Main Character • The Character representing the audience position in a story • A story has a central character that acts as the focus of the audience’s emotional attachment to the story. This Main Character is the conduit through whom the audience experiences the story subjectively. The Main Character may be the Steadfast Character who needs to hold on to his resolve or the Change Character who alters his nature in an attempt to resolve his problems. Either way, it is mostly through his eyes that we see the passionate argument of the story, if not also the dispassionate argument.

Logic • [Element] • dyn.pr. Feeling<–>Logic • a rational sense of how things are related • Logic is the mental process of choosing the most efficient course or explanation based on reason. The Logic characteristic exemplifies the theory behind “Occam’s Razor,” that the simplest explanation is the correct explanation. Therefore, the Logic characteristic is very efficient but has no understanding or tolerance that people do not live by reason alone. As a result, the character with the Logic characteristic often ignores how other’s “unreasonable” feelings may cause a very real backlash to his approach. • syn. linear reasoning, rationality, structural sensibility, syllogistics

Limit • [Plot Dynamic] • The constraint of time or options that, by running out, force the story to a climax • The Limit is what forces the story to a close. One of the functions of a story is to give the audience the value of experiences it has not had itself by living through the Main Character. As such, the Main Character in the story Changes or Remains Steadfast and hopes for the best, and we learn from his accomplishments or disappointments. Yet, even a Main Character would not jump into the void and commit to a course of action or decision unless forced into it. To force the Main Character to decide, the story provides all the necessary information to make an educated guess while progressively closing in on the Main Character until he has no alternative but to choose. This closing in can be accomplished in either of two ways: either running out of places to look for the solution or running out of time to work one out. Running out of options is accomplished by an Optionlock; a deadline is accomplished by a Timelock. Both of these means of limiting the story and forcing the Main Character to decide are felt from early on in the story and get stronger until the climax. Optionlocks need not be claustrophobic so much as they only provide limited pieces with which to solve the problem. Timelocks need not be hurried so much as limiting the interval during which something can happen. Once an established Limit is reached, however, the story must end and assessments be made: is the Outcome Success or Failure? is the Judgment Good or Bad? is the Main Character Resolve Change or Steadfast? etc.

Level • [Structural Term] • One of the vertical strata of the Dramatica structural chart. The relationship between levels (Elements, Variations, Types and Domains) of dramatic units is similar to turning up the power on a microscope: each has a different resolution with which to examine the story’s problem. Domains take the broadest viewand have the greatest structural impact on Genre. Types are more detailed and most directly affect the Plot. Variations are even more refined, most intensely inflluencing Theme, and Elements provide the greatest detail available in a story, concentrating on the qualities or traits of Characters.

Learning • [Type] • dyn.pr. Understanding<–>Learning • gathering information or experience • Learning describes the process of acquiring knowledge. It is not the knowledge itself. When a portion of a story focuses on learning, it is the gathering of an education that is of concern, not the education that ultimately has been gathered. Learning need not be an academic endeavor. One might learn to express one’s feelings or learn about love. Learning does not even require new information as sometimes one learns simply by looking through old information from a different perspective or with a new approach. It is not important if one is learning to arrive at a particular understanding or just to gather data. As long as the focus is on the process of gaining information, Learning is the operative word. • syn. cultivating experience, acquiring information, collecting data, gathering knowledge

Leap of Faith • Just prior to a story’s climax, a conscious choice by the Main Character to either Change or remain Steadfast with no way of knowing for sure which will best lead him to his goal or resolve his personal problem • No Main Character can be sure that he will succeed until the story has completely unfolded. Up until that moment, there is always the opportunity to change one’s approach or one’s attitude. For example, a Main Character may determine that what he thought was the true source of the problem really is not. Or he may reconsider his motivation to try and resolve it; whether he should give up or try harder. Again, there is no way for him to tell with certainty which path will lead to success. Nevertheless, when these scenarios close in on a single moment in the story, the moment of truth, where the Main Character has their last opportunity to remain steadfast in their approach and attitude or to change either or both, there will be a Leap of Faith. After that, all that remains is to see it to its conclusion, good or bad. That moment of truth is called the Leap of Faith because the Main Character must choose a course and then commit himself to it, stepping into the unknown with blind faith in a favorable outcome or resignation to an ostensibly poor one.

