Warp wrote:
>   I believe that the whole point of that book was to give seven extremely
> broad categories under which the vast majority of stories can be categorized.

Vast majority I'll go with, sure. And "if you're a beginning playwrite, 
stick with these themes" makes sense, as in "make sure you have an 
antagonist if the protagonist just sits in the same place without changing" 
and so on. But I'm not sure what's useful about a classification system 
where Frankenstein, The Matrix, and Hamlet can all be categorized in the 
same pile. :-)

"Here's seven ways to add something interesting to your story" or "seven 
ways to turn a situation into a story" I can see, yes. Otherwise it's just 
an essay about the situation.

How about "The Cube", the one with the guy trapped in the white cube with 
all the visitors, not the one with the rooms with a door on each side?

The *innovative* movies are the ones that don't match one of those seven 
plots, methinks. The *good* innovative movies are rare, yes. :-)  But I 
think a lot of (for example) PKDick stories don't fall into those categories.

Not that I really care. It's just that the topic has come up in three 
different online places I hang out in the last couple of weeks, so I've 
thought about it more than I should. :-)

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Forget "focus follows mouse." When do
   I get "focus follows gaze"?

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