Three types of plot:
- Concentric- all events unfold around one conflict, everything is subject to cause-and-effect relationships. (F.M. Dostoevsky "Crime and Punishment")
- chronicle- a plot with a predominant temporal correlation between events. (L.N. Tolstoy "Childhood. Adolescence. Youth")
- multiline- has several event lines, intersecting with each other from time to time. (M.A. Bulgakov "The Master and Margarita")
Plot Components:
1) exposition- an element of the plot that depicts the life of a character before the start and development of the conflict, or outlines cultural-historical or socio-psychological facts, and also provides information about the place and time of the upcoming action. Most often it is given at the beginning of the work and is transmitted either in the words of the author (epic works), or in the deliberately informative dialogues of the characters (drama). There is a so-called "delayed exposure" (detective) Not to be confused with prehistory- an image of the hero's childhood, etc.
2) tie- events that upset the balance of the initial situation, revealing contradictions in it, which give rise to conflict and set the plot action in motion. It can be prepared and motivated in the exposition of the work, but it can also be sudden, giving the plot action incompleteness and sharpness.
3) Conflict- the principle of contradiction, collision. Common throughout the piece. collision- a specific collision that becomes the content of a specific scene, episode, act. The conflict can be built from many collisions. Can evolve throughout the story.
4) Peripeteia- a sharp twist in the plot, caused by unexpected circumstances. A sudden change in the fate of the hero, a rapid transition from one situation to another (from happiness to mortal danger, from obscurity to insight). Gives the plot sharpness and entertainment, typical for works with a pronounced intrigue.
5) Intrigue- a special construction of the plot, when the characters overcome various obstacles and conflict situations. It is a sequence of ups and downs, unexpected events, unusual situations and circumstances that break the measured course of the action and give the plot dynamism, sharpness and entertainment. The development of intrigue is always accompanied by a clash of interests, intricacies of relationships between characters, a game of chance and all sorts of misunderstandings. Quid pro quo. An integral property of many genres and genre varieties (short story, sitcom, melodrama, detective story, adventure novel).
6) climax– moment highest voltage plot action, after which it steadily moves towards the denouement. It can be a decisive clash, a turning point in fate, or an event that fully reveals the characters of the characters and conflict situation. It is characteristic of works with a concentric plot.
7) denouement- conflict resolution, the outcome of events in the work. It is given at the end when external events play an important role, it can be transferred to the middle or the beginning of the narrative. It can be tragic or prosperous, unexpected or motivated by the whole course of the story, plausible or deliberately conditional or artificial, or it can be represented by an open ending.
14. Motive: origin and meaning of the term. Typology of motives.
motive- the minimum meaningful component of a literary work that has received a verbal and figurative embodiment in the text, repeated either in various works, or within the writer's work, or in the context of a genre tradition or literary movement, or on the scale of a national literary tradition.
plot- a set of coherent and dynamic motives.
Motives are:
1) Free– can be easily removed from the context without damaging it.
2) Dynamic- change the situation (cause-and-effect relationships, the plot is built on them)
3) Static- do not change the situation (the plot can be built on them)
4) messengers- if they are removed, the causal relationship in the work will be violated.
Motivation- a system of techniques that allows you to justify the introduction of individual motives and complexes.
1) Compositional
2) Realistic
3) Artistic
keynote- Leading, repeating motif.
15. Psychologism and its types. Psychological analysis. Internal monologue, "stream of consciousness".
Psychologism- a system of techniques and means aimed at revealing the inner world of a character.
Internal psychologism :
1) internal monologue - direct fixation and reproduction of the thoughts of the hero, to a greater or lesser extent imitating the real psychological patterns of inner speech.
2) mindflow- a way of narration that imitates the work of the human consciousness and subconsciousness; registration of heterogeneous manifestations of the psyche;
3) analysis and introspection- a technique in which complex emotional experiences are decomposed into elements and thereby explained to the reader.
Indirect psychologism- the transfer of the inner world of the hero through external signs: behavior, speech, portrait, dream (subconscious images), facial expressions, clothes, landscape details.
Total:
Point of view- a compositional technique that organizes the narrative and determines the position of the subject in space in relation to the objects of the image, the subject of evaluation, the addressee of the speech. Consistent review and moving point of view.
estrangement(introduced by Shklovsky) - artistic principle images of any action or object, as seen for the first time, as dropped out of the usual context or presented in a new perspective.
This topic was already raised on another site - there it did not arouse interest. Perhaps the same picture will be here. But suddenly, all the same, a constructive conversation will turn out ...
To begin with, I will lay out a brief description.
The plot is concentric (centripetal)
type of plot, distinguished on the basis of the principle of development of the action, the connection of episodes, from the features of the plot and denouement. In S.K. between the episodes, a causal relationship is clearly visible, the plot and denouement are easily distinguished. If the plot is at the same time multilinear, then a causal relationship is also clearly traced between the plot lines, which also motivates the inclusion of a new line in the work.
The plot is chronicle (centrifugal)
a plot with no pronounced plot, with a predominance of temporal motivations in the development of the action. But in S.x. episodes can be included, sometimes quite extensive, in which events are connected by a causal relationship, i.e. in C.x. often includes various concentric plots. Contrasted with a concentric plot.
Principles of connection of events in chronicle and concentric plots differ significantly, therefore, their capabilities in depicting reality, actions and behavior of people also differ. The criterion for distinguishing between these types of plot is the nature of the connection between events.
