A look back at story structure and a step into the new year, Storyteller's log 1-1-2013

Let's look at where we've been with the help of Scared Bunny's look back mirror.

Our story thus far, I promised to share the development of my new story theory as I write it into a complete new text. I self published my first book as an introductory book- Iggy's Incredibly Easy Way to Write a Story. Which is my primer on the subject.

Speaking of suspense, so far I've been telling you what limitations I personally find with most story theories. Let's look at the structure of what I've done so far. To do this I'd like to introduce you to another approach offered by Nancy Duarte from her book, Resonate: Present Visual Stories that Transform Audiences.

Resonate on Amazon

Nancy deals mainly with presentations and has taken things from storytelling such as archetypes and the hero's journey to develop her own version of mapping presentations. I'm now going to take what she evolved for presentations back to storytelling for narratives. This is exactly why it is so important not to just read what everybody else is reading on your subject but outside the subject. It get's you out of a rut.

Nancy introduces her mapping tool she calls the Sparkline of a presentation. In her book she analyzes a number of presentations using this tool.

                             

I think this is a brilliant, particularly in the way in the way she shows what's at stake during the story or presentation. She compares the bottom line of "what is" and then contrasts that with "what could be". Very clear and elegant.

Let's look at a Sparkline of what I've presented so far on the storyteller's log 11-26-2012. First, I talked about the two senses of being lost in the story. The first sense was good, that you want your audience lost in your story so the world fades away and they live the dream. The second sense was that in trying to create a story often writers get lost not knowing what to do or where to go next, I know this happens to me. Then I told you what will come- a new way for you not to get lost. Only I didn't say when. 

Already we have the beginnings of a story. A problem is presented. A solution is promised. I announced my intention to show you a better way to create stories. Then there were obstacles. I showed attempts at solutions and why they don't work for me. First with Aristotle, then Plot Points, the Hero's Journey, and the structuralists- Propp and Eco.

Here's what we get using the various mappings.

Here's Aristotle's mapping of the problem, promise and possible solutions and their limitations. This really doesn't really show us much does it?

Here's the Plot point mapping of the same data. This shows even less information. 

Here's the Hero's journey mapping. I'm starting to get lost again.

Here's Propp's functions. But it doesn't fit into his functions. I'm definitely lost again. Maybe I should have bought a GPS.

Now here's Duarte's Sparkline mapping. This gives us some useful information. It shows how I offered solutions that I've learned about but ultimately found limiting.

But look closely, we're interested in story structure. I've basically repeated myself four times. This makes it repetitive, potentially boring and probably frustrating. If you've come back to this blog wanting to learn about a new story structure you've been let down. So far.

This was done for a point. I could have continued with several other approaches that I find helpful but limiting but that would have strained credibility. I wanted to introduce you to a useful structure and see how it could be applied to analyze a story structure.

Remember this when you're structuring your movie. You need to walk a fine line with suspense. The right amount will keep the audience on the edge of their seat. If you repeat too much, you'll lose the suspense.

But too much suspense will put them to sleep. Storytelling is story delaying, but just the right amount.

Tomorrow, I'll tell you exactly what I'm looking for in a story structure theory. Till then...

What do plot points plot? Storyteller's Log 12-5-2012

 

DISCLAIMER: I am presenting parody of story writing books that I've read to make a point. While it's meant in good fun, I don't want to diminish the fact that there is great information in these books which have informed my owning thinking on the subject. My advice, read them all.

Before we get to plot points, I wish to explore plots. Here's what Apple's Dictionary has to say on the subject of plots.

plot |plät|noun1 a plan made in secret by a group of people to do something illegal or harmful: [ with infinitive ] :there's a plot to overthrow the government.2 the main events of a play, novel, movie, or similar work, devised and presented by the writer as an interrelated sequence.3 a small piece of ground marked out for a purpose such as building or gardening: a vegetable plot.4 a graph showing the relation between two variables.• a diagram, chart, or map.verb ( plots, plotting , plotted ) [ with obj. ]1 secretly make plans to carry out (an illegal or harmful action): the two men are serving sentences for plotting a bomb campaign | [ no obj. ] : Erica has been plotting againstme all along.2 devise the sequence of events in (a play, novel, movie, or similar work).3 mark (a route or position) on a chart: he started to plot lines of ancient sites.• mark out or allocate (points) on a graph.• make (a curve) by marking out a number of such points.• illustrate by use of a graph: it is possible to plot fairly closely the rate at which recruitment of girls increased.PHRASESlose the plot informal lose one's ability to understand or cope with what is happening: many people believe that he is feeling the strain or has lost the plot.the plot thickens see thicken.
What parts of this apply to story writing? I believe they all do but in different ways. Obviously, number 2 is the most common usage of plot- the main events of a play, novel or movie. The first could be considered an example of one type of plot- a group making secret plans.
The last two, 3 and 4 are interesting for their application to story structure. What do plot points actually plot?

This is where I have problems with plot point theories of story. What do plot points plot? They've left off the last two aspects of the definition of plotting as a verb. They don't mark out points on a graph, they don't make a curve from the points and they don't illustrate anything. They don't show me my story's structure.

In the last post, we saw that Aristotle tried to make a plot by graphing time along the x axis and audience involvement along the y axis. But we also saw that this had limited usefulness, mainly as to help pacing.

"What if we plot something else?"

Let's not get ahead of ourselves, Bunny. The problem as it exists is that each of the plot point theories followed Aristotle's rut of plotting audience involvement. Each author of the plot point theories tried to differentiate themselves by how many plot points they chose and what they called each point.

Let's look at some of these theories. (Without naming names)

One has five points.

Another one has nine points.

One might have twelve.

Why not go for fifteen?

Why stop there?

Help, I can't stop!

It's all going dark...

There is even one version that has 120 points, one for each page!

But how big is a plot point? They don't say. Does it matter? Do they come in different colors?

How to you get from one plot point to another? Jump? Careful Bunny. 

This is my problem with the plot point theories. They don't clearly show how they relate to one another.    They are too abstract to show a relationship between them. So this still leaves me lost in Act Two. How can I see if something belongs in it or not?

One theorist suggests that the plot point are like a suspension bridge taking you from the beginning to the ending. Again, like Aristotle who told us that stories have a beginning, middle and end, this is someone with a keen sense of the obvious but not really helpful to me as a writer.

There's one theory that suggests arranging them strung out on a clothes line. Interesting metaphor but it still doesn't differentiate the difference between the socks and underwear from the shirts. That reminds me, I have to go do my wash.