Comedy and Tragedy in Storytelling

Readers and fellow writers alike have told me my recent short stories (which can be read here at http://collectionofshortstories.blogspot.com) mix comedy and tragedy. I've been learning about how, and I discovered it depends on the external structure of a story.

In story, you have the inciting incident which is followed by the first major turning point in the beginning, followed by a small pinch reminding of what the story's about. Then the midpoint, another small pinch, followed by a major turning point towards the end, and wrap it up with a big showdown.

In the modern era, we're raised to believe comedy has to be hilarious and tragedy has to be something horrible. To understand comedy and tragedy at its fullest and undertand how and why its needed in storytelling, we need to go back to the Ancient Greek definition.

In Ancient Greece, tragedy is just a dramatic moment which builds up tension while comedy serves to relieve the tension. So in essence, all the major turning points are a three act tragedy while the small pinches serve as a two act comedy in between. The inciting incident and the big showdown are opposite ends the big picture or photograph which captures everything in the story.

For those young writers who wish to learn the internal structure of writing a scene, there's an awesome 80 page guide called The Elements of Style written by William Strunk Jr. and E.B. White which has been considered by many to be the bible for writing stories for the past 70 years, even Stephen King recommends it!

In The Elements of Style, writers'll discover the concepts of usage, composition, form, mistakes to avoid, and of course how to use styles in a story.

It can be purchased here:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/020530902X/qid=1140915383/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/102-1235126-9605720?s=books&v=glance&n=283155