An Introduction to Genre by Rachelle Ramirez
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An Introduction to Genre By Rachelle Ramirez © 2020, Rachelle Ramirez Introduction 2 What is Genre? 3 Genre’s Five Classifications 3 The Content Genre Toolbox 7 External Genres 11 Action 11 Crime 14 Horror 18 Transitional Genres 20 Thriller 20 Western 23 War 26 Love 29 Society 32 Performance 35 Internal Genres 37 Status 37 Worldview 40 Morality 43 Final Thoughts 46 Tips and Tricks for Determining Your Genre 46 Applying Genre to Your Work 47 Innovating on Genre 47 Putting It All Together 48 1 Introduction In this guide, you will learn the essentials of genre as taught in the Story Grid methodology by Shawn Coyne. Coyne developed his ideas during 25 years as an acquisitions editor in several major New York publishing houses. His goal was to have a tool he could use first to determine whether a manuscript worked, then to offer an objective diagnosis of manuscript problems and a clear plan of action for the author. I am offering this guide to authors who want to do as much of their own developmental editing as they can, with the goal of presenting the best possible version of their stories, either to literary agents or directly to the reading public. You’ve hit an obstacle. You’re not the first writer to start a story and get stuck along the way. Maybe you have a story idea but aren’t sure how to develop it. Maybe you’re into your fifth draft and don’t know how to solve a particular problem. Maybe you only sense something is wrong with your story but aren’t sure how to diagnose and fix it. You want fast and practical solutions for solving story problems so you can get back to writing and delivering a stellar story. Genre is the solution. Whether you’re writing a fiction or nonfiction manuscript, screenplay, television series, short story, play, or musical, the tools you’ll find in this genre guide will help. We’ll explore together, informed by the experts. We won’t reinvent story structure. We’ll cover the basics of genre with efficiency and clarity because I’ve combed through the wealth of information available on all the major genres and sorted the solutions from the rhetoric. This is the no-nonsense guide to genre, the only one of its kind. You get the conventions, the obligatory scenes, the whole treasure map. In this book, you’ll find some quick tricks to help you identify your story’s genre, save time and headaches, apply this information to your work, and innovate on your 2 genre. You’ll develop your knowledge and skills and get back to writing and improving the story you envisioned, but with less struggle. Let’s get started. What is Genre? Fundamentally, genre is a fancy way of identifying the kind of story you’re telling. Because there are so many misconceptions regarding genre, let’s start by dispelling a few false beliefs. Myth: Genre only concerns marketing and selling books. The Story Grid method defines genre differently than publishers, booksellers, and sales departments do. In Story Grid terms, genre is a tool for the writer, not for the audience. As a writer, you aren’t managing bookstore displays. You’re crafting stories. You will use genre classifications as a guide to managing audience expectations, satisfy the reader, and keep them engaged. Myth: My story can’t be confined by genre. I’ve said this myself. But after really studying genre, I came to the same conclusion that the masters of story structure have come to: genre encompasses every story ever told. Though I was resistant to embracing genre, I discovered many ways I could improve my story using genre as a tool. As you study the content genres in this book, you'll see how they encompass all types of stories. You can use this to great advantage. Myth: Genre is a formulaic set of rules. Genre is both art and science. It’s not a recipe, it’s a list of primary ingredients. It’s not a sewing pattern, it’s knowing you are making a shirt. Genre requires us to use both sides of our brains for creativity. One side channels and respects the muse, the other side is the translator of our muse’s message for our intended audience. Genre is our translation tool. Now that we’ve challenged these false beliefs, let’s define genre through the lens of the writer and editor. 