Another great example of the Storyteller Structure is The Notebook, written by Nicholas Sparks and then adapted to the screen by Jeremy Leven. In this story, a man (named Duke in the film but Noah in the book) reads a story of young love to a woman suffering from Alzheimer’s. As he tells her the story, it becomes clear the female lead of the story is a younger version of the woman listening. The reader is an older version of Noah, the young man in the story, and his active goal is to get his wife to remember who he is. By reading their story (written by Noah in the book and Allie in the movie), Old Noah fights to get his beloved wife back, even if just for a moment. Once again, the A-plot is the Storyteller, and so this is where the elements of the Major Dramatic Curve can be seen. The story is just a primary tactic and not the main story.
Other examples of the Storyteller structure are The Great Gatsby and Slumdog Millionaire, but there are slightly varied versions of this structure as well. One variation of the Storyteller structure can be seen when a character gathers the story from another source instead of telling the story to others. This is most often scene when some kind of interviewer – usually a detective, reporter, lawyer or judge – tries to gather information from a number of sources. In The Cuckoo’s Calling, private detective Cormoran Strike tries to piece together how a famous celebrity was murdered by interviewing a number of people who knew her. As he gathers evidence, we get to experience Lula Landry’s story. We get to know her as Cormoran fights to win his goal of solving the case. Interview with The Vampire similarly tells us the memorable story of Louis, Lestat and Claudia via an interviewer. The interviewer wants to convince Louis to make him a vampire, and the primary way he tries to accomplish this is by getting Louis to tell his story. Louis uses his story to try to convince the interviewer that he doesn’t want to be a vampire, but it fails. In the film version of The Sweet Hereafter, lawyer Mitchell Stephens questions the various witnesses of the school bus accident. As he hears their stories, so do we. Similarly, the majority of Citizen Kane is also told via interviews with people who know Kane throughout his life. In all of these examples, it is the person gathering the details of the story who drives the story forward. This means the interviewer is the protagonist, and the main story we remember after reading or viewing the tale is the B-plot. Other examples of this variation of the Storyteller Structure include Velvet Goldmine, Big Fish, and The Silkworm.
A much more subtle use of the Storyteller Structure can be seen in the Ian McEwen novel and Christopher Hampton screenplay adaptation of Atonement. In both versions of the story, the reader/viewer can’t quite choose the protagonist of the story until the very end of the narrative. While there are clues (change in novel structure in the book and the ongoing sound effect of the typewriter in the movie), it’s not entirely clear that Briony is the protagonist until she tells us she has manipulated all we have seen until this point. Briony’s goal is to find atonement for the false accusation she made as a child that ultimately lead to the death of Robbie, a young servant educated by her father and in love with her sister. The primary tactic Briony uses to gain her atonement is by changing the events of the story. She manipulates what we know about the characters so she can give them the happy ending she stole from them. She is the most unreliable of narrators, but every change she makes serves her goal of fighting for forgiveness. At the end of the story, the storyteller’s goal is clear and going back and re-reading the book or re-watching the film shows you who how were manipulated in a brilliant and structurally sound way.
Keep in mind that having a storyteller doesn’t automatically mean the Storyteller Structure is being used. The film Edward Scissorhands opens with an older version of Kim telling her granddaughter about Edward in order to explain why it snows. While this seems like a great set-up for a storyteller structure, the film never returns to the older version of Kim, and therefore doesn’t pay off the structure as a whole. In fact, that opening scene could be completely cut from the film, and it wouldn’t affect the overall viewing experience at all.
Similarly, the film Moulin Rouge! is framed by Christian writing the story of his and Satine’s love affair. While this appearance of our storyteller is much more consistent throughout the film (we cut back to him quite often to see his reaction to the events of the story), the film could have worked just as well without him. Christian and Satine have very clear and active goals that don’t need the storyteller’s involvement to succeed or fail. While the addition of the storyteller may have helped with pacing and delivery of the story, the main plot is still the love affair.
