Fictional

Information about Fictional

An illustration from Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, depicting the fictional protagonist, Alice, playing a fantastical game of croquet.

Fiction is the telling of stories which are not entirely based upon facts. More specifically, fiction is an imaginative form of narrative, one of the four basic rhetorical modes. Although the word fiction is derived from the Latin fingere, "to form, create", works of fiction need not be entirely imaginary and may include real people, places, and events. Fiction may be either written or oral. Although not all fiction is necessarily artistic, fiction is largely perceived as a form of art and/or entertainment. The ability to create fiction and other artistic works is considered to be a fundamental aspect of human culture, one of the defining characteristics of humanity.

Elements of fiction

Even among writing instructors and bestselling authors, there appears to be little consensus regarding the number and composition of the fundamental elements of fiction. For example:

"Fiction has three main elements: plotting, character, and place or setting." (Morrell 2006, p. 151)
"A charged image evokes all the other elements of your story—theme, character, conflict, setting, style, and so on." (Writer's Digest Handbook of Novel Writing 1992, p. 151)
"For writers, the spices you add to make your plot your own include characters, setting, and dialogue." (Bell 2004, p. 160)
"Contained within the framework of a story are the major story elements: characters, action, and conflict." (Evanovich 2006, p. 16)
" . . . I think point of view is one of the most fundamental elements of the fiction-writing craft . . ." (Selgin 2007, p. 83)

As stated by Janet Evanovich, "Effective writing requires an understanding of the fundamental elements of storytelling, such as point of view, dialogue, and setting." (Evanovich 2006, p. 41) The debate continues as to the number and composition of the fundamental elements of fiction. [1]

Character

Characterization is often listed as one of the fundamental elements of fiction. A character is a participant in the story, and is usually a person, but may be any persona, identity, or entity whose existence originates from a fictional work or performance.

Characters may be of several types:

Point-of-view character: the character from whom the story is viewed.
Protagonist: the main character of a story
Antagonist: the character that stands in opposition to the protagonist
Supporting character: A character that plays a part in the plot but is not major
Minor character: a character in a bit/cameo part

Plot

Plot, or storyline, is often listed as one of the fundamental elements of fiction. It is the rendering and ordering of the events and actions of a story. On a micro level, plot consists of action and reaction, also referred to as stimulus and response. On a macro level, plot has a beginning, a middle, and an ending. Plot is often depicted as an arc with a zig-zag line to represent the rise and fall of action. Plot also has a mid-level structure: scene and sequel. A scene is a unit of drama—where the action occurs. Then, after a transition of some sort, comes the sequel—an emotional reaction and regrouping, an aftermath. (Bickham 1993, p. 39)

Setting

Setting, the locale and time of a story, is often listed as one of the fundamental elements of fiction. Sometimes setting is referred to as milieu, to include a context (such as society) beyond the immediate surroundings of the story. In some cases, setting becomes a character itself and can set the tone of a story. (Rozelle 2005, p. 2)

Theme

Theme, a conceptual distillation of the story, is often listed as one of the fundamental elements of fiction. It is the central idea or insight serving as a unifying element, creating cohesion and is an answer to the question, 'What did you learn from the piece of fiction?' In some cases a story's theme is a prominent element and somewhat unmistakable. (Morrell 2006, p. 2)

Style

Style is not so much what is written, but how it is written. Style in fiction refers to language conventions used to construct the story. A fiction writer may manipulate diction, sentence structure, phrasing, dialogue, and other aspects of language to create style. The communicative effect created by the author's style is sometimes referred to as the story's voice. Every writer has his or her own unique style, or voice (Provost 1988, p. 263). Style is sometimes listed as one of the fundamental elements of fiction.

Forms of fiction

Traditionally, fiction includes novels, short stories, fables, fairy tales, plays, and poems, but it now also encompasses films, comic books, and video games.

The Internet has had a major impact on the distribution of fiction, calling into question the feasibility of copyright as a means to ensure royalties are paid to copyright holders. Also, digital libraries such as Project Gutenberg make public domain texts more readily available. The combination of inexpensive home computers, the Internet and the creativity of its users has also led to new forms of fiction, such as interactive computer games or computer-generated comics. Countless forums for fan fiction can be found online, where loyal followers of specific fictional realms create and distribute derivative stories. The Internet is also used for the development of blog fiction, where a story is delivered through a blog either as flash fiction or serialblog, and collaborative fiction, where a story is written sequentially by different authors, or the entire text can be revised by anyone using wiki.

Uses of fiction

Although fiction may be viewed as a form of entertainment, it has other uses. Fiction has been used for instructional purposes, such as fictional examples used in school textbooks. It may be used in propaganda and advertising. It may be perpetuated by parents out of tradition such as with Santa Claus or to instill beliefs and values. Although they are not necessarily targeted at children, fables offer an explicit moral goal.

