I remember a succinct way of thinking of the structure of an argumentative essay I was taught in middle school, splitting it into three basic parts. It was "First, you tell em what you're gonna tell em, then you tell em, then you tell em what you just told em."

@kimaya4503

Жыл бұрын

oh this is great...

@dumplinglover8042

Жыл бұрын

LOL Thats so good

@restlessdream8745

10 ай бұрын

Whoa. This would make the concept of school essays so much easier to grasp for the confused neurodivergent kid I used to be in middle school!

@dViNEfm9

6 ай бұрын

Yes!

Shaelin, your videos have helped me fall in love with writing again. You've taught me countless invaluable lessons (and saved me so much time). I just wanted to thank you for being so awesome!

Starting my first short story since high school. I’ve been working on my passion project for a while now, but I’ve realized that I need to start and finish more stories to really feel confident in myself as a writer and artist. I have OCD and this exercise has become part of my exposure therapy as my obsessive perfectionism has caused me to be afraid of creating, a process that is often times inherently messy. Finding your channel has been so helpful! Also, I love your shirt!

@BigPhilly15

Жыл бұрын

This is me. FINISHING is my challenge. Aside from loving short stories, I believe writing them is a good exercise in building a habit of completing one’s work. Good luck to you!

@MotionMaiden

Жыл бұрын

@@BigPhilly15 Thank you, good luck to you as well! (Accidentally replied from my other account 😆)

I started writing short stories thanks to you Any short story related content you put out is a blessing to me 😁

Shaelin, you have basically singlehandedly explained to me how to write prose. Plot is something I've known how to do forever but prose and syntax and diction is something I've never been good at I am now very excited to learn more about Short Fiction "D

This Video reminded me on Kishotenketsu and its pretty good usable for short stories, Japanese comic creator (Mangaka) use it all the time for any kind of work for example 4 Panel shorts also called Yonkoma, and short comics called Doujinshi. In longer stories, they stack it, every chapter has its own Kishotenketsu, inside the main story. the kiku (起句) is the opening part, setting the scene and introducing the characters. shōku (承句) is the development part, highlighting an event or incident involving the characters and that builds up. tenku (転句) is the changing part, the twist, leading the story to its climax, and tipping over to its conclusion. kekku (結句) is the outcome part, showing the consequences and transformation of the event and characters. Its main focus is on character and their development and not conflict, unlike western story structures, which makes it easier to be used for interesting and compelling stories. Yonkoma Firstly, the kishōtenketsu makes the structure particularly appropriate for a yonkoma (four panels) manga story. Each panel in the yonkoma can be matched to a part in the kishōtenketsu. The first panel sets the scene, the second one highlights an element, the third one shows the twist and the last one the conclusion. When used in short stories such as (20 pages) one chapter Doujinshi, its roughly used as follows: 10% for the introduction (kiku), 60% for the development (shōku), 20% for the twist/change (tenku) and 10% for the outcome (kikku). Basically, for a 20 pages chapter, this would give approximately: kiku: 2 pages shōku: 12 pages tenku: 4 pages kekku: 2 pages Of course, these figures are indicative, but see that the development part, and then the twist part, shall be given the more room.

I've had a project collecting dust for a while now and with coming back to it now. I've come to realize how a short story can help build me up as a writer and breathe life into a fictional world. This outline is simple, and having a thesis/theme built into the planning helps so much.

Holy shit I remember this from school !!! We had to argue things without believing in them! (cue traumatic flashbacks of trying to get homework done) Now that you've brought it up, it's a structure that has the potential to be very helpful in filmmaking, regardless of whether it's short or long. Narratives can avoid the cookie cutter look by actually having a point, as in a thesis that you give to the audience with the right balance of clarity and subtlety. Now I'm getting why "The Lion King" is so popular ... it's the story structure. Inciting Incident - Simba's presented at Pride Rock, his uncle be trippin' Thesis Statement - Mufasa schools Simba on everything having its proper place Body 1 - drop a body Body 2 - be nobody (hakuna matata) Body 3 - return in a new body Conclusion - Simba takes his proper place

