Story Elements Quotes

However appalling to consider, however tedious to enact, every novel requires furniture, whether it is to be named or unnamed, for the characters will be unable to remain in standing position for the duration of the story.

The best parts of any story to me are the unexpected things.

I really love to write about food, crafts, and fashion, so those details will always be a part of my books. I think they inject stories with color and flavor, providing a tactile experience.

Everyone's always interested in a dark theme, especially when there's humor connected to it. It seems like that helps, if that's an integral and organic part of the whole story.

Fiction wouldn't be much fun without its fair share of scoundrels, and they have to live somewhere.

There's a classic element that all good Disney movies have. It really comes down to the storytelling, I think. It manages to push all of these buttons inside of us; there's a sentimentality.

I don't know what the definition of a short story is, and I don't even care to answer that question. That's something somebody in academia would think about. I just want to tell a story, and if people listen, and if it stays with you, it's a story.

I think all songs should have weather in them. Names of towns and streets, and they should have a couple of sailors. I think those are just song prerequisites.

You can read a dozen different textbooks or how-to manuals that will tell you the basic rules of what makes a story - a beginning, a middle, and an end.

If you're going to tell stories about life, you have to include a woman in your story.

As a writer, I try to appeal to the 'elusive boy audience' the same way I try to appeal to everyone: I do the very best I can to create interesting characters, addictive plots, tons of conflict, believable settings, unexpected plot twists, intriguing beginnings, and satisfying endings.

Whatever story you're telling in Louisiana, the landscape is going to become a character in it.

When you're telling a story, you've got to give details.

The elements of a good story are most definitely details, little bitty details. That does it, especially when you're describing, when you're setting the scene and everything. It's like you're painting a picture, so details are very important. Also, the music gotta be right. The music can really set the tone for the story and let you know what the story is gonna be about, but definitely, it's the vibe in the place where you at and the detail.

I'm certainly a plot and character man. Themes, structure, style - they're valid components of a novel and you can't complete the book without them. But I think what propels me as a reader is plot and character.

I like the story writing process. I usually use someone who has been trained for structure to take the story that I actually want, place those elements in the right places.

Magazine stories, the best ones anyway, are generally a combination of three elements: access, narrative, and disclosure.

I am much more involved in the filmmaking experience on Mag Seven. I'm much more involved in story elements, casting decisions, the writing of the show, the blocking of the scenes.

If what you know and what you love are the same thing, that's great. But if not, write what you love. I love history, secrets, conspiracies, action, adventure, international settings.

A good novel is an indivisible sum; every scene, sequence and passage of a good novel has to involve, contribute to and advance all three of its major attributes: theme, plot, characterization.

When you tell a story, there are imperatives of structure, of style, of pacing and all of this, that are there simply because you want to make it a good story. When do you introduce your characters? When do you put them onstage, when do you take them off the stage? How do you weave the different threads of the narrative together?

Over the years, if you look at the films of people like Billy Wilder, Preston Sturges, Frank Capra, their supporting characters, even if it's a doorman with two lines, always seem three-dimensional. To me, that's a sign of good storytelling.

It's one thing to not want an evil-sorcerer type villain in your story, but it's another thing to avoid having any sort of antagonist at all. A story without an antagonist gets weird pretty quick.

The point about a great story is that it's got a beginning, a middle and end.

The things I like to find in a story are punch and poetry.