EM7: TEACHING AND ASSESSMENT OF LITERATURE Module 9

LESSON: STRUCTURES OF LITERATURE

Lesson Proper:

A. Structure of Literature
✓ The structure is the arrangement of story elements according to purpose, style, and genre.
The structure doesn't just happen on its own. Rather, it's carefully considered by the author
to make sure their intended meaning is conveyed.
✓ “Fiction is supposed ... to be entertaining and narrative, so structures have to be buried a
little bit. If they become foregrounded too much, it stops being fiction and starts being poetry
- something more concrete and out of time." — Eleanor Catton
✓ A structure may be confused with the plot. While the plot is the events in the story itself,
heavily affected by character, setting, and theme, the structure is how these elements are
presented to the reader.

B. Story Structure
✓ Story structure is the order in which plot events are told to the reader or audience. While
stories can be told in a wide variety of ways, most Western story structures commonly share
certain elements: exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, and resolution.
✓ A tightly controlled structure will answer a reader's questions, provide a climax followed by
resolution and information at the end of the story, further the characters’ development, and
unravel any central conflicts. In other words, it's responsible for a satisfying narrative
experience that accomplishes the author’s aims.
✓ Writing is an art, but if there’s one part of the craft that’s closer to science, this would be it.
Become a master of story structure, and you will have the world at your feet.

C. Classic Story Structure

✓ When people discuss different story structures, they often talk about the different
frameworks used to analyze stories. When you boil them all down, all stories have certain
shared elements.
✓ Elements of classic story structure:
• Exposition. This first part establishes a
protagonist's normal life and greater
desires, and usually culminates in the
inciting incident.
• Rising action. The protagonist pursues
their new goal and is tested along the way.
• Climax. Our hero achieves their goal — or
so they think!
• Falling action. The hero now must deal with
the consequences of achieving their goal.
• Resolution. The conclusion tying together the plot, character arcs, and themes.
EM7: TEACHING AND ASSESSMENT OF LITERATURE Module 9

D. Story Structures
1. Freytag’s Pyramid
✓ Named after a 19th-century German novelist and playwright, Freytag’s Pyramid is a five-
point dramatic structure that’s based on the classical Greek tragedies of Sophocles,
Aeschylus, and Euripides.
✓ Structure:
• Introduction. The status quo is established; an inciting incident occurs.
• Rise, or rising action. The
protagonist actively pursues
their goal. The stakes
heighten.
• Climax. A point of no return,
from which the protagonist can
no longer go back to the status
quo.
• Return, or fall. In the aftermath
of the climax, tension builds, and the story heads inevitably towards...
• Catastrophe. The protagonist is brought to their lowest point. Their greatest
fears have come true.
✓ This structural model is less frequently used in modern storytelling, partly due to readers’
limited appetite for tragic narratives (although you can still spot a few tragic heroes in
popular literature today). By and large, commercial fiction, films, and television will see
a protagonist overcome their obstacles to find some small measure of success. That
said, it’s still useful to understand the Pyramid as a foundational structure in Western
literature — and you will still see it occasionally in the most depressing contemporary
tales.
2. The Hero’s Journey
✓ Inspired by Joseph Campbell’s concept of the monomyth — a storytelling pattern that
recurs in mythology all over the world — The Hero’s Journey is today’s best-known story
structure. Some attribute its popularity to George Lucas, whose Star Wars was heavily
influenced by Campbell’s “The Hero with a Thousand Faces”.
✓ Campbell’s original structure uses terminology that lends itself well to epic tales of
bravery and triumph — with plot points like “Belly of the Whale,” “Woman as the
Temptress,” and “The Magic Flight.” To make The Hero’s Journey more accessible,
Disney executive Christopher Vogler created a simplified version that has become
popular amongst mainstream storytellers.
✓ Structure:
• The Ordinary World. The hero’s everyday life is established.
• The Call of Adventure. Otherwise known as the inciting incident.
• Refusal of the Call. For a moment, the hero is reluctant to take on the challenge.
• Meeting the Mentor. Our hero meets someone who prepares them for what lies
ahead — perhaps a parental figure, a teacher, a wizard, or a wise hermit.
EM7: TEACHING AND ASSESSMENT OF LITERATURE Module 9

• Crossing the First Threshold.

