{"id":11468,"date":"2015-08-10T19:24:48","date_gmt":"2015-08-10T09:24:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/?p=11468"},"modified":"2024-07-04T02:38:20","modified_gmt":"2024-07-03T16:38:20","slug":"novelist-kurt-vonnegut-explains-the-structure-of-stories-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/?p=11468","title":{"rendered":"Novelist Kurt Vonnegut Explains The Structure Of Stories"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Kurt<\/p>\n

Writers, here\u2019s a little fun Thursday lunchtime activity for you. Think about the story you\u2019re currently working on\/avoiding. What shape does it take? Get a pen and some paper and trace it out. On the axis of good fortune versus ill fortune, where do your characters tend to fall?<\/p>\n

Kurt Vonnegut was born 99 years ago today, so it\u2019s high time we revisit one of his best craft lectures. In it, he breaks down his taxonomy of storytelling. But none of this \u201cbeginning \u2192 rising action \u2192 climax \u2192 falling action \u2192 resolution\u201d crap that we learn in middle school. He begins: \u201cStories have very simple shapes, ones that computers can understand.\u201d And then he goes on to do a little literary stand-up comedy, tracing the story arc of\u00a0Hamlet<\/em>,\u00a0The Metamorphosis<\/em>, and even\u00a0Cinderella<\/em>. Not by plot, but by the feelings of the characters we follow. For Kurt Vonnegut, the true movement of a story lays in a character\u2019s happiness.<\/p>\n

If you have 17 minutes to spare today, I recommend you give it a watch and maybe plot your own happiness, too. In fact, tag yourself. (We\u2019re Kafka\u2019s cockroach.)<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=oP3c1h8v2ZQ<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Writers, here\u2019s a little fun Thursday lunchtime activity for you. Think about the story you\u2019re currently working on\/avoiding. What shape does it take? Get a pen and some paper and trace it out. On the axis of good fortune versus ill fortune, where do your characters tend to fall? Kurt Vonnegut was born 99 years … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Novelist Kurt Vonnegut Explains The Structure Of Stories”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,7,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general-interest","category-humourhumor","category-inspiration"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11468","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11468"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11468\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53505,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11468\/revisions\/53505"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tomgrimshaw.com\/tomsblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}