PROSE

Novels
Short Story
Plays
Legends
Fables
What is Prose?

Prose is verbal or written language that follows the natural flow of speech. It is the most
common form of writing, used in both fiction and non-fiction. Prose comes from the Latin “prosa
oratio,” meaning “straightforward.”

4 Common Types of Prose

 Nonfictional prose.

Prose that is a true story or factual account of events or information is nonfiction. Textbooks,
newspaper articles, and instruction manuals all fall into this category.

Anne Frank’s Diary of a Young Girl, composed entirely of journal excerpts, recounts the young
teen’s experience of hiding with her family in Nazi-occupied Netherlands during World War II.

 Fictional prose.

A literary work of fiction. This is the most popular type of literary prose, used in novels and short
stories, and generally has characters, plot, setting, and dialogue.

 Heroic prose.

A literary work that is either written down or preserved through oral tradition, but is meant to be
recited. Heroic prose is usually a legend or fable. The twelfth-century Irish tales revolving
around the mythical warrior Finn McCool are an example of heroic prose.

 Prose poetry.

Poetry written in prose form. This literary hybrid can sometimes have rhythmic and rhyming
patterns. French poet Charles Baudelaire wrote prose poems, including “Be Drunk” which starts
off:

“And if sometimes, on the steps of a palace or the green grass of a ditch, in the mournful
solitude of your room.”

What Is the Difference Between Prose and Poetry?

Prose

 Follows natural patterns of speech and communication

 Has a grammatical structure with sentences and paragraphs

 Uses everyday language

 Sentences and thoughts continue across lines

Poetry

 Traditional poetry has deliberate patterns, such as rhythm and rhyme

 Many poems have a formal metrical structure—repeating patterns of beats

 Incorporates more figurative language

 Poems visually stand out on a page with narrow columns, varying line lengths, and more
white space on a page than prose

 Deliberate line breaks

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” written by Robert Frost.

 Poetry Form

“The woods are lovely, dark and deep. But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I
sleep, And miles to go before I sleep.”

Prose Form

“The woods look lovely against the setting darkness and as I gaze into the mysterious depths of
the forest, I feel like lingering here longer. However, I have pending appointments to keep and
much distance to cover before I settle in for the night or else I will be late for all of them.”

 The above paragraph is conveying a similar message but it is conveyed in ordinary

language, without a formal metrical structure to bind it.

Novel

 The term novel is a truncation of the Italian word novella (from the plural of

Latin novellus, a late variant of novus, meaning “new”).

 The novel originated in the early 18th century after the Italian word "novella," which was
used for stories in the medieval period. Its identity has evolved and it is now considered
to mean a work of prose fiction over 50,000 words.

 Novels focus on character development more than plot. In any genre, it is the study of
the human psyche.
  A novel is an established fictional work written to captivate and entertain a reader with a
handful of common or poetic mechanisms. The purpose of writing a novel is to tell a
complete story in any way the novelist deems fit.

 Novels come in different genres such as science fiction (or sci-fi), crime, fantasy,
romance, teen drama, melodrama, etc.

 The ancestors of the novel were Elizabethan prose fiction and French heroic romances,
which were long narratives about contemporary characters who behaved nobly.

 The novel came into popular awareness towards the end of the 1700s, due to a growing
middle class with more leisure time to read and money to buy books.

 Public interest in the human character led to the popularity of autobiographies,

biographies, journals, diaries and memoirs.

Elements of a Novel

 Setting

 Plot

 Theme

 Characters

 Setting -Covers the time, place, and the background. It involves not only geography but
also the entire climates of beliefs, habits and values of a particular region and historical
period. Sometimes, it emphasizes a certain locality like Chinatown in Sta. Cruz, Manila
in Edgardo Reyes’ “Sa Mga Kuko Ng Liwanag”. It is essential that the setting be in
keeping with the story that is told.

 Plot -Skeleton or framework which give shape and proportion to the novel. •

 Order of Events or happenings in the novel.

 Conflict is an important element of the plot.

It may be caused by the physical environment like hostile nature, social environment like the
conventions, customs or traditions that exist in a cultural community, other characters, or it may
be a physical , emotional and mental handicap within the main character itself.

 Characters -Moving spirit of the novel. They do not only act but also manifest the moral,
emotional and intellectual qualities endowed to them by the author.
Ten Novels and Their Authors is a 1954 work of literary criticism by William Somerset
Maugham. Maugham collects together what he considers to have been the ten greatest novels
and writes about the books and the authors. The ten novels are:

 The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling by Henry Fielding

 Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

 The Red and the Black by Stendhal

 Le Père Goriot by Honoré de Balzac

 David Copperfield by Charles Dickens

 Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert

 Moby-Dick by Herman Melville

 Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

 The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky

 War and Peace by Tolstoy

  Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll (1865)

Short Story
what are the key elements of a short story?

 Setting – The time and place a story takes place.

 Characters – the people, animals or creatures in a story.

 Plot – the series of events that make up a story.

 Conflict – a problem or struggle between two people, things or ideas.

 Point of View –the angle from which the story is told.