The hero steps out of their
comfort zone and enters a
‘new world.’
• Tests, Allies, Enemies. Our
protagonist faces new
challenges — and maybe
picks up some new friends.
Think of Dorothy on the
Yellow Brick Road.
• Approach to the Inmost
Cave. The hero gets close to their goal. Luke Skywalker reaches the Death Star.
• The Ordeal. The hero meets (and overcomes) their greatest challenge yet.
• Reward (Seizing the Sword). The hero obtains something important they were
after, and victory is in sight.
• The Road Back. The hero realizes that achieving their goal is not the final
hurdle. In fact, ‘seizing the sword’ may have made things worse for them.
• Resurrection. The hero faces their final challenge — a climactic test that hinges
on everything they’ve learned over their journey.
• Return with the Elixir. Having triumphed, our protagonist returns to their old life.
Dorothy returns to Kansas; Iron Man holds a press conference to blow his own
trumpet.
✓ While Vogler’s simplified steps still retain some of Campbell’s mythological language
with its references to swords and elixirs, the framework can be applied to almost any
genre of fiction. To see how a ‘realistic’ story can adhere to this structure, check out our
guide to the hero’s journey in which we analyze Rocky through this very lens.

3. Three Act Structure

✓ Following the adage that “every story has a beginning, middle, and end,” this popular
structure splits a story’s components into three distinct acts: Setup, Confrontation, and
Resolution. In many ways, the three-act structure reworks The Hero’s Journey, with
slightly less exciting labels.
✓ Structure:
a) Act 1: Setup
• Exposition. The status quo or
‘ordinary world’ is established.
• Inciting Incident. An event that
sets the story in motion.
• Plot Point One. The
protagonist decides to tackle
the challenge head-on. She
‘crosses the threshold,’ and
the story is now truly moving.
EM7: TEACHING AND ASSESSMENT OF LITERATURE Module 9

b) Act 2: Confrontation
• Rising Action. The story's true stakes become clear; our hero grows familiar
with her ‘new world’ and has her first encounters with some enemies and allies.
(see Tests, Allies, Enemies)
• Midpoint. An event that upends the protagonist’s mission. (Similar to the climax
in Freytag’s pyramid)
• Plot Point Two. In the wake of the disorienting midpoint, the protagonist is tested
— and fails. Her ability to succeed is now in doubt.
c) Act 3: Resolution
• Pre-Climax. The night is darkest before dawn. The protagonist must pull herself
together and choose between decisive action and failure.
• Climax. She faces off against her antagonist one last time. Will she prevail?
• Denouement. All loose ends are tied up. The reader discovers the
consequences of the climax. A new status quo is established.
✓ When we speak about a confrontation with an antagonist, this doesn’t always mean a
fight to the death. In some cases, the antagonist might be a love rival, a business
competitor, or merely an internal or environmental conflict that our protagonist has been
struggling with the entire story.
4. Dan Harmon's Story Circle
✓ Another variation on Campbell’s monomyth structure, the Story Circle is an approach
developed by Rick and Morty co-creator Dan Harmon. Again, heavily inspired by the
Hero's Journey, the benefit of Harmon's approach is its focus on the protagonist's
character arc. Instead of referring to abstract concepts like 'story midpoint' and
'denouement', each beat in the story circle forces the writer to think about the character's
wants and needs.
✓ Structure:
• A character is in a zone of
comfort... This is the
establishment of the status
quo.
• But they want something...
This 'want' could be
something long-standing
and brought to the fore by an
inciting incident.
• They enter an unfamiliar situation... The protagonist must do something new in
their pursuit of the thing they want.
• Adapt to it... Faced with some challenges, they struggle then begin to succeed.
• Get what they wanted... Usually a false victory.
• Pay a heavy price for it... They realize that what they 'wanted' wasn't what they
'needed'.
• Then return to their familiar situation... armed with a new truth.
• Having changed... For better or worse.
EM7: TEACHING AND ASSESSMENT OF LITERATURE Module 9

