Robert Mckee Story Quotes & Sayings

Story is metaphor for life and life is lived in time. — Robert McKee

Story isn't a flight from reality but a vehicle that carries us on our search for reality, — Robert McKee

Robert McKee says humans naturally seek comfort and stability. Without an inciting incident that disrupts their comfort, they won't enter into a story. They have to get fired from their job or be forced to sign up for a marathon. A ring has to be purchased. A home has to be sold. The character has to jump into the story, into the discomfort and the fear, otherwise the story will never happen. — Donald Miller

Of the total creative effort represented in a finished work, 75 percent or more of a writer's labor goes into designing the story designing story tests the maturity and insight of the writer, his knowledge of society, nature, and the human heart. Story demands both vivid imagination and powerful analytic thought. — Robert McKee

Story is about originality, not duplication — Robert McKee

I went to a seminar early in my career on the craft of storytelling by Robert McKee. It was really life altering. There are basic principles on how to craft an engaging story and he covers them well. He's got a book out, 'Story,' that I would highly recommend to anyone interested in improve their storytelling. — Jane Jensen

Story is about eternal, universal forms, not formulas. — Robert McKee

Story Climax is the fourth of the five-part structure. This crowning Major Reversal is not necessarily full of noise and violence. Rather, it must be full of meaning. If I could send a telegram to the film producers of the world, it would be these three words: "Meaning Produces Emotion." Not money; not sex; not special effects; not movie stars; not lush photography. — Robert McKee

Life is chaotic and meaningless, and you have to find your meaning. You must find the answer, you can't just live. That's the point of story: helping you find your meaning in life. — Robert McKee

Leaders use story to author the future. — Robert McKee

A fine work of art - music, dance, painting, story - has the power to silence the chatter in the mind and lift us to another place. — Robert McKee

The daydreamy hypothetical that floats through the mind, opening the door to the imagination where everything and anything is possible.

- Story, Robert McKee — Audrey Godwin

In life, idea and emotion come separately. Mind and passions revolve in different spheres of our humanity, rarely coordinated, usually at odds. In fact, in life, moments that blaze with a fusion of idea and emotion are so rare, when they happen you think you're having a religious experience. But whereas life separates meaning from emotion, art unites them. Story is an instrument by which you create such epiphanies at will, the phenomenon known as aesthetic emotion. — Robert McKee

If the story you're telling, is the story you're telling, you're in deep shit. — Robert McKee

Whereas life separates meaning from emotion, art unites them. Story is an instrument by which you create such epiphanies at will, the phenomenon known as aesthetic emotion ... Life on its own, without art to shape it, leaves you in confusion and chaos, but aesthetic emotion harmonizes what you know with what you feel to give you a heightened awareness and a sureness of your place in reality. — Robert McKee

You do not keep the audience's interest by giving it information, but by withholding information ... — Robert McKee

The universal erosion of values has lead to the universal erosion of story. — Robert McKee

Given the choice between trivial material brilliantly told versus profound material badly told, an audience will always choose the trivial told brilliantly. — Robert McKee

Good story' means something worth telling that the world wants to hear. Finding this is your lonely task ... But the love of a good story, of terrific characters and a world driven by your passion, courage, and creative gifts is still not enough. Your goal must be a good story well told. — Robert McKee

The material of literary talent is words; the material of story talent is life itself. — Robert McKee

Story is morally neutral. It can express profound truth or propaganda. The two greatest political storytellers of the 20th Century were Winston Churchill and Adolph Hitler. Because storytelling is a form of persuasive jujitsu, and because world is full of black belt storytellers, the corporate leader has to train both his offensive and defensive moves — Robert McKee

When you do enough research, the story almost writes itself. Lines of development spring loose and you'll have choices galore. — Robert McKee

Designing story tests the maturity and insight of the writer, his knowledge of society, nature, and the human heart. Story demands both vivid imagination and powerful analytic thought. Self-expression is never an issue, for, wittingly or unwittingly, all stories, honest and dishonest, wise and foolish, faithfully mirror their maker, exposing his humanity ... or lack of it. — Robert McKee

When we want mood experiences, we go to concerts or museums. When we want meaningful emotional experience, we go to the storyteller. — Robert McKee

If you can't play all the instruments in the orchestra of story, no matter what music may be in your imagination, you're condemned to hum the same old tune. — Robert McKee

The Business story is designed to trigger the listener to take an effective action. If it doesn't, the story fails. — Robert McKee

To retreat behind the notion that the audience simply wants to dump its troubles at the door and escape reality is a cowardly abandonment of the artist's responsibility. Story isn't a flight from reality but a vehicle that carries us on our search for reality, our best effort to make sense out of the anarchy of existence. — Robert McKee

Curiosity is the intellectual need to answer questions and close open patterns. Story plays to this universal desire by doing the opposite, posing questions and opening situations. — Robert McKee