Roy Peter Clark passionately spoke to University of Tampa students about helpful tips on storytelling.
The Senior Scholar at The Poynter Institute began his speech by having the students listen to a familiar Beatles song entitled “Eleanor Rigby.” Clark emphasized the actual story behind the popular song. He explained the character, action, conflict, setting and resolution behind the Beatles hit. In addition, Clark described the importance of adjectives and a characters need for complications in stories.
“All the characters in the story have something significant at stake,” said Clark.
He described the basic structure for storytelling. He explained how every story has its own purpose. Some of his story purposes included: the journey there and back, winning the prize, loss and restoration and overcoming obstacles. He described Hurricane Katrina as an example of a loss and restoration story.
Clark explained the purpose of going to the movies. He described the cinematic experience as an escape from reality.
“You go there to dream and you are immersed into another time and another place,” said Clark.
He briefly described his recollection to the past while watching “Dreamgirls” in the movie theatre. Clark was taken back to the days of Diana Ross and the Supremes while viewing the film.
Clark provided the importance of detail when creating characters and stories. He emphasized the need to limit broadness in order to give a well-shaped story structure.
“The more I can limit my topic, the easier it is to write about,” he said.
Clark described detail to be important to character traits. He explained a story behind his own reading glasses and a wedding ring to provide an example of his own character traits.
“In stories, detail defines the character,” said Clark. “My glasses and wedding ring define who I am if I was a character in a story.”
He told a story about a student who wanted to write about vandalism. He explained how his student wanted to write about the general topic of vandalism but Clark narrowed the topic down to vandalism in the student’s particular school.
Clark emphasized a stories need for a cliff hanger. He used the television show “24” to describe a viewer’s urge to want more. Before a commercial in “24,” a large image of the time of day appears on the screen. It leaves the viewer hanging and keeps them glued to their television set to see what is going to happen next.
“It’s all about the cliff hanger,” he said. “This is what encourages you to turn the page.”
Roy Peter Clark provided a tremendous amount of storytelling tips to the students of the University of Tampa. His knowledge in the basic structure of storytelling could easily encourage a student to write a story about an interesting character. His “50 Writing Tools” book has steadily gained popularity with writers around the world.