Description
Daniel Joshua Rubin’s Story Principles is the ultimate site for storytellers in all media. It will help you become a more confident, intelligent, inspired writer and have more fun writing Our first course, Story Principles 101 will teach you the fundamental principles of story. SP101 offers clear, simple, actionable solutions to virtually any problem you face. Why? Because mastering the fundamentals is the most effective way to learn any craft. SP101 makes the fundamentals as simple as possible to master by stripping out all jargon, and organizing them in a common sense progression. With lesson titles like Drop the hammer, Earn transformations and Layer conflict you will be amazed by how simple it is to grasp the concept and apply it immediately to your work. Whether you’re new to writing, have written and struggled or you’re a professional writer that wants to keep the basics close at hand you will find here a total writing system that gives you what you need to write the best story you can – in any media. But don’t just take our word for it.
Rave Reviews
Our textbook, 27 Essential Principles of Story, Master the Secrets of Great Storytelling From Shakespeare to South Park (Workman Publishing), Story Principles Workshops and DJRs consulting clients rave about what they’ve learned and more importantly about what they’ve written. The method is passionately endorsed 100s of readers on Goodreads and Amazon, writers blogs and YoutTube Channels. And has won heavy praised by Oscar, Tony, Pulitzer-Prize, Golden Globe and Emmy Award-wining writers, directors and producers including Tracy Letts (August: Osage County, Bug), Paul Giamatti (Billions, Downton Abbey) and Alexa Junge (Friends, West Wing).
How it Works
Founder Daniel Joshua Rubin, who has written for TV, theater and new media, and ran a marketing department of a company that ultimately was acquired for nearly a billion dollars asked a simple question: what would the greatest introductory writing program look like? His answer was that it would need to be comprehensive, flexible, simple, inspiring and enjoyable. And it would focus on flow states, those magical moments when hours seem to pass by in minutes. It would need to talk to writers with respect and speak to directly to them while they are inspired to write. An inspired writer is a different animal. Their emotions are raw, their passion intense. Their vision sits before them and they feel a hunger make it real, to realize on the page what they saw in their mind. A great course directly ties the aspiring writer to the greatest writers of all-time, by showing exactly how they crafted their masterpieces. From Hamlet and Frankenstein to South Park and Eminem’s Stan masterpieces in all media, genres, throughout the world and for all time do not appear suddenly by accident. Their forged into existence by storytellers that mastered the craft. They consistently made intelligent choice after intelligent choices that were aligned with the truth of who they were. They knew how to get themselves into the zone.
It’s All About Flow States
Struggling writers tend to obsess over how hard writing is, how “Resistance” – this supernatural boogey man force Steven Pressfield wrote about in The War of Art rises up to thwart their efforts and make tons of lame jokes about preferring to clean the garage rather than write. Respectfully, this is all whining and bullshit and at times, sure, all creative people are guilty of wallowing in self-pity. But there’s a simple, clear solution to annihilate this nonsense, fuel your own self-respect and get after it. You master your craft. You build a total writing system that will help you actually do the work.
It all comes down to this. To access flow states you need to have the perfect amount of difficulty. If it’s too hard to write, you’ll get frustrated and quit. If it’s too easy – as countless hack gurus make it seem – it will fail to inspire your best work. If you just write, with no clue what you’re doing, you’re likely to get lost. If you follow a path that is too formulaic it will strangle your creativity and suck the fun and discovery out of your work. Story Principles are uniquely designed to get this balance just right.
For example, consider this moment. You’re crafting the beginning of your story and you want to get out of the gate strong. The principle, Drop the hammer teaches you how to set up a surprising but believable moment that springs your character into action. This gives you some milestones to hit yet leaves room for an infinite variety of creativity in how your story hits those milestones. As you work through solving these creative challenges you get lost into the process. And this is exactly how you access flow states. You have the confidence that comes from knowing you can do it but still leave room for the mystery of discovering exactly how.
