Changes

The rejected anthropology master's thesis of the author Kurt Vonnegut posited that all stories could be plotted on a two-dimensional graph, with two axes: the G-I axis and the B-E axis.<ref>This would do for literature what Descartes did for algebra, collapsing the study of stories into the study of the mathematical properties of their shapes, as Descartes merged algebra and geometry by collapsing the study of shapes into the study of their functions, and by collapsing the study of functions into the study of their shapes.</ref> One extreme of the G-I axis is “good fortune”; the other extreme is “ill fortune”. By the same logic, the B-E axis lies between “beginning” and “ending”.<ref>Note that this is different from the “plot arc” or “diagram” commonly taught in elementary literature classes: the “plot arc” merely measures the speed and excitement of the action, while the shape of a story measures the good and ill fortune of its (main) characters.</ref>

The rejected anthropology master's thesis of the author Kurt Vonnegut posited that all stories could be plotted on a two-dimensional graph, with two axes: the G-I axis and the B-E axis.<ref>This would do for literature what Descartes did for algebra, collapsing the study of stories into the study of the mathematical properties of their shapes, as Descartes merged algebra and geometry by collapsing the study of shapes into the study of their functions, and by collapsing the study of functions into the study of their shapes.</ref> One extreme of the G-I axis is “good fortune”; the other extreme is “ill fortune”. By the same logic, the B-E axis lies between “beginning” and “ending”.<ref>Note that this is different from the “plot arc” or “diagram” commonly taught in elementary literature classes: the “plot arc” merely measures the speed and excitement of the action, while the shape of a story measures the good and ill fortune of its (main) characters.</ref>

==References==

==References==

[[Category:Essays]]

[[Category:Essays]]