Narrative-Structure

Most storytelling advice tells you to start slow: establish the ordinary world, introduce your characters, build context before introducing conflict. The Fichtean Curve says: screw that. Start with a crisis. Then another crisis. And another. And another. Keep escalating until you reach a climax, deliver a brief resolution, and you’re done. No leisurely setup. No patient worldbuilding. No gentle easing the audience into the story. Just: Crisis. Crisis. Crisis. Boom. ...

The Princess Bride begins with a grandfather reading a book to his sick grandson. Inside that book is the story of Westley and Buttercup. But that story contains another story—the legend of the Dread Pirate Roberts. Three stories, nested inside each other like Russian dolls. This technique—nested loop narrative—is one of the most elegant ways to add depth, resonance, and meaning to your stories. But it’s also one of the easiest to mess up. ...

Joseph Campbell’s The Hero’s Journey has dominated storytelling advice for decades. Seventeen stages, archetypal characters, mythological resonance—it’s the blueprint for everything from Star Wars to The Matrix to Harry Potter. But there’s a problem: it’s complicated. Most writers don’t need a 17-step formula. They need something practical, intuitive, and flexible enough to apply to everything from sitcoms to space operas. Enter Dan Harmon’s Story Circle—an eight-step distillation of Campbell’s monomyth that’s simpler to use, easier to teach, and just as powerful. ...

Western storytelling has a formula: introduce a hero, give them a problem, make it worse, then resolve it through struggle. Conflict is everything. Heroes need villains. Protagonists need obstacles. Stories need tension. But what if there’s another way? What if you could tell a compelling story with zero conflict, no antagonist, and no struggle—and still keep your audience completely engaged? Welcome to kishotenketsu (起承転結), the East Asian narrative structure that’s been creating beautiful stories for over a thousand years without relying on conflict at all. ...

Every screenwriting book tells you the same thing: stories have three acts. Act 1: Setup (establish character, world, conflict) Act 2: Confrontation (escalating obstacles, rising stakes) Act 3: Resolution (climax, falling action, denouement) There’s a problem though. Most of your favorite movies don’t actually follow this structure. Or rather, they follow it so loosely that calling it “three acts” is misleading at best and creatively limiting at worst. Let’s be clear: the three-act structure isn’t wrong. But it’s not a rule—it’s a retrospective description, not a prescription. And treating it as gospel might be why your story feels forced. ...