The human story does not always unfold like a mathematical calculation on the principle that two and two make four. Sometimes in life they make five or minus three; and sometimes the blackboard topples down in the middle of the sum and leaves the class in disorder and the pedagogue with a black eye.
Winston Churchill

Good memoirs follow the laws of dramatic structure. These “laws” consist of nine essential story elements that drop into the tripartite structure of a story—the beginning (what you wanted), the middle (what you got), and the end (what you finally realized and concluded).

The beginning contains a description of the initiating incident, the problem, and the desire line.

The initiating incident is an event from which all else follows. The incident creates the problem. It throws the protagonist’s life out of balance, and the rest of the story describes the protagonist’s attempt to regain balance.

The problem, which is created by the initiating incident, usually occurs at the beginning and leads directly to the protagonist’s need/desire. The problem might be a character weakness (immaturity, ignorance, rage). Or it might be an issue that the social/cultural environment presents or has presented (racism, poverty). Or it might be a poor belief or value system (succeed at any cost, demolish opponents).

Whatever the problem, it leads to a desire. The defined problem begins a desire line that continues through the rest of the story. The desire serves as the engine of the story, and the desire line serves as the engine’s tracks. The desire line engages the reader’s interest—it gets the reader involved. But the line has to continue well into the story. It can’t be immediately gratified—for a simple reason: no struggle, no story.

The middle part of the story describes the struggle. The desire line is moving forward, but it is still unsatisfied. Moreover, the protagonist, having established a desire, has usually also developed a plan for fulfilling it. The dramatic conflict arises from the conflict between the protagonist’s plan and the efforts of the adversaries (antagonists) to thwart it.

The middle part begins with some definition of the adversary. The adversary need not be an enemy and need not even be a human. It could, for example, be the person you love the most—who is not loving you in desired ways. It could be crippling poverty or provincial prejudices. It could be an internal or external force, or a series of them. The adversary is anything or anyone who obstructs the desire line.

Pivotal events cause the desire line to bend or intensify. One can plot a story by setting the pivotal events in place. The pivotal events keep the story from becoming a boring wasteland.

Fortunately for memoirists, life rarely goes in a straight line from desire to outcome. Aristotle put it this way: "In a story you want actions that happen contrary to expectations and that are brought about one by the other."

A short story is built around one pivotal event. A classical three-act structure is usually built around three pivotal events. But a memoir can have any number—as few as two, as many as five, or more. The precipitating event marks the end of the middle section. It is a turn of fate, and it is usually a surprise. It kicks off everything that happens until the end. It forces a crisis—and usually forces choices.

A conclusion contains a crisis, a climax, and a final realization. All three usually occur sequentially, but occasionally some of them seem to occur simultaneously.

The precipitating event pushes the story to a critical juncture. It narrows options and forces a choice. In other words, it creates a crisis. It takes the protagonist to a higher or lower moral place, depending on how he or she deals with it. The crisis crystallizes the polarity between the protagonist and the adversary—which has run throughout the story.

The climax differs from the crisis. The crisis forces all the story’s tension into a narrow space. The climax represents the explosion. The climax is the story’s payoff—the final and major pivotal event.

In a drama, the transformative climax occurs within a single scene. A memoir, however, doesn’t play out along neat structural lines or scenes—as does a movie. An interior change may occur after the precipitating event, and the climax needn’t be a huge event. It might be a quiet scene—watching an obsession slip away, for example, or seeing the image of a former love fade away.

A story ends with a final realization—the desire has been satisfied, thwarted, or transformed. The final realization can be seen as the “point of the story”—its “lesson.” It completes the climax. It’s the bottom line. It might be a small new perception, a slight shift in values, a moment of insight.

A story can exist without an initiating incident or a precipitating event. But it needs a point—otherwise it’s not a story. It needn’t be a moral point; it can be an emotional, spiritual, or aesthetic point. The storyteller in all cases, however, needs a reason for telling the story.

Some understanding of these nine essential story elements can help you see and structure your life as story.

There is more than one way to find story in your life. You may have to write and write—and then find the core story. You may find it by developing your central characters—or by working with your thematic conflict.

You can create structure in various ways, and it matters little how you put the story together, so long as you eventually include and order the basic components. If you arrange them correctly, your story arc will feel sure and will hold strong—and it will endure. If you effectively fit the nine components into the basic tripartite structure of the story, you will create a dramatic structure that supports your narrative and drives your story.

Dramatic structure is the essence of myth, and through it you bring the mythic into ordinary, temporal life. Find your structure—then you will find your story’s shape.

Orlo J. Otteson
651-278-4824
otteson@aol.com