AT chronicle In plots, the connection between events is temporary, that is, events succeed each other in time, following one after another. The “formula” of plots of this type can be represented as follows:
a, then b, then c... then x (or: a + b + c +... + x),
where a, b, c, x are the events that make up the chronicle plot.
Action in chronicle plots is not distinguished by integrity, strict logical motivation: after all, in the plots-chronicles, no one central conflict. They are a review of events and facts that may not be outwardly related to each other. The only thing that unites these events is that they all line up in one chain in terms of their flow in time. chronicle plots are multi-conflict: conflicts arise and go out, some conflicts come to replace others.
Often, in order to emphasize the chronicle principle of the arrangement of events in works, writers called them "stories", "chronicles" or, in accordance with the old Russian literary tradition- "stories".
AT concentric plots, causal relationships between events predominate, that is, each event is the cause of the next one and the consequence of the previous one. These stories are different from chronicle unity of action: the writer explores any one conflict situation. All events in the plot seem to be pulled together into one node, obeying the logic of the main conflict.
The "formula" of this type of plot can be represented as follows:
a, therefore, b, therefore, c ... therefore, x
(a -> b -> c ->… -> x),
where a, b, c, x are the events that make up concentric plot.
All parts of the work are based on clearly expressed conflicts. However, the chronological links between them can be broken. AT concentric the plot comes to the fore some one life situation, the work is built on one event line.
And now the questions:
What, in your opinion, is unacceptable in this or that plot?
Which one is best for what?
Why do stories with a concentric plot predominate in science fiction/fantasy, while critics and authors forget about the chronicle type?
What are the advantages and disadvantages of each type?
In general, I propose to discuss this topic.
It is customary to single out a concentric plot and a chronicle plot. This classification is based on the difference in relationships between events. If in the chronicle plot the main attention is paid to time and its flow, then in the concentric plot the emphasis is on mental factors. That is why the authors of sagas and chronicles usually deal with the first plot, while the second is preferred by science fiction writers, novelists and others for whom the chronology of events is of no fundamental importance.
In a concentric plot, everything is simple and clear: the author explores only one conflict, and the elements of the composition are easy to single out and name, as they go one after another. Here, all episodes will have a causal relationship, and the entire text will be permeated with clear logic: no chaos, no compositional violations. Even if the work involves several storylines, all events will be interconnected according to the principle of links of one chain. With a chronological plot, everything is somewhat different: here the cause-and-effect relationships may be broken or completely absent. In addition, some elements of the composition may simply not be.
The word "plot" (from fr. sujet) denotes a chain of events recreated in a literary work, i.e. the life of characters in its spatio-temporal changes, in changing positions and circumstances. The events depicted by the writers form (along with the characters) the basis objective world works. The plot is the organizing principle of the dramatic, epic and lyrical-epic genres. It can also be significant in the lyrical kind of literature (although, as a rule, here it is sparingly detailed, extremely compact): “I remember a wonderful moment ...” by Pushkin, “Reflections at the front door” by Nekrasov, V. Khodasevich’s poem “2- November th."
Understanding the plot as a set of events recreated in a work goes back to domestic literary criticism 19th century (work by A.N. Veselovsky "Poetics of plots"). But in the 1920s, V. B. Shklovsky and other representatives of the formal school drastically changed the usual terminology. B. V. Tomashevsky wrote: “The totality of events in their mutual intercom <...>let's call the plot ( lat. legend, myth, fable. - W.H.) <...>The artistically constructed distribution of events in a work is called a plot” 1 . However, in modern literary criticism the meaning of the term "plot", dating back to the 19th century, prevails.
The events that make up the plot are correlated in different ways with the facts of reality preceding the appearance of the work. For many centuries, the plots were taken by writers mainly from mythology, historical legend, from the literature of past eras, and at the same time they were somehow processed, modified, and supplemented. Most of Shakespeare's plays are based on subjects familiar to medieval literature. Traditional stories (not in last turn antique) were widely used by classic playwrights. O big role plot borrowings said Goethe: “I advise<...>take on topics already covered. How many times, for example, have Iphigenia been depicted - and yet all Iphigenia are different, because everyone sees and depicts things<...>in my own way" 2 .
In the XIX-XX centuries. the events depicted by the writers began to be based on the facts of reality close to the writer, purely modern. Significant is Dostoevsky's close interest in the newspaper chronicle. From now on, the writer's biographical experience and his direct observations of his surroundings are widely used in literary work. At the same time, not only individual characters have their prototypes, but also the plots of the works themselves (“Resurrection” by L.N. Tolstoy, “The Case of Cornet Elagin” by I.A. Bunin). In plot construction, the autobiographical principle clearly makes itself felt (S.T. Aksakov, L.N. Tolstoy, I.S. Shmelev). Simultaneously with the energy of observation and self-observation, individual plot fiction is activated. Plots that are the fruit of the author's imagination ("Gulliver's Travels" by J. Swift, "The Nose" by N.V. Gogol, "Kholstomer" by L.N. Tolstoy, in our century - the works of F. Kafka) are widely used.
The events that make up the plot are related to each other in different ways. In some cases, one life situation comes to the fore, the work is built on one event line. These are for the most part small epic, and most importantly - dramatic genres, for which the unity of action is characteristic. Plots single action(they can rightly be called concentric, or centripetal) was preferred both in antiquity and in the aesthetics of classicism. Thus, Aristotle believed that tragedy and epic should depict “one and, moreover, an integral action, and parts of events should be composed in such a way that when a part is changed or taken away, the whole changes and sets in motion” 3 .
