See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/338423211

Into the Woods: The Promised Land of Narrative Hybridization

Article · May 2016

CITATION READS

1 2,686

1 author:

Delia Enyedi
Babeş-Bolyai University
4 PUBLICATIONS   1 CITATION   

SEE PROFILE

All content following this page was uploaded by Delia Enyedi on 07 January 2020.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

 Into the Woods: The Promised Land of Narrative Hybridization 139
Reviews

Delia ENYEDI

Into the Woods:

The Promised Land of Narrative Hybridization

Review of: John YORKE. Into the Woods. How stories work and why we tell them. London, UK:
Penguin Books, 2014.

In the context of the simultaneous new age

of 3D cinema and the heralded golden age of
twenty-first century television, John Yorke’s
exploration of the anatomy of story sets itself
an intriguing task. Just as the first prescriptive
screenwriting manual by Ralph P. Stoddard
promised, back in 1911, Into the Woods also
stands as “a book of valuable information for
those who would enter the field of unlimited
endeavor”. The correspondence is not coinci-
dental. More than a century later, the efface-
ment of creative boundaries continues to be
related to the search of narrative solutions for
an audiovisual medium in the midst of accel-
erated technical and social change.
For Yorke, an experienced British screen-
Delia ENYEDI writer and producer, the answer stands in
Babeș-Bolyai University the alluring promise of a universal story ar-
email: delia.enyedi@ubbcluj.ro chetype. His quest builds on the foundations
laid by famous predecessors such as Vladimir
EKPHRASIS, 1/2016 Propp and his analysis of Russian folk tales,
EXTREME STORYTELLING Joseph Campbell’s superimposition of myths
pp. 139-142 and legends originating from various corners
140 Delia ENYEDI

of the world or the more recent examination of the meta-plot by Christopher Booker.
In doing that, Into the Wild reconciles the guideline format following the construction
of characters, acts and scenes with theoretical inserts from the field of narratology.
As in most educational screenwriting works, the basic reference remains Aristotle
as architect of the three-act-structure. An endnote clarifies the fact that Syd Field was
the one who later translated into film acts what the Greek philosopher only referred
to as the narrative principles of a beginning, middle and end of a story. However, a
close reading of the Poetics reveals that the concepts of “anagnorisis” (the recogni-
tion of some truth by the hero) and “peripeteia” (a change by which the action veers
round to its opposite) are not imposed as compulsory, but rather as enhancing ele-
ments for a complex drama. It is an aspect which would have contributed to Yorke’s
demonstration of today’s dominance in cinema and television of a structure that de-
fined theatre prior to the twentieth century.
The five-act-structure in question goes back to Terence (190-159 BC). Revived
during the Renaissance, it was discussed in 1863 by German novelist Gustav Freytag
in reference to the Elisabethan drama. Known as Freytag’s Pyramid, what it operates
is a placement of the climax in a cardinal point that dominates the plot. Consequently,
the balanced action rises to it and falls from it. So the question that arises is how
does the five-act-structure, defined by Yorke as “a detailed refinement” of the three-
act-structure by “inserting two further act breaks in the second act of the tradition-
al Hollywood paradigm” (33), succeeds in placing the midpoint “almost exactly half-
way through any successful story” (37)?
The Classical Hollywood Cinema firmly prescribed anagnorisis, the equivalent of
Plot Point I in the terms of Syd Field, as an inciting incident separating the first and
second act. In this pattern, peripeteia or Plot Point II marks the climax placed between
the second and the final act. Although Field insists that these plot points “can be quiet
scenes in which a decision is made” (Screenplay [1979] 2005, 27), they usually stand for
a crucial change in the psychology of the protagonist and the subsequent acme of ob-
stacles placed between him and his goal. It would seem that following Yorke’s logic,
the insertion of two additional acts to the classical structure made out of three would
further push the climax near the end, between the forth and the fifth act. In proving
that this doesn’t actually happen, he refers to the five sections of a story as identified
by Christopher Booker (Anticipation / Dream / Frustration / Nightmare / Resolution)
to underline the fact that the “the action peaks in the middle of the [third a.n.] act be-
fore fortunes reverse in the second half” (40).
The fate of the classical climax remains unquestioned by Yorke. One valid expla-
nation supplements Aristotle’s dismissal of a mandatory climax with Freytag’s more
functional indication of an additional moment of suspense during the fall of the ac-
tion. Its goal would be to question one last time the victory or the defeat. Only by in-
vesting this additional moment with the role of the traditional climax can the mid-
 Into the Woods: The Promised Land of Narrative Hybridization 141

