Principles of narrative
These principles sit at the intersections of biology, narrative theory, and modeling & simulation, and form the foundation of No Lip Service’s approach to narrative communications.
A story is a model.
Stories are useful, not true.
The purpose of a story is subjectivity.
Stories are the language of change.
Stories are biological.
Literature is a technology.
Thought is in service to action.
Narrative is a tension communication system.
Stories model relational actions.
Stories generate knowledge, not truth. The nature of a story is subjective, not objective, so it can only contain a point of view — not truth.
The power — and purpose — of a story is communicating subjective experience; without subjectivity, simulation is not possible. Subjectivity is the feature of storytelling, not its shortcoming; objectivity is neither the purpose nor intention of a story.
Change cannot be communicated without telling a story. The construction of a story — beginning, middle, end — is the description of change, and story is the form — or language — of communicating change.
Stories are mental models before they are represented with language.
Nothing humankind has achieved would have been possible without literature. Full credit: Angus Fletcher, Wonderworks and Storythinking.
Thought — and stories — are in service to action. Movement evolved before cognition; cognition better advantages movement.
Narrative is the communication of tension from the teller to the audience, using a story. The objective of narrative is to create an alignment between the teller and audience, through shared tension.