At the same time, plots are widespread in the literature, where events are dispersed and on "equal rights" unfolding event complexes independent of one another, having their own "beginnings" and "ends". These are, in the terminology of Aristotle, episodic plots. Here, events do not have causal relationships among themselves and are correlated with each other only in time, as is the case, for example, in Homer's Odyssey, Cervantes' Don Quixote, Byron's Don Juan. Such stories can rightly be called chronicle. From the plots of a single action are also fundamentally different multiline plots in which several event lines unfold simultaneously, parallel to one another, connected with the fate of different persons and touching only episodically and externally. Such is the plot organization of Anna Karenina by L.N. Tolstoy and "Three Sisters" by A.P. Chekhov. Chronicle and multi-line plots draw eventful panoramas, while the plots of a single action recreate separate event nodes. Panoramic scenes can be defined as centrifugal, or cumulative(from lat. cumulatio - increase, accumulation).
As part of a literary work, the plot performs essential functions. Firstly, the series of events (especially those that make up a single action) have a constructive meaning: they hold together, as if cementing what is depicted. Secondly, the plot is vital for the reproduction of characters, for the discovery of their characters. Literary heroes are unimaginable outside of their immersion in one or another series of events. Events create a kind of “field of action” for the characters, allow them to reveal themselves in a diverse and full way to the reader in emotional and mental responses to what is happening, and most importantly, in behavior and actions. The plot form is especially favorable for a vivid, detailed recreation of a strong-willed, active principle in a person. Many works with a rich series of events are dedicated to heroic personalities (remember Homer's Iliad or Gogol's Taras Bulba). Action-packed, as a rule, are works in the center of which a hero prone to adventures (many revival novels in the spirit of G. Boccaccio's Decameron, picaresque novels, comedies by P. Beaumarchais, where Figaro acts brilliantly).
And, finally, thirdly, the plots reveal and directly recreate life's contradictions. Without some kind of conflict and the life of the characters (long or short), it is difficult to imagine a sufficiently pronounced plot. The characters involved in the course of events, as a rule, are excited, tense, dissatisfied with something, a desire to gain something, achieve something or save something important, suffer defeats or win victories. In other words, the plot is not serene, one way or another involved in what is called dramatic. Even in the works of idyllic "sound" the balance in the life of the characters is disturbed (Long's novel "Daphnis and Chloe").
off-plot elements- plug-in (cm). episodes, stories and lyrical (author's) digressions (see lyrical digression) in epic or dramatic work, not included in the plot action, the main function of which is to expand the scope of the depicted, to enable the author to express his thoughts and feelings about various phenomena of life that are not directly related to the plot. Example V. e. - author's digressions in "Eugene Onegin" by A.S. Pushkin or " Dead souls"N.V. Gogol. V.e. in a fairy tale - a saying, in an epic - a sing-along.
13. Plot and composition. Composition elements. Types of compositional links.
Plot- a series of events (sequence of scenes, acts) occurring in work of art(on the theater stage) and built for the reader (spectator, player) according to certain rules of demonstration. The plot is the basis of the form of the work. According to Ozhegov's dictionary, plot- this is the sequence and connection of the description of events in a literary or stage work; in the work visual arts- the subject of the image.
Composition is the ratio of parts of a work in a certain system and sequence. At the same time, the composition is slender, complete system, including various ways and forms of literary and artistic representation and conditioned by the content of the work.
Composition elements
Prologue is called introductory part works. She represents summary events that preceded those described in the pages of the book.
The exposition is somewhat akin to the prologue, however, if the prologue does not have a special influence on the development of the plot of the work, then the exposition directly introduces the reader into the atmosphere of the story. It describes the time and place of action, central characters and their relationships. The exposure can be either at the beginning (direct exposure) or in the middle of the work (delayed exposure).
With a logically clear construction of the composition, the exposition is followed by a plot - an event that starts the action and provokes the development of a conflict. The plot is traditionally followed by the development of the action, consisting of a series of episodes in which the characters seek to resolve the conflict, but it only escalates. Gradually, the development of the action approaches its highest point, which is called the climax. The climax is the decisive clash of characters or a turning point in their lives. This is followed by a denouement. Resolution is the end of an action, or at least of a conflict. As a rule, the denouement occurs at the end of the work, but sometimes it appears at the beginning.
Often the work ends with an epilogue. This is the final part, which usually tells about the events. Such are the epilogues in the novels of I.S. Turgenev, F.M. Dostoevsky, L.N. Tolstoy.
1. External (architectonics). Its main components include the division of the text into paragraphs and chapters, a prologue and an epilogue, various appendices and comments, dedications and epigraphs, author's digressions and inserted fragments. In a word, everything that stands out graphically and can be easily seen by opening the book.
2. Internal composition(narration) provides an emphasis on the content of the work: organization speech situations, plot construction, system of images and individual images, strong text positions (leitmotif, repetitive situations, finale, etc.), main compositional techniques. Let's take a closer look at the latter.
14. Conflict as the basis of the plot. Types of conflict.
Conflict- a specific artistic form of reflection of contradictions in people's lives, reproduction in art of an acute collision of opposite human actions, views, feelings, aspirations, passions.
specific content conflict is the struggle between the beautiful, the sublime, and the ugly, the base.
