Author Archives: Melanie Anne Phillips

Using Character Names from Someone Else’s Story

A writer recently asked:

I purchased your Storyweaver, because I’ve had many stories rumbling around in my head for years. Several of them are adaptations of old tv dramas and old movies.

My stories are totally different from the originals, but use the same characters names.

I guess my main question is: am I legally allowed to write these stories?

I’m guessing there must be some sort of rights acquired in order to do so. If that’s the case, I’ll have to forget it. I can’t afford the possible hundreds of thousands it would cost to acquire rights to characters names… and without these characters, my stories wouldn’t be the same.

Thank you for any help you can possibly provide.

Respectfully yours,

SV

My reply:

Hi, SV

While a character name cannot be copyrighted, it can be trademarked. And, in copyright cases, character names can be taken into consideration as part of an overall argument of infringement.

For example, there is no doubt you cannot get away with calling a character Luke Skywalker, even if you were telling a story about an orange and an apple, and Luke was the apple.

At the other end of the scale, you couldn’t get away with publishing a story about a young farm boy in a galaxy far far away whose father turns out to be the villain, and both of whom use a paranormal power (know as the PP) to move objects and control minds no matter what you called them, even Fred and Ethyl.

And in the middle are character names such as Joe Smith, which don’t really ring a bell with most people as belonging uniquely to some previously published work. Those kinds of names can be used without concern, even if they have been previously published in some obscure fiction.

In the end, it is up to you to determine if the character names are so identifiable that using them would violate copyright or intellectual property rights, and if you run into trouble, then it is up to the courts.

Hope this helps.

Melanie

Act Order – Sign Posts, Journeys & Throughlines

A Dramatica user asks:

Hi Melanie,

In the [Dramatica] theory book you can find this text:

“Just because we have absolute freedom, however, does not mean our decision will have no effect on our audience. In fact, the order in which each scene crops up deter- mines which information is a first impression and which is a modifier. It is a fact of human psychology that first impressions usually carry more weight than anything that follows. It takes a lot of undoing to change that initial impact. This is why it is usually better to introduce the Main Character’s Signpost 1 before the Impact Character Sign- post 1. Otherwise, the audience will latch onto the Impact Character and won’t switch allegiance until much farther into the story. Clearly, if our weaving has brought the audience to think the Impact Character is the Main Character, we have failed to convey the real structure and meaning of our story. So, just because we have freedom here doesn’t mean we won’t be held accountable.”

I understand it.

My question: Is it possible to start out with the OS Signpost 1 before the MC Signpost 1?

Thanks al lot,
Eduardo

My reply:

Hi, Eduardo

Sure, in fact the only hard and fast “rules” are that you shouldn’t introduce a throughline’s journey before its sign post and that you should finish all sign posts and journeys of the same “act” (such as sign post 2 and journey 2) for all four of the throughlines before introducing any of the next act’s sign posts or journeys, such as sign post 3 or journey 3 of any of the four throughines. That way, acts are not fragmented from one throughline to another, and all throughline finish an act before any throughline begins the next act.

So, as for putting the OS Sign post 1 before the MC sign post 1 is just fine – it simply means you are choosing to open your story with the Objective story and then introducing your Main Character after the overall story subject is revealed.

Melanie

al Awlaki, the “Uncanny Valley” and Writing Empathetic Characters

Recently, al Awlaki (the infamous “American” Al Qaeda) was killed by American forces. He was viewed as a great threat because of his ability to speak to the domestic population of the United States in their own language and culture and to inspire terrorist acts by those susceptible to his message of jihad.

While these allegations are certainly true, they alone do not explain the intensity with which Awlaki was both feared and despised. In fact, there is another quality he possessed that amplified the trepidation and derision he precipitated: he fell into the “Uncanny Valley.”

“Uncanny Valley” is a term generally used to define any non-human entity whose attributes are just human enough to be disturbing. For example psychological test have been run that chart an empathy line against robots whose features range from fully mechanical to completely human in appearance. At first, the results were predictable: the more human the robot appeared, the more empathetic people were to it.

