Exercise: The Paper Cup – What Is Story (Part 1)

“A foam cup fell from the picnic table and landed on its bottom. A boy’s arm knocked it over. His sleeve really, so not much. The cup landed on its bottom and remained upright. A stampede of children’s feet could not trample or shake it from its soft footing on the grass. It nearly floated, its lip unmarred by any stain or blemish of production. The foam cup managed even to avoid the squirrel who, darting curiously closer at bursts, dashed off with her nut instead. But then the wind blew the small cup over, and the groundskeeper knifed it up and into his bag of trash.”

This is our raw story about a paper cup. We will follow the Paper Cup and understand its development within narrative device, dramatic line, and audience.

Exercise: What is the story? Let’s look at the appreciation of movement in our story using the following exercise worksheet.

1) Choose (or create) a popular or unpopular philosophical truth.

There does not seem to be any philosophical truth or “meaning” yet explored. Even though our extract about the paper cup is interesting, it feels more so observational and therefore does not feel self-contained.

2) Imagine a figure for this truth. In other words, what activity or sequence of events can contain this truth literally or symbolically?

In this case, our figure would be a paper cup that falls off a picnic table and lands upright on the grass. It is eventually knifed up as trash by the groundskeeper.

3) Choose three events through this figure that lead to the “truth” or through it.

Story is the appreciation of movement between two points. The three points of action requested here might typically be understood as “beginning, middle, and end,” but actually represent the cycle of set-up, action, and suspense that moves a story between two points. The two most noteworthy points of a story are its beginning and its ending. Multiple cycles of “action” will play between them.

The three events (or points) that I might choose to carry us through this little story are 1. where the cup starts (on the picnic table), 2. where it lands (on the grass), and 3. the groundskeeper picking it up.

4) Write a story through those points of action.

What three points would you choose in The Paper Cup?

For Works in Progress: What essential figure contains the “truth” in your story? What three events move through this truth?

Now See what philosophical truth is chosen for The Paper Cup under Narrative Device.

Next: The Paper Cup – Narrative Device (Part 2)

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