 Theme – the controlling idea or the central insight.

 A short story is a work of prose fiction that can be read in one sitting—usually between
20 minutes to an hour. There is no maximum length, but the average short story is 1,000
to 7,500 words, with some outliers reaching 10,000 or 15,000 words.

 At around 10 to 25 pages, that makes short stories much shorter than novels, with only a
few approaching novella length. A piece of fiction shorter than 1,000 words is
considered a “short short story” or “flash fiction,” and anything less than 300 words is
rightfully called “microfiction.”
  Short stories typically focus on a single plot instead of multiple subplots, as you might
see in novels. Some stories follow a traditional narrative arc, with exposition (description)
at the beginning, rising action, a climax (peak moment of conflict or action), and a
resolution at the end. However, contemporary short fiction is more likely to begin in the
middle of the action (in medias res), drawing readers right into a dramatic scene.

 While short stories of the past often revolved around a central theme or moral lesson,
today it is common to find stories with ambiguous endings. This type of unresolved story
invites open-ended readings and suggests a more complex understanding of reality and
human behavior.

 The short story genre is well suited to experimentation in prose writing style and form,
but most short story authors still work to create a distinct mood using classic literary
devices (point of view, imagery, foreshadowing, metaphor, diction/word choice, tone,
and sentence structure).

What is the history of the short story?

 Short-form storytelling can be traced back to ancient legends, mythology, folklore, and
fables found in communities all over the world. Some of these stories existed in written
form, but many were passed down through oral traditions.

 By the 14th century, the most well-known stories included One Thousand and One
Nights (Middle Eastern folk tales by multiple authors, later known as Arabian
Nights) and Canterbury Tales (by Geoffrey Chaucer).

 It wasn’t until the early 19th century that short story collections by individual authors
appeared more regularly in print. First, it was the publication of the Brothers Grimm fairy
tales, then Edgar Allen Poe’s Gothic fiction, and eventually, stories by Anton Chekhov,
who is often credited as a founder of the modern short story.

 The popularity of short stories grew along with the surge of print magazines and
journals. Newspaper and magazine editors began publishing stories as entertainment,
creating a demand for short, plot-driven narratives with mass appeal.

 By the early 1900s, The Atlantic Monthly, The New Yorker, and Harper’s Magazine were

paying good money for short stories that showed more literary technique. That golden
era of publishing gave rise to the short story as we know it today.

What are the different types of short stories?

 Short stories come in all kinds of categories: action, adventure, biography, comedy,
crime, detective, drama, dystopia, fable, fantasy, history, horror, mystery, philosophy,
politics, romance, satire, science fiction, supernatural, thriller, tragedy, and Western.
  Here are some popular types of short stories, literary styles, and authors associated with
them:

 Fable: A tale that provides a moral lesson, often using animals, mythical creatures,
forces of nature, or inanimate objects come to life (Brothers Grimm, Aesop)

 Flash fiction: A story between 5 to 2,000 words that lacks traditional plot structure or
character development, and is often characterized by a surprise or twist of fate (Lydia
Davis)

 Mini saga: A type of micro-fiction using exactly 50 words to tell a story

 Vignette: A descriptive scene or defining moment that does not contain a complete plot
or narrative, but reveals an important detail about a character or idea (Sandra Cisneros)

 Modernism: Experimenting with narrative form, style, and chronology (inner

monologues, stream of consciousness) to capture the experience of an individual
(James Joyce, Virginia Woolf)

 Postmodernism: Using fragmentation, paradox, or unreliable narrators to explore the

relationship between the author, reader, and text (Donald Barthelme, Jorge Luis Borges)

 Magical realism: Combining realistic narrative or setting with elements of surrealism,

dreams, or fantasy (Gabriel García Márquez)

 Minimalism: Writing characterized by brevity, straightforward language, and a lack of

plot resolutions (Raymond Carver, Amy Hempel)

Famous short stories

 “The Tell-Tale Heart” (1843) – Edgar Allen Poe

 “The Necklace” (1884) – Guy de Maupassant

 “The Yellow Wallpaper” (1892) – Charlotte Perkins Gilman

 “The Story of an Hour” (1894) – Kate Chopin

 “Gift of the Magi” (1905) – O. Henry

 “The Dead,” “The Dubliners” (1914) – James Joyce

 “The Garden Party” (1920) – Katherine Mansfield

 “Hills Like White Elephants” (1927), “The Snows of Kilimanjaro” (1936) – Ernest
Hemingway

 “The Lottery” (1948) – Shirley Jackson

  “Lamb to the Slaughter” (1953) – Roald Dahl

 “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” (1955) – Gabriel García Márquez

 “Sonny’s Blues” (1957) – James Baldwin

 “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” (1953), “Everything That Rises Must Converge” (1961) –
Flannery O’Connor

How are short stories different from poems?

 Short stories are written in prose, and organized according to the whims of the author, in
whatever fashion deemed necessary to deliver the story with maximum effect to the
reader.

 Poems are written to the specific verses, meters, or rhymes that characterize that genre
of literature.

