CMC Review.

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Question1: Theories (4đ)
Course 1: The Craft of Plot ✅✅✅
Week 1: What Is Plot?
 Plot is the main events of a novel or story devised and
presented by the writer as an interrelated sequence. Main
events mean what happens in your story, literally the actions or
events that occurred. Devised and presented as an interrelated
sequence means the connected order In which things happen in your
story. So plot then is this: What happens in your story and the
connected order in which those events occur.
Character + Action = Plot
*The difference between a story and a plot.
 The great English author Forster defines the difference like this : The
king died and then the queen died is a story while the king died and
the queen died of grief is a plot.
 A story is an itinerary of events that have occurred that don't have
any relation to one another. A plot is a series of events linked
causally to one another.
*Freytag's Pyramid
 Exposition : at the base of one side of the pyramid
 Inciting incident : the actual event that kicks off the action in story
 Rising Action : the pyramid goes up
 Climax : at the top of the pyramid
 Falling action
 Resolution : at the base of the other side of the pyramid
 Denouement : on the other end of the pyramid

*The five key questions (when creating a great dynamic character)

 What do they want? : creating a character that wanted
something. A character that needs something is fate. A
character that wants something is will.
 What are their weaknesses? : Each of
these characters were more interesting to follow and to read
about because of their weaknesses, not their strengths. So
 when compiling a list of traits for your characters, make sure that
their weaknesses are more interesting than their strengths.
 Where are they from? : Where are they from emotionally helps
us understand a character's motivation for acting the way that
they do. And it can be instrumental in helping us understand
why a character desires a particular thing.
 Where are they going? : If I know why a character wants a
particular thing and I understand where they're from, I have
an understanding, not only of how hard they're going to try to
get what they want, but how resilient they'll be when rising
actions are put in their way to obstruct their path.
 What can your characters do to surprise you? : Look for
places in your story where your characters do things you didn't
expect them to do, and encourage your characters by
following them instead of trying to lead them.
*What exactly is a rising action ?
 Your main character wants something. Some obstacle, it can be
another thing another character, your main character's own flaws,
gets in your main character's way of getting that one thing your
character wants. Those obstacles are rising actions.
Week 2: What Is Structure?
The three act structure
 The beginning : where set up your characters, their relationships,
their wants and desires
 The middle : where the plot reaches its climax
 The end : where the plot is resolved
The ABDCE structure
 A stands for Action. Action is what draws the reader in. It's
something specific and concrete.
B is for Background. Background is essentially context, or what was
happening to these characters before the story started.
D is for Development. This is where the meat of your story is. This
is where the plot of your story happens because it's in this
area where your characters deal with the rising actions you throw
their way.
 C stands for Climax. This is the place where the key narrative
twist in your story happens. And because of that twist, things are
different for your main characters in a real and significant way.
E is for your Ending. This is where we learn that the characters we
thought we knew have become someone else because of their
journey.
* Example Structure (k cần sửa)
Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.
The Action, Romeo is taken by his cousin Benvolio to a Capulet ball where he meets
and instantly falls in love with Juliet.
The background, Romeo's family, the Montagues, and Juliet's family, the Capulets, are
sworn enemies.
Development, Romeo and Juliet, after a whirlwind courtship, decide to get married.
Juliet's cousin Tybalt, incensed that Romeo snuck into the Capulet party, challenges
him to a duel.
Romeo refuses to fight, so his friend Mercutio accepts the duel on Romeo's behalf.
Tybalt kills Mercutio, so Romeo kills Tybalt and is exiled.
The climax, Romeo returns from exile and sees Juliet in the tomb. Juliet turns out not to
be dead, only in a death-like coma due to a potion provided to her by a friar. When she
awakens, she discovers Romeo is dead, then kills herself too.
The ending. The friar that gave Juliet her potion tells the entire story to both the
Montagues and the Capulets, who agree to at last end their grudge.
Week 3: What Is a Scene?
 A scene is a part of a story, at a specific time and place, between
specific characters.
 Scenes are the building blocks of storytelling.
 The Iceberg Theory : cut everything away except for the most
essential details. The idea is we see only a tip of what's happening to
a character, but the substantial bulk of what makes this character tick
is like an iceberg hidden underneath the water.
 Good scenes ( a five point checklist ) :
1. An action : all scenes need action. Scenes usually start with a
specific action.This means something has to happen, an action
is something concrete.
2. Dialogue is what two characters say to each other
