A Very Short Story

Kimberly Appelcine has written the best essay on “The Elements of Storytelling” I have ever read. We all know a good story when we hear one, but it’s often hard to define exactly what separates a good story from a poor one. Appelcine provides some simple guidelines for creating an effective story, based on the following elements: setting, character, backstory, plot and detail.

A few days ago while I was working my weekend job at a restaurant, I made a quick remark to a customer. She was taking a photograph of the bookshelf above her booth, which is decorated with a calculated jumble of books and knickknacks.

“I see you like my collection,” I remarked as I passed her table. “I’m a knickknack collector and I’ve run out of room in my apartment, so I started bringing stuff here.”

The lady laughed appreciatively. Why? I realized a moment later that I had done more than just make a remark; I had told a very short story. I analyzed it in terms of Appelcine’s elements.

My story had a setting (my crowded apartment), a character (a crazy knickknack collector), a backstory (collector runs out of room in his apartment) and a plot (collector solves problem by bringing knickknacks to work). The only thing missing was detail, but after all it was only a two-sentence story and the knickknacks themselves provided the detail.

Of course I wasn’t thinking about storytelling technique when I made this remark. I think that we all have an innate sense of how to tell a story and just naturally tend to put ideas and experiences into story formats. When we sit down to deliberately write a story, however, we often lose track of this innate sense, so a simple set of guidelines like Appelcine’s is very helpful.