The Four Story Types
In his book Characters & Viewpoint, Orson Scott Card divides stories into four categories he calls MICE, which stands for:
- Milieu
- Idea
- Character
- Event
Freytag’s Analysis
In the 19th century, a German dramatist named Gustav Freytag analyzed the dramatic structure of ancient Greek and Shakespearean plays. He divided drama into these parts:
- Exposition, the set-up of the situation.
- Inciting moment that kicks off the action.
- Rising action.
- Climax (or turning point) that immediately precedes the audience’s catharsis.
- Falling action.
- Denouement, the resolution of loose ends.
Most stories spend the majority of their time in part 3, rising action.
Act 1
- Stimulus starts the action.
- Introduce protagonist.
- Set the stakes.
- Catalyst: an event that throws the protagonist into Crisis.
Act 2
- Crisis: the protagonist’s purely emotional moment of despair.
- Plot complications.
- Introduce the antagonist.
- Agonia: the protagonist’s struggle (Agonia means struggle in Greek).
- Epiphany: the protagonist’s self revelation.
Act 3
- Remedy: the solution devised as a result of that revelation.
- Climax: the final conflict.
- Resolution: tying up loose ends.
Plot Is Physical, Story Is Emotional
I cannot overemphasize how important this concept is.
- Plot is Physical.
- Story is Emotional.
When your heroine’s father is machine-gunned by mobsters, that is plot.