Veronica Berglyd Olsen
49 lines
2.3 KiB
ReStructuredText
49 lines
2.3 KiB
ReStructuredText
.. _a_story:
|
|
|
|
***************
|
|
Story Structure
|
|
***************
|
|
|
|
.. _The Story Grid: https://storygrid.com
|
|
|
|
|
|
As of version 2.7, story structure annotations using the ``%story`` style of comment is supported.
|
|
To use the feature, make the first word of a comment ``story``, followed by a period, a structure
|
|
term, a colon, a space and the text for that term.
|
|
|
|
Here's and example:
|
|
|
|
.. code-block:: md
|
|
|
|
%story.term: text
|
|
|
|
The term can be anything that you want to track in the manuscript. This construct is intended to
|
|
make it easier to extract metadata from a work to perform a structural analysis of the story.
|
|
|
|
There are probably as many ways to examine story structure as there are authors and editors
|
|
combined. For this reason the story tag is flexible. You can use any terms you want and track any
|
|
aspect of the story that serves your purposes.
|
|
|
|
An example method has been advanced by Shawn Coyne in `The Story Grid`_. This method asserts that a
|
|
story is composed of "beats", and that each beat has an inciting incident, a complication, a
|
|
crisis, and a resolution. One might capture these elements of a beat where a character overcomes
|
|
their fear of giving a speech as:
|
|
|
|
.. code-block:: md
|
|
|
|
%Synopsis: Carol overcomes her fear of giving a speech.
|
|
%Story.incite: Carol is pleased to be invited to a conference to see her boss deliver a keynote.
|
|
%Story.complication: Carol's boss calls in sick and asks her to deliver a big speech.
|
|
%Story.crisis: Carol has a fear of appearing on stage.
|
|
%Story.resolution: Carol engages the help of a coach who helps her overcome her fears and delivers a great speech.
|
|
|
|
Other analytical models propose tracking a scene's pace, how it affects the mood of the story, or
|
|
which element(s) of the story's genre are being satisfied. An author can use this mechanism to
|
|
track any element of a scene. Some examples include time of day, how much time passes in the scene,
|
|
or even the physical form of a shape-shifting character. If a story involves magic, one could track
|
|
which wand a main character has in hand. It's up to tha author.
|
|
|
|
When the story and other scene metadata is extracted into a tabluar form, it is possible to get a
|
|
comprehensive overview of the story and to identify possible issues. For example, so many
|
|
fast-paced scenes without a break that readers might become fatigued or over-stimulated.
|