Grant and the kids make it back to the control room, barely escaping the T-Rex who is trapped by one of the functional electric fences. They climb over the fence on a tree knocked down by the Tyrannosaurus. The Raptors are at the door of the control room, the girl goes to the computer to lock the door. She locks it, then tells Grant she can bring up the rest of the fences. There might be some kind of visual reminder in the room (such as a dino picture) that Grant (and the audience) associate with his major learning experience with the kids about needing to accept Chaos. Grant almost allows her to bring up the power, then yells for her to stop. He tells her not to bring it up, but to actually cut the power on all of the fences.
Just as before, the Raptors break in, the humans escape onto the dino skeletons. NOW, when T-Rex comes in to save the day, it is solely because of Dr. Grant’s decision to cut the power to the fence that was holding him in. Having learned his lesson about the benefits of Chaos and the folly of Order, he is a changed man. The author’s proof of this correct decision is their salvation courtesy of T-Rex.
Equilibrium is established on the island, Grant suddenly loves kids, he gets the girl, they escape with their lives, and all because the crucial element of Order connected both the Objective and Subjective storylines.
Certainly, Dramatica has many more suggestions for Building a Better Dinosaur, but, leapin’ lizards, don’t you think this is enough for one Constructive Criticism?
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