But, as the human qualities reached a point where they became “almost human” there was a sudden drop-off in empathy as steep as a cliff. In fact, the reaction to such an entity reached a point where it plummeted below zero empathy into the realm of negative empathy, documented as “revulsion.”

The same test was also run using stuffed animals and the results were essentially the same – our empathy increases as human likeness increases until a sharp break point is reached where additional increases quickly reverse the trend. Once the line hits bottom and as human similarity continue to increase, eventually empathy rises again into the positive, and ultimately reaches maximum when the non-human entity appears absolutely identical to a human, even though one knows it really is not.

Now this aspect of human psychology has tremendous implication for writers, especially in the creation and development of characters. While it has been explored directly in such works as the I, Robot novels by Asimov (and especially well handled in the movie, Bicentennial Man starring Robin Williams) it is always at work in the relationship between an audience and the fictional entities that populate the stories it reads and watches.

Let me propose that the Uncanny Valley not only pertains to the visual qualities of non-human entities, but to how we intuitively sense their humanity, almost as if we were automatically and subconsciously performing a Turing Test on every person we meet.

I believe we are. I believe we are prepared to accept something totally alien as a risk of unknown potential, while any creature we can identify as of human essence is a known quantity and, therefore, a predictable risk at worst. But some one or some thing that is just off-kilter enough is loose-canon when it comes to threat. We might find ourselves lulled into complacency only to be set-upon when our guard is down.

For example, we are afraid of an earthquake or tornado because it is random and chaotic. We are afraid of bears in a different way because they share our emotions and we understand what they might do. But a Terminator or a demonic spirit is far more terrifying for while we are able to frame it as an entity in our minds, we are unable to fathom its motivations or to predict its behavior, which are often contrary to humanity.

In contrast, consider animated cartoons in which cars, cattle, or cantaloupes may all engender empathy from an audience because they are carefully (albeit intuitively) crafted to fall far enough from human-looking to avoid the Uncanny Valley on one side, and close enough to human in spirit to avoid the Uncanny Valley on the other.

Many of the disfigured humans of fiction are often drawn to revolt us in appearance while connecting to us in their humanity. And, of course, many characters are written to illustrate that even the most beautiful can have revolting souls.

Now for the sake of a mental exercise, consider how this holds true in real life. For example, most of us find the Elephant Man uncomfortable to look at, yet empathize deeply with his heart. But what of those in our own live who have been badly burned or born with physical defects? What must that life be like when you are constantly reminded, subliminally, that others shun you as non-human? There are lessons here for our spiritual growth and stories to be told.

Let’s shift gears, for a moment, and go to the opposite extreme – the science of mind, the neurology of psychology. If you go to Wikipedia and look up Uncanny Valley you’ll find graph that shows the sudden dip and re-rise of the empathy line.

I was immediately struck by how similar that line is to the “action potential” of a neuron in the brain. After a neuron fires, it is chemically inhibited from firing again immediately. Rather, the “action potential” goes from maximum, down a steep cliff during the actual firing to a negative action potential until the forces that lead to the ability to fire recharge.

I’m going to make a leap here and share with you an aspect of the psychology behind Dramatica – a theory we call Mental Relativity. As part of the theory we propose (because of what we have observed in our model of story structure) that dynamics in the electro-chemical operations of the brain are reflected, almost as fractals, in the high-level dynamics of psychological processes. Simply put, psychology exhibits sympathetic vibrations of the patterns of physical brain function.

Now, I realize there are no studies (to my knowledge) that explore this, but is absolutely is a prediction of the Mental Relativity theory. But why would this be? Consider one potential explanation…

It is one of our most essential survival tools to be able to recognize objects, patterns, edges, what is part of something and what is not. The same curve we see in neurons or in the Uncanny Valley actually is just a reflection of our ability to define the limit of things.

We use this to see a rock in our path or to determine if figure coming through the mist is a friend or foe. It is what allows us to describe the nature of an object or a person and the scope of an argument or a story.

And so, with an aspect of our minds that is so foundational and all pervasive, a wise author would give it heed when building characters to be attractive or off-putting, a wise person would think twice about from whom they turn away (and why), and as for al Awlaki, well, he was American enough to connect with those who felt isolated, but just a little bit too non-American to avoid our ire.

