1.

Scenes are the basic building blocks of story, so knowing how to write
them is vital. The only way to master this skill is through study and
application; study scenes that others have written then apply what you’ve
learned to your own work. Scene analysis is not a sexy concept, I’ll grant
you that. However, if you take the time and make the effort to really learn
how to do it, the improvement in your writing will blow your mind.
2. A deep understanding of scenes—and how and why they function—
represents a quantum leap in a writer’s ability to tell an amazing story; not
one that merely works, but one that gets people talking. For that reason
alone, it’s worth the effort.
3. The Basics: Identify the 5Cs
4. The first step in analyzing a scene is accurately identifying the five
commandments (5Cs) of storytelling within that scene. This will tell you
whether, at a fundamental level, your scene is working or not. If the
commandments are there, the scene works. If they’re missing, you’ve
written exposition or shoe leather. There’s already a ton of information
about the five commandments in Shawn’s book, on this blog (here and
here) and in both Story Grid podcasts (here and here), so I’m moving
forward with the assumption that you’ve got a handle on them.
5. Let’s look at two examples, one from Dracula and the other from How to
Lose a Guy in 10 Days, to see the effect the 5Cs have on scenes:
6. Excerpt from Dracula, written by Bram Stoker
7. My dearest Lucy,
8. Such a sad blow has befallen us. Mr. Hawkins has died very suddenly.
Some may not think it so sad for us, but we had both come to so love him
that it really seems as though we had lost a father. I never knew either
father or mother, so that the dear old man’s death is a real blow to me.
Jonathan is greatly distressed. It is not only that he feels sorrow, deep
sorrow, for the dear, good man who has befriended him all his life, and
now at the end has treated him like his own son and left him a fortune
which to people of our modest bringing up is wealth beyond the dream of
avarice, but Jonathan feels it on another account. He says the amount of
responsibility which it puts upon him makes him nervous. He begins to
doubt himself. I try to cheer him up, and my belief in him helps him to
have a belief in himself. But it is here that the grave shock that he
experienced tells upon him the most. Oh, it is too hard that a sweet,
simple, noble, strong nature such as his—a nature which enabled him by
our dear, good friend’s aid to rise from clerk to master in a few years—
should be so injured that the very essence of its strength is gone. Forgive
me, dear, if I worry you with my troubles in the midst of your own
happiness; but, Lucy dear, I must tell some one, for the strain of keeping
up a brave and cheerful appearance to Jonathan tries me, and I have no
one here that I can confide in. I dread coming up to London, as we must
do the day after tomorrow; for poor Mr. Hawkins left in his will that he was
 to be buried in the grave with his father. As there are no relations at all,
Jonathan will have to be chief mourner. I shall try to run over to see you,
dearest, if only for a few minutes. Forgive me for troubling you. With all
blessings,
9. Your loving
10. Mina Harker.
11. Here we have an expository passage in which Mina reports that Mr.
Hawkins has died and she and Jonathan have inherited a fortune. She
tells us that she is grieved and Jonathan is distressed, but those feelings
don’t translate off the page to the reader. Even though we have likely
experienced a loss in our own personal lives, we don’t connect with the
Harkers’ loss. We don’t feel grieved or distressed. Likewise, we don’t feel
joy for their windfall, or apprehension for Jonathan’s increased
responsibilities.
12. We could argue that there is an inciting incident; Mr. Hawkins has died.
But, what are the complications? There are things that happen as a result
of the death (the Harkers are rich, Jonathan is nervous and they’ll be
going to London) but those aren’t complications. There is no crisis here
either. Jonathan isn’t debating whether he’ll accept the inheritance or the
added responsibility at work. Without a crisis there can be no climax or
resolution. There is nothing here for us to latch on to emotionally. The
reader is kept at arm’s length. Without the five commandments this
passage, like poor Mr. Hawkins, is dead.
13.