Storytelling Masterclass for Writers—by a Successful Writer!

What is a story? What is a narrative? What is it about stories that makes them so powerful in our lives? 

Knowledge gaps are the substance of stories. All stories are made from knowledge gaps. Every story. including yours. And SUBTEXT - the absolute life blood of intrigue and grip - is the knowledge that goes into the gaps. Understand this and you understand story.

Every question is, of course, a knowledge gap between that question and the answer. In this lecture we will learn the fundamental role of questions, and one in particular that is the most common and fundamental of story dynamics.

The Hollywood Formula became ubiquitous for many years. Fortunately, not so much now.

Well worth knowing about - if only to break the 'rules' knowingly!

Aristotle was, I guess, the first Story Consultant! He came up with his principles more than 2,300 years ago, and they not only still hang together today, they are powerful and applicable and well worth knowing about and using in your stories. His principles are there to be seen in the Frozen trailer and - get this - are used 25 times in Back to the Future! 

Without a receiver there is no story - there is narrative, but no story - so all knowledge gaps are measured from the audience perspective. For a knowledge gap to exist, the audience either knows more than another participant in the story - a privilege dynamic - or they know less than another participant in the story, a revelation dynamic. This is true of every knowledge gap, and the finest stories tend to have a balance of privilege and revelation.

There ARE stories without conflict. Indeed, I wrote one (and filmed it - you'll see it later). However, conflict is a staple of the vast majority of fine stories, and it's critical you understand it. So in this lecture, we look at the four levels of conflict and - most importantly - the role of dilemma and the way to ensure that this is meaningful conflict.

OK, so following on from the conflict seminar, let's take a deeper dive into a specific example: the conflict architecture of Back to the Future.

Most well-crafted characters have a plan (or maybe suffer from the plans of others).

And every plan gives you three knowledge gaps for the price of one.

The 'narrational position' is a fascinating subject in story.

Whenever I am consulting on a story, one of the list of things I always examine is the narrational position and the possibilities that arise from adding a narrator. It can be incredibly powerful.

When people open a book or sit down in a cinema they want to be taken somewhere. The power of the story world you create cannot be overvalued. It's hugely important and can be the making of your story.

Backstory is generally required, but also tricky. Too much backstory and your audience starts to fidget and get bored. Too little and the story might not make proper sense. This video shows you how to turn backstory into just more story.

The perennial argument: Which is most important: Plot or character?

Well, you need both. And - get this - if you are writing at your best, plot and character become one and the same thing!

Who is your protagonist? What do you do if you feel you have more than one protagonist? Or more characters that could be the protagonist? What are the forces of antagonism railed against them?

We address the five elements of character, and the six questions to ask of ALL your characters to understand their motivation and deliver them with integrity.

A deeper dive into the Frozen trailer to work through the elements of character and the six questions to ask of all your characters.

There is a difference between a character's actions, words and presentation to the world... and the truth of what they are thinking and planning on the inside. This is true of people in life and in story.

This is a critical and wonderful difference to understand and use.

If you think about it, every story can be reduced to action and dialogue, so understanding how to ensure they are used to create knowledge gaps is somewhat important!

Subterfuge doesn't just mean hiding something. It includes all forms of lies and deceit and even apparently innocent dynamics, for example, the knowledge that Marty McFly is a time traveller from the future throughout his time in 1955. We in the audience know this, but none of the 1955 characters do. Or that Walter What IS Heisenberg.

Subterfuge is a very common and hugely powerful knowledge gap dynamic.

Storification is the ultimate story dynamic. It's the meaning of your story in the mind of the receiver that they build for themselves having received your narration.

This is the critical dynamic that makes a story a story.

The surpassing aim is the outcome of the characters deep inner desires. They have been chasing the answer (probably the answer to the key question) throughout the story, and when they get to the end, what they get may well be more or different from that original motivation. A hugely powerful dynamic, often facilitating that wonderful thing we all recognise, a revelation - or a nice twist - in the tail of a story.

Possibly the most important of all knowledge gaps, the character moving up - or down - the ladder of life through the decisions they make and the outcomes their actions and choices harvest in a story is often the basis of the story's ultimate power.

If we learn something true from a story, is it still fiction?! A narrative is bedded down as a memory if it hangs together logically, not truthfully. It still becomes a memory. This is how we can plant memories in a receiver's mind.

Every story is a metaphor writ large, and every metaphor is a story in miniature.

To understand metaphor is to understand story.

Some say a moral argument is the definition of a story. I wouldn't go that far, but if you have a moral argument at the centre of your story, firstly, you can be pretty sure you have great potential for powerful story, and secondly, there are excellent story dynamics implied by the morality at question you can use to structure your story to deliver it to its optimal power.

Possibly the least well-known, documented or used of story dynamics, and yet, as you will see in the examples in this video, Recognition and Cultural Allusion can be used to make some of the finest and most sophisticated stories around.

How to strike a balance between writing from the heart and guiding with your head...

Once the seeds begin to blossom, how do you know what to do to guide the story threads?

Bella is the film I made to demonstrate that story-telling is about characters, their motivation, inner and outer arcs, their decisions, their growth and the outcomes. These do not necessarily require conflict, spectacle, a 'bad guy' or even dialogue.  Come with me to drop in and experience a slice of Johanna's life, and see what you feel. 

There is a book that charts the journey from the first seeds to the final product up there on the silver screen.

Oktapodi is a wonderful, fun story exemplifying some key story dynamics. Take a look and see if you can identify the key question, the surpassing aim, the character growth and an instance of Aristotle.

Thanks are due to Julien Bocabeille, originator and director of Oktapodi for giving me permission to use this film in my seminars.