The 5 Elements of Storytelling

Our Story

There once was a curious little boy who lived in a tiny village at the edge of the woods. One day, the boy’s mother fell ill, and the village healers told the boy and his father that there was no cure for her. The boy was distraught, and spent night and day trying to devise a way to help his mother.

One night before bed, the boy’s father told him a story of a brave knight who searched the lands far and wide for a hidden, magical book. The book, the legends told, was a collection of recipes. But it was not a cookbook; in the hands of a worthy and learned man or woman, each one of the recipes was capable of producing a powerful potion. Naturally, these potions varied in their purpose and effects. There were elixirs for growing as tall as a mountain, for becoming as wise as the wisest elder, and even for death, but the boy was interested in only one of the potions his father described: a healing potion…that could heal anyone.

Epilogue

That little narrative is less than 200 words and yet it contains all the crucial elements of a short story. We’ve talked about the various frameworks that stories can have in previous blogs, but you may not know that those are based on an even more basic formula that applies to virtually all narratives. They are, in no particular order:

1. Setting
2. Character
3. Conflict
4. Plot
5. Theme

Our primary setting in the tale above is obviously the village or, more generally, another world where magic is real. The characters and plot are similarly apparent: the boy, his parents, the village healers and the brave knight are all interacting with each other in some way, and those interactions drive the forward motion toward a potential resolution fairly directly. The theme and conflict are perhaps less clear, maybe even subjective, but for the sake of argument, let’s say that the central conflict is between the boy and his mother’s illness, while the principal theme is heroism.

If that metaphorical demonstration seems much clearer than, say, this more academic explanation from Aberystwyth University (a Welsh college), you shouldn’t necessarily chalk it up to a cultural gap. The fact of the matter is, storytelling has been around virtually forever because, well, humans need it. There’s just something about a narrative structure that wedges information in our brains like a good meal sticks to our ribs, and so we tend to pay a lot more attention to people who can wield it effectively. Presenters, take note.

 

As Jennifer Aaker, a marketing professor at Stanford told The Guardian last year,

“Research shows our brains are not hard-wired to understand logic or retain facts for very long. Our brains are wired to understand and retain stories. A story is a journey that moves the listener, and when the listener goes on that journey they feel different and the result is persuasion and sometimes action.”

The Moral of the Story

As a public speaker or presenter, you should disabuse yourself of the notion that you’re “dumbing down” your material when you elect to tell a story — you’re not. If anything, you’re taking the smarter path; the presentation with a story arc will stand the best chance of lasting through the ages while the list-based, more “professional” presentations all fall away.





New Call-to-action




Join our newsletter today!

© 2006-2024 Ethos3 – An Award Winning Presentation Design and Training Company ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Contact Us