point delineate its supremacy and establish a relationship of direct dependence with
the protagonist and his character arc.
By citing Constantin Stanislavski’s approach on characters motivated by desire,
Yorke associates the protagonist with a “tragic flaw” (21). He sees it not only as an al-
ready existing negative trait but also as an ongoing process of emotional decay. In an
imperative response to this specific flaw, the protagonist sets on a journey to find the
“elixir” that can cure it. Thus, the “Journey there; Journey back” (69) merges the dra-
matic principles of narrative composition identified by Gustav Freytag with the ones
adapted for cinema by Christopher Vogler from comparative mythology.
The transfer of the monomyth in cinema was made at the end of the ’70 with the
protagonist of Star Wars following the seventeen stages of the Hero’s Journey as laid
out by Joseph Campbell. Later, it was made popular for screenwriters in the ’90 by
Vogler, who also reduced its consecution to twelve stages. But it did little to resolve
the criticism surrounding this archetypal narrative structure. The temptation of con-
structing or reading any conflict of a movie through this paradigm was deemed re-
ductive, if not altogether aberrant. However, it did respond to the creative challenges
of scriptwriting a story with a particular type of protagonist, the hero. It is one of the
reasons behind the relevance of John Yorke’s structure in the current cinematic age
dominated by 3D technology and the superheroes that exhibit it best, much too often
with little narrative creativity.
The main reason is the similarity between the Hero’s Journey and the Journey
there – Journey back that revolves around the midpoint. Identified by Vogler as the
“Supreme Ordeal” (The Writer’s Journey [1998] 2007, 151), it is the moment when the
protagonist enters the enemy cave and steals the object of his desire. Yorke points out
that this “isn’t necessarily the most dramatic moment, but it is a point of supreme
significance” (58). A key link is being traced between the lack of necessary knowl-
edge to use this elixir and the acknowledgement of its possession as a point of no
return. From that moment on, the protagonist and the world around him can nev-
er be the same. The second half of the story will try to resolve his understanding of
the newly acquired gift as the cure for his flaw. Examples range from different types
of plots, such as Titanic with its midpoint moment of the ship hitting the iceberg and
Jaguar Paw’s escape at the moment of sacrifice in Apocalypto, to different types of pro-
tagonists, the two-dimensional character of James Bond who doesn’t undergo sig-
nificant emotional change and the multiple protagonists of American Grafitti. Unlike
most authors of screenwriting manuals before him, Yorke brings television films into
the same discussion, aware of its revival by the audience consumption habits of the
Millennial generation.
In brief, the journey into the woods and back aims to identify all characters and
plots, belonging to the big or small screen, with the help of five narrative stages.
The first act gradually takes the protagonist from “no knowledge” through “grow-
ing knowledge” on the path to an “awakening”. He then experiences “doubt” and
142 Delia ENYEDI

“overcoming reluctance” before “acceptance” of his mission. The middle act peaks
by opposing before and after moments around the “key knowledge”. Once the un-
conscious flaw and an elixir as cure are exposed, the forth act brings the succession of
“doubt / growing reluctance / regression”. In the end, “total mastery” is achieved af-
ter moments of “re-awakening” and “re-acceptance”.
As final proof that irrespective of the number of acts all narrative structures culmi-
nate in the midpoint, a supplementary table juxtaposes thirteen such versions. When
reaching the monomyth, the peak of the story is indicated as the “Atonement with the
Father”. In defining it, Joseph Campbell spoke of a “self-generated double monster –
the dragon thought to be God (superego) and the dragon thought to be Sin (repressed
id)” (The Hero with a Thousand Faces [1949] 2008, 110). What it translates into is a trau-
matic relationship of the character to a false threatening father, as a consequence of
emotional experiences from childhood. While this stage can represent the moment of
acquiring key knowledge by auto-induced faith in the attributes and positive inten-
tions of a male figure, it seems to be a more of a complementary stage for the previous
two, the “Meeting with the Goddess” and the “Woman as the Temptress”, dealing
with a universal mother figure. Instead, an alternative option for extracting the mid-
point of the monomyth could be casting attention to the next stage, the “Apotheosis”.
Described as a divine state in which ignorance is surpassed, that is the moment when
“we no longer desire and fear; we are what was desired and feared” (The Hero with a
Thousand Faces [1949] 2008, 138). Key knowledge has been absorbed.
Following any of these two interpretations, there is no doubt that what John Yorke
first and foremost operates is a break in a screenwriting tradition that saw the internal
conflict as an option to the external one. Instead, he demonstrates its permanent pres-
ence by subjecting the protagonist to a psychological gaze. Thus, it becomes less im-
portant how the assault of the opposing factors unrolls, but when exactly during the
self-discovery journey he embraces the existence of a cure for his flaw.
Only as a consequence does Into the Woods validates the dominance in film of a
three-act-template fitting the five-act form of monomyth extraction. But despite the
fact that it proclaims a Grail Quest structural formula as a backbone on “some level in
every story” (4), ultimately it is Hollywood films that it speaks of. The third appendix
dedicated to Being John Malkovich in response to Charlie Kaufman openly rejecting the
functionality of the classic structure is just one example. Unfortunately for the inquir-
ing readers, John Yorke dismisses European films such as Jean-Luc Godard’s Weekend
as a mere “reaction against” (4) this seemingly universal narrative structure.

View publication stats