The three act structure

Photo by Magda Ehlers on Pexels.com

BY PHIL MOORE

Most stories follow a 3-Act structure. Certainly most movies. This was first defined by Syd Field in the mid-’70s in his book Screenplay. It has been repeated, refined, and built upon in hundreds of books since. But the basic idea goes back as far as Aristotle, who in his Poetics defined stories as having a Beginning, Middle and End that are causally related.

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Writing for a small screen: guidelines

First steps: structuring a story

Women in World War II. Photo: The U.S. National Archives/CC/Flickr

TOPIC: Structuring a story.

The first draft

Photo: Sam Hood/State Library of NSW

 

Writing, says our mate Jack Hart, is like organised thinking. Organising your information is the first step towards imposing order on the writing process, thereby disciplining the mind.

Take a closer look – focus & organisation

Photo: Bernie Borghetti/Flickr Some rights reserved

This week you’ll continue to research, and begin to organise the information you’ve found in a way which makes sense to you.