Questions About Act Order in Different Cultures

A writer asked the following question regarding my earlier article, “Changing Dramatica’s Suggested Act Order.”

How does one go about sussing this out? What approach would you recommend if I were trying to figure out which argument is primary in Mexico or Argentina or Norway?

Here’s my thoughts:

Alas, there’s no specific methodology developed at this time to help make such a judgment.  The best approach I’ve found is to look to existing stories that are popular and long-lived within the culture in question. 

All stories seek to provide both order and sequence.  Order is spatial and is the equivalent of “where there’s smoke, there’s fire” – in other words, what conditions co-exist – a focus on relationships.  Sequence is temporal and is the equivalent of “one bad apple spoils the bunch” – in other word, what conditions lead to another condition. 

All cultures will explore both, and stories for (or about) men will largely look at deadlines and linear progressions while stories for (or about) women will largely look at restrictions and conflicting forces.  This, of course, further clouds the issue. 

And, naturally, some cultures are more balanced between the two while others are at the extremes of the bias.  Further, the intensity of how strongly a culture is attached to accuracy is a variable as well.  In such a case, even a strong bias might not be so crucial. 

Remember also that all cultures most appreciate stories that are fully accurate in both aspects, for that is what our human minds most seek.  Therefore, the only importance in knowing the cultural bias is if you want to intentionally break structure for personal reasons, which is always the equivalent of saying, “I know it is better THAT way, but I just want it THIS way.” 

So, in the end, it is a judgment call, but the good news is, if you can’t decide the relative importance of time or space or the overall importance of either to a given culture, then the culture probably doesn’t care all that much either, making it pretty safe for whatever you do.

Melanie

Writing Charcters of the Opposite Sex

Perhaps the most fundamental error made by authors, whether novice or experienced, is that all their characters, male and female, tend to reflect the gender of the author. This is hardly surprising, since recent research finally proves that men and women use their brains in different ways. So how can an author overcome this gap to write characters of the opposite sex that are both accurate and believable to their own gender?

In this Dramatica Tip, we’ll explore the nature of male and female minds and provide techniques for crafting characters that are true to their gender.

At first, it might seem that being male or female is an easily definable thing, and therefore easy to convey in one’s writing. But as we all know, the differences between the sexes have historically been a mysterious quality, easily felt, but in fact quite hard to define. This is because what makes a mind male or female is not just one thing, but also several.

First, let’s consider that gender has four principal components:

Anatomical Sex

Sexual Preference

Gender Identity

Mental Sex

Anatomical sex describes the physicality of a character – male or female. Now, we all know that people actually fall in a range – more or less hairy, wider or narrower hips, deeper or higher voice, and so on. So although there is a fairly clear dividing line between male and female anatomically, secondary sexual characteristics actually create a range of physicality between the two. Intentionally choosing these attributes for your characters can make them far less stereotypical as men and women.

Sexual Preferences may be for the same sex, the opposite sex, both, or neither (or self). Although people usually define themselves as being straight, gay, bi, or celibate, this is also not a fixed quality. Statistics shows, for example, that 1/3 of all men have a homosexual encounter at least once in their lives.

Although it often stirs up controversy to say so, in truth most people have passing attractions to the same sex, be it a very pretty boy or a “butch” woman.

Consider the sexual preference of your characters not as a fixed choice of one thing or another, but as a fluid quality that may shift over time or in a particular exceptional context.

Gender Identity describes where one falls on the scale between masculine and feminine. This, of course, is also context dependent. For example, when one is in the woods, at home with one’s family, or being chewed out by the boss.

Gender Identity is not just how one feels or things of oneself, but also how one act’s, how one uses one’s voice, and how one wishes to be treated. Often, a male character may have gentle feelings but cover them up by overly masculine mannerisms. Or, a female character may be “all-business” in the workplace out of necessity, but wishes someone would treat her with softness and kindness.

Actually, Gender Identity is made up of how one acts or wishes to act, and how one is treated or wishes to be treated. How many times have we seen a character who is forced by others to play a role that is in conflict with his or her internal gender self-image? Gender Identity is where one can explore the greatest nuance in creating non-stereotypical characters.

