How — but also when and why — did you end up in the form that you’re in? Is the form you began a piece in the same form that the piece should end in? What can other forms teach you about the one you currently practice in? Have you been not-so-secretly exploring other forms, or wanting to find a way to let that first essay out? What genres or forms do you read in when you’re actively working on a writing project?
In this resource, we’re thinking about the everydayness of genre and form. While we have backgrounds in specific traditions of writing on the page, we no doubt brush up against all kinds of forms in our day-to-day lives, be it on the news or via eavesdropping, in politics or family discussions, encounters with the world or in the wild. What does this mean for us when we put pen to paper? Are there rules? What rules are there for the making, taking, and breaking? Which ones can we bend, and which will break?
Below, we list out seven things to know when it comes to genre and form, as well as “narrative frameworks.”
On the topic of genre and form.
First, it can be helpful to know the difference between genre and form. While genre—such as poetry, nonfiction, and fiction—largely has to do with the actual content of the work, form has to do with the actual structure and scaffolding of the writing, which might be specific to each genre. So for example, genres can have sub-genres—in nonfiction, you could have academic writing, travel writing, food writing, or for many of us, creative nonfiction—but when it comes to forms of nonfiction, that would look like essays, memoir, reportage, cultural criticism. If you’re a poet and/or looking to play with scaffolding, consider this resource from Writer’s Digest, which lists 168 poetic forms. This is a great way to understand the many experimental shapes our work can take.
Think of form as a kind of scaffolding.
It can help to think about form as a kind of scaffolding: the thing you use while you build the foundation, framing, and structure of the thing. It is extremely helpful—if not impossible to build without—but at some point, you have to remove the scaffolding to see the end result and do the finishing touches. So think of form in that way: perhaps you begin within the limitations of a form—say, a ghazal, which might help you begin and get into a state of flow with the words or work—but perhaps a new shape emerges toward the end. Form is what you make of it; genre is how it’s packaged and sold.
Know the rules in order to break them.
No matter what form you work in—even if you choose to create hybrid works that blur the line between genre (ie. auto-fiction) or form (ie. prose-poetry), it’s helpful to have some foundational knowledge so you can use/work against a genre or form to your advantage. If you are a nonfiction writer, for example, study the differences between opinion, reportage, memoir, and essay. The reason this is so important is that we—as humans, readers, and consumers of digital information—are hard-wired for stories: creating within the constraints of a form can help readers access your writing or work.
Remember: you contain all forms.
Even though you may be a writer of a specific genre/form, we also encourage you to remember that each person, in a way, contains all genres: fiction is your imagination, nonfiction is your narrative of yourself, and poetry is the way you see the world. While we get and know the impulse to say things like—I’m not a poet, or, I don’t write/do nonfiction—don’t say it to the point that you block yourself off from exploring what those forms have to teach you about your work, story, and narratives. After all, poets do make the best essayists (and that’s coming from us, who are traditional essayists).
Genre can be an ingredient within your work.
You can sprinkle poetry into a fiction manuscript. Utilize the power of imagination in a nonfiction project. Have a narrator go through an entire imaginative scene in a novel. Different genres can surface in any given project.
Know your ABDCEs (i.e. narrative frameworks).
While it’s important to know your ABC’s when it comes to genre and form, don’t forget your ABDCE’s, or, narrative frameworks. If this phrase sounds new, a narrative framework is the shape, structure, or blueprint of a story. It is what guides the plot. One narrative framework that is often used in fiction (and nonfiction) is ABDCE: action, background, development, conflict, and ending. You can think of this in terms of a single piece or a project: for example, what is the action, background, etc. of this piece or chapter, but also, which chapter is the action, where are my background chapters, which contain conflict, how do I progress or evolve the tension, and how do I arrive at the ending? We aren’t the biggest fans of the “hero’s journey,” which is for a different time and place, but ABDCE is
See more resources about genre, form, and narrative shifts in our paid Writer’s Hub.