Knowledge • Most terms in Dramatica are used to mean only one thing. Thought, Knowledge, Ability, and Desire, however, have two uses each, serving both as Variations and Elements. This is a result of their role as central considerations in both Theme and Character.

[Variation] • dyn.pr. Thought<–>Knowledge • that which one holds to be true • Knowledge is something a character holds to be true. That does not necessarily mean it IS true but just that the character believes it is. The gulf between what is known and what is true can create enormous misconceptions and inaccurate evaluations. • syn. held truth, maintained information, presumed facts, accepted ideas

[Element]

• dyn.pr. Thought<–>Knowledge • that which one holds to be true • The Knowledge characteristic urges a character to rely on what is held to be true. The Character representing Knowledge will tap the resources of its information to find parallels and understanding that he can apply to the issue at hand. The advantage of Knowledge is that one need not learn what is already known, thereby skipping non-essential re-evaluations and getting a head start with solving a problem. The difficulty is that Knowledge can be wrong. Without re-evaluation dogma sets in — rigor mortis of thought, leading to inflexibility and closed minded-ness because the Character believes no re-consideration is needed since the subject is already “known.” • syn. learnedness, held truths, authoritative certainty, generally agreed upon truths

Justification • The process by which we establish and maintain givens • All understanding comes from determining connections between processes and results, causes and effects. All anticipation comes from accepting these connections as unchanging and absolute. In this manner we are able to respond to new situations based on our experience and to plan for the future based on our expectations. But our knowledge of our world and ourselves is incomplete. We are constantly learning and redefining our understanding and our anticipation. Sometimes we have built up such a complex hierarchy of experience and expectation that it becomes easier (more efficient) to formulate or accept what might seem an unlikely and complex explanation than to redefine the entire base of our knowledge. After all, the enormity of our experience carries a lot of weight compared to a single incident that does not conform to our conclusions. Unfortunately, once conflicting information is explained away by presupposing an unseen force it is not integrated into the base of our experience and nothing has been learned from it. The new and potentially valuable information has bounced off the mental process of Justification, having no impact and leaving no mark. This is how preconceptions, prejudices, and blind spots are created. It is also how we learn, for only by accepting some things as givens can we build complex understandings on those foundations. Justification also creates the motivation to change things rather than accept them, but in so doing also creates a blind spot that keeps us from seeing a solution in ourselves in situations where it would be better to accept. Because we cannot know if a point of view should be held onto or given up and reexamined, we have no way of being certain that we are approaching a problem correctly. But either way, we will not question our Justification, only the propriety of applying it to a particular instance. In the case of a Main Character who must remain steadfast, he needs to hold onto his Justifications long enough to succeed with them. But in the case of a Main Character who must change, he needs to give up his Justifications and re-examine his basic understanding. Stories explore the relationship of the inequity between the way things are and the way the Main Character sees them or would have them be. Then it can be evaluated by the audience as to whether or not the decision to remain steadfast or change was the proper one. So Justification is neither good nor bad. It simply describes a mind set that holds personal experience as absolute knowledge, which is sometimes just what is needed to solve the problem and other times is actually the cause of the problem.

Judgment • [Plot Dynamic] • The story assessment of whether or not the Main Character ultimately resolves his personal problem • The notion that the good guys win and the bad guys lose is not always true. In stories, as in life, we often see very bad people doing very well for themselves (if not for others). And even more often we see very good people striking out. If we only judged things by success and failure, it wouldn’t matter if the outcome was good or bad as long as it was accomplished. The choice of Good or Bad places the author’s moralistic judgment on the value of the Main Character’s success or failure in resolving his personal problems. It is an opportunity not only to address good guys that win and bad guys that fail, as well as good guys that fail and the bad guys that win, but to comment on the success or failure of their growth as human beings.

Issue • [Variation] • The thematic focus or topic of the Domain being explored • Each of the four Domains: Objective Story, Subjective Story, Main Character, and Obstacle Character, have a thematic topic which is described by its Issue. The Objective Story Issue, for example, provides a value standard for judging the Objective Characters’ efforts in a story. Whatever kinds of things are done by the Objective Characters in relation to the Story Goal can be said to be linked thematically by this particular item.