This is so amazing honestly. I am always so overwhelmed over how short stories work. 😊❤

You earned yourself a new subscriber. I‘m currently outlining a longer story without any prior writing experience and thought about writing a few short stories to practice before getting into it writing. This video helped a lot about how to structure it and understanding what‘s actually important. Big thanks 👍

I’ve been thinking about this lately too! You can state things outright if you have the concrete detail to back up your statement. It’s like you have to prove it through the events of the story. Also brings to mind Diane Callahan’s video on show vs. tell, especially the bit where she goes over the description of The Secret Garden’s MC.

Thank you for bringing such clarity and structure to short story writing. To me, this structural outline is a perfect headstart for short story writing. I love your videos and your advice.

This is so informative! I am struggling with writing my short story, but I am so happy I watched this because I now have a sense of direction of how to structure it.

@jackhaggerty1066

Жыл бұрын

*The Wall Will Tell You - The Forensics of Screen Writing* by Hampton Fancher with an introduction by novelist Jonathan Lethem. Only 68 pages but packed with tips. Fancher wrote the screenplay for Blade Runner. He knows how stories work and why they may fail. *The Art of the Voice - Poetic Principles and Practice* by Tony Hoagland. Again, like Fancher's book, these tips will help the story writer.

I would love a video of you analyzing a short story or a few short stories, maybe giving more examples of theses that tie to closing paragraphs. Just to see how it can be done well without being too obvious. I definitely want to make my short stories stronger! Thanks for video.

I very much needed this. 😅 Thanks for everything, as always. 💜⚡️

I love this so much, thank you! This is one of most helpful short story videos I've watched.

That's such a fresh yet simple perspective, thank you!

That part about having enough size for the pieces to be able to settle into rules, especially with your use of the word "gravity" has finally let me figure out when I should call something a novel! Novels have hydrostatic equilibrium! If it's round (has room for rules), it's a planet (novel). What word count that happens at depends on the writing style (maybe, not sure yet)

Connectivity/Causality between the three points is an interesting thought. "Movement" is how it was explained to me. Does the story have narrative movement? "If your audience can see that your story is going somewhere, they'll get on the bus." (Fred Craddock)

Wow. I always viewed my use of a thesis statement in short stories as a weakness. I’m a lawyer by training, so I had assumed I was using such academic tools as a crutch. Thanks for your video.

This is a very helpful and well communicated process for structuring short stories - thank you!

Often wondered about whether an essay could mirror the structure of a short story. But you've spelled it out in a way that is useful and makes sense. Thanks for the tip.

Thank you Shaelin! I am attempting to write my first ever work of short fiction and I have no idea how to go about it, so this is a great help!

Cool. Most of my published short stories follow this pattern but with lots of twists added. Structure works every time. My next anthology, due in 2023, has many with this method employed. It is natural and logical and readers respond well to this familiar structure.

Watching this video was like a revelation! After watching this, I must confess the idea of starting a short story now seems a bit less menacing.

Oh my god. Thank you so much. You are an Angel of ideas. This new way of thinking about short stories has really really helped me. I appreciate you and what you do 😊

Thank you. You really helped me through my creative writing course. You made fell in love with writing for sure 💯👏🏻👏🏻

In case you're looking for any criticism there is none. You're brilliant and this is great.

I haven't quite finished the video yet, but I have to say this is quite brilliant. Struggling to plot my second novel so I turn to short stories - realized I'm equally lost in general. With this foundation I feel inspired to finish many of the short ideas I've had without connective tissue (for lack of a better phrase). Kudos, Shaelin - excellent insight ✌️

Thanks for sharing! This is definitely something worth exploring more!

thank you for this. i think i like this way of writing a short story. i haven't officially made one, but i would like to start. i have an idea for a story. but i wanted to try turning it into a short story, and this already seems like its helping me with how i think of the story in general. THANK YOU!!!🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤

Thank you so much this makes so much sense as former pastor of a church this structure by different terminology is used for sermons there are just a few difference but most part the same. I was thinking about that the other day the fist paragraph has to be mix of telling and showing as it was the theses or in sermon terms proposal. Music sturcers and theater work best in three settings. Georg Lukas said the success of the original star wars series that it falled

i could not love this video more. thank you!!

