Beats - a definition

questions
#1

This might seem to be a basic question, but it struck me yesterday that I haven’t come across a Dramatica definition of beats, yet we use it all the time with the storyform. Also, novelists haven’t traditionally used it much, maybe because it’s a word born out of the performing arts.

Just to complicate matters, a beat has different meanings depending on who is using it. I’m sure McKee has a definition but I don’t have his book, so maybe someone can enlighten me. Others define a beat as an identifiable moment of change. In novelist-speak, is a beat the turning point of a scene?

Many times, @jhull has talked about beats as being the source of conflict driving a scene…could that be a synonym phrase for a kind of turning point? Would a scene turn on the beat? For example, let’s say the beat is Strategy in a scene. The scene turns when the Strategy goes awry or better than expected. Is that a good way to see it too?

Maybe one of the experts can define it in terms of Dramatica :slight_smile:

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#2

Hey @whitepaws. The way I approach a beat is to think of it as a point something happens in your story. It is often a palpable event within a scene, and it can be scaled to fit an entire storyform. When working with scenes, you could think of them as turning points -as you rightly stated earlier. However, you could be more granular and think of them as points of actions or decisions that enhance either Character, Plot, Theme & Genre; that way they do more work and are thus more meaningful. For instance, when a character places a prop a certain way on a wooden table in the scene; that’s a beat. But the manner with which she places the prop will enhances character. The act of the placement might be meaningful to the plot. So the beat not only draws attention to itself, it has a distinct feel to it.
Secondly, a beat -just like in music- adds to the rhythm of music. Spacing their occurence can be used in pacing of your story.

Hope this helps.

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#3

A beat is any bit of story tied to the storyform.

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#4

From my experience in acting: a beat is an identifiable pause in action to indicate a noticeable change in the consciousness of the character.

This pause is preceded by an action or series of actions, and this pause is succeeded by a different action or series of actions.

I imagine that Jim’s Storybeats are sometimes a beat as I have described above. And sometimes they are a single action that leads to the beat. And other times, they are the series of actions that lead to the beat.

In other words, sometimes the transition is gradual and other times it is sharp. That’s the reason that they can require a moment, scene or sequence to implement.

@whitepaws I had an existential crisis about beats a while back when I subscribed to Subtext, and thinking about it really helped me deal with the idea of scenes and sequences as well.

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#5

And there he goes saying things with much better economy and clarity than me.

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#6

Nice @jhull ! This is guru-speak right here! Thanks for that.
A new analogy is in order then: Each pluck of the string, each tremble of the drum, or whatever eerie whistle that finds its way from the wooden flute to the heart of the listening audience is a beat. A story beat! So long as it is conducted by the one of the 56 batons of the Storymaster(storyform).

Each baton = story point of course. Hehe…:grin:

Cheers!

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#7

Thanks, @Khodu and @museful - it’s something to work with, for sure! Thanks for the brevity, @jhull, but perhaps a little too brief for me to sink my teeth into :grin:

On my continued hunt for the meaning of “beats”, I came across this gem of a definition by novelist, William Bernhardt:

“Beats are exchanges between two characters, typically actions and reactions, that combine to create the meaningful change of the scene.”

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#8

The meaningful change of the scene is the storyform, specifically the difference between the Potential element and Outcome element.

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#9

Only meaningful change is going to advance the story, illuminate character, shape character, etc.

For example, the plot requires an elimination of a limited number of options or an expenditure of time using the best options – especially from the perspective of the OS.

Beats are the mechanism by which we do this. In life, we learn. If we never experienced that moment of clarity, painful realization or whatever – we’d never change our process.

It’s interesting when you look at Storybeats because they don’t always represent beats as we are discussing them. At times they do; but, sometimes, they use negative space to show the beat (i.e. negative space art). Negative space art is :drum: drumroll :drum: subtext.

I think you asked a really great question that requires a tailored and personal understanding. For me, this kind of question helps me advance my process.

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#10

I totally get what you’re saying about that space in between @museful - subtex :).

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Sometimes the storypoints are in that space, sometimes they’re in the known space. Beats are hard to pin down!

From the practical perspective, ideally we’d be conscious of WHAT and HOW to nail down the subtext (but I guess that’s what learning the craft is all about). With that in mind, I was thinking that the progressive storypoints which are focussed on the scenes - SRCA - could possibly be the Signpost Beats(?)

So, going back to the progressive storypoints section of the storyform…lets say Strategy is the setup storypoint in SP1. Strategy could be the moment of change - turning point - in the setup portion of the Signpost (Act 1).

