6 HN users recommended this lecture6 months2019–2024score 7
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026
Frequently recommended as a delightful, influential way to think about story structure.
Kurt Vonnegut's 2004 Case College lecture, with Spanish subtitles, in which he sketches the shapes of stories on a blackboard. He plots story arcs as good and bad fortune against time.
“Vonnegut is really special. I always like coming back to his Shape of Stories talks” (HN, 2020)
Vonnegut is really special. I always like coming back to his Shape of Stories talks: [link] Here's a longer one: [this video] It's interesting to see the difference in him with age. He seems to giggle more as an older man.
Longer Shape of Stories talk showing Vonnegut late in life
Yes, Hero's Journey plot ( [link] ) is very well understood and yet continues to sell well and generally the idea of certain shapes to stories is beautifully explored here among other places: [this video]
Explores the idea that stories have certain shapes
You can find variations of this talk across his life but Vonneguts 'Shape of Stories' kept ringing in my head while going over this paper. I like the later-in-life version of the talk. [this video]
Later-in-life version of Vonnegut's Shape of Stories talk
That's what I meant by presentations of his shapes of stories. There are a couple of lectures posted on YouTube. [link] [this video] The thinking originated in his (rejected) master's thesis at the University of Chicago. Here are some photos of some of the graphs: [link] Even there, in an incomplete copy, there are seven unique story shapes. And there's a major difference between saying here are some shapes of some stories and here are the only story shapes.
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