ShmoopTube

Where Monty Python meets your 10th grade teacher.

Search Thousands of Shmoop Videos

Booker's Seven Plot Types 367456 Views


Share It!


Description:

Who knew every book ever written could be slotted into one of seven plot types? Christopher Booker, that's who. J.R.R. Tolkien probably has a few things to say about the theory—but what do you think?

Language:
English Language

Transcript

00:00

Thank you We sneak Bookers Seven plot types a lot

00:08

in jenny's opinion there's no book in the world that

00:11

could possibly compare to jane eyre So imagine how surprised

00:14

jenny would be if she were to learn that charlotte

00:16

bronte's masterpiece actually has a lot in common with other

00:19

rags to riches stories Well it goes like this According

00:22

to author and journalist christopher booker there are seven basic

00:25

plot types that a story could follow Overcoming the monster

00:30

rags to riches the quest voyage in return comedy tragedy

00:38

and rebirth Now this whole seven basic plot thing may

00:42

seem totally incredible Think of all the books ever written

00:45

in the world than all the stories ever told Can

00:48

we really some every plot ever conceived in one of

00:52

seven simple ways Well let's break it down in the

00:56

overcoming the monster plot the protagonist sets out to defeat

00:59

the bad guy or girl or thing that's threatening the

01:03

protagonist protagonist home protectionist hot date You get the idea

01:08

An excellent example of the overcoming the monster plot in

01:12

literature is the tale of dayal where a scandinavian hero

01:15

does the king of the danes a huge favor by

01:18

killing the monstrous grendel Then they will help the brother

01:21

out again by killing grendel's mother well in the rags

01:26

to riches plot the penniless protagonist gets everything here She

01:30

has ever wanted money fame maybe a nose job before

01:33

losing it all growing as a person and then gaining

01:37

everything back in jane eyre After our heroine comes within

01:42

And i do of getting hitched to a wealthy big

01:45

amiss she takes off and proved she doesn't need a

01:47

man or even a miraculously obtained fortune to make it

01:51

on her own Mr rochester changes for the better too

01:54

it's kind of required of him After all he does

01:56

lose his house his eyesight His hand is crazy for

02:00

why and his beloved fiance all because he tries to

02:03

marry jane when he still got bertha in the attic

02:07

So everyone loses everyone grows and everyone ends up happy

02:11

Except bertha Because she's dead right in the quest plot

02:15

the protagonist and his or her buddies set out to

02:18

find any important object or reach a certain place facing

02:22

grave peril along the way Take the odyssey Odysseus just

02:27

wants to get home to his loving wife But first

02:30

he has to survive A cyclops and the wrath of

02:33

the cyclops dad and cannibals and some very dangerous women

02:37

All in all it takes odysseus years to get home

02:40

but what a story he has to tell when he

02:42

reaches ithaca Of course the suitors don't get to hear

02:45

it because they're all dead then there's the voyage in

02:49

return plot where the protagonist goes somewhere exotic survived everything

02:53

thrown at him or her and comes home wiser for

02:56

the experience in lewis carroll's adventures in wonderland alice follows

03:01

the white rabbit down a hole into a world populated

03:04

by talking creatures You talking to me things that cause

03:07

alice to change size multiple times on a homicidal point

03:11

of hearts At the end of this story alice awakens

03:14

and realizes that her journey in tow wonderland was actually

03:17

a dream The comedy plot follows protagonist destined for love

03:22

although they have to overcome a lot of obstacles before

03:24

they get their happy ending in shakespeare's twelfth night for

03:28

example viola disguises herself as a dude knew corsino sends

03:32

a hell of a guy to talk to the woman

03:34

he wants to marry olivia into getting hitched Olivia however

03:39

falls for violet the guy while viola falls for the

03:42

duke we haven't even touched on violas presumed dead twin

03:46

brother sebastian Eventually the play ends happily once all the

03:50

cases of mistaken identity or cleared up But of course

03:53

we expected this because twelfth night follows the comedy plot

03:57

The tragedy plot on the other hand doesn't have a

04:00

happy and instead the protagonist is a villain who bites

04:03

it In the finale shakespeare's macbeth involves a protagonist who

04:08

takes some really bad advice from his power hungry wife

04:11

macbeth consequently murders a monarch and becomes king of scotland

04:15

Not that rains for long after everyone figures out he's

04:18

a regicide well he loses his head and yeah he

04:21

totally deserved it The rebirth plot features a protagonist who

04:26

is kind of a jerk but redeems him or herself

04:28

over the course of the story on charles dickens A

04:31

tale of two cities Way meet sydney carton and english

04:35

barrister sydney's hard to like Well he drinks a lot

04:38

he's really depressed and cynical and he's in love with

04:41

lucie manette who we all know belongs with sydney's doppelganger

04:45

charles darnay At the end of the novel however sydney

04:48

brakes charles out of a french prison and is executed

04:51

in charles place thus proving that sydney is in fact

04:55

the king of all that is awesome So here we

04:58

have it seven basic plots to describe every story in

05:01

existence now it's entirely possible for an author to take

05:04

elements of these seven basic plots and mix him up

05:07

a little For example think of the lord of the

05:10

rings trilogy There are multiple monsters overcome chief of which

05:14

is sorrow on there's an overarching quest to destroy the

05:17

ring and the hobbits undertake avoids that leads them all

05:20

over the map before they eventually return to the shire

05:24

Or what about victor hugo's les miserables You see the

05:27

rebirth plot type in the story arc of jeeva and

05:30

a thief turned nice guy overcoming the munster plot type

05:33

in val jean's eventual triumph over his nemesis java and

05:38

the comedy plot type in the romance between cosette and

05:41

marius Of course benin doesn't get a happily ever after

05:46

because she's dead and that's the story of booker's seven

05:49

plot types Now that jenny's learned something new she's going

05:52

to re read jane eyre for the millionth time and

05:55

see how many plot types she confined You better watch

05:58

out for overcoming the monster with bertha mason though jenning

06:01

that lady's a firebug Good luck with that You talking 00:06:11.562 --> [endTime] to me

Up Next

What Not to do in an Introduction
32968 Views

This video offers some rules of thumb for writing a good introduction. It covers everything from tone (confidence is key!) to phrases and clichés...

Related Videos

What Not to do in a Conclusion
7001 Views

Even the best essays can go wrong in the conclusion—this video covers what not to do in a conclusion to help avoid any essay-ending problems. The...

Using Citations Effectively
3751 Views

You want to be as picky with your citations as Goldilocks was with her porridge—not too many, not too few... juuust right. You want to prove that...

Wordiness
15167 Views

Want even more deets on wordiness? Click here to review. Or take a look at our entire grammar section for all the goods.

Run-on Sentences
6511 Views

Want even more deets on Run-on Sentences? Click here to review. Or take a look at our entire grammar section for all the goods.