Nathan Baugh
@nathanbaugh27 • 234,082 subscribers
I write & talk about stories // @thriveholdings
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In 4 minutes, Kurt Vonnegut explained stories better than anyone I’ve ever heard. “The shape of the curve is what matters. Not their origins.” He plots stories on 2 axes: X: Time Y: Good fortune / ill fortune He goes on to say, “Somebody gets into trouble, then gets out of it again. People love that story. They never get tired of it.” Point 1: Stories have defined patterns. In Joseph Campbell’s Hero of a Thousand Faces, he makes the case for the Hero’s Journey. Since then, it’s become the most famous storytelling structure in the world. Vonnegut argued stories could be divided into 8 shapes. Each story, he said, fit one of the 8. Point 2: Vonnegut says, “Be a sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them — so the reader may see what they're made of.” To see who your characters really are, you have to make them suffer. Only then does your audience have someone worth cheering for. Point 3: End on a high note. Vonnegut says, “It’s not accidental that the line ends up higher than where it began. This is encouraging to readers.” The way a story makes people feel when they finish is how they remember it. It’s called recency bias. Lift people up and they will love you. *** “There are people. There are stories. The people think they shape the stories, but the reverse is often closer to the truth.” I wrote this with Robbie Crabtree. Follow him for lessons on storytelling + fundraising. And I talk about creative storytelling. Follow Nathan Baugh for more like that.
Nathan Baugh6,248,469 次观看 • 2 年前
Students at NYU asked the creators of South Park the million-dollar question: “What makes a good story?” They gave one of the best explanations of story I’ve heard: “If we can take the beats of your outline, and the words ‘and then’ belong between those beats… you got something pretty boring. What should happen between every beat you’ve written down is the words ‘therefore’ or ‘but.’” They go on to say, “That gives you the causation between each beat, and that makes a story.” Point 1: There’s an idea in storytelling called ‘Promise, Progress, Payoff.’ Essentially, a story is a neverending cycle of promises that are paid off over the span of the story. It’s a cycle of expectation and resolution. Cause and effect. Conflict and progress. Point 2: A story isn’t a bunch of random events thrown together. A story is a series of but / because / therefore moments. A famous example: • Harry discovers he's a wizard. Because of this, he goes to learn magic at Hogwarts. • But then he learns Voldemort wants to kill him and rule the world. • Therefore, he must find a way to defeat him. Point 3: ‘And’ implies a simple continuation. ‘But / Therefore’ give prior events meaning through causation. ‘But’ implies conflict. ‘Therefore’ implies progress. I’m reminded of a Hemingway quote: “Prose is architecture, not interior decoration.” Great writing is intentional. It doesn’t wander. It builds upon itself. *** I hope you enjoyed that! If so, follow Nathan Baugh. I study the best storytellers ever and share what I learn.
Nathan Baugh3,829,975 次观看 • 3 年前
When Christopher Nolan explains the plot of Momento, he draws a hairpin. It’s an idea I keep coming back to: Stories as shapes. In Momento, half of the movie moves forward in time while the other half moves backward. Then, toward the end, the two sides meet near the tip of the hairpin. Point 1: Nolan says to “approach structure mathematically with diagrams.” In storytelling, the idea of structure is everywhere: • 3 Act • StoryGrid • Hero’s Journey But Nolan claims those restrict his creativity. He prefers to think in ‘shapes’ rather than in hard rules. “What I do is draw many diagrams,” Nolan says, “Particularly if there’s a type of structural complexity.” Point 2: I’m reminded of Kurt Vonnegut, who taught about the “shapes of stories” at Harvard and Case Western. He broke down stories into ~8 unique shapes. Each runs on 2 axes: • X – Time • Y – Good vs ill fortune For example, Nolan’s plot map of Inception looks like Vonnegut’s “Man In Hole” shape. But Momento is non-linear so it doesn’t follow any of the 8. And yet Nolan still describes it as a shape. *** “Breaking rules isn’t interesting. It’s making up new ones that keeps things exciting.” – Christopher Nolan Follow Nathan Baugh for more ideas like this!
Nathan Baugh256,319 次观看 • 3 年前
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