Finally, Mental Sex describes where one falls on the scale from practical, binary, linear, logistic, goal-oriented thinking to passionate, flexible, emotional, process-oriented thinking. In fact, every human being engages in ALL of these approaches to life, just at different times and in different ways.

Now, in creating characters, consider that each of the four categories we just explored is not a simple choice between one thing or another, but a sliding scale (like Anatomical Sex) or a conglomerate of individual traits (like Gender Identity). Then, visualize that wherever a character falls in any one of those four categories places absolutely no limits on where he or she may fall in the other categories.

For example, you might have a character extremely toward male anatomical sex, bi-sexual (but leaning toward a straight relationship at the moment), whose gender identity is rough and tumble (but yearns to be accepted for his secret sensitivity toward impressionistic paintings) who is practical all the time (except when it comes to sports cars).

Any combination goes. But when it comes to Mental Sex itself, there are four sub-categories within that area alone which tend to define the different personality types we encounter:Memory relies on our training to organize our considerations in a give situation toward components or processes. And every character always has a Conscious choice to focus on the components or processes at any given moment. In other words, in a given situation, at each level of Mental Sex does a character center on the way things are or the way things are going? At each level is the character more interested in getting his or her ducks in a row or in a pond?

Subconscious

Memory

Conscious

Preconscious

In brief, each of these “levels” or “attributes” of the mind can lean toward seeing the world in definable or experiential terms. Pre-conscious is a tendency to perceive the world in components or as processes that is determined before birth. It is the foundation of leaning toward the tradition “male” or “female” personality traits. Subconscious determines the tendencies we have to be attracted or repelled from component or process rewards.

Finally, beyond all of these considerations is the cultural indoctrination we all receive that leads us to respond within social expectations appropriately to the role associated with our anatomical sex. These roles are fairly rigid and include what is proper to wear, who speaks first, who opens the door or order the wine, who has to pretend to be inept where and skilled where else (regardless of real ability or lack there of in that area), the form of grammar one uses in constructing sentences, the words one is expected to use (“I’ll take a hamburger,” vs. “I’d like a salad”), and the demeanor allowable in social interaction with the same and the opposite sex, among many other qualities.

In the end, writing characters of the opposite sex requires a commitment to understand the difference between those qualities, which are inherent and those, which are learned, and to accept that we are all made of the same clay, and merely sculpt it in different ways.

—Melanie Anne Phillips

Want to know more?

Consider our four-hour audio program on Characters & Gender:

Definitive Scientific Article on Dramatica Theory

Here is a link to the definitive explanation of the Dramatica theory (in PDF) from 1993, that explains all of the key concepts in text and graphics, including descriptions of non-story uses of the psychological model and the functioning of the model in terms of the dramatic circuit created by Potential, Resistance, Current, and Power (Outcome) and its relationship to the prediction of temporal story progression in terms of a quad-based 1 2 3 4 sequence.

http://storymind.com/free-downloads/sa_article.pdf

God and Dramatica

Now here’s a touchy subject.  Still, over the years, many have taken a philosophical, even spiritual view of Dramatica.  There are even some who have drawn a comparison between Dramatica’s 64 elements and the 64 trigrams of the I Ching.   In fact, two of them wrote articles on that topic.  Here are the links:

Noa’s Archetypes
by noted ballet coach,
Anthony Noa

The One and the Many
by C.J. Lofting

Some find this comparrison odd, and at first so did we, since neither Chris nor myself had studied the I Ching before creating Dramatica and only after having this brought to our attention did we explore the similarities.  Ultimately, for me, it is just another indicator that we are all looking for the same answers to the same universal questions.  Dramatica is just another lens through which to focus on our own existence.

A new Dramatica user recently sent to me the following:

I’m probably stating the obvious, but have you thought about the Story Mind in terms of God, and human beings in terms of representing different aspects of God?
 
Well, as you might expect, I do in fact have a few thoughts on that matter.  But before I pen them, a caveat:
 
In the early days of our development of Dramatica, some twenty years ago, Chris and I encountered legions of fans who were so enraptured with the potential of the theory as a model of the mind that they started applying it to all kinds of areas outside of the realm of the creation of fiction.
 
