Author Solon Simmons is the director of The Narrative Transformation Lab at George Mason University’s Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution. His latest book is a fascinating explanation of how the way we tell stories about conflict can create opportunities for political struggle, reconciliation or self-realization.
Simmons suggests that there are four main prototypes of conflict stories and illustrates these using dramatic fiction (movies and novels) that fit the genres.
His four prototypes include two story types that are based on a struggle against and adversary – if the protagonist wins the struggle, this is romance; if the protagonist loses, this is satire. The other two story types are based on a journey framework – if the protagonist is successful in their journey, this is comedy, and if unsuccessful, this is tragedy. Simmons suggests that the two struggle stories are useful if you are wanting justice, but the journey stories are more useful in you are wanting peace and reconciliation.
Which story form you choose, and how it ends, gives rise to what Simmons calls “post-plot pressure”, a sense of anxiety or yearning that motivates the audience to do something in response to the story. A struggle story leaves the audience renewed in their awareness of and motivation to fight injustice. A journey story leaves the audience with greater insight and willingness to tackle the challenges of collaborative problem solving.
Simmons explains that:
“Given the world in which we live, any good peace story has got to confront the problem of injustice in the short term, but it ultimately as to tackle the challenge of solving problems together in the long run.”
Simmon’s book is a brilliant addition to our growing awareness of the importance of story structure on how we experience (and hopefully resolve) conflict.
