Narrative Philosophy
Building stories from the worldview beneath them.
Every story makes assumptions about how its world works.
What matters, what counts as possible, what people owe one another, how choices lead to consequences, where meaning comes from and what gets taken for granted all shape a narrative, whether they are considered deliberately or arrive along the way.
GoodBoy makes that underlying worldview a conscious part of developing the story.
What matters, what counts as possible, what people owe one another, how choices lead to consequences, where meaning comes from and what gets taken for granted all shape a narrative, whether they are considered deliberately or arrive along the way.
GoodBoy makes that underlying worldview a conscious part of developing the story.
Worldview as world building
Ideas have consequences.
GoodBoy begins by asking what holds the world of a story together.
That can include its values, ideology, logic, ethics, relationships, structures, histories and assumptions about people. Some are shared across the storyworld. Others belong to particular characters or communities. They can reinforce one another, compete or come into direct conflict.
Making those foundations more explicit helps us follow their consequences through the narrative: how a world operates, what its characters believe, what choices make sense to them and what happens because of those choices.
The philosophy becomes part of the architecture of the story rather than an explanation placed on top of it.
That can include its values, ideology, logic, ethics, relationships, structures, histories and assumptions about people. Some are shared across the storyworld. Others belong to particular characters or communities. They can reinforce one another, compete or come into direct conflict.
Making those foundations more explicit helps us follow their consequences through the narrative: how a world operates, what its characters believe, what choices make sense to them and what happens because of those choices.
The philosophy becomes part of the architecture of the story rather than an explanation placed on top of it.
Following the thought
Letting ideas travel through the story.
An idea rarely stays where it starts. A belief affects a choice. A choice changes a relationship. A relationship changes what becomes possible next. Characters encounter people who understand the same situation differently. Institutions carry assumptions beyond any single person. Consequences reveal things nobody intended.
Narrative Philosophy follows those trails of thought through the work.
Doing so helps us notice when the logic of a story begins contradicting itself, when a convenient turn asks the world to behave differently than it has before, or when the implications of an idea lead somewhere worth exploring further. It also asks us to remain conscious of our own values as makers, including where the story challenges them.
Narrative Philosophy follows those trails of thought through the work.
Doing so helps us notice when the logic of a story begins contradicting itself, when a convenient turn asks the world to behave differently than it has before, or when the implications of an idea lead somewhere worth exploring further. It also asks us to remain conscious of our own values as makers, including where the story challenges them.
Cohesion without conformity
A world can hold disagreement.
A coherent story does not require everyone inside it to agree. Characters can misunderstand one another, act against their own beliefs, change their minds, behave inconsistently and make choices they later regret. Cultures can contain competing values. Systems can produce outcomes nobody participating in them wants.
Those contradictions are part of the material. The aim is to understand enough of what sits beneath them that disagreement, surprise and consequence can emerge from the world rather than being arranged around the conclusion the story wants to reach. That leaves more room for people to remain complicated.
Those contradictions are part of the material. The aim is to understand enough of what sits beneath them that disagreement, surprise and consequence can emerge from the world rather than being arranged around the conclusion the story wants to reach. That leaves more room for people to remain complicated.
Serious enough to play
A sturdy world can get strange.
Deliberateness underneath the story gives GoodBoy room to take risks with what happens above it. The work can move through the surreal, silly, serious and serendipitous. Form can bend. Expectations can misbehave. A premise can wander somewhere improbable without becoming arbitrary.
The stranger the journey gets, the more useful it is to know what still holds. Narrative Philosophy gives GoodBoy a way to build that underlying coherence while leaving room for discovery, accident and ideas that change in the making.
We know what holds the world of the story together. Then we get to see what happens.
The stranger the journey gets, the more useful it is to know what still holds. Narrative Philosophy gives GoodBoy a way to build that underlying coherence while leaving room for discovery, accident and ideas that change in the making.
We know what holds the world of the story together. Then we get to see what happens.
Ether
Bodee
Bodee
