Saturday, November 7, 2015

The Chemistry Of Storytelling

I was googling something -- maybe whether canned corn stores safely in perpetuity and where it belongs in the food pyramid -- and I ran across this diagram of how to write a dramatic story:

link to original
This immediately suggested to me what is known as a generic reaction coordinate in chemistry:


Both diagrams depict action moving left-to-right. Think of the "reactants" on the left side, lower figure as the "exposition" in the top diagram and the "products" as the "denouement."

In chemistry, the climax is known as the transition state. The transition state is the fleeting state where a reaction can go forward or reverse. I believe these notions are covered by the language in the Freytag Pyramid diagram.

Note also that the chemistry plot ends in a higher energy state. Reaction diagrams that end in a lower energy state are possible as well as those that start and finish at the same level. Is this possible in storytelling? Are there uphill stories as as well as downhill ones?

27 comments:

bagoh20 said...

" Something goes "up" and comes back down, but what is it, exactly."

Now I learned me some chemistry of a few varieties back in college, but that first diagram seems to describe extra curricular activity to me.

bagoh20 said...

"Are there uphill stories as as well as downhill ones?"

comedies vs tragedies

chickelit said...

Stop being so salacious, bags. I'm serious here.

Did you ever read my How Chemistry Is Like Sex? Or better yet, Coupling Illustrated?

chickelit said...

WRT to the Freytag Pyramid and my second reference, I thing the transition state is reached when ammonia's lone pair is about halfway into borane's LUMO.

bagoh20 said...

"Stop being so salacious, bags.",

I don't know what that word means, but I'm pretty sure it's all I got.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I just saw saw Wild (2014) with Reese Witherspoon. The movie maker followed that top diagram to a T.

rhhardin said...

Melodrama works by having the ending lower than the beginning. To women, this seems meaningful.

bagoh20 said...

Due to my long time as a dog rescue volunteer and dog owner, I have some experience with ammonia. I did some experiments a while back to try and find the best way to eliminate the smell from all the dog piss that resides on my patio. I dipped a number of q-tips in dog urine and let them age a couple days. This transforms them into ammonia scented ear cleaners.

I then dipped them in a variety of remedial solutions: Bleach, Bacteria-based Dog Urine eliminator, a variety of detergents, and odor-eliminating cleaners, windex, and vinegar.

Although some of the scented cleaners masked the smell a little, the only one that eliminated the smell was vinegar, which was my hypothesis and hoped for winner since it should neutralize the ammonia, would not require rinsing, and I like the smell of vinegar. It turns the ammonia into water and salt, I suspect. I buy glacial acetic acid and dilute my own to about 5%.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Here is really good story--

(hold tight for unbearable handsomeness)

*sniffs & tissues*

deborah said...

The rhythm of life.

Simplistically thinking, the typical happy-ending love story begins low and ends high. A melodrama might begin medium and end low. Et cetera.

The climax concept has always intrigued me. Is there only one right answer for each story, or can there be a debate over it?

chickelit said...

The climax concept has always intrigued me. Is there only one right answer for each story, or can there be a debate over it?

In chemistry, there can be multiple "bumps" along the pathway from reactants to products; these give rise to "intermediate states." There is however only one state called the transition state and that's the one highest in energy.

I suppose that in drama, there could multiple climaxes, but really only one major climax. YMMV

chickelit said...

Thanks y'all for the suggestions of various story archetypes which end on higher or lower notes. That simply didn't cross my mind.

chickelit said...

@Bags: mixing ammonia and bleach can be hazardous because it make chloramine. That's some nasty stuff there.

Ammonia plus vinegar is the smarter choice. Ammonia plus hydrochloric acid (HCl) is good too because that makes ammonium chloride. That stuff was known to the ancients as the salt of Ammon. Chip might be intrigued by that because it's named for Amun. The Egyptians invented chemistry (The word is derived from the ancient Egyptian name of Egypt (khem, khame, or khmi, meaning "black earth", contrasting with the surrounding desert), though the science was perfected by the Germans.

bagoh20 said...

"@Bags: mixing ammonia and bleach can be hazardous because it make chloramine."

That sounds like some kind of conspiracy theory fabricated by the MSM to keep women out of the kitchen. It's not gonna work over here. "Kitten Darling, come mix this up for me."

bagoh20 said...

Chickie, I can't remember very well how to solve chemical equations. Is there a website where you can just plug in reagents and get the products?

chickelit said...

Chickie, I can't remember very well how to solve chemical equations. Is there a website where you can just plug in reagents and get the products? .

There should be, but I don't know of one. See, the chemical education I had taught us to know those answers. But much like language translation.

Googling your question, I see you're not the first to inquire: link

BTW, I once collected recipes for the recycling of transition metal waste. I have them filed away somewhere. I wrote to dozens of chemistry professors asking for their secrets and many obliged.

chickelit said...

I didn't finish a thought there. Much like language translation, software is obviating much of that knowledge. I still feel very embellished though.

bagoh20 said...

Similarly, GPS has virtually eliminated things I used to enjoy like navigating in the woods with a compass and map, or in an airplane the old fashion way with compass, waypoints, and ground features. Using those old skills was actually the funnest part of both hiking and flying. Don't get me wrong, I love GPS, when I need to get somewhere hassle free, but like they say, the journey (and figuring out how) is all the fun.

I was in the last slide rule class of my High School. I do not miss that technology. It was so done at that time that we were allowed to use a calculator (about $100 at the time) to take the tests.

rcommal said...

Jesus. Childbirth!

I remember the language of those damned classes.

rcommal said...

Seriously: I kid you not.

In chemistry, the climax is known as the transition state. The transition state is the fleeting state where a reaction can go forward or reverse.

LOL.

chickelit said...

@rcommal: That's a new one on me about childbirth transition states but it makes perfects sense.

Maybe deborah was right: "life cycles"

MamaM said...

...where it belongs in the food pyramid

Somewhere in the pile, with sweetcorn as the number 2 processed vegetable in the United States.

With Blog corn, it tends to be more about the inciting incident than the transition.

Fun to find the tag CL, and determine the source!

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Nice video AprilA

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Thanks - I thought so. Dogs tell nice stories.

Steg said...

Deborah: "The climax concept has always intrigued me. Is there only one right answer for each story, or can there be a debate over it?"

Anyone ever see Mr. Nobody with Jared Leto? An old man reflects on his life wondering if he made the right choices. The movie splits into several story lines while he remembers, but they are all contradictory. There was a really good line at the end, where the reporter asks which life was the correct one. I won't give it away if someone is interested to watch.

I think it makes sense that storytelling is akin to chemistry. It all evokes imagery and emotion in our heads, which is chemistry, right?

deborah said...

Yes, that sounds about right.

I haven't seen it, sounds good, thx.

Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...

Was that diagram a sexual response curve?