joebathelt 's review for:

Into the Woods: A Five Act Journey Into Story by John Yorke

5.0

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This book is a deep dive into how stories are constructed. The author is a screenwriter who created memorable BBC series like “Life on Mars” and “Shameless”. He is also extremely knowledgeable regarding all kinds of stories spanning classic authors like Shakespeare and Dickens and modern TV drama from Easter Enders to The West Wing. The book is a dissection of story structure that takes the reader on a journey that begins with the well-known structure of Ancient Greek drama until the reader eventually realises that the same structures elements are also found in a fractal form in individual sciences in East Enders. The author convincingly argues that there is a universal form of narrative that underlies all good drama and that just naturally arises even when the writer is not consciously aware of it. The book concludes with a discussion of why this structure arises and what it may tell us about the nature of our thinking. The book is immensely insightful and made my view everything I read or watch with different eyes. Being more conscious about narrative structure also enriched my own writing. The detailed discussion of narrative structure is sometimes a bit technical. I read this book into several spurts and sometimes put it down because it was too much for bedtime reading after a long workday. I would highly recommend it though to anyone interested in getting a broader view of film, TV, literature, or human psychology.