{"id":236,"date":"2017-06-06T17:47:15","date_gmt":"2017-06-06T17:47:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jackjward.com\/?p=236"},"modified":"2017-06-06T17:47:15","modified_gmt":"2017-06-06T17:47:15","slug":"crooked-spine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/jackjward.com\/?p=236","title":{"rendered":"Crooked Spine?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Writer extraordinaire, Rob Paterson<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong>has a great post about the S.P.I.N.E. of Writing. on his blog<\/strong><\/a>. Rob points out that for a story to be successful it must have at least one of the following five elements of the SPINE:<\/p>\n

Skills<\/strong> \u2013 If a story teaches the audience how to do something, whether it\u2019s growing plants, judging wine, star-ship tactical combat, solving crossword puzzles, or how to get a good night\u2019s sleep, then the audience will consider that story interesting.<\/em><\/p>\n

Perspective<\/strong> \u2013 If a story offers a new way of seeing the world, or conversely, confirms or supports the way the audience already sees the world, then they will likely consider it interesting. In our lives, we only really know our own points of view, and stories let us see the world as others see it, that\u2019s one of the wonderful parts about experiencing a story. On the flipside, we naturally want our own views of the world to be the correct ones, and stories that back up\u00a0those views will resonate with an audience that wants those views to be true. (This might sound sinister to some, but most popular stories have\u00a0a version of this buried inside them which acts as a comfort to the audience \u2013 \u201cgood will always triumph over evil\u201d, \u201cif you work hard you will succeed in life\u201d, \u201cthere\u2019s someone out there for everyone\u201d, \u201cthere\u2019s justice in this world\u201d, etc.)<\/em><\/p>\n

Information<\/strong> \u2013 If a story offers the audience knowledge about a subject they\u2019re not familiar with, they will consider it interesting. This is different from Skills in that it isn\u2019t teaching the audience how to do something, but giving them information about a topic or topics. This can be history, culture, fashion, sports, nature, geophysics, religion, and everything in between. If the audience is interested in this topic, or made to be interested in it by the presentation of the story, then they\u2019ll stick with it.<\/em><\/p>\n

Novelty<\/strong> \u2013 If the story offers the audience something new or that they haven\u2019t seen before, they will consider it interesting. This can be any aspect of the story from way its told (character, plot, setting, style, structure, etc) to the content (skills, perspective, information) that is new to the audience. Give them something they don\u2019t know, they haven\u2019t seen done, or they haven\u2019t seen done this way, and they\u2019ll be on board.<\/em><\/p>\n

Emotion<\/strong> \u2013 If a story can make the audience feel something, then they will find it interesting. (Although not always enjoyable.) All good stories should make the audience feel something at some point, and certain kinds of stories are even built around producing specific kinds of emotion. (Horror, Thriller, Romance, Erotica, Comedy, Tragedy, etc) If you can elicit emotions from your audience, and its emotions they want to feel (as opposed to disgust at the story\u2026), then they\u2019ll stick with it.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Sir Philip Sidney in An Apology for Poetry<\/a>\u00a0wrote that poetry should “teach and delight”. My mother told me once that writing has three levels- to entertain, to teach, and to transform. Very few books do all three, and many just are satisfied with the first one. Rob Paterson identifies with S.P.I.N.E. how there’s very specific ways you can take your writing from the mundane to the powerful. Just pick at least one!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Writer extraordinaire, Rob Paterson\u00a0has a great post about the S.P.I.N.E. of Writing. on his blog. Rob points out that for a story to be successful it must have at least one of the following five elements of the SPINE: Skills \u2013 If a story teaches the audience how to do something, whether it\u2019s growing plants, judging wine, star-ship tactical combat, …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[238,237,235,236,234,239,231,232,233],"class_list":["post-236","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-writing","tag-an-apology-for-poetry","tag-emotion","tag-information","tag-novelty","tag-perspective","tag-philip-sidney","tag-rob-paterson","tag-s-p-in-e","tag-skills"],"wppr_data":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/jackjward.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/jackjward.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/jackjward.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/jackjward.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/jackjward.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=236"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/jackjward.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":238,"href":"http:\/\/jackjward.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236\/revisions\/238"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/jackjward.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=236"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/jackjward.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=236"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/jackjward.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=236"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}