Conflict in literature is the basis art form works, the development of its plot. Conflict and its resolution depends on the concept of the work.
Most often, only the main ones are singled out: love, philosophical, psychological, social, symbolic, military and religious.
15. Theme, idea, problem in a work of art.
Theme- (from the ancient Greek - “what is given is the basis”) is a concept that indicates which side of life the author pays attention to in his work, that is, the subject of the image. The problem is not a nomination of any phenomenon of life, but a formulation of the contradiction associated with this life phenomenon. Idea - (from the Greek word - what is seen) - the main idea of a literary work, the author's tendency to reveal the topic, the answer to the questions posed in the text - in other words, what the work was written for.
16. Lyrics as a kind of literature. The subject and content of the lyrics.
Lyrics- this is one of the main types of literature, reflecting life by depicting individual states, thoughts, feelings, impressions and experiences of a person caused by certain circumstances.
lyrics like literary gender opposes the epic, and dramaturgy, therefore, when analyzing it, one should take into account the generic specificity to the highest degree. If the epic and drama reproduce human existence, the objective side of life, then the lyrics are the human consciousness and subconsciousness, a subjective moment. Epos and drama depict, lyric expresses. It can even be said that lyric poetry belongs to a completely different group of arts than epic and dramaturgy - not to the pictorial, but to the expressive.
The main thing in the lyrics is emotionally colored descriptions and reflections. The reproduction of relations between people and their actions does not play a big role here, most often it is absent altogether. Lyrical statements are not accompanied by an image of any events. Where, when, under what circumstances the poet spoke, to whom he addressed - all this either becomes clear from his very words, or in general turns out to be insignificant.
The subject of lyrics is the inner (subjective) world of the poet, his personal feelings caused by some object or phenomenon.
The content of a lyrical work cannot be the development of objective action in its interconnections, expanding to the fullness of the world. The content here is the separate subject and thus the isolation of the situation and objects, and also of the way in which, in general, with such a content, the soul brings itself to consciousness with its subjective judgment, its joys, amazement, pain and feeling.
17. lyrical image. lyrical subject.
The lyrical hero is the image of that hero in lyrical work whose experiences, thoughts and feelings are reflected in it. It is by no means identical to the image of the author, although it reflects his personal experiences associated with certain events in his life, with his attitude to nature, social activities, people. The peculiarity of the poet's worldview, worldview, his interests, character traits find a corresponding expression in the form, in the style of his works. The lyrical hero reflects certain specific traits people of their time, their class, exerting a huge influence on the formation spiritual world reader.
A lyrical subject is any manifestation of the author's "I" in a poem, the degree of the author's presence in it, in fact, a look at the world the poet himself, his system of values, reflected in the language, images. In Fet's lyrics, for example, the personality ("I") exists "as a prism of the author's consciousness, in which the themes of love and nature are refracted, but does not exist as an independent theme."
Sometimes the poet chooses the model of the so-called "role distance", then they speak of a specific role-playing lyric - a first-person narrative perceived by the reader as not identical to the author. In R. l. the poet manages to "suddenly feel someone else's as his own" (A.A. Fet). Role character lyrical character appears in this kind poetic works due to extra-textual factors (for example, knowledge of the poet's biography or the understanding that what is depicted cannot take place in reality. The lyrical "I" is a conditional character whom the author trusts the narrative, as a rule, characteristic of a given era or genre: a shepherd in pastoral poetry, a dead man in an epitaph, a wanderer or a prisoner in romantic lyrics; often the story is told from the point of view of a woman.
18. Aesthetic function means of expression artistic speech in lyrics.
The means of artistic expression are varied and numerous. These are tropes: comparisons, personifications, allegory, metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, etc.
Trope(from other Greek τρόπος - turnover) - in a work of art, words and expressions used in a figurative sense in order to enhance the figurativeness of the language, artistic expressiveness speech.
The main types of trails:
· Metaphor(from other Greek μεταφορά - “transfer”, “figurative meaning”) - a trope, a word or expression used in a figurative meaning, which is based on an unnamed comparison of an object with any other on the basis of their common feature. (“Nature here is destined for us to cut a window into Europe”). Any part of speech in a figurative sense.
· Metonymy(ancient Greek μετονυμία - “renaming”, from μετά - “above” and ὄνομα / ὄνυμα - “name”) - a kind of trail, a phrase in which one word is replaced by another, denoting an object (phenomenon) located in one or another (spatial, temporal, etc.) connection with the subject, which is denoted by the replaced word. The replacement word is used in a figurative sense. Metonymy should be distinguished from metaphor, with which it is often confused, while metonymy is based on the replacement of the word “by contiguity” (part instead of the whole or vice versa, representative instead of class or vice versa, receptacle instead of content or vice versa, etc.), and the metaphor is "by likeness". Synecdoche is a special case of metonymy. (“All flags will visit us”, where flags replace countries.)
· Epithet(from other Greek ἐπίθετον - “attached”) - a definition of a word that affects its expressiveness. It is expressed mainly by an adjective, but also by an adverb (“to love passionately”), a noun (“fun noise”), a numeral (“second life”).
An epithet is a word or a whole expression, which, due to its structure and special function in the text, acquires some new meaning or semantic connotation, helps the word (expression) to acquire color, richness. It is used both in poetry (more often) and in prose (“timid breath”; “magnificent sign”).