For a Storyteller Structure to work, the Storyteller needs to have an active goal, and the story he or she tells has to be a tactic the Storyteller uses in order to win that goal. In other words, the story wouldn’t exist if not for the presence of the storyteller. If you are writing this kind of narrative – where the story is a byproduct of the storyteller’s journey – then make sure all elements of the Major Dramatic Curve exist on the storyteller’s narrative Curve since this is the driving factor behind the story as a whole.
Flashback/Flash-forward
Non-linear storytelling is a regular part of our modern day cultural narrative structures. Whether we merely have a flashback or we completely shake up the chronology of a story, manipulating time has become a well-known and useful tool we can use to tell unique and compelling stories. The key to making sure these kinds of stories work is to make sure that two things are true: 1) there is a reason to manipulate time and 2) all elements of the Major Dramatic Curve are still in place.
Let’s first look at a narrative that manipulated time in a way that didn’t work: the film 21 Grams. With a compelling story and a dynamic cast, this film had every reason to be an emotional powerhouse. The story focuses on how a freak accident impacts the lives of three people: the woman who lost her husband and daughter, the man who hit them, and the man who received a heart transplant from the dead husband. If all the pieces were told in a chronological fashion, there is a clear and compelling Curve driving the story forward in a dynamic way. But the director and editor made the decision to tell this story in a nonlinear fashion. The choice resulted in a rather frustrating watch for the viewer. While the stunning performances received high praise, critics called the film “frustratingly flawed” and referred to the structure as a “parlor game” that “doesn’t let any of the characters build an arc of growth or despair.” The filmmakers may have chosen to tell the story in a nonlinear fashion because they thought it would be “cool” or “interesting,” but the problem was that the story didn’t provide the motivation for a nonlinear tale.
If you are considering using a nonlinear structure to tell your story, remember form follows function. The story should contain elements that warrant the use of a non-traditional story structure in order for it to work. These elements can be character-driven or thematic in nature, but they need to exist.
Two great narratives that use character as justification for nonlinear storytelling are The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger and the Christopher Nolan film Memento. In both narratives, the protagonist suffers from a medical condition that causes them to see the world in a non-traditional way. This, in turn, justifies the story being delivered to us in a non-traditional way as well. In The Time Traveler’s Wife, protagonist Henry DeTamble has Chrono-Impairment, a disease that causes him to involuntarily travel back and forth in time. As he experiences his life “out of order,” we experience his story out of order. The chronology matches his point of view, and so the structure works.
Similarly, Memento’s Leonard was shot in the head and, as a result, he can’t form any new memories. He has to remind himself where he is and what he’s doing by writing himself notes or tattooing information to his skin. His short-term memory loss results in his experiencing the world around him in bursts. In order to allow us to experience the world in the same fashion, Christopher Nolan presents Leonard’s story in a “pendulum” fashion. We start at one extreme of his time line (th
e far future), then swing back and see the other extreme of his time line (the distant past). We cut back and forth – one narrative moving forward and another moving backward – until we meet in the middle of his timeline. This cutting back and forth mimics the way Leonard receives information in bursts. As he must piece together what’s happening in his world, so must we, the viewers. This works because we are placed in his shoes and forced to see the world in the same way he sees it.
With both of these stories, what’s fascinating is that even though we experience their story out of order, we are still presented with their Major Dramatic Curves in a linear fashion. In The Time Traveler’s Wife, we experience Henry’s relationship with Claire as a fully developed, linear Major Dramatic Curve. We see their meeting, growing fondness for each other, marriage, pregnancy and death all in the right order. Similarly, in Memento, we see Leonard’s journey towards avenging his wife’s murder in a fully developed Curve – in fact, two of them! Both his forward progressing story and his backward progressing story have completely developed Major Dramatic Curves. Because the Curves are presented in a traditional order, the nonlinear narrative works.
