Narrative Text

What is narrative text? Narrative text is a text that contains imaginary stories, fairy tales, or true stories that have been exaggerated. Usually there is a moral value to be learned at the end of the story.

The purpose of this text is to entertain the reader about a story or stories written by the author and at the same time imply a moral message to be conveyed to the reader.

Types of narrative text:

1. Adventure stories

2. Fables : Stories whose characters are animals, but show human-like behavior such as talking.

3. Fairy-stories : Stories that are generally fantasy or full of magic.

4. Historical narratives

5. Horror stories

6. Legends : The stories told are based on facts, but the characters don't really exist.

7. Myth : The story tries to explain about the world and how we should react to it.

8. Mysteries

9. Science fiction

10. Slice of life

Narrative Text Features

1. The tenses used are those that show events in the past > Past Tense.

2. Adverbs of time which are commonly used at the beginning of sentences, such as long time ago, once, one, once upon a time.

3. There are snippets of conversation between characters.

4. The use of adjectives (adjectives) to provide a more detailed description in the form of phrases (noun phrases).

Narrative Text Structure

There are 3 frameworks of narrative text (generic structure of narrative text) when we write, namely Orientation, Complication, and Resolution. But usually there are several options when we compose a narrative text.

1. Orientation : In this paragraph we introduce the core of the story, the characters/characters, the place, as well as the time of the story that we want to write.

2. Complications : In this section, we can write down the conflicts in the story to its climax. In writing a conflict there are also 4 different things, namely:

a. Physical: marked by physical conflict between characters.

b. Natural: marked by conflicts between characters and things related to natural forces.

c. Social: marked by a meeting between figures, but have different interests.

d. Psychological: characterized by a conflict within oneself between choosing good or bad things, being arrogant or humble, also being greedy or not.

3. Evaluation : This section is optional, usually contains an insertion of an assessment or evaluation of the story or the existing conflict.

4. Resolution : In this section we can show the solution or resolution of the existing conflict. The ending can be happy or sad. However, the writer can play this part by giving other problems that make the reader curious. Usually this curiosity is deliberately raised in the mystery story type.

5. Re-orientation : The last part of the narrative text is also optional. As writers, we can provide moral messages, suggestions, or lessons in the closing section for readers who come from the story

Elements of Language (The Characteristics/ Language Feature)

The following are the linguistic elements of Narrative Text / The Characteristics / Language Feature of Narrative Text:

1. Past tense: (Killed, drunk, went, won, sent, etc.)

2. Adverb of time: (Once upon a time, today, one day, will, yesterday, later, etc.)

3. Time conjunctions: (When, then, suddenly, before, after, until, a soon as, etc.)

4. Specific character / use of specific story characters, not general. (Cinderella, Alibaba, Snow White, Tangled, Ariel, etc.)

5. Action verbs / verbs that show an action: (Killed, walked, wrote, stayed, dug, etc) 

6. Read direct speech to make the story seem more alive (Direct speech). (Princess said,"My name is Princess) Direct speech uses the present tense.

7. Saying and thinking verbs: Verbs that show speech or reporting. (Said, told, thought, etc).

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