✓ Created by a writer whose chosen medium is the 30-minute sitcom, this structure is
worded in a way that sidesteps the need for a protagonist to undergo life-changing
transformations with each story. After all, for a comedy to continue for six seasons (and
a movie) its characters can't completely transform at the end of each episode. They can,
however, learn small truths about themselves and the world around them — which, like
all humans, they can quickly forget about if next week's episode calls for it.
5. Fichtean Curve
✓ Fleshed out in John Gardner’s The Art of Fiction, the Fichtean Curve is a narrative
structure that puts our main characters through a series of many obstacles on their way
to achieving their overarching goals. Resembling Freytag’s Pyramid, it encourages
authors to write narratives packed with tension and mini-crises that keep readers eager
to reach the climax.
✓ Bypassing the “ordinary world” setup of many other structures, the Fichtean Curve starts
with the inciting incident and goes straight into the rising action. Multiple crises occur,
each of which contributes to the readers’ overall understanding of the narrative —
replacing the need for the initial exposition.
✓ Structure: To discuss this unusual structure, it’s perhaps best to see it in use. We’ll use
Celeste Ng’s “Everything I Never Told You”, as an example. Spoilers ahead.
a) Rising Action
• Inciting incident. The
novel begins with the
line: “Lydia is dead.
But they don’t know
this yet.” Within the
first three paragraphs,
Marilyn realizes that
her daughter Lydia is
missing. Thus,
readers are thrown
straight into rising
action as Marilyn anxiously searches all the usual places Lydia might be found.
• First crisis. Lydia’s family is informed her body was found in a nearby lake. From
this first crisis's climax, the narrative flashes back to provide exposition and
details of the family’s history.
• Second crisis. In flashbacks, we discover that, 11 years prior, Marilyn
abandoned her family to resume her undergraduate studies. In her absence,
the family begins to fall apart. Marilyn learns she is pregnant and is forced to
return home. Having lost her opportunity for further education, she places the
pressure of academic success on her children.
• Third crisis. Back in the present, Lydia’s father, James, is cheating on Marilyn.
The police decide to close the investigation, ruling Lydia’s death a suicide. This
results in a massive argument between her parents, and James leaves to stay
with the “other woman.”
EM7: TEACHING AND ASSESSMENT OF LITERATURE Module 9

•Fourth crisis. Flashback to the day Lydia died. From her perspective, we see
that she’s misunderstood by her parents. She mourns her brother’s impending
departure for college, leaving her as the sole focus of her parents’ pressure.
Isolated, she tries to seduce a friend — who rejects her advances and explains
he’s in love with her brother.
b) Climax
• Lydia takes a boat into the lake in the middle of the night — determined to
overcome her fear of water and reclaim control of her life. Lydia jumps off the
boat, into the water, and out of this life. As in a classical tragedy, this moment
is both devastating and inevitable.
c) Falling Action
• Some level of resolution is achieved, and readers get to at least glimpse the
“new norm” for the characters. Lydia’s family lean on one another in their grief.
While they may never be able to make their amends with Lydia, they can learn
from her death. Not all the loose ends are tied off, but readers infer the family is
on the long road to recovery.
✓ Note: In the rising action stage, all the crises should build tension towards — and
correspond with — the story’s major climax. Like the three-act narrative structure, the
Fichtean Curve’s climax typically occurs two-thirds through the book.
✓ While this structure lends itself well to flashback-heavy novels such as Everything I
Never Told You, it is also incredibly common in theatre. In stage plays like The Cherry
Orchard and A Doll’s House, the action takes place in a fixed time and place, but
backstory and character development are revealed through moments of high drama that
occur before the audience’s eyes.
6. Save the Cat Beat Sheet
✓ Another variation of the three-act structure, this framework created by Hollywood
screenwriter Blake Snyder, has been widely championed by storytellers across many
media forms.
✓ While many structures are reluctant to prescribe exactly when in a story the various
beats should take place, Snyder and Save the Cat have no such qualms. The number
in the square brackets below refers to the page that the beat should take place —
assuming you’re writing a 110-page screenplay.
✓ Structure:
• Opening Image [1]. The first shot
of the film. If you’re starting a
novel, this would be an opening
paragraph or scene that sucks
readers into the world of your
story.
• Set-up [1-10]. Establishing the
‘ordinary world’ of your
protagonist. What does he want?
What is he missing out on?
EM7: TEACHING AND ASSESSMENT OF LITERATURE Module 9