References

Bell, James Scott (2004). Write Great Fiction: Plot and Structure. Cincinnati, OH: Writer's Digest Books. ISBN 158297294X.
Bickham, Jack M. (1993). Scene & Structure. Cincinnati, OH: Writer's Digest Books, 23-62. ISBN 0898795516.
Edgerton, Les (2003). Finding Your Voice: How to Put Personality in Your Writing. Cincinnati, OH: Writer's Digest Books. ISBN 1582971749.
Evanovich, Janet (2006). How I Write: Secrets of a Bestselling Author. New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 39 and 83. ISBN 0312354282.
Morrell, Jessica Page (2006). Between the Lines: Master the Subtle Elements of Fiction Writing. Cincinnati, OH: Writer's Digest Books. ISBN 1582973938.
Provost, Gary (1988). Beyond Style: Mastering the Finer Points of Writing. Cincinnati, OH: Writer's Digest Books.
Rozelle, Ron (2005). Write Great Fiction: Description & Setting. Cincinnati, OH: Writer's Digest Books. ISBN 158297327X.
Selgin, Peter (2007). By Cunning & Craft: Sound Advice and Practical Wisdom for Fiction Writers. Cincinnati, OH: Writer's Digest Books. ISBN 1582974918.
(1992) The Writer's Digest Handbook of Novel Writing. Cincinnati, OH: Writer's Digest Books. ISBN 0898795079.

Note

1. ^ counting a page roughly as 200 words.
2. ^ a professional writer usually writes an average of 500-1000 words per day. Stephen King stated he writes an average of 2000 words per day, every day.

Medicine

Antiretroviral therapy. It is used in the treatment of HIV infection.
assisted reproductive technology

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Adaptive resonance theory

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Entertainment is an event, performance, or activity designed to give pleasure or relaxation to an audience (although, for example, in the case of a computer game the "audience" may be only one person).
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Culture (from the Latin cultura stemming from colere, meaning "to cultivate,") generally refers to patterns of human activity and the symbolic structures that give such activity significant importance.
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Human nature is the fundamental nature and substance of humans, as well as the range of human behavior that is, believed to be invariant over long periods of time and across very different cultural contexts.
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fictional character is any person, persona, identity, or entity whose existence originates from a work of fiction. The process of creating and developing characters in a work of fiction is called characterization.
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''For the 2007 documentary film, see Protagonist (film)

A protagonist is a term used to refer to a figure or figures in literature whose intentions are the primary focus of a story.
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In literature, the antagonist is that against which the main character or protagonist contends. ^[1] An antagonist is often a Villain, but may be a force of nature, set of circumstances, an animal, or other force that is in conflict with the protaganist.
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In fiction, a plot or storyline is the rendering and ordering of the events and actions of a story, particularly towards the achievement of some particular artistic or emotional effect.

Structure of plot

Plot has structure at several levels and forms.
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In fiction, a scene is a unit of drama. A sequel is what follows, an aftermath. Together, scene and sequel provide the building blocks of plot for short stories, novels, and other forms of fiction.
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In fiction, the setting of a story is the time and location in which it takes place. Broadly speaking, the setting provides the main backdrop for the story. Sometimes setting is referred to as milieu
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In literature, a theme is a broad idea in a story, or a message or lesson conveyed by a work. This message is usually about life, society or human nature. Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas explored in a literary work.
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A literary genre is a genre of literature, that is "a loose set of criteria for a category of literary composition", depending on literary technique, tone, or content.

The most general genres in literature are (in chronological order) epic, tragedy,^[1]
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Flash fiction is fiction characterized by its extreme brevity, as measured by its length in words. While there is no universally accepted exact word limit, generally a short story is considered to constitute flash fiction if it is less than 1,000–2,000 words long, and most
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The short story is a literary genre. It is usually fictional narrative prose and tends to be more concise and to the point than longer works of fiction, such as novellas (in the modern sense of this term) and novels.
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A novelette (or novelet) is a piece of short prose fiction. The distinction between a novelette and other literary forms, like a novella, is usually based upon word count.
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A novella is a narrative work of prose fiction longer than a short story but shorter than a novel. While there is some disagreement of what length defines a novella, the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America Nebula Awards for science fiction define the novella as having a
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novel (from, Italian novella, Spanish novela, French nouvelle for "new", "news", or "short story of something new") is today a long prose narrative set out in writing.
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For other meanings of epic, see .

The epic is long, exalted narrative poetry, generally concerning a serious subject and details the heroic deeds and events important to a culture or nation.
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fable is a brief, succinct story, in prose or verse, that features animals, plants, inanimate objects, or forces of nature which are anthropomorphized (given human qualities), and that illustrates a moral lesson (a "moral"), which may at the end be expressed explicitly in a pithy
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fairy tale or fairy story is a fictional story that usually features folkloric characters (such as fairies, goblins, elves, trolls, witches, giants, and talking animals) and enchantments, often involving a far-fetched sequence of events.
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play or stageplay, written by a playwright, or dramatist, is a form of literature, almost always consisting of dialogue between characters, intended for performance rather than reading.
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Poetry (from the Greek "ποίησις", poiesis, a "making" or "creating") is a form of art in which language is used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities in addition to, or in lieu of, its ostensible
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Fictional film or narrative film is film that tells a fictional story or narrative. Narrative cinema is usually contrasted to films that present information, such as a nature documentary, as well as to some experimental films (works such as Wavelength
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A comic book is a magazine or book containing sequential art in the form of a narrative. Comic books are often called comics for short. Although the term implies otherwise, the subject matter in comic books is not necessarily humorous, and in fact it is often serious and
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video game is a game that involves interaction with a user interface to generate visual feedback on a video device.

The word video in video game traditionally refers to a raster display device.
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Internet is a worldwide, publicly accessible series of interconnected computer networks that transmit data by packet switching using the standard Internet Protocol (IP). It is a "network of networks" that consists of millions of smaller domestic, academic, business, and government
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