Narrative Theories

Narrative
Narrative is concerned with the form or structure of the text itself, the way it tells the story, how it is shaped. You will have come across the word ‘narrator’ before, and understand it to mean storyteller. Similarly, Narrative refers to the story that is told or written.  In the context of mass media the story is the media text and a whole team of people have been involved in creating and shaping it for the audience. Narrative is therefore a process of organising and structuring.
What’s the difference between Story & Narrative?
 “Story is the irreducible substance of a story (A meets B, something happens, order returns),
narrative is the way the story is related (Once upon a time there was a princess…)”

Narrative Theory

Field and 3 Act Structure associated with Syd Field
Syd Field in the ‘Screenwriters Workshop’ identified how conventional narrative feature length films share conventional characteristics in their construction/the way the story is told, and that successful scripts can be written by adhering to this theory. The narrative is split into three sections: Set up, confrontation, resolution, and has two significant plot points between the acts.
Example
“The film is structured in terms of Syd Fields ‘3 Act Structure’. In the set up, we get to know the characters of Somerset and Mills, and the nature of their relationship. At plot point 1 the ‘problematic’ (Problematic – something that needs solving) is established and the confrontation stage of Field’s theory features Mills and Somerset trying to catch the antagonist”
Propp and Character types associated with Vladimir Propp
Russian formalist theory (formalist – breaking things down into small units and analysing them) Propp analysed hundreds of folk tales and argued that there are 31 basic character functions. These functions include actions such as ‘delivery’ (villain gets information about the victim) ‘Trickery’ (villain tries to deceive the victim) and ‘struggle’ (hero and villain fight) Through this he demonstrated the relationship between characters and the structure of the narrative. Fairytales are useful to analyse because they contain stock characters and structural ingredients. After studying 115 fairytales, Propp was able to identify seven main character ‘roles’, as he called them:
1 the villain
2 the donor (or provider)
3 the helper
4 the princess (or sought-for person) and her father
5 the dispatcher
6 the hero
7 the false hero.
These roles represent the building blocks of narratives, it is their actions, in what Propp calls ‘functions’, that construct the narrative Propp states that several roles may well be filled by the same character and that some may also be filled by more than one character
Example
The most often-used example of this is the Star Wars trilogy (Turner, 1993; Berger, 1992);
this is because Star Wars makes an interesting point of comparison between the tradition of the fairytale structure and the classic Hollywood moving image product:
Todorov and Narrative Structure associated with Tzvetan Todorov Russian Formalist theory (again)
Todorov described the way in which the conventional narrative’s flow is divided into 3 sections – (an early antecedent of Field’s 3 act structure) A state of equilibrium is disrupted (by the problematic) to ceate a sense of ‘disequilibrium) before achieving a sense of ‘new equilibrium’ when the problem is resolved.
Example
“…although the problem has been resolved by the end of ‘21 grams’, the world will never be the same again. This is what Todorov termed a ‘new equilibrium’, normal life has been restored. But it is quite different to the life the characters lived before the accident happened and disequilibrium was caused.
Story & Plot associated with Tzvetan Todorov (Another Russian Formalist Theory)
The story (fabula) is all the events shown and implied by the film in chronological order. The plot (syuzhet) is just the events actually shown, in the order they are shown.
Example
“…the story and plot of Pulp Fiction are quite different, and part of the pleasure for the audience is ‘figuring out’ the story from the plot. The story ends with the road movie stock situation of Butch and Fabienne  riding off into the sunset on a chopper. Conversely. The end of the plot finishes minutes after the opening of the plot, with Vince and Jules leaving the Hawthorne Grill.
Narrative Codes associated with Roland Barthes
Barthes suggested that narrative works with different codes which activate the reader to make sense of it.
Enigma Code – little puzzles to be solved
Action codes – looks, significant words, close ups which suggest an event such as ‘jealousy’, ‘falling in love’ accident waiting to happen etc
Symbolic code – an object, event or action which refers to something outside itself – like the flower which represents ET’s life.
Example
“….one narrative code which keeps the audience hooked in Pulp Fiction is the enigma, ‘What is in the briefcase?’ This enigma is not answered in the film and audiences have actively participated in making meaning, resolving the enigma with theories and hypotheses circulated on the internet.”