For example, one lawyer was using it to help structure his closing arguments in criminal trials.  A student in one of my UCLA classes began exploring how Dramatica might be applied to the patterns he encountered in sub-nuclear physics.  And another student in a Deep Theory class I taught was having her pyschiatrist apply it to help her integrate her multiple personalities.
 
Due to the comments by users and students and our own awareness of some of the philosophical implications of Dramatica, Chris and I began to worry about the potential abuse of Dramatica as the basis for some new religion.  After all, Dramatica (in its original form) dealt with four Classes – Universe, Mind, Physics, and Psychology – which were already a keystone in Dianetics (something neither of us knew until long after the theory was complete).  Of course, we use the terms differently as meaning the four posible realms of exploration in a story – External or Internal States or Processes.  Every story problem can be identified as being either an External or Internal State or Process.  Universe is an External State, Physics is an External Problem, Mind is an Internal State, Pyschology is an Internal Process.  And so, for us, this was just a story issue.  But, quite naturally, stories are about the way we think and feel and we realized that people would probably try to resolve problems in their own lives by identifying them in the same way, with the same terms.
 
So, we have always been pretty wary and on guard against any “cult-like” movements that might crop up around the ol’ theory, lest the power of Dramatica from an organizational and self-illuminating aspect might be subverted to lure in and control innocent seekers of truth.
 
(After all, in my pre-Dramatica days I had written and edited a feature length documentary on Jim Jones and the People’s Temple and the Guyana suicide.  I spent a year on that project, and it has made me ever-watchful for any charismatic leader who isolates his or her flock and professes to be the sole source of God’s Truth.  Again, the Tao that can be spoken is not the Eternal Tao.  In fact, I went on to write a song about what I learned in that year – including interviewing one-on-one a survivor from the massacre.  Here’s a link to a rendition of that song, if you are interested: on mp3 at Guyana Dreamin’ or on video at Guyana Dreamin’)
 
And so, knowing that the last thing I want to do is encourance any kind of following of my personal philosophies, please take this as just a little sharing of some of my speculations with that new user who asked:
 
I’m probably stating the obvious, but have you thought about the Story Mind in terms of God, and human beings in terms of representing different aspects of God?
 
Here’s my reply:

If God is within us and we within God, then the concept of characters within a Story Mind might be a useful perspective in our attempt to better understand our relationship with the Divine.

Consider – suppose that we experience our linear lives like scanning lines on a television. Suppose our souls do not perish at death, but simply reset to the next scanning line, so that we either have been or will at some time be and live the life of every thinking creature that has existed, currently exists, or will exist. In other words, be good to your neighbor and every bug on your wall, for it is you.

Time is irrelevant to God, for it is our one continuous life as a single soul that scans the experience of reality from a Main Character view – I think, therefore I am. But God sees all the scanning lines not as individual linear experiences, but as comprising a bigger picture – the fully scanned image, in motion, as the universal collection of thinking creatures is constantly altering as new hosts are born and old hosts die, frame by frame.

Together, we play out across God’s mind, informing God’s thoughts and, in a sense, continuously creating God as God puts us (who are really one) into play.

God is both author and audience to his own creation in a way no player on the field can ever fully appreciate, for ours is not to watch the movie but to live the role.

I call this concept “co-creation.”

Just idle speculation.  Make of it what you will.

Melanie

Changing Dramatica’s Suggested Act Order

A Dramatica user recently asked:

Hello:  would appreciate your help on this.  Am using the Dramatica software.  Level III.    Impact Character is MIND and that’s OK.  However, the software keeps telling me that Signpost #1 is Memories and Signpost #2 is Preconscious/Impulsive Responses.  I want them reversed, i.e. Signpost #1 to be Impulsive Responses and Signpost #2 to be Memories.  I have gone back into the impact character descriptors  prior to the PLOT PROGRESSIONS  viz. to the Impact Character  Development and written in Impulsive responses.   Nothing changes .    I  realize I can just “call” them something other than what the software says, i.e. call Signpost #2,  #1  but would prefer to have the software place them in the order I want.   Can you suggest how I can do that?  Thanks for your help.