I’m so glad I found this! I’m new to fiction but in college I got a lot of acclaim for my essays, for whatever reason I just really took to the form. In fact an ex once told me I speak in essay form, I do have a habit of bookending with thesis and conclusion I guess

Excellent video and a great way to consider a short story. Thank you.

A few observations from a humble viewer: 1. Your videos are awesome. No bs whatsoever and the information is presented clearly and in a way that's engaging enough to keep one's attention. 2. It's very clear that you have a powerful engine for creativity. Impressive. 3. You've probably heard this before, but I bet you'd make an amazing teacher. Keep up the good work :)

Boy did I need this video!

Thankyou for another wonderful video. So helpful. Going to write my short story now

This is an interesting concept here to use while doing some short stories

Shaelin, you're amazing. Thanks for posting this.

Wow, great way of framing this. You are referring to it as from "back in school" but I use a variant of that form every time I write an email or do a presentation in my day job. You need to make your point in the first three sentences, and then you can elaborate it. Most don't read the elaborations - people either don't have time, or don't care about the details until they do -- which is why you still have to put them in. Sadly, effective corporate communication requires the TLDR lead. Thank you, the idea you presented here to use what I do everyday as a starting point has already started popping the light bulbs over my head.

Could you make it a pdf to have on hand?

Look at you taking care of us plotters with a structure video! 😋

I have tried writing short stories for years and it always seemed like crap. I can come up with tons of story ideas but could never really plan them out. I’ve always just tried to sit down and write and that never worked. But I put your structure to use and for the first time it seems like it will really work!! It actually feels like a short story. It obviously needs more detail but from the bottom of my heart thank you for your knowledge!!!

such a good idea, love it

Internal structure. Essays of Joan Didion, Mavis Gallant, Scaachi Koul, Manjushree Thapa, Sinead Gleeson, Durga Chew-Bose, Emilie Pine. Akutagawa's short story *The Life of a Stupid Man* is told in 51 short numbered paragraphs, not linear, confessional, abject. Useful technique. Structure can be so internal it's hardly there. S.T. Coleridge saw an immense flock of starlings in 1799, haunted by their synchronicity. The image of the starlings suggested the absence in himself of a centre, merely a powerful force he scarcely understood like Akutagawa's. Penguin have reissued Akutagawa's *Rashomon and 17 Other Stories* in a deluxe edition. Intro by Murakami, Notes by translator Jay Rubin.

I like how we see how important the thesis is after we see the character make choices

@jackhaggerty1066

Жыл бұрын

*Writers are losing control of their characters ... but us it actually possible ?* Tom Blake. Linkedin. He thinks writers are gods of their fictional world so it is not possible for any of their characters to *go rogue* and live their own life. I disagree. Writers channel material from everywhere, they are not in control. Most brain activity is not at the conscious level. Writers are not little gods, they do not choose their characters, they are haunted by other possible lives. *Other Voices, Other Rooms*. Alan Massie's novel *Arthur the King* shows us Merlin (Myrrdin) as a feral child, shunned by other children, preferring animals to people. The Christian priests would kill him because he worships Mithra but a blind woman saves him and has him educated in the Latin tongue. Neither writer nor reader can know Merlin. Can we know anyone ? A.S. Byatt said she fears solipsism. Writing gets you out of yourself. We cannot predict our dreams so how can we predict our fictional characters ? Mr Blake needs to read Shakespeare to understand that. For a book about the lives we can only imagine read *0n Not Being Someone Else - Tales of Our Unled Lives* by Andrew H Miller.