Possibly! Maybe!?

(I know scenes will incorporate other storypoints but I’m looking to zero in on the scenes which go to create the signposts.)

#11

Okay so this is the thing that I wasn’t getting for a long, long time, but is KEY to making it all work in my opinion.

Everyone at first makes the mistake of encoding story points as storytelling, not as a source of conflict. But even once you get the source of conflict piece down, you still have to show how that conflict progresses (“turns”) to the subsequent points (PRCO) when you’re looking at plot progression. I think some writers do this intuitively. Others of us find it trickier.

I know you’ve discussed PRCO a in few recent writers’ rooms @jhull but speaking for myself I could still use more discussion and examples of how this works in practice to get the feel for it.

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#12
  • A beat is contained by two pauses. Like two commas.

OR

  • The pause is the beat (take a beat or take a moment).

In other words: a beat is self contained or the moment that contains.

I wonder: if a scene contains more than one beat, could the PRCO be said to reset after each beat? I think so.

It is interesting, I think, that a beat suffers from the same thing as a scene in terms of definition.

I just read the definition of a scene according to Dramatica. Two parts of this definition were interesting to me:

  • In keeping with the most common definition, Dramatica uses “Scene” to mean everything that takes place consecutively in a single place and time.

AND

  • A less common usage of “Scene” is as a unit representing a complete dramatic movement, such as an argument that begins, develops, and resolves.

http://dramatica.com/dictionary/scene

#13

Just to add to that, maybe a beat could be defined by modifying the definition of a scene:

  • A less common usage of “Scene” is as a unit representing a complete dramatic movement, such as an argument that begins, develops, and resolves.

Then a beat could be:

  • Part of a scene (a complete dramatic movement) that is self contained (begins, develops, and resolves).

I still like the idea that a beat has two workable definitions, that it can be contained within two moments or that it can be the moment itself.

#14

I thought we were supposed to ignore all that PRCO stuff (whatever that is… searching it here didn’t clarify) and just focus on signposts and sequences: Difficulty understanding PRCO

#15

Potential is reality and why it sucks.

Resistance is what makes the suckiness more or less bearable.

Current are the forces that interact to maintain or dispel the suckitude.

Outcome is the altered state of suckdom at the end of the scene. Because no one should outright win until the end of the script. All outcomes generally lead to more Potential (another sucky situation).

Goal is a separate thing and shouldn’t be confused with Outcome, but it is useful in a scene as storytelling.

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#16

PRCO is an analogy.

My issue with this analogy is that most analogies are intended to simplify an explanation. PRCO doesn’t seem to do this very well.

In many ways, this is where I struggle with Dramatica.

However, this struggle can lead to a stronger overall understanding with time. It can also lead to hair pulling and frustration.

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#17

I think this is a case, as with many elements of story, where Dramatica is both more precise and harder to understand than other explanations.

Goal-Conflict-Disaster is a lot easier to understand than PRCO and therefore potentially more useful. But does every scene end in disaster? I guess it depends on how you define “disaster” etc.

Yup.

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#18

I think disaster lacks nuance and that’s why people dislike it. But, if you watch a show like “Lost in Space” it really is that way. It, at least, it is often that way.

I kind of like the following when talking about a protagonists goal at the end of a scene.

Yes he succeeded, therefore…
Yes he succeeded, but…
No, he failed, but…
No, he failed therefore…

I think the first will never happen, because everything comes at a cost.

The protagonist will be tired, beaten up, make an enemy, lose a friend, etc. There are always consequnces. That’s like the second.

The third is silver lining territory.

The fourth is just plain disaster.

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#19

I would say end with Resultant: Goal, Conflict, Resultant. I use the PRCP ( cos I prefer this to PRCO, even though the Outcome is very easy to understand). The P here is the Resultant. It has a charge. This is the Potential for more negativity to occur or a more positive happening to grace the next scene. This helps with control of pacing , mood of the work in general. etc.

Another school of thought, like @museful stated see the nature of this “Potential” as either:

  1. Yes,
  2. No ,
  3. Yes but,
  4. No and furthermore.

The last two are great in moving your fiction forward- especially great for novelists.

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#20

See, that sounds practical and useable. Do you use it at the end of every PSR item or just the 1st or 4th?

I wish more of these theory things were elaborated upon with simple concrete examples. Are there any? I get the feeling that following Dramatica’s open-ended instructions on what to do with the PSR isn’t enough to make a good story (for someone like me who gets inspired by cool ideas but doesn’t know how the pieces go together)… but maybe that’s because my instinct is to solve conflicts, not make them worse.

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