Classical Design in Stories

In his excellent book Story, Robert McKee makes the following observations about the lasting importance of Classical Design in storytelling.

"The art of story is in decay, and as Aristotle observed twenty-three hundred years ago, when storytelling goes bad, the result is decadence....

"[Stories following principles of Classical Design] are 'classical' in the truest sense: timeless and transcultural, fundamental to every earthly society, civilized and primitive, reaching back through millennia of oral storytelling into the shadows of time. When the epic Gilgamesh was carved in cuneiform on twelve clay tablets 4,000 years ago, converting story to the written word for [perhaps] the first time, the principles of Classical Design were already fully and beautifully in place.

"CLASSICAL DESIGN means a story built around an active protagonist who struggles against primarily external sources of antagonism to pursue his or her desire, through continuous time, within a consistent and causally connected fictional reality, to a closed ending of absolute, irreversible change.

"...great storytellers have always known that, regardless of background or education, everyone, consciously or instinctively, enters the story ritual with Classical anticipation."

In order to recover the art of story, students should become thoroughly familiar with Classical Design. Students should study the classics like Gilgamesh, which McKee mentioned, and also other pillars of Western literature such as The Odyssey and Beowulf. While there is value in some stories that thoughtfully break with Classical Design (think: Rashomon or No Country for Old Men), there is an overall truth, goodness, and beauty in the conventions of Classical Design, and students are well-served to consider the classics as models for excellent storytelling.