Each and every time I begin to struc­ture a speech or pre­sen­ta­tion I con­sider which ‘story type’ to use (if it is suit­able at all).

Not being par­tic­u­larly well-versed in these, I recently came across a cou­ple of use­ful resources.

First, Nick Morgan’s descrip­tion of the five “basic sto­ries that West­ern cul­ture has to make your speeches stronger, ‘stick­ier’ and more instantly gras­pable”:

  • The Quest (A cut-down ver­sion of everyone’s favourite; The Monomyth/Hero’s Jour­ney?)
  • Stranger in a Strange Land
  • The Love Story
  • Rags to Riches
  • Revenge

Next, a large col­lec­tion of TV tropes (via xkcd, of all places). A trope? As the site says,

A cat­a­log of the tricks of the trade for writ­ing fic­tion […] devices and con­ven­tions that a writer can rea­son­ably rely on as being present in the audi­ence mem­bers’ minds and expectations.

Update: This hand­book of rhetor­i­cal devices will also come in handy, surely. Carl has also pro­duced a nice seven-stage guide to the mythic adven­ture.