Nonlinear narratives using conceptual or thematic protagonists can also work as long as the Major Dramatic Curve travels in a linear fashion as well. The most famous example of this can be seen with Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction. In this story, the film begins and ends in the middle of a timeline – a scene in a diner. The film cuts backwards and forwards, circling back and forth in time. With seemingly no rhyme or reason about where we will go next, we have no idea what the next scene will hold. At one point, we even witness a main character die and then come “back to life” in the next scene.
While the narrative’s forward and backward movement may seem random, it’s actually extremely well placed. This film uses several Eastern ideas including the theme that violence begets more violence, and the only way to escape the circle of violence is to grant forgiveness. In the film, any character who seeks revenge or commits violence will continue to be caught up in the cycle of violence unless they forgive or are forgiven. In fact, if a character shows forgiveness, they are never seen in the film again (or only seen in a small capacity), as if escaping the film equates escaping the cycle of violence.
Jules and Vincent are two hitmen whose lives travel in drastically different directions. After coming close to death, Jules has a major revelation and decides to forgive the two robbers at the diner instead of killing them. This forgiveness grants him his life, and he escapes the film unharmed. Jules, on the other hand, doesn’t learn how to forgive, and he gets killed. Death, however, isn’t strong enough to get him out of the cycle of violence, and he appears in another scene. Boxer Butch Coolidge wins a match when he was told by mobster Marcellus Wallace to lose. By all rights, in the violent world of Pulp Fiction, this should mean he’s dead. While on the run, both he and Marcellus are kidnapped by a group of unsavory characters. While Butch has the opportunity to escape and leave Marcellus to die, he chooses instead to go back and save him. As a result, Marcellus forgives Butch, and they both are never seen in the film again. Forgiveness has granted Butch life where nothing else could have.
While the stories of these characters, fighting their way through violence and forgiveness, are told out of order, the Major Dramatic Curve is linear. The Place of Rest is the scene in the diner where we see violence for the first time. The Inciting Incident comes when Vincent and Jules arrive at the apartment where the suitcase thieves reside. Here, Jules invokes God (the ultimate forgiver) with his Biblical quote. From here on out, the battle rages with violence and all the possible outlets for violence to emerge. The Crisis Point is when Butch must decide between saving Marcellus or leaving him to die at the hands of the unsavory characters in the pawn shop. He makes the decision to save Marcellus, and then we see the violence getting “cleaned” (both metaphorically and literally) until we reach our Climax. We see Jules forgive the two diner robbers, Pumpkin and Honey Bunny, and the film ends. Forgiveness has destroyed violence, and the Major Dramatic Curve is complete.
While creating nonlinear stories requires a lot of extra work on behalf of the writer, there is a growing desire by consumers to see these kinds of narratives. Just make sure you justify the choice of nonlinear storytelling and keep that Major Dramatic Curve working in a linear progression to make the story work.
A Word About Television
Many believe we live in a Golden Age of television, and with such great narratives being created for the small screen, it’s not a surprise to learn the impact this kind of storytelling has on other narrative forms. While we mentioned one form of television storytelling above with Downton Abbey, it’s worth taking a moment to look at the two main kinds of storytelling narratives and how they relate to the Major Dramatic Curve and to other formats.
Television shows can exist as one of two kinds of structures: episodic or serials. In an episodic television show, the world and the characters of each episode are the same, but the story is not a direct continuation of the previous episodes. While there can be some development over the course of a season, the episodes are basically standalone tales that can be watched out of order. A great example is season one of Supernatural. Over the course of the first season, there is an overarching story of brothers Sam and Dean looking for their missing father, but the real attraction of the show is the Monster-Of-The-Week structure in which the brothers fought a new supernatural being each week.
When television first began, most television shows were episodic because it was common for viewers to miss an episode every now and then due to life’s demands. With no recording equipment and no reruns, if a viewer missed an episode, there was no way they could see it after the original air date. As a result, television writers knew they had to tell stories limited to a single show. Early television shows like The Lone Ranger and The Honeymooners could be watched whenever the viewer could be home to watch the original airing, and missing an episode wouldn’t affect the overall comprehension of plot.