· Synecdoche(ancient Greek συνεκδοχή) - a trope, a kind of metonymy based on the transfer of meaning from one phenomenon to another on the basis of a quantitative relationship between them. (“Everything is sleeping - both man, and beast, and bird”; “We all look at Napoleons”; “In the roof for my family”; “Well, sit down, luminary”; “Most of all, take care of a penny.”)
· Hyperbola(from other Greek ὑπερβολή “transition; excess, excess; exaggeration”) - a stylistic figure of explicit and intentional exaggeration, in order to enhance expressiveness and emphasize the thought said. (“I’ve said it a thousand times”; “We have enough food for six months.”)
· Litotes- a figurative expression that downplays the size, strength, meaning of what is being described. A litote is called an inverse hyperbole. ("Your Pomeranian, lovely Pomeranian, no more than a thimble").
· Comparison- a trope in which one object or phenomenon is likened to another according to some common feature for them. The purpose of comparison is to reveal in the object of comparison new properties that are important for the subject of the statement. (“A man is stupid as a pig, but cunning as hell”; “My house is my fortress”; “He walks like a gogol”; “An attempt is not torture.”)
In stylistics and poetics, paraphrase (paraphrase, paraphrase; from other Greek. περίφρασις - “descriptive expression”, “allegory”: περί - “around”, “about” and φράσις - “statement”) is a trope that descriptively expresses one concept with the help of several.
Paraphrase is an indirect reference to an object by way of description, not naming. (“Night luminary” = “moon”; “I love you, creation of Peter!” = “I love you, St. Petersburg!”).
· allegory (allegory)- conditional representation of abstract ideas (concepts) through a specific artistic image or dialogue.
· personification(personification, prosopopoeia) - tropes, the assignment of the properties of animate objects to inanimate ones. Very often, personification is used in the depiction of nature, which is endowed with certain human features.
· Irony(from other Greek εἰρωνεία - “pretense”) - a trope in which the true meaning is hidden or contradicts (opposed) to the obvious meaning. Irony creates the feeling that the subject matter is not what it seems. (“Where can we, fools, drink tea.”)
· Sarcasm(Greek σαρκασμός, from σαρκάζω, literally “to tear [meat]”) - one of the types of satirical exposure, caustic mockery, the highest degree of irony, based not only on the increased contrast of the implied and expressed, but also on the immediate intentional exposure of the implied.
Infinite variety literary plots not once tried to classify. If this was possible at least partially (at the level of repetitive plot schemes), then only within the boundaries of folklore (the works of Academician A. N. Veselovsky, V. Ya. Propp’s book Morphology of a Fairy Tale, etc.). Beyond this line, within the limits of individual creativity, such classifications proved nothing but the arbitrary imagination of their writers. This is the only thing that convinces, for example, the classification of plots undertaken at the time by Georges Polti. Even the so-called eternal stories(the plots of Ahasuerus, Faust, Don Juan, the Demon, etc.) do not convince of anything other than the fact that their commonality is fixed only on the unity of the hero. And here, nevertheless, the scatter of purely plot options is too great: a chain of different incidents stretches behind the same hero, sometimes adjoining the traditional plot scheme, then falling away from it. Moreover, the very dominant of the hero in such plots turns out to be too unstable.
Obviously, the Faust of the folk legend, the Faust of Christopher Marlowe and the Faust of Goethe and Pushkin are far from the same, just like Molière's Don Juan, Mozart's opera, Pushkin's The Stone Guest, A. K. Tolstoy's poem. The suppression of these plots in some general mythical-legendary situations (the situation of Faustian conspiracy with the devil, the situation of retribution that befell Don Juan) do not muffle the individual originality of the plot drawing. That is why we can talk about the typology of plots in the world of individual creativity only with the most general trends largely dependent on the genre.
In the boundless variety of plots, two aspirations have long made themselves felt (however, rarely presented in a pure, unadulterated form): to an epicly calm and smooth flow of events and to event-driven, to diversity and rapid change of situations. The differences between them are not unconditional: ups and downs in tension are inherent in any plot. And yet in world literature there are many plots marked by an accelerated pace of events, a variety of situations, frequent transfers of action in space, an abundance of surprises.
An adventure novel, a travel novel, adventure literature, and detective prose gravitate precisely towards such an eventful depiction. Such a plot keeps the reader's attention in unrelenting tension, sometimes seeing in maintaining his own main goal. In the latter case, interest in characters is clearly weakening and depreciating in the name of interest in plot. And the more all-consuming this interest becomes, the more obvious such prose from the field of great art moves into the realm of fiction.
Action fiction in itself is heterogeneous: most often not rising to the true heights of creativity, it, however, has its peaks in the adventure or detective genre or in the field of fantasy. However, it fantastic prose least of all, in terms of artistic value: it has its own masterpieces. Such, for example, are Hoffmann's romantic fantasies. His bizarre plot, marked by all the riot and inexhaustibility of fantasy, does not in the least distract from the characters of his romantic madmen. Both the characters and the plot carry Hoffmann's special vision of the world: they contain the daring of taking off above the vulgar prose of measured-philistine reality, they mock at the seeming strength of the burgher society with its deification of utility, rank and wealth. And finally (and this is most important) Hoffmann's plot insists that it is in the human spirit that the source of beauty, diversity and poetry, although it is also the receptacle of satanic temptation, ugliness and evil. Hamlet's words "There are many things in the world, friend Horatio, that our wise men never dreamed of" could be put as an epigraph to the fantasies of Hoffmann, who always painfully felt the flow of the secret strings of being. The struggle between God and the devil goes on in the souls of Hoffmann's heroes and in his plots, and this is so serious (especially in the novel "Satan's Elixir") that it fully explains Dostoevsky's interest in Hoffmann. Hoffmann's prose convinces us that even a fantastic plot can contain depth and philosophical content.