Bill

My reply:

Hi, Bill

Here’s the problem (and a solution):

First, the reason Dramatica chooses that order is that is the sequence that will support your overall story argument or message.

Here’s why – the order of things changes their meaning. For example, a slap followed by a scream has a different meaning than a screen followed by a slap. Similarly, the order in which perspectives are explored in a story is what ultimately makes the argument, over time.

So, Dramatica is telling you the order necessary to fully make and support your message. In fact, if you pick all the sequence orders, the Story Engine in Dramatica will be able to determine the message and fill in many of the structural items based on sequence alone!

Now, here’s a solution for what really isn’t a problem, but more of a frustration:

Every culture looks at time and space in a story to make the argument. But, every culture favors one of the other as being the primary argument and other as being the supporting argument.

A culture will accept inaccuracies in the secondary argument, but not in the primary argument. In Japanese culture, the Timeline argument is most important. But in Western culture, the Spatial argument is most important.

So, while it will slightly weaken your argument to change the order of the signposts (and therefore the nature of the journeys) in Western culture, your audiences will see that a a minor violation that doesn’t negate the primary argument.

The one caveat is to make absolutely sure you keep all the spatial (structual) items exactly on target because if you interject inaccuracies in there as well, with the slight weakness of your timeline already at work, the entire structure might fall.

Hope this helps.

Melanie

Bill’s reponse:

Hi:  Thank you so much for taking the trouble to reply in detail.  Much appreciated.   In the meantime, I rethought everything, thinking “just what if Dramatica knows something I don’t . . . however impossible that might be!”  And I figured that the Dramatica order was indeed better.  So that’s what I’m using.  And again many thanks.  Cordially,  Bill

Questions About Dramatica’s Features

A teacher of writers recently asked:

  • Does Dramatica include a database structure for building character files? Too me it seems this would be an important story building concept that a computer could offer with great advantage; the ability to collect character names, traits, histories, personalities etc.
  • Are there other database structures for collections of titles, dialog, story starters, first line hooks, etc? 
  •  Is there an outline structure regarding acts or scenes and the order of events?
  •  From my experience in writing classes two important difficulties always seem to come to light. Point of view and order of events (plotting the story with Beginning, Middle, & End). Does Dramatica help with these trouble areas?

My reply:

In answer to your questions, though Dramatica is all about the Story Engine, it does have a data base of character names and information and a few pre-built stereotypes to start from.

While it doesn’t have story starters per se, it ships with about 70 example files of notable movies, books, teleplays and stage plays.  Each can be used for ideas, and there’s even a feature that lets you strip out all the identifiable storytelling and subject matter leaving nothing but the bare bones structure.  You can then use that to build your own story since structure is just the blueprint and the storytelling makes it your own.

There are also built-in scene by scene and chapter by chapter templates for a novel or a screenplay to give you some timeline guidance if you wish.

As for the “trouble points” you list, point of view and timeline issues are the center and purpose of Dramatica.  Each story point is defined not just by what the subject matter is, but how you want to position your readers or audience in relation to each issue.  And characters are all defined by their points of view as well.  Plus, Dramatica can actually predict what should happen in act two, based on other information you’ve provided about your story’s underlying message argument.

More Questions from Alice

A response and further questions from the Dramatica user who was answered in my last post: Can Two Characters Share the Same Traits?

Hi Melanie

Okay, that is understood, and makes sense, and I like the logic, but this makes the software somewhat limiting in my view. I think there should be a facility to show the character in conflict with themselves, so for instance, they have a trait, and then a conflicting trait, so they have inner conflict.

My question is though, how do I build a character with more than one trait, even where that trait is contradictory and not a neat amplifier, as in – But if you want to fully explore the individual traits and get down to that level of human qualities, then you build each character one element at a time –

How do I do that using the actual software, I mean do I have to create a character with one trait and then build that same character again, (name, cartoon image etc) and give them another single trait?

If I want to build up more complexity within that character? How does the software cope with that? What do I need to do in actual step by step terms with the actual software?