The legendary American playwright, Arthur Miller once walked into a little studio he built in the woods outside of his house in Connecticut. He had spent over a decade mastering his craft. And that night, he got into the mother of all flow states. He wrote the first act of his masterpiece, Death of a Salesman in a single sitting. Why couldn’t his happen for you?
Comprehensive and Flexible
Story Principles 101 is a seven-module course built to rival the finest writing programs in the world in terms of practical value. Founder DJR graduated with honors – and won several awards – while studying dramatic writing at the prestigious Yale School of Drama. He has taught writing at UCSD and Loyola University, Chicago. And knows what is taught in most dramatic writing programs. The truth is while these programs offer students some valuable production resources and help them build networks, they cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and simply can’t teach the fundamentals any better than they are taught here – free.
Now let’s look at what the course includes:
- Master Story Selection – learn how to decide what to write by exploring how some of the greatest writers in history chose the subjects that became their masterpieces.
- Master World-Building – learn how to build worlds that are specific, richly detailed, alive and exciting to spend time.
- Master Character Development – learn how to write dynamic, intelligence, active and decisive characters that possess the gravitas needed to carry your story from start to finish.
- Master Dialogue – learn to write effective, authentic dialogue that drives characters deeper into their conflicts and makes scenes more compelling.
- Master Plot Construction – learn how to build tension and keep your reader turning pages, so their fully engaged throughout your story.
- Master Theme – learn how to make sure your story is ultimately meaningful and resonates long after your reader finishes.
- Master Execution – learn how to build a writing life that works, one that allows you to successfully navigate the complexities of real-life.
Consider the logical progression. You learn how to decide what to write, then how to build a world, fill it with characters, make them talk, put them into action, make the action meaningful and once you know all this we teach you how to actually get it done. Virtually any problem you face will have an easy-to-find solution.
Resources include:
- Video Lessons – to articulate each principle
- How-To Guides – to help you execute each principle
- Graphic Art – to help you visualize concepts
- Links to famous scenes – to show you how the principle was executed by master storytellers in their most accomplished works
- Cheat Sheets – to make it easy for you to take away key concepts of each module
- Award Ceremonies – powerful animation created by an elite team of award winning professionals to genuinely reward your accomplishments along the way. These are inspired by the belt ceremonies used in marital arts dojos. Once you master a core skill you become a more powerful, authentic writer – just like a martial artists becomes a more effective fighter after learning how to strike, kick, block, etc.
Flexible System
You can access the courses in any order you like. For example, if you’re currently wrestling with a character who feels inconsistent, start with Master Character Development. Or you can take your time, relax and go through the course from start to finish.
Massive ROI on Your Time
A few weeks of intensive study will last a lifetime. The return on your investment of time is staggering. The time you’ll save by avoiding careless mistakes is incalculable. Consider that one poor creative choice can send you careening down the wrong path and waste months – sometimes even years! – of work. These mistakes lead to harsher reviews, reputation-damaging critiques at major studios, publishers and development companies in movies in television. And they drain your spirit. It’s appalling to think of how many young writers damaged their careers because they were never properly trained. If only they understood the fundamentals with a little greater clarity they could have made choices that may have radically improved the quality of their stories – and altered the course of their lives.
The Bottom Line
DJR’s Story Principles 101 makes it as simple as it can be made to master of the craft of storytelling without dumbing it down. It helps you drill the principles through strategic repetition so that you recall the lessons many years after you’ve completed the course. It’s incredible how many graduates toss their caps into the air at graduation and from that moment on basically forget every single thing they learned the past four years. That is not going to happen here. Not only will you recall the lessons but they’ll be right there for you online and in your textbook, there at your fingertips to be called up as needed. And here is the best part. This online course is FREE. The only thing you’ll spend money on is the textbook. As of this writing it’s under $15.00 and has a roughly 4.5 star rating with over 400 reviews on Amazon and Goodreads.
The only thing that stands between you and the very best story you can write is ,mastering the fundamental principles of your craft. That can change right now.