notes from the underground

STRUCTURE: PLOT-CENTRIC OUTLINING

THE POINT:
A strong narrative structure gives the reader a feeling of momentum, and helps the writer focus on the story he or she wants to tell.

HOW TO OUTLINE:
Step 1: Find your premise
The premise is your story’s basic idea. This is what you answer when someone asks, “What is your story about?” It is sometimes called a logline.

Tip: If you’re having trouble finding an interesting premise, you might think of two words that contradict each other. Then start imagining how those words came together.
Ex. “Fight Club,” or “Beggar God”


Step 2: Should You Use a 3-Act or 5-Act Structure?
3 ACT
1. Decision
2. Action
3. Consequences

5 ACT
1. Problem—the characters decide to solve it
2. They try an easy solution—but that solution fails
3. They discover the real problem
4. Put together a solution
5. Solve the problem—or, decisively fail to solve it

Tip: For longer pieces, like plays, scripts, or novels, a five-act structure gives a strong framework for your narrative. The three-act structure might work best, however, at the very start of a piece, or for a shorter work (or even while trying to figure out the shape of each act in a 5-act structured story). Figuring out where your first act begins and ends (where the characters make the decision that starts them on their journey) can be especially important, and that’s where a three-act outline might be most useful.

Step 3: Reverse-Engineer Your Characters
What characters would be most interesting to see work through the plotline you’ve just developed? Sometimes characters are very close to our hearts, but don’t fit into the pieces we happen to be writing on at the moment—that’s ok! You can write as many stories as you want—but don’t try and shove them into a story that isn’t theirs. Give them the respect and space to tell their own story.

If you can’t tell whether a particular character belongs in a story or not, think about their thematic or emotional arc. Usually, a plot will tell the story of a particular journey (such as: a journey from isolation to togetherness, or from being a child to being an adult). All the characters should go on a similar journey, in their own way. If a character’s journey isn’t related to the plot’s thematic arc, maybe he or she belongs in a different story.

Tip: When you’re trying to find characters that fit into your plotline, consider: Who is the worst possible person to be in this situation? Who would have the furthest to travel to reach the story’s resolution?

Is This Useful?
Outlining the plot before finding your characters or starting to write might not work for you—or it might not work for every story. Outlines and plots are just tools you can use if you get stuck or don’t know where to start. You can use none, some, or all of these steps—whatever you might need for a particular story.

Sometimes, outlining can actually be most useful when you’re going back to edit a story you’ve already written. If you make an outline after you’ve already gotten a full draft down, it can help you spot any plot holes, characters you’ve forgotten about, or places where you may need to include more information.

To Sum Up:
The good thing about having a strong outline: if you think about the characters’ goals and obstacles before you start, you don’t have to worry about your characters becoming aimless or losing focus while you write their stories.

The downside is that your storytelling might become rigid or you may become bored with the story. Ultimately, you are the master of your story’s universe, and you get to do whatever you want—regardless of what you’ve outlined.

EXAMPLE: Independence Day

Premise: Hostile aliens come to Earth.

In Three Acts:
1. Individuals decide to fight the aliens.
2. Each human tries to stop the aliens from taking over, but the aliens keep winning. So the humans band together.
3. Working together, the humans drive the aliens away.

In Five Acts:
1. Hostile aliens arrive on earth and individual humans decide to stop them. The most powerful humans decide to use diplomacy.
2. But the aliens refuse to cooperate; they have no mercy. The humans must use force.
3. But fighting the aliens as individuals—or even individual countries—is hopeless.
4. So all the humans band together to fight
5. And they win!

The easy solution was to talk to the aliens—FAILS.
The hard but right solution was for the humans to talk to each other—WINS

The plot’s thematic/emotional arc is: we are stronger together than we are apart.
The character’s individual stories each follow the same arc. Ex. Bill Pullman’s pilot starts out as a drunk, isolated lowlife. By the movie’s end he reunites with his family and sacrifices himself for the entire human race.

An isolated, drunken lowlife is the worst possible person to do what his character must ultimately do: come together with the rest of humanity and save the world. Because his journey takes him from one extreme (isolation) to the other (self sacrifice for the good of the group), it’s the most interesting version of the journey possible.

-------------------------------- PS ---------------------

These are the notes I provided for the ex-offender workshop I led last week. Don't worry--I'm not a scriptwriting hack ALL the time; this week we're talking about shaping a story around its characters, instead of the other way around. If you don't agree with some/all of these notes, I'd love to hear it. I'm going back to the workshop tomorrow, so there's still time to set everybody straight ;)

(By the way, I got the three-act structure definition from a blog that I can no longer find, and the five-act is based on a book I read on mystery writing. If any of you remember who said/wrote the three-act structure definition, I'd really appreciate it).