Play

 Play is a literary form of writing for theatre, which narrates a story with elements of
conflicts, tensions, and actions through dialogues of characters. For dramatic
significance, it is divided into acts and scenes. The writers present their feelings,
emotions, and ideas through their characters and make them speak.

 The playwright uses various dramatic elements to create more profound meanings and
enhance understanding of the audience. Also, they insert text, apart from the actual
dialogues of the characters, to unfold the description of characters on stage, their natural
action, and psychological intentions. In this way, the writers make their texts emotive,
lifelike and thought-provoking.

 Etymologically, ‘play’ is derived from the Greek word ‘paizo’ which means “to act” or “to
perform.”

Elements of Play

 A play has certain elements such as,

 Plot: It refers to the order of the events that occur in the play.

 Characters: The characters form a crucial part of the story and are interwoven with
the plot of the play.

 Dialogue: It refers to the conversation or interactions between the characters in the

play.
  Setting: It refers to the time and place where a story is set. It is one of the important
parts of the play.

 Conflict: It refers to the challenge main characters need to solve to achieve their goals.

 Resolution: It is the unfolding or the solution to a complex issue in a story.

Types of Plays

 Tragedy: These types of plays end on a tragic note and most likely a character’s death.

 Comedy: These types of plays are meant to amuse the audience, and they end on a
happy note.

 Domestic Play: These types of plays are based on the normal life of family and friends.

 Tragicomedy: It is a fictional work comprises of both tragedy as well as comedy.

 Melodrama: This type of has often exaggerated characters and episodes with songs
and music for an emotive appeal to the audiences.

Examples of Play from Literature

 Macbeth by William Shakespeare

The play is the best example of tragedy because of the tragic flaw and moral weakness of the
main character become the cause of his eventual downfall.

 Oedipus Rex by Sophocles

Sophocles, a famous Greek tragedian, wrote Oedipus Rex which is one of the famous Greek
tragedies till date. This tragic play highlights the role of fate and chance which brings a
disastrous end for their victims.

 The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare

This play is a perfect tragicomedy. The writer has presented unremitting tragedy in the first three
acts. However, the last two acts comprise the restorative comedy.

Functions of the Play

 A play functions as a tool to give reveal to one’s thoughts through performance in front of
the live audience. Writers skillfully feature certain situations to make the audience laugh
at funny incidents as well as feel pity and fear for unfortunate circumstances or incidents.

 It enables the audience to understand and feel a lot out of less description. Also, it is a
convenient way to present different characters and their inner thoughts in dramas.
 Moreover, it enables the writers to dramatize the story in a way that events and
characters are easily brought to life through a theatrical performance.

Legend

 Originated from Latin legendus, legend means “something which ought to be read.”

According to J. A. Cuddon, a legend is “a story or narrative that lies somewhere
between myth and historical fact and which, as a rule, is about a particular figure or
person.” Traditionally, a legend is a narrative that focuses on a historically or
geographically specific figure, and describes his exploits. Similar to a myth, a legend can
provide an etymological narrative, often filling in historical gaps.

Difference Between a Legend and a Myth

 There are marked differences between a legend and a myth. While legends are made up
stories, myths are stories that answer questions about the working of natural
phenomenon. Myths are set in olden times, even in pre-historic times. However, legends
are stories about people and their actions, or deeds they perform to save their people or
nations.

 The people mentioned in legends might have lived in recent times, or sometime in
known history. Legends are told to serve a specific purpose, and can be based on facts
– but they are not completely true. People mentioned in a legend might not have really
done what the story of the legend relates. In some cases, legends change the historical
events.

 The common point between a myth and a legend is that they both have been passed
down from generation to generation in oral form.

Examples of Legend

 Examples of legends are Ali Baba, the Fountain of Youth, Paul Bunyan, Kraken, Atlantis,

the Loch Ness Monster, and Bigfoot. Some legends are stories about real people; others
are not. Odysseus and Robin Hood for example may have been real but most the stories
about them are definitely fiction.

 For some places, legends are the earliest history. For example, the origin of ancient
Rome is known only from legends, as are the earliest dynasties in the history of China.

Function of Legend

 In literature, the function of a legend is to present the story of human actions in such a
way that they are perceived by the audience to be true. Actions are presented as if they
 have taken place within human history. For its audiences, a legend has to include
happenings that are not outside the realm of possibility, but it may include miracles.

 Change has certainly occurred in legends over time, giving them a freshness, vitality,
and a realistic taste. On the contrary, a large number of legends function in the realm of
uncertainty; neither believed, nor doubted by the audiences.

Fable

What is a Fable?

 Fables are stories intended to teach a lesson, and animals often speak and act like
human beings.

Elements to Remember

 ANIMALS are usually the main characters —

 The plot and characters are SIMPLE

 Stories teach a MORAL or LESSON —

 SETTING is common and nonspecific —

 Author uses PERSONIFICATION

Aesop

 Aesop was a slave that lived about 550 BC. — He is famous for his fables. —

 Legend says he was granted freedom from his master because he enjoyed the stories
so much. —

 Interestingly, Aesop didn’t write down any of his fables. But after his death, they were
written down for him.