tension dynamic plot is far from always steady and does not always develop in an ascending direction. Here, a combination of braking (retardation) and forcing dynamics is much more often used. Braking, accumulating the reader's expectation, only exacerbates the affect of straining plot twists. In such a plot special meaning acquires randomness: random meetings of characters, random changes in fate, unexpected discovery by the hero of his true origin, an accidental acquisition of wealth or, conversely, an accidental disaster. All life is here (especially, of course, in the adventure novel and in the novel " big roads”) appears at times as a plaything of chance. It would be in vain to look for any profound artistic "philosophy" of chance in this. Its abundance in such plots is largely due to the fact that chance makes it easier for the author to take care of motivations: after all, chance does not need them.
If the accidental in such plots acquires ideological significance, then only in the historical early forms picaresque novel. Here, a well-organized event is perceived as a kind of reward for the strong-willed determination of a private person, an adventurer and a predator, who justifies his predatory inclinations by the depravity of the human world order. The unreasoning onslaught of such a person, who perceives everything around him only as an object of application of the predatory instinct, in such plots, as it were, sanctifies his base goals with the good fortune of chance.
Epic Quiet Plot Types, of course, do not avoid tension and dynamism. They just have a different tempo and rhythm of the event, which does not divert attention to itself, allowing the artistic fabric of characters to be expanded. Here the artist's attention is often transferred from the outer world to the inner world. In this context, the event becomes the point of application of the hero's internal forces, highlighting the contour of his soul. So sometimes the smallest events turn out to be more eloquent than large ones and are presented in all their multidimensionality. Psychologized dialogue, various confessional-monologic forms of revealing the soul naturally weaken the dynamics of the action.
The epicly balanced, slow types of plots are most noticeable against the backdrop of turbulent eras that incline literary creativity to a dramatized and dynamic depiction of reality. By their very appearance against this background, they sometimes pursue a special goal: to recall the deeply harmonious, calm flow of the world, in relation to which the strife and chaos of modernity, all this fuss of vanities are drawn only as a tragic falling away from the eternal foundations of life and nature or from traditional foundations. national existence. Such, for example, are “Family Chronicle” and “Childhood of Bagrov-grandson” by S. T. Aksakov, “Oblomov” and “Cliff” by I. A. Goncharov, “Childhood, adolescence and youth” by L. N. Tolstoy, “Steppe » A. P. Chekhov. To the highest extent, these artists have the precious gift of contemplation, loving dissolution in the subject of the image, a sense of the significance of the small in human existence and its connection with the eternal mystery of life. In the plot frame of such works, a small event is enveloped in such a richness of perception and such freshness of it, which are accessible, perhaps, only to the spiritual vision of childhood.
Finally, there are types of plots in literature in which the time span of an event is either "compressed" or reversed. In both cases, this is accompanied by a slowdown in the event tempo: the event is, as it were, fixed by means of "slow motion" Images. Seemingly homogeneous and solid, in such an image it reveals many "atomic" details, which themselves sometimes grow to the size of an event. L. N. Tolstoy has an unfinished sketch called "Stories of Yesterday", which the writer intended to reproduce not only in full what happened, but also in the abundance of its contact with the fleeting "breaths" of the soul. He was forced to leave this plan unfinished: one day of life, which fell under the "microscope" of such an image, turned out to be inexhaustible. Tolstoy's incomplete experience is an early forerunner of the literature that in the 20th century will be aimed at the "stream of consciousness" and in which events, falling into the psychological environment of memory and slowing down their real pace in this environment, bring to life a demonstratively slow flow of the plot (for example, "In in search of lost time" by Joyce).
Keeping in mind, again, only trends plot construction, one could single out the centrifugal and centripetal forms of the plot. centrifugal plot unfolds like a ribbon, unfolds steadily and often in the same temporal direction, from event to event. Its energy is extensive and is aimed at multiplying the diversity of positions. In the literature of travel, in the novel of wanderings, in moralistic prose, in the adventure genre, this type of plot appears before us in its most distinct incarnations. But even beyond these limits, for example, in novels based on a detailed biography of the hero, we meet with a similar construction of the plot. Its chain includes many links, and not one of them grows so much that it can dominate in big picture. The wandering hero in such stories easily moves in space, his fate lies precisely in this relentless mobility, in moving from one living environment to another: Melmoth is a wanderer in Maturin's novel, David Copperfield Dickens, Byron's Childe Harold, Medard in Hoffmann's Elixir of Satan, Ivan Flyagin in Leskov's The Enchanted Wanderer, etc.