Or is the software based on the assumption that most characters will be hosts to one individual trait or another, so that the storymind works as a whole? I understand this, and it’s a great concept, really, but it still falls short when you want to examine a character’s psychological nuances. My novel is a character based, it’s a novel about psychological journey to inner integrity, so conflicting elements are vital to the whole concept.

Sorry to be awkward, but I do think if the software could be near perfect. At the moment I feel rather hampered by the character build aspect.

All the best

Alice

My response:

Hi, Alice

Okay, if I were to condense your message down to two points:

1. How do you assign more than one element to a character?

2. Dramatica seems to lack psychological depth for characters.

In response to question one, go to the Build Characters area that has the grid of character elements. Then, when you create a character (and its character icon), simply click and drag the icon to the first element you wish that character to have. Then, click and drag the character icon again to the next element you wish it to have. The character’s icon will appear on the grid in the square representing each of the elements you drag it to. In this way you can add as many elements as you wish to each character. What’s more, as you drag other characters (icons) to the grid, the position in the gird of one character relative to another predicts the kind of relationship they will have. Diagonal positions are most contentious because diagonal elements are most opposite. Horizontal relationships are Companion because they go hand in hand, sometimes for good (a positive Companion relationship) or for bad (a negative Companion relationship). Vertical relationships are dependencies, including co-dependencies, which can also be positive or negative in nature. So, as you see, you can use the kind of relationship you want between characters to determine which elements they will have, or choose the elements you want them to have and let that determine their relationships. Clearly, relationships are determined by the traits of each character. And further, since complex characters may have many traits and come into conjunction with other characters in many squares in different ways, very complex relationships may be built and/or described since the characters may be contentious in regard to two of their traits, but positive companions when issues arise in regard to two other traits they possess.

As for question two about the psychological depth. Unlike life in which we all have a myriad of central problems, each becoming paramount in a different context and in which contexts are constantly changing, stories are about a single central problem (the message issue of the story) and how it is explored in a single fixed context (the thematic topic)

Since characters represent facets (traits or problems solving techniques) of our minds the elements they possess are fixed. But, as in our own minds, there are two special characters – the Main Character who represents our sense of self (“I think, therefore I am”) and that “devil’s advocate” voice within us that takes the contrary position on any issues so we weigh the pros and cons of going with our old tried and true method or trying something new the might be better but is unproven. In fact, it is this conflict over methods, attitudes, ethics, morals, word views or personal codes or paradigms that defines the Subjective Story while the Objective Story is defined by the attempt to achieve the logistic goal of the plot.

All of the Dramatica structure is divided into four large areas called Domains. One is about situations, one is about attitudes, one is about activities, and the other is about manners of thinking. The Objective Story will explore one of these in the effort to achieve the goal. The Subjective Story will explore another in the push and pull relationship over the message between the Main Character and its opposite. And the Main Character and its counter part will each get one of the remaining two parts of the structure.

So, Main and the other character (called the Obstacle, Impact, or Influence Character) each get a whole 1/4 of the structure to describe their inner growth, angst, or deliberations. Their psychologies are quite complex as a result, not to mention the special relationship between them that is far more complex than the simple Objective Characters who only represent traits.

Yet in stories, we see that many characters might be explored deeply, not just these two. That is a parallel for how we deal with more than one problem in real life. Since a story, by definition, will center on a single problem, to create complex psychological explorations around an Objective Character other than the Main or Obstacle character, you create sub-plots. In a sub-plot, one of the other Objective characters becomes the Main or Obstacle character in another story that hinges, plot-wise or subject matter-wise on the first story but is not actually part of the main story – just a side trip or a tributary.

In this way, as a Main or Obstacle character in a sub-plot or sub-story, you can greatly increase the psychological complexity of as many of the objective characters as you like with a separate sub-story for each of the characters you wish to deepen.

Ultimately, this creates a very rich set of characters and a very complex and subtle plot, while avoiding muddying the original story through the use of tributary sub-stories.

But, that’s pretty heady stuff – not what people are usually prepared to start out with when they first come to Dramatica which can be daunting enough even on a superficial first introduction to it. So, we hold that information back until people master the single story structure before immersing them in the web of multiple sub-stories and many complex internal explorations of characters.

Hope this helps.

Melanie