With these kinds of shows, the plot is self-contained, and so the Major Dramatic Curve can exist as a fully developed unit unique to each episode. The crime fighter will take down the villain of the week. The doctor will heal the patient of the week. The CSI investigators will find the murderer of the week. These shows are self-contained and so the Curves are as well.
If the episodic has hints of a larger storyline (Sam and Dean looking for their father, Jim and Pam flirting across the desk, Moriarty getting closer to Sherlock, etc.), then a larger Curve can also exist that encompasses the entire season. The key thing to remember with episodics, however, is the episode specific Curves must be fully developed. This is true for other episodic narrative structures as well, including a collection of short stories (such as The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, Orlando by Virginia Wolf or The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros), an episodic web-series (such as Neil’s Puppet Dreams) or an episodic comic series.
After the invention of the VCR and later the TiVo/DVR systems, which allowed viewers to watch a show after the original air date, a new kind of television show became more popular: the serial. Taking its storytelling origins from serial comics and serial radio shows, a serial television show could tell a larger story over the course of multiple episodes or an entire season. While most of the first television serials were daytime soap operas, more “evening soaps” showed up after the VCR, including Dallas and Knots Landing. Today, serials make up the majority of our television lineup, and they aren’t just soaps anymore: Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones, Dexter, The Walking Dead, Silicon Valley, Orange is the New Black and Arrested Development are only a few of the heavy hitters.
In these kinds of television shows, the key thing to remember about the Major Dramatic Curve is the main Curve must last the entire season. While there can be smaller goals in each episode, these episode-based goals are just tactics the protagonist uses to win his larger goal. In the HBO serial Silicon Valley, protagonist
Richard wants to prove the validity of the file compression application he created. In the pilot episode, he leaves his day job to form his own company, and the main goal of season one is to get that company off the ground. While each episode has a minor goal (complete a successful business plan, secure the copyright for the name of his company, fixing code, conducting a successful presentation at a major award competition, etc.), all of these episode goals work to support the season-long goal of launching his company.
Other serial formats should also use this kind of narrative structure. Serial comics (like Fables), serial web series (such as The Guild) and serialized novels (Stephen King’s The Green Mile or The Dark Tower, for example) also have a strong Major Dramatic Curve lasting the entire series. Uniting the individual episodes under one Major Dramatic Curve keeps the series feeling consistent and engaging for the reader/viewer.
Back in the world of television, as DVRs became more common and serials became more successful, a strange hybrid developed. Episodic television shows slowly morphed into something closer to a serial in later seasons. House, Supernatural, Grimm and Once Upon A Time are only a few examples. A similar thing happened in the later Harry Potter, Divergent and The Hunger Games book series as well. While the reasoning behind this morphing of structure is a direct result of how stories are sold in their respective industry (it’s easier to sell a stand-alone narrative than one without a clear cut ending), it’s important to study how the writers changed their underlying structure to reflect their new method of storytelling.
Let’s look at The Hunger Games: the first book of the series has a clear cut Major Dramatic Curve, which we have revisited several times in this text. The first book is obviously part of a larger series (we are left wondering what will happen next when we reach the end of the novel), but it can also stand on its own. The next two books in the series, Catching Fire and Mockingjay, are written in a way that both mirrors the structure of the first book and contradicts it. All three books have a similar underlying structure: each one has some kind of a tour and then some kind of a game. In The Hunger Games, the tour is Katniss’s choosing and journey to the Capitol where she explores that world before the Games. Catching Fire refers to the two sections as the Tour and the Games directly. In Mockingjay, Katniss’s tour is her attempts at becoming the PR figure everyone wants her to be and then the Games is the journey into the Capitol where booby traps are set up in the streets. This similar underlying structure makes all three books feel a part of the same series so the reader doesn’t feel like they were thrown into a completely new world.
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