by Sarah Chauncey | Jan 18, 2017 | Counterintuitive Guide to Life, Memoir, Nonfiction, Resonant Storytelling, Writing
Nearly every blockbuster movie of the past 40 years (and possibly before that) has been deliberately structured around something called the “monomyth,” also known as the Hero’s Journey. Star Wars. The Matrix. The Lion King. So were Dan Millman’s book The Way of the...
by Sarah Chauncey | Aug 17, 2016 | Memoir, Nonfiction, Resonant Storytelling
Every young writer is taught that the essence of story is conflict. But “conflict” is a loaded word. Most people see it as negative, confrontational and even violent. But it isn’t, inherently. Even if you’re writing about a world that’s all unicorns...
by Sarah Chauncey | Jul 9, 2016 | Memoir, Nonfiction, Resonant Storytelling, Writing
Yesterday, the people behind the Wordnik Twitter account shared an article about how researchers at the University of Vermont have discovered that all stories follow one of six arcs. These are the arcs they identified by data-mining more than 1,700 novels: “Rags to...