One life position here easily and naturally flows into another. Meetings at life path wandering hero provide an opportunity to develop a wide panorama of morals. Transfers of action from one environment to another present no difficulty for the author's imagination. Such a centrifugal plot, in essence, has no internal limit: the patterns of its event can be multiplied as much as you like. And only the exhaustion of fate in the life movement of the hero, his “stop” (and this “stop” most often means either marriage, or gaining wealth, or death) puts the final touch on such a picture of the plot.
centripetal plot highlights in the flow of events the supporting positions, turning points, trying to detail them emphatically, giving close-up. These are, as a rule, nerve knots, energy centers of the plot, which are by no means identical to what is called the climax. There is only one climax, but there can be several such macrosituations. Pulling the dramatic energy of the plot to themselves, they simultaneously radiate it with a vengeance. In the poetics of drama, such situations are called catastrophes (in Freytag's terminology). The action that takes place between them (at least in the epic) is much less detailed, its pace is accelerated, and much of it is omitted from the author's description. Such a plot takes human destiny as a series of crises or a few, but "stellar" minutes of being, in which its essential beginnings are slightly revealed. Such are the “first meeting, last meeting” of the hero and the heroine in Eugene Onegin, in Turgenev’s novels Rudin and On the Eve, etc.
Sometimes such situations in the plot acquire stability beyond the boundaries of a particular writing style, the ability to vary. This means that literature found in them a certain general meaning that affects the life sense of the era or nature. national character. Such is the situation that can be defined as “a Russian man on rendez-vous”, using the title of an article by Chernyshevsky (this is A. S. Pushkin, I. S. Turgenev, I. A. Goncharov), or another persistently repeated in the literature of the second half XIX century (in the works of N. A. Nekrasov, Ap. Grigoriev, Y. Polonsky, F. M. Dostoevsky), most eloquently indicated by Nekrasov's lines:
When from the darkness of delusion
I raised a fallen soul...
The centripetal plot tends to stop the flight of time more often, peer into the stable beginnings of being, pushing the boundaries of the fleeting and discovering a whole world in it. For him, life and destiny are not an unstoppable movement forward, but a succession of states, containing, as it were, the possibility of a breakthrough into eternity.
Borges saw four main plots of literature.
Modern researchers - six.
Booker - seven.
Vonnegut counted eight.
A gathering of writers on the "Litkult" saw twelve.
Polti distinguished himself - he listed thirty-six.
And now - in more detail!
Four plots of Borges
“There are only four stories. And no matter how much time we have left, we will retell them - in one form or another. - says Jorge Luis Borges. These stories are: the first is about the fortified city, the second is about the return, the third is about the search, and the fourth is about the suicide of God. Classical examples of these stories, cited by Borges himself: Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, Jason's journey, Jesus' crucifixion, and Odin's self-sacrifice.
However, the number of these stories can be reduced to just two, which we will retell in one form or another. Namely: these are stories about a Woman and a Man and about a Man and his Way. That is, stories in which events revolve around a woman or women, and stories in which they do without it. The story of the fortified city began with several women and one man. The story of the return - ended with a return to the woman. Search stories rarely featured women. They were also in the story of Jason. And only the story of the crucifixion is not tied to women. Of all this history, where everything revolves around women, we retell the most. And no one learns from stories of self-sacrifice.
There were only six main literary plots - modern researchers!
A team of scientists from the United States and Australia analyzed the change in emotional coloring in the texts of popular literary works and found in them several common types of plots. Among them, six turned out to be the most popular: "from rags to riches", "tragedy", "fall and rise", "Icarus", "Cinderella" and "Oedipus".
Booker's version: 7 main plots of world literature
"one. From rags to riches: a story ordinary person which reveals something extraordinary in itself.
Examples: Cinderella, David Copperfield, Jane Eyre. From the movies: Golden fever, My fair lady.
2. Adventure (quest): a difficult journey in search of an elusive distant goal. Examples: The Odyssey, the myth of the Argonauts, King Solomon's Mines, Around the World in 80 Days
3. There and back: some event pulls the hero / heroine out of the familiar environment. The plot is their attempts to return home. (Why isn't Odysseus here, by the way?!) Examples: Alice Through the Looking Glass, Robinson Crusoe, Time Machine.
4. Comedy : Not just a general term, but an identifiable form of plot which follows its own rules.
(Still a very slippery definition.) Examples: Tom Jones, all Jane Austen novels, Only girls in jazz.
5. Tragedy: At the climax main character dies because of his lack of character, usually the passion of love, or the thirst for power. Examples: Macbeth, Faust, Lolita, King Lear.
6. Resurrection: Hero, under the power of dark forces or a curse. A miracle brings him out of this state into the light. Examples: Sleeping Beauty, A Christmas Carol, The Sound of Music
7. Defeat the monster: the hero or heroine fights the monster, defeats it in an unequal fight, and receives treasure or love. Examples: David and Goliath, Nicholas Nickleby, Dracula, James Bond stories.
D. Johnston version
(also 7 types):
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Cinderella (unrecognized virtue),
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Achilles (fatal mistake)
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Faust (debt to be paid)
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Tristan (love triangle)
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Circe (spider and fly),
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Romeo and Juliet,
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Orpheus (selected gift).
Eight Plots of World Literature - Kurt Vonnegut
Writer Kurt Vonnegut managed to fit all the works of world literature and cinema into eight simple plots. In general, all stories tell us about how people get out of holes, meet their other half, or lose everything they could get in this life.
The genius of Hamlet, according to Vonnegut, lies precisely in its vagueness: “Shakespeare told us the truth, and people so rarely do this, being too engrossed in their own ups and downs. The truth is that we know so little about life that we are not even able to determine what is good for us and what is bad.
Here are the 8 stories:
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Full ass man
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Boy meets girl
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The story of the creation of the world
· Old Testament
· New Testament
· Cinderella
· Worse and worse
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How to get to the top
12 plots of world literature
FIRST plot, the most hackneyed - Cinderella.
