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The Seven Plots

novella

novella

Active Member
There's a new book about based on the idea that there are only seven basic plots in all of literature. It's called The Seven Plots by Christopher Booker. (innovative title, huh?)

Anyway, this is not exactly an original idea--everyone from Jung to Joseph Campbell has said as much--, but it's a fun idea. I like to think of a book and see if it fits one of the plots:

1. Overcoming the Monster
2. Rags to Riches
3. The Quest
4. Voyage and Return
5. Rebirth
6. Comedy
7. Tragedy
 
I've never heard this contention before, it's really interesting. Where would a mystery/detective novel feature? Under 'The Quest'?

Also, what defines the difference between 'The Quest' and 'Voyage and Return'?
 
I think there is a lot of overlap and use of more than one of these basic plots or intertwining of plots in various books, but the quest would be focused on the recovery or identifying of a specific treasure, e.g., the Grail, Lord of the Rings, Raiders of the Lost Ark, the Wizard of Oz. And the Voyage and Return would not have an object's acquisition as the focus, e.g., stories of young men going off to war, runaway stories.

There's an overarching theme to most literature which blurs the lines: usually there is a protagonist who has to overcome some difficulty in order to move on to the next phase of his/her life.

Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz has a Voyage and Return story, but when she's actually in Oz, it become a Quest story and also Slaying of the Beast.

But I guess the idea is that it's hard to find a plot that falls completely outside these themes.
 
Thank you, Novella! I've always wondered what the plots were, ever since a teacher told me that there were only seven but couldn't remember what they were.
 
novella said:
There's a new book about based on the idea that there are only seven basic plots in all of literature. It's called The Seven Plots by Christopher Booker. (innovative title, huh?)
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So, is it non-fiction, discussing writing style, etc, or is it a fictional work that makes it obvious that the author is trying to use all seven plots? I hate reading about writing, but would totally dig another fictional book about books (having just finished Shadow of the Wind).
 
It's a nonfiction book by a British journalist. Apparently he refers to lots of classics and popular books to make the case. It's a tome--700+ pages.
 
*thinks of her original stories*

Yep...my main ones are overcoming the monster, the quest, and tragedy.

That's really interesting! Can you tell us more about this book? Sounds like one I'd be interested in checking out!
 
My friend regularly refers to the seven original plots - especially in the cinema while watching movie previews! It's nice to finally know what they are!
 
I think Tragedy is often one of these plots that is thwarted.

Hamlet, for instance is part Overcoming the Monster and Voyage and Return, although both plotlines have a tragic outcome.
 
Yeah, what about books like Waiting For Godot? I don't like books being generalized into particular classes, but that's the way it is.
 
Well, that's a good question. I guess they are not really plots at all.

The author of this book about plots says at some point that Chekov's characters are not "motivated" enough to do anything plotwise, which is really funny--as if the characters have control over what they do? It's like he's blaming the characters in the story for not behaving well in terms of plot.

I would guess that there is a quest of sorts, a psychological quest for one or more characters in those stories that appear to be plotless.
 
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Very interesting, I would like to read that book. Most examples that come to my mind now are related to The Voyage and Quest plot, on the Ulysses model. I’ve just read The Piano Tuner by Daniel Mason and it fits the Ulysses model perfectly, as for Defeating the Monster, I think Lord of the Flies fits here.

And I don’t think if it’s just on the subject, but I read a book called Love and the Western World by Denis de Rougemont in which he says that most literature deals with unhappy love stories or impossible love stories, nobody deals with love from the point of …”they lived happily everafter”, from Romeo and Juliet to Madame Bovary or Anna karenina.

I wonder why booker missed that anyway, unhappy love stories.:rolleyes:
 
Thelma said:
Very interesting, I would like to read that book. Most examples that come to my mind now are related to The Voyage and Quest plot, on the Ulysses model. I’ve just read The Piano Tuner by Daniel Mason and it fits the Ulysses model perfectly, as for Defeating the Monster, I think Lord of the Flies fits here.

And I don’t think if it’s just on the subject, but I read a book called Love and the Western World by Denis de Rougemont in which he says that most literature deals with unhappy love stories or impossible love stories, nobody deals with love from the point of …”they lived happily everafter”, from Romeo and Juliet to Madame Bovary or Anna karenina.

I wonder why booker missed that anyway, unhappy love stories.:rolleyes:
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I guess unhappy love stories, like Romeo and Juliet, Love Story, West Side Story, etc. would be classic tragedies.

Cinderella is a happy love story! So is Bridget Jones. And some of Dickens' love stories end well. Maybe they would fall into the Rags to Riches category?
 
DS said:
What about Pointless plots? You know, stories that go nowhere.
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Like that statement, 'no comment is a comment', I would say 'pointless plot' has a 'point' in its plot (it's getting you nowhere.). :p (just being insane.)
 
Now I hate to put down any book before I've read it, but when you say there's 7 main plots, and then use something as ambiguos as Tragedy or Quest, my bullsh*t meter starts ringing. I mean it sounds to me like he's just stating the obvious. Can't see what I would get out of reading it myself.
 
Evil Homer said:
Now I hate to put down any book before I've read it, but when you say there's 7 main plots, and then use something as ambiguos as Tragedy or Quest, my bullsh*t meter starts ringing. I mean it sounds to me like he's just stating the obvious. Can't see what I would get out of reading it myself.
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Yeah, I'm not planning to read the book myself. I just think knowing what the seven plots are supposed to be is cool. Everyone knows it's not an original theory, as I said in the first post--it's ground travelled by everyone from Jung to Plato to Joseph Campbell. I guess I'm interested in that because I like to analyze things to death and also have trouble putting together plots that feel original for my own books. Maybe originality of plot is less important than I thought?
 
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