Generating Plots for a Given Query Using a Case-Base of Narrative Schemas

Computational generation of literary artifacts very often resorts to template-like schemas that can be instantiated into complex structures. With this view in mind, the present paper presents a casebased reasoning solution that builds a plot line to match a given query, expressed in terms of a sequence of abstraction of plot-bearing elements of a story, by retrieving and adapting templates for narrative schemas from a case-base. The abstractions of plot-bearing elements of a story are defined in terms of Propp’s character functions. The case-base of narrative schemas is built based on a review of a number of existing attempts to provide an elementary set of patterns for basic plots. A selection of these patterns, reformulated in terms of Propp’s character functions, is used as case-base. The paper explores a solution for automatic generation of stories based on this formulation of the narrative schemas.