Three months ago, I wrote about Kurt Vonnegut’s 8 Shapes of Stories theory.

Vonnegut begins his exceptional 2004 lecture with, “Well, there’s no reason why the simple shapes of stories can’t be fed into computers.”

Fast-forward to 2016 and researchers at The University of Adelaide decided to do just that. They took the emotional arcs of 1300+ novels from Project Gutenberg, turned that into data, used modern tech to analyze the emotional arcs, and then identified 6 patterns seen over and over again in western storytelling.

What I found fascinating was the group, though heavily influenced by Vonnegut’s theory, didn’t feed the computers his shapes. Despite that, the 6 shapes produced by the machine sharply resemble those found in Vonnegut’s original 8.

And Vonnegut’s ideas still hold weight:

• “Be a sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them — so the reader may see what they're made of.”

• “It’s not accidental that the line ends up higher than where it began. This is encouraging to readers.” (True for 6 of the 8)

• “The shape of the curve is what matters. Not their origins.”

The University of Adelaide’s study focuses on the emotional arcs of the stories, not the typical plot arc. These sound similar but they’re very different. Let me explain.

For both, time is the X axis. But the Y axis of the traditional plot arc measures ‘tension’ or ‘excitement’ as it peaks at the climax. However, with the emotional arc view, the Y axis becomes the emotion felt by the protagonist, ranging from horrible to great. In this view, the climax could either be a peak or a trough depending on the shape of the story.

I’d argue the emotional view of arcs is more powerful. You see the wild swings and cycles of a story that captivates your audience and makes them say, “what happens next?” The constant ups and down, pushes and pulls, gives and takes of an exceptional story. Not just the slowly increasing line of a plot arc that summits at the climax and tails off at the end.

For example, here’s the emotional arc the team identified for the 7th Harry Potter:

Fall, rise, fall, over and over with a slight downward trajectory, leading to a sharp spike at the end when (spoiler!) they defeat Voldemort. To me, it most closely resembles to Cinderella story shape. It’s an illuminating activity: take your favorite story, map out the major plot points, and see which story shape it most closely resembles.

Without further ado, here are the 6 types of story the group identified (with examples for each):

1. Rags to Riches (rise)

Your classic underdog tale. A humble, hardworking peasant climbs the mountain to pull the sword from the stone.

• Rocky

• King Arthur

• The Pursuit of Happiness

2. Riches to Rags (fall)

Maybe the saddest story of them all. A journey from the highest of highs to the lowest of lows.

• King Lear

• Citizen Kane

• Scarlet Letter

3. Man in a Hole (fall then rise)

A character’s doing fine, gets herself into a huge problem, but figures out how to overcome it. They often end up better than they started.

“You see this story again and again,” Vonnegut says. “People love it, and it is not copyrighted.”

• The Martian

• The Hunger Games

• Shawshank Redemption

4. Icarus (rise then fall)

The hero goes on a meteoric rise up New York (or some other) society, calls everyone “old sport,” and throws the wildest parties in town. Then reality sets in, and he realizes he’s too close to the sun.

• Macbeth

• Great Gatsby

• Death of a Salesman

5. Cinderella (rise then fall then rise)

I’ll leave this description to Vonnegut:

“We’re gonna start way down here. Worse than that, who is so low? It’s a little girl… the shoe fits, and she achieves off-scale happiness.”

• Red Rising

• Slumdog Millionaire

• The Count of Monte Cristo

6. Oedipus (fall then rise then fall)

Up until the ~70% mark of the story it looks like things are sunshine and rainbows. Walter White goes from high school teacher to king of the drug lords, if you will. Then all goes wrong. The original fall is often not their doing while the final fall is.

• Hamlet

• Gone Girl

• Breaking Bad

My 3 big picture takeaways:

• Rags to Riches, Oedipus, and Cinderella rank as the three most popular with consumers. AKA, those books sold the most copies.

• When you’re thinking through a story, give in an emotional shape. You might be surprised how much it helps you craft your plot.

• Vonnegut was a damn genius.

Have an awesome weekend,

Nathan

PS: If you’re curious on the study’s methods, analytics, and more, the entire research paper is here.

Nathan’s Notes

4 things I found interesting this week:

• Pika. The ChatGPT of video. This looks bonkers.

• Kurt Vonnegut’s 8 rules for writing short fiction. Number one’s a banger: “Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.“

• 5-minute book summaries on the best non-fiction around. My friend Alex curates this newsletter and it’s excellent.

• 5 essential storytelling rules I just made up. Officially one of my favorite YouTube videos ever made. “Don't Stop the Dominoes Ever”