but requires some additional explanation.
3. Specific intimate details about yourself, your surroundings,
and the people you are writing about.
4. Inner point of view is what you are thinking, feeling and
processing. Whenever it's time for a character to explain what
they're feeling about a particular action, a prop, another
 character or an obstacle in their path, they should do one of
three things ( the three Rs ) :
 React : something active right in the moment
 Reflect : the character thinks about what they're faced
with in the moment and internally weighs their options
 Reveal something about characters’ selves to the reader
that helps us understand who they are, and how they're
going to respond to this action, prop, character or
obstacle.
5. Definite starting point and stopping point : all scenes need
Week 4: Editing and Revision
 Editing and Revision : can help you see your plot in a different
way so you discover what your story is about.
 The process of Revision :
 Starts with the first draft, which will now become your second
draft, and continues until the manuscript's ready to send to an
agent.
 Can take weeks, months, sometimes even years.
*A 21 point checklist ( How do you begin to revise? )
1. Start with easy fixes ( spell check )
2. Omit needless words
3. Cut where you're doing the reader's thinking
4. Cut stage direction
5. Insure consistent character motivation
6. Has an action happened in the first paragraph ?
7. Is my story coherent?
8. Are there complete scenes?
9. Do I start each scene with something active?
10. Am I writing in an active voice?
11. Is the setting working?
12. Are my characters acting believably?
13. Are the transitions clear ?
14. Does my story fit together ? (ABDCE)
15. Did I explain the risks for each character ?
16. Did I explain the consequences of these risks?
17. Does every story deepen character or advance the plot ?
18. Is the second draft 10% shorter than the first draft ?
19. Am I ready to discard pages that aren’t working ?
20. Is what you meant in your head clear on page?
21. Are my readers no longer confused?
Course 2 : The Craft of Character ✅✅✅
Week 1: Discovering Characters from Your Life and Elsewhere
*The first things we being to think about telling a story
 Who is it about?
 Who matters to me?
 Who do I want to tell the story about?
*How do you conceive of a character ?
 The heart of a character is who matters to you. Not who you think
will be interesting to other people, but what you care
about ( somebody that you've developed in your imagination ).
 Begin to imagine a character :
 The physical being
 Use all your senses : Once you’ve brought them to life
physically, you need to be able to hear them.
The reader should be able to see, hear, smell.
 The act of being invested : you are beginning
to conceive and to look at the world around you is, what
draws you in? What speaks to you? Whose story do you want
to tell?
*Two crucial parts of developing character
 Observation
 Empathy
Week 2: Creating Characters on the Page
*How to make the character that you have observed and empathized
with come to life
 Remembering how important goals and desires are in a
character, what they want, what they are going for.
 Can you hear them telling it, because that's important.
 It can't be a general thing, it has to be a particular thing.
 Have to begin to think about what meaning you find in that detail.
 This information allows you to make a series
of decisions about a character,
and also to expand your character. Every piece of
information helps build a human being. And human beings
are what we're going for.
Week 3: Dialogue and Monologue
*Inflection
  It's important to craft your characters in such a way that they have
distinct voices that the reader can identify, to help identify who's
telling the story.
 The way in which we discover them, and their difference, and their
natures, is through the language that they use.
 When you're writing a character, the speech is not just in dialogue,
it's also in the words that they choose as they are expressing their
thoughts.
*The art of dialogue
 How do you combine artifice and art and that Which is interesting and
provocative, with that, Which is true and real?
*Three goals (The standard try to reach in dialogue)
1. Illuminate character
2. Advance the story
3. Interesting Sentences
*Idiosyncrasies
 The key to everything is understanding your character's attitudes,
their fears, their misgivings, their hesitations, and their hopes.
Week 4: Set Your Characters Free and Give Them Somewhere to Go
*Voice of narrator
 Point of view is often written in a manuscript as POV
 Kinds of points of view :
 First person - the viewpoint character is “ I ” ( the narrator
speak about himself / herself )
 Second person - use
pronouns you and your ( the narrator speak directly to
the reader )
 Third person - which is “ he ” , “ she ” , “ it ” or “ they ”
( the narrator watches the story - but isn’t in it )
*Voice of narrative
 You have a lot of choices about who tells the story, and you are
allowed to move.
 The process of exploration :
 Who do you want to tell the story?
 What is the story you most want to tell?
 Which of your characters is most able to tell the story?
 Who can tell the story ?
 Who should tell the story ?
 What will the story become in the voice and the eyes of that
character ?
  The omniscient narrator :
 The great advantage that it gives you, is that it is all seeing.
 Gives you a very wide lens with which to engage your story.

