Please enable JavaScript.
Coggle requires JavaScript to display documents.
B2. Stories: Building Blocks Schematic Overview - Coggle Diagram
B2. Stories: Building Blocks
Schematic Overview
Story = A story is a description, either true or imagined, of a connected series of events.
Stories are everywhere around us and they come in many shapes and forms.
Books
films
television series
newspaper articles
songs
tales
myths
legends
ANALYSING A STORY
BUILDING BLOCKS OF A STORY
the theme
= central message or the underlying meaning of a story.
Examples:
Believe in yourself
Power and Corruption
Love is blind
Don't judge a book by it's cover
Death
Good vs Evil
Courage and Heroism
the plot
The events that happen in a story are called the plot or storyline. Storylines are made up of different phases:
the exposition
the rising action
the climax
the falling action
the resolution
the point of view
= the perspective from which the story is told.
important points of view:
First Person:
The story is told by a character in the story. Often the narrator will be the protagonist or a character that is close to the main character. The narrator uses the pronouns I, me, we and us. You see the story through this character's eyes and you only know what he/she thinks, knows and feels.
Third Person
: The narrator uses the pronouns he, him, she, her, it, they and them. The narrator is not a character, but is outside the story.
Multiple Third Person
: The story is told from different characters' perspectives. The narrator usually changes the character he/she focusses on per chapter or per scene.
Omniscient Third Person
: The narrator is all knowing and knows what every character feels and thinks.
the characters
= A character is a person or a personified animal, plant or object.
Characters and the role they play
A protagonist
= the main character of the story, the action centers around the protagonist and the reader or watcher is supposed to care about this character the most. Often - but not always - the protagonist is the 'good guy' and the hero of the story. Ex. Harry Potter
An antagonist
= the character that works against the protagonist. Often - but not always - the antagonist is the bad guy or the villain of the story. Ex. Voldemort
A deuteragonist
= a secondary character. These characters are also in the spotlight, but not as much as the protagonist. This type of character is necassary to the story because they help to reveal important details, they motivate the protagonist or they mislead the protagonist. Deuteragonists can be 'good' or 'bad' characters or a mix of both. Ex. Ron and Hermoine
A tertiary character
= a minor character in a story. They play a small part in the protagonist's life, but they are not that important to the story. Ex. Professor Flitwick
A love interest
= a type of character the protagonist is attracted to. Usually the love interest is a deuteragonist, but this is not always the case. Ex. Cho Chang and Ginny Weasly
A confidant
= a type of character the protagonist shares their thoughts and emotions with. This type of character is quite hard to pin down. Often stories focus on the main character's love story and other relationships are a bit forgotten, so it is hard to call this character a deuteragonist because you don't see them that much. But they are important, so they cannot be put in the tertiary category either. Ex. Dumbledore
-
A foil
= a type of character that is the opposite of the protagonist. Their personalities and values clash. The protagonist and foil can have an antagonistic relationship or the foil can be a deuteragonist. Throughout the story their role can even change.
Ex. Draco Malfoy
Characters and their qualities
Round characters
are multi-dimensional characters. They have emotional depth, have multiple characteristics and we know quite a lot about them. This makes them more real and life-like.
Flat characters
are one-dimensional characters. They do not have any emotional depth. They usually have one or two main characteristics which makes them quite stereotypical.
Dynamic characters
change and grow during the story.
Static characters
do not change throughout the story. They stay the same.
the setting
= when and where the story takes place
Example
the time of day: early, midday, afternoon, evening, night...
the time of year: in winter, in the month of June, the first of September...
the time in history: Prehistory, Victorian Era, now, in the future...
the location: in Wales, on the Moon, in South America, at the bottom of the ocean...
the scenery: in a field, on a mountain, on the surface of the Sun...
the weather: during a hail storm, after the rain, in a tornado...
the genre
Fiction or Nonfiction?
Specific Genres
The most popular:
Fantasy
Science fiction
Action and adventure
Mystery and crime
Horror
Thriller and suspense
Historical fiction
Romance
Contemporary fiction