Short Story Characteristics

• Engels
• Middelbare school
• vwo
• Leerjaar 4

 Short Stories

Plot of story:

Plot and tension

• The plot is the development in the story. One action or event relates to another action or event.
  

       Example: The King died, and the Queen died of grief.

       The ‘wh-questions’ are a good means to discover the plot.

• Tension (or suspense) relates to the plot. The more (unexpected) things happen, the more tension a reader will experience.
  

Character

• Protagonist, main character: usually one or two
•  readers often connect with the character. 
• Description: often uses labels: e.g. jealous, courageous, cheeky, though, strong, weak, etc. 
• Not a lot of character development in short stories. 
• The character is not the same as the plot. 

In three to five words, how would you describe yourself as a character?

Theme

• The theme is the message of the story. 
• When you know the theme you will understand the story. 
• Some keywords for themes: love - revenge - redemption - good vs evil 
• You need to be able to describe the theme, so a theme is usually more than a keyword. 
• Stories contain multiple themes  

Setting

• Time and place
•  Examples for place: country, house, room
• Examples for time: specific year or era, war time, future, seasons
• Sometimes there are no direct references, so look for clues. For example: references to historic events, name of the king/queen, is it inside our outside. 

Narration or Point of view

• The narrator is the person or other character who is telling us the story. 
• Usually it is clear who the narrator is. 
• Different narration types

First person or I-narrative

•  it is told from a particular character's point of view, as they are experiencing it themselves 
• Usually you don't get the perspectives of other characters. 
• uses first person pronouns (I, we, me, us) 

Third person narrative

• tells the story using third person pronouns (they,  their, he, she) 
• Usually narrated by an outsider, someone who doesn't appear in the story. 
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