Yeah that's a neat way of looking at structuring a short story, thinking about it, quite a lot of mine come back to a thesis statement of sorts, but I think I allude to it instead of state it so maybe that's not obvious to readers as it is to me

Hey! This is great writing tips! I feel like I could try to structure the chapters of my novel like that. I wanted to structure them like short stories with causality links between them, so I'm not writing useless pointless chapters. Obviously it's a bit more complex since I imagine that the consequences of the conclusion of a chapter will cause the introduction scene of the following chapter, but if I apply this and mix it up with my 6-Arc structure I bet it could work!

Will have to start writing short stories more often 😅

@ShaelinWrites

Жыл бұрын

Yes!!

oh, forgive me. But I must also (fairly ) add that I think you're one of the more brilliant and inventive writers I've seen in quite a long time ma'am. And many of your short stories I've found online are wonderful. You do great work. You have a lot to offer the world. good day/morning/somethin. JSH

As a retired professor, thank you for the succinct and helpful video.

That moment you realize Reedsy has been your college and Shaelin has been your professor for years now

The way I've written most of my short stories is basically just... a simpler, more linear main plot, with only one or two subplots that gets easily resolved with the resolution of the main plot. Although this is still not very short stories, they might still require a minimum of 10.000 words to get everything tied together without being rushed. For extremely short short stories (less than 5.000 words) I tend to just go abstract. Basically not much plot, but a main character going from point A to point B and it's mostly just an emotional journey to some kinda self discovery, with a lot of metaphors and analogies. But it doesn't have much of a story per se. It can literally just be for ex the character walking down the road from one house to another, and that change in environment tells an internal story within the character. I think both versions can make great stories, but the latter is much harder for me to do, and I doubt that I'm executing it particularly well, tbh. So for beginners I would actually suggest the former. Just having a very simple plot that doesn't need a ton of obstacles to reach its final resolution. It can have just one obstacle. Also, having fewer characters, only a few of those having some actual development, and fewer subplots is going to cut down on the page time significantly. This way, it's really just a simpler, smaller version of a regular sized novel. I dunno if either of those are how you're supposed to write short stories though. I started off with making short stories when I just began writing, and later on expanded to novels.

I always liked: Tell them what you're going to tell them. Tell them. Tell them what you told them.

This shirt! 😍

Brilliant. I can do flash and I can do novels. Short stories I haven’t nailed down yet. This helps 😊

@ItsBrittany.

6 күн бұрын

What is flash?

@The_WriterVerse

6 күн бұрын

@@ItsBrittany.it’s around 500-1000 words.

@ItsBrittany.

6 күн бұрын

@@The_WriterVerse thanks

On the topic of essay structure, I'd really like to know how to actually write one. I flunked my way through highschool so I haven't really had to write one in years, much less a good one. I've been meaning to write some for my blog but I just have no idea what I'm doing lmao

@munafruit

Жыл бұрын

take what she said in this video, and then for the micro structure of each of the body paragraphs there are a few different mnemonic acronyms but the one we learnt was PEA - point, evidence, analysis. so for an essay you make your points, you back them up with quotes or stats or whatever evidence you have, then you explain and analyse it. and you're not being graded so play with it however you want! good luck

I hypothesize that to a slightly lesser degree, depending on the subject & structure of a novel this approach could also be applied to chapters. 👀

@ShaelinWrites

Жыл бұрын

Oohh okay I’m so intrigued you’re so right

@munafruit

Жыл бұрын

especially if the novel happens to be a composite novel where each chapter is a standalone short story like in a collection but then the stories inform each other and fall into a larger narrative structure **ahem** yes

@kimaya4503

Жыл бұрын

@@munafruit 🎯

I love writing

You are BRILIENT! You just unstuck me 🌺

What kind of short stories do you read that you’ve learned structure from, or what do you recommend reading for beginners to learn from?

@ShaelinWrites

Жыл бұрын

Depends what genres you like, but for a new writer I'd recommend picking up an anthology (Best American Short Stories, The Journey Prize, etc) and then, if there are any stories you particularly like, you can read other stories/collections by those authors.