3 Genre’s Five Classifications As writers, we need to be able to place our work in each of five genre classifications: ○ Time ○ Structure ○ Style ○ Reality ○ Content Let’s look at them one by one. The first four are easy, and you probably already know how your story shakes out, so we can dispense with them quickly, then get on the Big One: the fifth item, Content Genre. The Time genre tells the audience how much time they must invest in the story. Is this a one hour play? A two hour movie? An eleven hour read? Short, medium, or long: any choice is valid. The same story structure principles apply at every length. ○ Short Form includes poems, comic strips, short films, and short stories. ○ Medium Form Includes television episodes and documentaries, novellas, graphic novels, lengthy journalism, and one act plays. ○ Long Form Includes feature length films, plays, and documentaries, novels, book-length narrative nonfiction, television series, and plays with three or more acts. The Structure genre tells the audience how broad, minimalistic, or nontraditional a story to expect. Is it a linear story with a single protagonist? Does it follow multiple protagonists in connected plots? Or does it defy story structure expectations altogether? There are three choices: ○ Archplot: In these stories, a single active protagonist pursues their want despite conflict with external antagonistic forces. An archplot story is the classic heroic journey set on a linear timeline. The story ends with an irreversible change in the life of the protagonist. All of the questions raised throughout the story are answered, no subplot is left unresolved. ○ Miniplot : In these stories, passive characters avoid external confrontation at all cost as story events force them to fight their own internal antagonism. A 4 miniplot story uses multiple protagonists in addition to the primary protagonist, to dramatize its controlling idea. These several protagonists each have a clear beginning, middle, and end, and the primary protagonist must change irreversibly by story's end. There is a win-but-lose or lose-but-win ending. Some questions raised by the story are left unanswered and open to reader or audience interpretation. A linear timeline is not necessary. ○ Antiplot: By breaking classic story form, antiplot is a rebellion against story structure. Consistent realty, causality, and time constraints are all optional. The characters may or may not battle external or internal antagonistic forces, which means they may have nothing to win, lose, or surrender. Absurdity is often the entire point of the work. Examples include Theater of the Absurd and Naked Lunch. The Style genre defines the type of experience your audience can expect: a musical? A poem? A dance performance? There are many different style genres. Some examples are: ○ Drama: A solemn and emotional mirror of reality. Progressively builds tension and anticipation via an unexpected yet believable series of events, circumstances, and character choices. ○ Comedy: Intended to make the audience laugh. ○ Documentary: A factual record of events in story form, generally filmed. A subgenre is "mockumentary." ○ Musical: Characters alternate between physical action, dialog, and song. ○ Dance: Characters’ principal actions are interpreted through movement and dance. ○ Literary: Intended to evoke emotion from the reader. Most often formal stories of change within characters. ○ Theatrical: Performed on a stage by actors. ○ Cinematic: Employs qualities of film via moving, pre-recorded images. ○ Animation: Animated. Often anthropomorphized stories with elements of farce; cartoons. 5 The Reality genre tells your reader or audience how far they will have to suspend disbelief in order to enjoy your story. Choices are: ○ Factualism: Based on real history, biography, or autobiography. An example is Into Thin Air. ○ Realism: All stories with a real-world setting vs. a made up world (past or present). An example is Gone Girl. ○ Fantasy: Requires audiences to significantly suspend disbelief. Such stories often reflect myths and folklore, and are generally regarded as imaginative. This category includes works incorporating dystopian themes, science fiction, and those with anthropomorphized or magical characters. An example is the Harry Potter series. ○ Absurdism: Characters’ actions are meaningless, irrational, and without causality. The plot structure is ambiguous, with no explicit controlling idea. An example is Waiting for Godot. Now for the big one: Content Genre. The Content Genre is the single most critical choice you’ll make in writing your stories. The rest of this book is focused on this all-important choice. From this point forward, we’ll refer to “content genre” as simply “genre.” Yep. They’re that important. Genre is the toolbox that contains most of your writers’ tools. Genre guides you through every step of creating stories that work, by: ○ providing themes and controlling ideas ○ defining the range of values your characters must pass through ○ specifying what your principal characters want and need ○ determining the obligatory scenes and conventions your story must include ○ defining your story’s core event ○ eliciting specific emotions from your reader Here are the twelve primary genres. For the rest of this book, we’ll be examining each one in detail. ○ Action ○ War ○ Performance ○ Crime ○ Western ○ Worldview ○ Horror ○ Love ○ Status ○ Thriller ○ Society ○ Morality 6 Important Note: For a story that works, you must choose one primary genre.