Course 3 : The Craft of Setting and Description

✅✅✅
Week 1: Persuasive Settings: Why Description Matters
*Why do we write ?
 According to Mario Vargas Llosa :
 Writers are rebellious.
 Writers want to create a new reality, their reality, in the pages
of their fictions, life as they see it.
 There is something in writers of fiction that makes them wish
passionately for a world different from the one they live in,
a world that they are then compelled to construct of words and
upon which they stamp, usually in code, their questioning of
real life. And their affirmation of that other reality which their
selfishness or generosity spurs them to set up in place of
the one they've been allotted.
*The power of persuasion
 Reduce the distance that separates fiction from reality, and once
that boundary is elided, to make the reader live the lie of fiction as if
it were the most eternal truth (suspend disbelief).
Its illusions are the most consistent and convincing depictions
of reality.
*How do we avoid being mediocre puppet masters ?
 What's really needed is the basic, humble, hard work of creating a
fictional world.
 Be aware of fictional time and space for yourself.
*What is the hardest part about writing ?
 Learning to hide the exposition.
*How do we move characters through time?
 Combine scene and summary function together
*What is a scene?
 A scene is the basic building block of narrative fiction.
 A scene covers a relatively short period of time - often just several
minutes or hours - in close detail.
 Scenes mimic real time in that they follow the actions in a play by
play, moment to moment manner. But fiction often encompasses a
longer duration of time than that of a play.
*Summary
 Summary compresses a relatively long period of time - hours,
days, or even years - into a relatively short amount of text.
 Summaries to provide background or context or condense
time or events.
*What is the setting?
 Setting is the time, place, and situation in which a fiction occurs.
 It's impossible to write a story without a setting.
 Being aware of your setting and describing it fully and
vividly will help you create richer fiction.
*What is the description ?
 Description is the mother of vivid fiction.
 In a sense, character is really a description of invented people,
and plot is really a description of events.
*The dirty secret to understanding great literature
 Not received or understood solely on an intellectual basis.
 Do not need to fully understand every word.
 Your senses will absorb and understand it with you or without you.
Week 2: If You Build It, They Will Come
*What is a significant detail ?
 A detail is the smallest unit of description.
 A great detail is a potent, small, vitamin rich unit of fiction.
*What makes a detail significant?
 Emphasize some things and not others.
 Shape the meaning and make it matter with every little thing you
offer.
*Insignificant detail
 Not only boring but it's counterproductive.
 The mind is always trying to find meaning, to synthesize, to
connect the dots.
 Like using the wrong bait => reader loses interest.
Week 3: Credibility and Research
*Three Kinds of Research
1. Functional research
 Includes a range of real-world ways any of us find things out.
 First-hand research : this research you do live (live
research) . Any research outside of books or reading texts.
2. Inspirational research
 Helps you uncover and discover
 It's intuitive, roundabout, and maybe even feels impractical.
  Makes you want to write
 Open up your heart and your mind, so that you can see
what's really inside there and know what it is you uniquely
have to say.
3. Imaginative research
 The time that you spend knowing and planning your story
world.
 Build the whole world of a story or in cinematic terms, the
diegetic world. The story-world or diegetic world is anything that
character's experience or encounter within that world.
Week 4: Realities
*What Is a Literary Genre ?
 Genre is a category of artistic composition characterized
by similarities in style or form or subject matter.
 The main genres as defined by contemporary publishing : crime,
fantasy, horror, mystery or detective, science fiction, romance, and
many more.
 Each of those groups there are subgroups.
*Example of Romance (romance subgenres)
 Contemporary romance  Paranormal romance
 Erotic romance  Romantic suspense
 Historical romance  Young adult romance
 Inspirational romance

Course 4 : The Craft of Style ✅✅✅

Week 1: Meaning, Sense, and Clarity
*The Pyramid of Language

Week 2: Writing with Nouns and Verbs

*What are the parts of speech
 Nouns : nouns, persons, places, things, ideas
 Pronouns : words like he and she, it, that stand in for nouns
 Adjectives : words that modify nouns
 Conjunctions : the pieces of speech that link other pieces of speech
 Verbs are the thing that's happening.
 Prepositions are words like up, down, in, to.
 Adverbs can modify verbs, they can modify adjectives, can also
modify other adverbs
 Interjections
Week 3: Economy
*Cutting things out
1. The simply wordy, the meandering.
2. The unnecessarily analytical.
3. Prepositions : people use more than one preposition together or
implied already in the verb.
4. The modifier (adjectives and adverbs)
5. The third item is the teak sheet, the crying out, the condescending,
the explaining.
Course 5 : Capstone: Your Story ✅✅✅