Culture · 6 pages · 12 min
How a plot differs from a story
A story orders events in time, and a plot stresses why they belong together.
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From the opening
In a distinction made famous in English criticism, a story gives events in their time order, while a plot organizes those events so that causality and design are what the mind follows. The king died and then the queen died is the story version, and the king died and then the queen died of grief is the plot version, because the second death is heard as a consequence. The opening covers how time order differs from because, what a flashback can be for, and why ordinary speech blurs the words.
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Inside
- How time order differs from because
- What a flashback can be for
- Why ordinary speech blurs the words
- When a narrative refuses causality
- Where the idea stops applying
- A distinction worth keeping
Sources
- Forster's distinction between story and plot
- Fabula and sjuzhet as chronology versus arrangement