/lit/ - Literature

>>21299525
hey, interesting to see someone else applying my method; i've never used it to deconstruct other works before but i'm going to do some exercises like that of my own. it's a good way of "validating" its efficacy.

and yeah, denouement could also be relabelled as "resolution" for more clarity i guess. crisis --> climax --> "resolution of the crisis which results in the character achieving his goal/abandoning it for a better goal" etc. etc. so you have crisis --> (climax + denouement), which together form the resolution.

these things are typically so compressed in terms of timing (i.e. the crisis, climax, and resolution are all happening essentially one after the other at the same time) that it's less necessary to really separate it out unless it's really becoming a sticking point in my writing. i usually just have the crisis and the resolution - the climax is inherent in the nature of the resolution. e.g. pic related. if i'm struggling hard though i do break it down into its elements for clarity.

but as you can see it's not a process that is vastly demanding, necessarily (and less so when you can just write "restless spirits mystery stuff happens and now they have changed their mind!" but don't worry, the preceding two pages of developments exist to build credibility for that "sudden" change of heart). it's more about getting down the beats that i want to hit - what is it that the characters do that causes the plot to happen. how does the plot happening affect the characters.

basically it's a great way, i find, to take a vague idea that might just be a premise and a scene or two or even just a sense of what you want the theme to be and turn that vagueness into something actionable. plotting out the detail of cause and effect and the pacing and everything is a bigger job that comes after this intermediate step (or never lmao, i just write and rewrite until it doesn't make me cry).