Kurt Vonnegut and the Shape of Stories
This story I was once given by my elder sister for a birthday present. I have just noticed that there is an animated version, too. When I read about the weekly stuff to do I remembered the story and now try to analyse the shape of the story with Kurt Vonnegut's approach:
I think Frederick is a happy story, therefore it should not be situated too much within the ill fortune section. Yet, the mice are cold and hungry when they've eaten up all their stocks, so the curve goes down into the ill fortune section. Interesting and beautiful is that not things to eat are cheering up the mice but stories about colors and seasons. Anyway, they are cheered up to the end of the story and that is why the curve has to rise again.
Isn't it funny to analyse stories like that? I can not really take this serious, because for me stories are about feelings not thinking. I know there are the humanities and they have to prove all the time that they are serious scientists. They use statistics and models like scientist from the natural sciences, but I am not sure if this is an approach for artists and storytellers. In the case of the story about Frederick some people may say it is hard work for the mice to collect food for the winter and this is ill fortune and they may draw a completely different curve from mine.
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