It is very stable, all variations fit into a clear plot outline"reference". The plot is loved by the authors of women's literature, often used by screenwriters of melodramas. There are a huge number of examples.
SECOND Plot - The Count of Monte Cristo is a secret hero who becomes apparent towards the end of the play, gaining wealth or opportunities from somewhere.
His mission is to take revenge, or to do justice! The plot is very fond of the authors of adventure novels and detective stories. It appeared long before Alexandre Dumas, but this novelist most successfully “lit up” this plot, and after him, many used and used the above-named plot.
THIRD plot - Odyssey.
This story can be called the first, it is extremely popular. Variations based on it can be different, but you just have to take a closer look, and the ears stick out quite clearly. Fiction writers, fantasy writers, authors of adventure literature, travel novels and some other genres are very fond of this ancient plot, and sometimes copy the details ancient Greek history, which can be conditionally considered the starting, reference.
FOURTH plot - Anna Karenina.
Tragic love triangle. Has roots in ancient Greek tragedies, but Lev Nikolaevich managed to write it out most vividly and in detail. In the twentieth century, especially at the beginning and middle of the century, this plot was one of the most popular (even ordinary copies copied from Tolstoy, when skilled authors change only first names, historical scenery and other surroundings, I saw several). But there are many talented variations on this theme.
FIFTH plot - Hamlet.
A strong personality with a mobile psyche. A broken hero, reflective and bright, fighting for justice, having tasted the betrayal of loved ones and other delights. Nothing, in the end, not achieving, only able to torture himself, but to achieve some spiritual enlightenment and purification, which encourages the viewer. Interesting as hell.
There is nothing to comment here. The plot is stable, very popular, there is a lot of Dostoevism in it, (native and close to the Russian heart, and to me in particular). At the present moment this plot popular as ever.
SIXTH plot - Romeo and Juliet. Happy love story.
The total number of repetitions of this plot exceeds the number of repetitions of all other plots, but for some reason there are very few talented works, you can literally count them on your fingers. However, in current serials, in fiction (especially women's), in dramaturgy and songwriting, the plot is unusually popular.
The plot, again, is extremely stable, as it has gone from antiquity to the present day, there are few special variations.
SEVENTH plot - Fathers and sons.
Its origins are ancient Greek, the plot is complex, and now there is a lot of room for variations in it. This can also be conditionally attributed to the story of the bride of Jason, who is forced to choose between her father and the groom, to sacrifice one of them. In short, the whole variety of parental selfishness colliding with the selfishness of children describes this ancient tangle of plots, similar friend on a friend. There is also altruism of parents, and even less often altruism of children, but usually this ends in tragedy (as if someone has jinxed our entire human race. Ask King Lear, he will tell you).
EIGHTH plot - Robinson.
It partly echoes Hamlet, primarily in the sound of the theme of loneliness, and a little with Odysseus, but the story of Robinson can still be called a separate big plot of world literature. Current writers and screenwriters often copy, word for word, the work of Daniel Defoe. But there are many talented and original variations. The hero, most often, is absolutely alone on the island, but this is not a prerequisite, it happens that several heroes find themselves in some kind of isolation from big world trying to survive and remain individuals in order to eventually be saved. My favorite variation is the story of Saltykov-Shchedrin "How one man fed two generals."
NINTH story - Trojan theme, the theme of war.
Confrontation of two systems, enmity and hatred, flip side which is nobility and self-denial. This plot, as a rule, is superimposed on other plots, or they are superimposed on it, but classic military novels, descriptions of wars in detail, with varying degrees of artistry, are also not uncommon.
TENTH plot - Catastrophe and its consequences. Classic antique story.
At the present time, he was dragged so that it is reluctant to speak. There are a lot of mediocre copies, but occasionally there are also curious ones. The plot is very narrow in terms of semantic variations, but very broad in terms of descriptive possibilities, surroundings and details. But to be fair, almost everyone next novel repeats the previous one, even if you don’t go to a fortuneteller!
ELEVENTH plot - Ostap Bender - a picaresque novel, an adventurous novel.
Sources and classic examples - in the literature of France of the New Time. Extremely popular these days, most often comedic. The tangle of plots is quite bright, and successful variations often come across, but all of them, one way or another, copy a couple of templates created at the beginning of the twentieth century.
TWELVE plot - Time machine, journey into the future.
Its mirror image is a stylized journey into the past, historical novels. However, this type of work, as a rule, uses “journey into the past” only as an entourage, and the plot is one of those that I listed above, while “journey into the future” is often a “pure plot”, that is, its essence boils down precisely to the description of how it all works there in this unknown future.
36 stories by J. Polti:
Prayer
· The rescue
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Revenge chasing crime
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Revenge, close for a close
· Hounded
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Sudden misfortune
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someone's victim
Riot
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a brave attempt
Abduction
· Mystery
· Achievement
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Hatred between loved ones
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rivalry between loved ones
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Adultery accompanied by murder
madness
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fatal negligence
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involuntary incest
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Unintentional killing of a loved one
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Self-sacrifice in the name of the ideal
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Self-sacrifice for loved ones
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Victim of infinite joy
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Sacrifice of loved ones in the name of duty
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Rivalry of unequals
Adultery
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Crime of love
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Dishonor of a Beloved Being
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Love that meets obstacles
love for the enemy
· Ambition
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Fight against god
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Unfounded jealousy
· Judgement mistake
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Remorse
・Rediscovered
The loss of loved ones