• Theme Stated [5]. During the setup, hint at what your story is really about — the
truth that your protagonist will discover by the end.
• Catalyst [12]. The inciting incident!
• Debate [12-25]. The hero refuses the call to adventure. He tries to avoid the
conflict before they are forced into action.
• Break into Two [25]. The protagonist makes an active choice and the journey
begins in earnest.
• B Story [30]. A subplot kicks in. Often romantic in nature, the protagonist’s
subplot should serve to highlight the theme.
• The Promise of the Premise [30-55]. Often called the ‘fun and games’ stage,
this is usually a highly entertaining section where the writer delivers the goods.
If you promised an exciting detective story, we’d see the detective in action. If
you promised a goofy story of people falling in love, let’s go on some charmingly
awkward dates.
• Midpoint [55]. A plot twist occurs that ups the stakes and makes the hero’s goal
harder to achieve — or makes them focus on a new, more important goal.
• Bad Guys Close In [55-75]. The tension ratchets up. The hero’s obstacles
become greater, his plan falls apart, and he is on the back foot.
• All is Lost [75]. The hero hits rock bottom. He loses everything he’s gained so
far, and things are looking bleak. The hero is overpowered by the villain; a
mentor dies; our lovebirds have an argument and break up.
• Dark Night of the Soul [75-85-ish]. Having just lost everything, the hero
shambles around the city in a minor-key musical montage before discovering
some “new information” that reveals exactly what he needs to do if he wants to
take another crack at success. (This new information is often delivered through
the B-Story)
• Break into Three [85]. Armed with this new information, our protagonist decides
to try once more!
• Finale [85-110]. The hero confronts the antagonist or whatever the source of
the primary conflict is. The truth that eluded him at the start of the story
(established in step three and accentuated by the B Story) is now clear, allowing
him to resolve their story.
• Final Image [110]. A final moment or scene that crystallizes how the character
has changed. It’s a reflection, in some way, of the opening image.
✓ Some writers may find this structure too prescriptive, but it’s incredible to see how many
mainstream stories seem to adhere to it — either by design or coincidence. Over on the
Save the Cat website, there are countless examples of films and novels analyzed with
Snyder’s 15 beats. You’ll be surprised how accurate some of the timings are for each of
the beats.
7. Seven-Point Story Structure
✓ A slightly less detailed adaptation of The Hero’s Journey, the Seven-Point Story
Structure focuses specifically on the highs and lows of a narrative arc.
EM7: TEACHING AND ASSESSMENT OF LITERATURE Module 9

✓ According to author Dan Wells, who developed the Seven-Point Story Structure, writers
are encouraged to start at the end, with the resolution, and work their way back to the
starting point: the hook. With the ending in mind, they can have their protagonist and
plot begin in a state that best contrasts the finale — since this structure is all about
dramatic changes from beginning to end.
✓ Structure:
• The Hook. Draw readers
in by explaining the
protagonist’s current
situation. Their state of
being at the beginning of
the novel should be in
direct contrast to what it
will be at the end of the
novel.
• Plot Point 1. Whether it’s a
person, an idea, an inciting incident, or something else — there should be a
"Call to Adventure" of sorts that sets the narrative and character development
in motion.
• Pinch Point 1. Things can’t be all sunshine and roses for your protagonist.
Something should go wrong here that applies pressure to the main character,
forcing them to step up and solve the problem.
• Midpoint. A “Turning Point” wherein the main character changes from a passive
force to an active force in the story. Whatever the narrative’s main conflict is,
the protagonist decides to start meeting it head-on.
• Pinch Point 2. The second pinch point involves another blow to the protagonist
— things go even more awry than they did during the first pinch point. This might
involve the passing of a mentor, the failure of a plan, the reveal of a traitor, etc.
• Plot Point 2. After the calamity of Pinch Point 2, the protagonist learns that
they’ve actually had the key to solving the conflict the whole time.
• Resolution. The story’s primary conflict is resolved — and the character goes
through the final bit of development necessary to transform them from who they
were at the start of the novel.
Reference: https://blog.reedsy.com/guide/story-structure/