@GDCheetahmotherFker

Жыл бұрын

@@ShaelinWrites Thank you for your quick reply. I’ve been watching your videos obsessively-You are a great teacher! I like fiction: literary, contemporary, realistic as well as magical realism, and women’s fiction. I spend WAY too much time searching for the “right” story to be a model for me to learn from until I just get overwhelmed and want to give up! (I have ADHD 🤪) So I was hoping you could name a couple of specific short stories that You feel might be helpful- for instance, Hills Like White Elephants-- but maybe more contemporary. Thanks for your time and all that you create on ShaelinWrites! 😇💕

A short story is like a video essay

Star Wars Clone Wars did a thesis at the start of every episode.

hey team, which do you think has more tension, a relationship between a girl and her father's mistress or a girl and her boyfriend's side chick? This video is a sign to start my short story but idk which relationship holds more tension.

@keepwriteon2169

Жыл бұрын

Maybe her father's mistress is also her boyfriend's side chick!?! 🤔

@wrigleyextra11

Жыл бұрын

@@keepwriteon2169 a third thing! I like it 😧

@ShaelinWrites

Жыл бұрын

these are both SUCH chaotic set-ups i'm obsessed (my vote for more tension is girl and her father's mistress oh boy that is so messy, but seriously though write both they're both so chaotic)

@wrigleyextra11

Жыл бұрын

@@ShaelinWrites I will write both then! The set-up is only one (the girl) knows who the other is, and under some pretext she finds her way into her life and discovers a baby that then she suddenly gets roped into taking care of and finds something odd about the baby (that is a secret oddity only she has that no one else knows). Okay ttyl so PUMPED to write this now.

@jackhaggerty1066

Жыл бұрын

Speaking for no one but myself there is a more complex tension between a girl and her father's mistress. *Blood is the river that cannot be crossed,* said Patrick White (read The Vivisector, The Solid Mandala, Voss & the bio by David Marr). Consider the complexity. Her father is no longer with the girl's mother. He may be with someone not much older than herself. She never thought about her parents' sex life, children don't, but her dad's new relationship alters the nature of fatherhood. It fractures it. *Steve Jobs 2015 Movie Last Scene.* KZread. Job's unfaithfulness is with his visionary career but he denied paternity for many years. The scene worked for me because I do not have a daughter and cannot understand a father who would not be proud of such a daughter. Perla Haney-Jardine is incandescent in this scene while Michael Fassbender is tied to a predictable emotional trope, not his best role. It is worth watching the daughters of writers on KZread. *Lies My Mother Never Told Me By Kalie Jones.* Kalie is the daughter of James Jones. Her dad wrote From Here To Eternity. *The Daughter of Sophie's Choice Author On Her Father.* Alexandra is the daughter of William Styron. Styron and Jones were good friends. Styron supported Jones as the latter struggled to finish his last novel, Whistle. *Styron Reading from Lie Down in Darkness.* KZread. *The Private World of James Jones 1 of 3.* KZread.

Gravitas

Like if you got here because your teacher made you. 👇

Personally I think the Hollywood/Pixar/ Superhero formulaic story templates have ruined fiction, turning novel writing into predictable cookie cutter junk.

I find much of what you say compelling, and very agreeable. But it seems as though you go out of your way to grossly over-complicate the mechanisms involved by which you apply your theory. (then rather ironically mention it's "simplicity" several times.) I'm unsure of your intended target-demographic, but (based on the titles and subject matter of your content) it's probably young persons who are just beginning their journey as writers, or simply New/fledgling writers in general. And that's cool. KZread and similar platforms are amazing ways to convey ideas and information for others to learn from. But your overly technical jargon that seems like you're parroting something one of your creative writing professors said is likely missing it's mark on MANY young beginners of the writing craft, and therefore alienating a good portion of your audience. (or potential audience. Especially American ones, who's average comprehension is statistically a 6-8th grade reading level.) Actual minimalism and simplicity is definitely a good device for educating newer writers and assisting them on their writing journey. (you should try that.)

your audio is not good and you should show us before you lose us

Your video is great. Thanks. I’ve watch several videos on how to write a short story. Some of these people may benefit by learning how to create an educational video.